On July 21, analysts who are members of the Expert Analytical Association “Sovereignty”, participated in the program “Detrás de la Razón”, whose leadership is under the management of the renowned international journalist Roberto de la Madrid.

The central theme of the dialogue was “The conflict in Ukraine and the rise of international crime. Threats to the security of Latin America”, a problem that was addressed by specialists Carlos Mamani Aliaga, Juan Felipe Flórez Aguirre and Renan Guevara.

Mamani Aliaga said that “The question of Ukraine is not only a matter between Russia, Ukraine and NATO. Unfortunately, in times of globalization, wars tend to globalize; and that is how they become spaces, focal points of intervention of forces outside these conflicts, such as, in the specific case of mercenarism, from which our region, Mexico and, above all, Colombia suffer, although Peru is not exempt.”

He also warned of the danger to Latin American societies of the lack of capacity of the countries of the region to readapt mercenary troops in a normal and legally optimal framework, which means that a significant number of these mercenaries end up in the criminal activity of the drug cartels. “These people come and, practically, the state closes its doors to them. And then, what is left for them in the end? Well, to become part of the fascist structures that are dedicated to drug trafficking and other illicit activities,” emphasizing his opinion that, paradoxically, this situation puts “the state itself in check.”

He valued that some “narco cartels,” in the Mexican scenario, come to have a greater and better sophistication in armaments, technology and combat experience than the Mexican federal state itself, also questioning a kind of absence that there would be, in many Latin American countries, of adequate military and security doctrines to confront and contain the drug trafficking system.

For example, he mentioned that many men who are recruited by forces aligned with Kiev learn of skills such as the novel and intensive use of military drones, in the field of real war, and that these skills are then applied in criminal organizations of drug trafficking and kidnapping of people.

He underlined a marriage of convenience between some drug cartels and transnational mercenary networks operating in wars such as the Ukrainian front.

He denounced that not a few Western banking and financial structures also benefit from the “parallel narco economy” and that a comprehensive sovereigntist response must be proposed and built, step by step, at the national and continental levels, to repel these threats and dangers with some success.

Juan Felipe Flórez Aguirre, for his part, addressed the international legal gaps that currently exist on mercenarism. He maintained that there are definitions of the mercenary who acts in international conflicts, but they do not cover mercenaries who operate in internal conflicts.

Speaking of private military contractors, I differentiate between those companies that provide only protection services to, for example, oil structures, and those that operate in war environments as belligerents.

He mentioned that the “privatization of war goes hand in hand with the privatization of the state in general and with the reduction of the state to turn it into an austere state so that the functions and services of the state are provided by private agents.

So, this privatization of the state is also being taken to the military area; which makes it quite attractive for governments to hire security companies. Why? Well, first of all, the State does not get its hands dirty and another important factor is that these security companies, in general, are British and American companies. Of course, these countries are among the first to produce and sell arms to the world internationally.”

Finally, it is noted that Renan Guevara spoke, among considerations, of the dynamics related to transnational criminal structures when he said, for example, the following: “Well, the main transformation is not that the cartels are acquiring new weapons. What is shocking and novel, and perhaps what is changing the systemic structure of what the displacement of power of a cartel means, is the new doctrine that these new forces of forces of powers are acquiring. A commercial drone already adapted for military uses, does not turn the cartel into an army, but it reduces, but reduces the distance between a criminal organization and a militarized irregular force.” He believes that the war in Ukraine could be a “laboratory where the new doctrine of what the war of the future may be is being carried out”.

Like his two previous colleagues, he agreed on the seriousness of the “privatization of war” with all its harmful implications for Latin American states and peoples and proposed that “a merged intelligence network” should be embodied in the context of a regional cooperation that is truly efficient.

This extensive and wide-ranging dialogue can be followed here: