Former DEA Chief: Hezbollah Eyeing Southwest Border, ‘Hell to Pay in the Not Too Distant Future’

This is not the first time this issue has been discussed given the open relationship between Iran and Venezuela. I believe a report surfaced last year regarding the arrival of Iranian Qods forces to Venezuela for training and insertion. The Qods and Hezbollah go hand in hand in efforts like this. The efforts and sophistication of the Drug Cartels have increased with gusto in recent years and you can rest assured that the relationship between the cartels and Hezbollah and Qods is truly symbiotic.

he Iranian-supported Shi’ite terrorist group Hezbollah has spread its influence all the way to the U.S. border with Mexico, a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing on Iran’s influence in the Western Hemisphere heard on Thursday.

Michael Braun, a former chief of operations at the Drug Enforcement Agency, said Hezbollah had developed relationships with the powerful Mexican drug cartels to “move their agenda forward.” He cited a plot, recently uncovered by the DEA, involving an Iranian operative in Mexico allegedly planning to assassinate the Saudi ambassador in Washington, D.C.

“Hezbollah are absolute masters at forming close relationships with existing organized crime groups around the world that helps them facilitate what they need to do to move their agendas forward,” Braun told CNSNews.com following the hearing. “And if anyone thinks for a moment that they don’t have their eye on the southwest border and all of our country, then they couldn’t be more wrong.”

The Cartels are merely a tool to advance the Jihad on "The Great Satan". They've wanted revenge ever since the 1953 Coup d etat in Iran.

“If anyone thinks for one moment that these terrorist organizations do not understand that the Mexican drug trafficking cartels now dominate drug trafficking in our country – reportedly in more than 250 cities – than they are very stupid or very naive,” he said.

“And these groups most assuredly recognize the strategic value of exploiting that activity, and all that has been built to support it, for moving their vision forward in this part of the world.”

I'll leave it at this. Consider the threat warning that was just officially released based on these hearings on Tuesday.

Braun said Quds Force and Hezbollah work “very, very hard” to develop relationships with criminal groups that already have in place systems for illegal activities, including drug and human trafficking, money laundering and forged document operations.

“And by developing those relations it provides them with the ability to operate far from home in our neighborhood and – as I said earlier – on our doorstep,” he replied.

cnsnews.com...
cnsnews.com...

Interesting point to ponder for all of those who think that Iran does not pose a threat to our nation. Read it and ask yourself why.

Venezuela is Iran's main hub in Latin America.Prior to 2005, Iran's investment in the South American country was zero.Yet in the past six years alone, Iran and Venezuela have conducted over $40 billion in trade, as Venezuelan strongman Hugo Chavez has embraced the Iranians with open arms. "They have identified each other as mutually useful, beneficial partners," Cardenas said. "And so, as Iran has attempted to evade international sanctions, Hugo Chavez has invited them in to basically establish a platform that allows Iran to use the Venezuelan banking system - from which they're prohibited from using elsewhere - in the international economic system," he explained.

Cardenas said the Iranians are using Venezuela not only to evade sanctions but to mine for uranium that will be used to build nuclear weapons. There have also been reports that Iran plans to build a missile base in Venezuela. "These missiles would obviously be able to hit urban centers in Florida," Cardenas warned. "They would also be able to debilitate the Panama Canal." "And if they debilitate the Panama Canal, that would have profound economic consequences for the United States," he added.

Hezbollah set up shop in the tri-border region because of its large population of Arab expatriates. It's used the same strategy on Margarita Island, off the coast of Venezuela. "We know that in April of this year, there were a couple of Iranian Hezbollah trainers that did training on Margarita Island for operatives who were brought to that place from throughout Latin America," said Roger Noriega, a visiting fellow with the American Enterprise Institute.

Noriega, a former State Department official, told CBN News that Hezbollah uses Latin America for training, fundraising, and much more. A recent Italian media report said the group has even established a cell in Cuba. "There's a network of mosques and Islamic centers throughout Latin America that are part of this network," Noriega said. "They recruit through them, they process people through them."

The most promising recruits, including Latin American converts to Islam, are sent back to the Iranian holy city of Qom for training. Conventional wisdom is 'It's all religious training.' But no: they learn terrorist techniques, explosives, bomb-making and arms training," Noriega said.

www.thecuttingedgenews.com...

About the Tri Borders Region in South America. A Terror Organization's playground

The Tri-Border Area (TBA) between Argentina, Paraguay, and Brazil is comprised of three cities: Puerto Iguazu (Argentina), Ciudad del Este (Paraguay), and Foz do Iguacu (Brazil). The area is well known as a haven for illicit activities ranging from counterfeiting to intellectual property theft to money laundering, and has been pointed to as a central point for the laundering of funds from drug trafficking and for the funding of terrorist organizations (believed to come from supporters within the large Arab population in the region). Specializing in financial crime, the area is known as the “largest illicit economy in the Western Hemisphere.” A Federal Research Division, Library of Congress report notes that while estimates of the amount of money laundered in the TBA vary greatly, the amount was reported to average 12 billion USD per year as of 2000-01.

This region has been festering for decades right on our back door!!!

The tri-border’s most attractive feature to a terrorist cell may be the relative ease with which money is laundered and transferred to and from regions overseas. Evidence linking al-Qai’da financial and operational activity to the tri-border region is sparse at best, yet this small corner of South America possesses all the characteristics necessary for an al-Qai’da lair. Law enforcement and intelligence agencies are quite certain that money is being raised for Hizballah in the tri-border region, giving…purported links between al-Qai’da and Hizballah even greater import.

www.financialtaskforce.org...

Who has been keeping an eye on this over the years and given the knowledge that we have had for so long, why have our Southern Borders been so grossly neglected. We should have been fortifying our southern border 20 years ago.

This sounds like a false flag to me, if they think Hezzbollah are running drugs into the country working with the cartels then why do they sell them guns?

1. CIA are probably pissed that the cartels have cut them out of the game and want an excuse to attack and regain control. These various factions show that the market is probably split and they no longer have a single kingpin they can control.
2. They will also want to obliterate anyone who can implicate them in the trade of drugs and guns.
3. They will use this as an excuse to get the Americans riled up against muslims again, seems to be working.

Also why are Iran a threat for having a working relationship with Venezuela? They are both oil producing nations that the US wants to bankrupt and take over so they can make more money from their own supply of oil.

CIA has been doing this in Arab countries for over 50 years, (training terror groups, running drugs, funding coups, killing people etc etc) its not so nice when it on your own borders though is it.

Self defense is apparently a justification for almost anything, just ask Israel. You get to break the geneva convention and do anything you like. These guys feel threatened so I guess will fight back. Looks like its going to be guerilla warfare if you go near Iran.

However I would like some solid proof that Iran do indeed have people involved in this. A story about and arrest or something would suffice as I think this is all lies and probably the work of the CIA and Mossad. If Iran are truly doing this would there not have been a bombing/killing by now? How do you know the Iranian werent there to provide training to them like the IRA did with the Farc?

The drug cartels should realize that when fundamental Islam rules their country, they will be out of business. Great post and well researched.

I also like trustnothing's assessment.

I would also add that if the banks stopped laundering money for the cartels/terror groups this could be quite easily dealt with. I mean who wants to be a peso millionaire or have a billion Iranian Rial or whatever if you cant spend it? Its because it is so easy for them to convert to dollars AND THEN BANK IT that they flourish and continue, the way to combat drug dealing is to ensure they can never legally spend a penny. Proceeds of crime acts etc, never let them keep it in a bank. Let their money rot in buried boxes literally.

The problem is not Arabs, nor jews, nor whites, nor is it the goverment in general. It is some small elements within which are corrupt but mostly it is western corporations who are driven by greed.

Ive demonstrated on other threads that RINOA (Rim Nokia Apple) were selling backdoors into USSC (US Chamber of Commerce) phones in exchange for increased market share in India as per leaked Indian intelligence memos. The corporations are traitors, they are a far greater threat that a bunch of Iranians in Mexico. And here we go on another crusade so that BAE systems etc get to sell more toys to the citizens on credit whilst I absolutely guarantee you that the amount of drugs coming in to the country will increase dramatically once the CIA re gain control. Drug prices have dropped and purity has risen since the start of the war on terror.

Since the US are the ones smuggling the herion out of Afghanistan does that mean that we are selling it on to the Iranians who then bring it to the US market via Mexico etc? Again this sounds like a setup

This really is the danger Iran represents.

People continually go on about how "Iran hasnt attacked anyone in over 100 years". Well thats horse hockey. Hezbollah attack Israel and forcefully took over Lebanon within the last decade. A poster just above made a great point too. These cartels are probably loving the support and training Hezbollah can provide, but we'll see how much they love things when they are forced to live under sharia law.

Remember the Iranian plot against the Saudi ambassador a few months ago? An Iranian who allegedly had connections to Iranian intelligence used Iranian money to hire drug cartel killers. The ambassador should by assassinated. Luckily for the righteousness he tried to hire an US informant and so this vile plot was thwarted.

Now we hear about well established relations between Hezbollah and Mexican drug cartels.

Think about this for a moment.

Either Iran has good connections to drug cartels or it hasn't. If Iran has good connections either directly or by their proxy Hezbollah, than why would they rely on a failed used car salesman to hire killers?

I believe neither the plot against the Saudi ambassador, nor the alleged Hezbollah-drug cartel connections are based in reality. They are just fearmongering fantasies which are used to vilify Iran. Feeble excuses which are used to justify unilateral sanctions, covert operations or even the use of military force against a foreign country.

"As long as people believe in absurdities they will continue to commit atrocities. “
- Voltaire

The drug cartels want more power. Notice in Mexico that it is the government employees who have to cover their faces, not the gangsters.

The War on Drugs has to end the way it is working currently. It is providing an escalating platform to fuel militarization of criminals, and the terrorists are riding piggyback with their tribal warfare writ global.

The monroe variation of backing your own black horse to consolidate these actors into a larger group doesn't appear to be working.

www.mexicanbusinessweb.com...

There is no doubt that the assertion that the terrorist group called Al Qaeda and the Mexican Zetas have formed an alliance that threatens U.S. national security, it seems not very serious and even funny, except that it is a warning made under oath before the U.S. Congress by James Clapper director of national intelligence of the U.S. government.

neglectedwar.com...

A Mexican radio station on Tuesday claimed it had a report that the Mexican marines had foiled a plot by the Somalian Islamic group al-Shabaab to attack the U.S. embassay in Mexico City.

MVS anchor Carmen Aristegui announced the scoop, which if confirmed would provide the strongest evidence to date that Islamic militant groups are operating in Mexico.

According to the alleged leaked report, marines raided a house in the middle-class Mexico City Roma neighborhood on 9 June, 2010 and found 22.7 kilos of explosive material along with detonators.

The drug cartels are ramping up their militarization, and they be hungry for your money.

The cartels would never tolerate foreign invaders like Hezbollah or any Islamic radical sect. Mexico is very Catholic, some 85% of the population. The cartels would have absolutely nothing to gain by aligning with Hezbollah, not to mention the extreme cultural divide. This is just fear-mongering. You can walk in places from Canada into the United States, there are even unguarded roads between the US and Canada, and how hard is it to enter the remoter wilderness of Canada by boat? If Hezbollah or terrorists wanted to smuggle a WMD in, that's where it would be. I'd worry more about someone in the DEA laying the ground work for false flag attacks or fishing for more budget funding than drug cartels suddenly taking a sudden liking to radical Islamic sects.

reply to post by Blackmarketeer


Canada's secret service is much better than you'd expect. Comparing them to what Mexico has would be a serious mistake.

It's not a failing of Canada's ability to guard the border anymore than it's a failing of the USA, it's just a fact that there's a vast stretch of border between the two with no real means to police it. There's a load of videos on Youtube of people showing themselves crossing into the US/Canada at out-of-the-way crossings with no border agents or police in sight.

Another factor is the cartels are in this to make money, helping terrorists to destroy your customer base is not how to make money. Not to mention the level of exposure this would bring to the cartels who would probably not want to be labeled as terrorists (even if they cause as much harm as one).

Personally I'd love to see the cartels throw in with some terrorist outfit, that'd be the quickest way for the US to go after them with all our military might and eradicate them once and for all - but then that's probably the plan with planting these sorts of allegations, laying the groundwork for ramping up military intervention in Mexico. Of course it's probably being planted by the likes of the CIA.

Because cartels never have power ambitions for nations.....

Oh wait, I think that sentence just described many nations over time, and some existing today! Gosh.

This is ridiculous. The cartels have nothing to gain from this. Attacking their biggest customer base? I mean really... The cartels make more money selling drugs in the US than they can anywhere else in the world. It's one thing to attack a few residents and border patrol to get your drugs across the border, it's another to go wide scale against whole cities which I'm guessing is what they're trying to fear monger us into the corner with.

Originally posted by Blackmarketeer
The cartels would never tolerate foreign invaders like Hezbollah or any Islamic radical sect. Mexico is very Catholic, some 85% of the population. The cartels would have absolutely nothing to gain by aligning with Hezbollah, not to mention the extreme cultural divide. This is just fear-mongering. You can walk in places from Canada into the United States, there are even unguarded roads between the US and Canada, and how hard is it to enter the remoter wilderness of Canada by boat? If Hezbollah or terrorists wanted to smuggle a WMD in, that's where it would be. I'd worry more about someone in the DEA laying the ground work for false flag attacks or fishing for more budget funding than drug cartels suddenly taking a sudden liking to radical Islamic sects.

The Cartels are amoral business entities hell bent on exploiting any and all resources at their disposal. Their disregard for human life is a clear indicator that religion and sin mean nothing to them. The violence is escalating as is the sophistication of their communication abilities, network of tunnels and semi submersible vessels.
Undoubtedly, they are being helped by a powerful force from Iran. Hezzbollah and Qods forces are known to be established in that region. They have the money and the resources that the Cartels will readily accept. All the cartels have to do is smuggle bodies into the country. It's the perfect relationship for Hezbollah and their slow, and low infiltration methods. Its part of their doctrine as is Patience and persistence. 20 plus years of border infiltration by Hezbollah.

This story ran last night.

Former Border Patrol Agent Zachary Taylor told The Blaze just how grave the threat really is.

Taylor broke down the imminent dangers and expanded upon the case that the U.S.-Mexico border has become the soft underbelly of U.S. homeland defense.

It’s not just an immigration problem, Taylor insisted, but also a major national security vulnerability.

A former US Border Patrol Agent himself, Taylor says all these threats have been exacerbated by current Obama administration policies and deliberate distortions by much of the media.

“Mexico has an insurgency on its hands — that is exactly what the problem is — and America will have the same problem as it makes it easier to get across the border,” Taylor said.

But Taylor brought some outside elements into his analysis. He stated that drug cartel activity and terrorist activity are both transnational in nature, which means groups from around the world have become involved.

In this case, that means the Shia militant group Hezbollah.

Taylor said that Hezbollah is allying with the drug and alien smuggling operations at the border to help finance their operations in the Middle East. And in the event of hostilities with Hezbollah’s benefactor — Iran — Taylor is concerned that the cartel smuggling networks could help make America’s WMD nightmare come true.

“Get them close enough and effective enough, they [Hezbollah] could smuggle a Weapon of Mass Destruction into the United States.”

www.theblaze.com...

So now you are linking Iran and Quds with the drug cartels in Mexico?

Sure, sure, because that's exactly what the cartels want, an all-out war with the US military. Call it a hunch, but I'm pretty sure the cartels would prefer lawmakers not even know they exist, much less are plotting to smuggle in a dirty bomb to kill off their number one customer of their drugs.

The violence from the cartels is aimed at their own local townspeople and Mexican lawmakers who interfere with their operations, not wading a religious jihad against the USA. I don't doubt some violence spills over at the border or a border agent got killed, and it's all unfortunate when it happens, but the nonsense that Mexican drug cartels have created some sort of unholy alliance with Iran smacks entirely of propaganda. The smugglers in Mexico have developed plenty of experience digging tunnels and thwarting border security, it's laughable to think they would have to unite with Palestinians to "learn smuggling tips".

Seriously, this whole topic is a right-wing think tank propagandist fantasy.

reply to post by jibeho

Who has been keeping an eye on this over the years and given the knowledge that we have had for so long, why have our Southern Borders been so grossly neglected. We should have been fortifying our southern border 20 years ago.

I agree. Perhaps America should have just annexed Mexico. America has made a lot of enemies in the past few decades, with their Nation Building exercises and greed for Arabic oil and other resources. Now they are lining up on our southern border, which still is not guarded properly.
Looks like it will get nasty soon. Thanks for bringing this to our attention, star and flag for a good post.

reply to post by Blackmarketeer


Quds are well heeled in Venezuela and have used Venezuela and the opens arms of Chavez as a spring board to expand throughout Latin America.

Give this a read if you're interested.

csis.org...

This all comes down to allegations made by one right-wing think tank, the "American Enterprise Institute", and a paper they published "The Mounting Hezbollah Threat in Latin America". ALL the rhetoric comes from that single source which does not provide any substantiating evidence.

Politifact has gone over that paper as have various government agencies, and it all comes up the same - the allegations are flimsy at best.

Hezbollah in Latin America poses an imminent threat to the United States (Politifact.com)

There was no indication that Quds or Hezbollah was working with Mexican drug cartels at all, and even the Congressional report showed only some individuals (with loose affiliations to Hezbollah) using the 'tri-border' area in South America (using the lax laws for various criminal activity like music piracy) for monetary gain. More like ex-patriates sending money home.

But the report, "International Terrorism and Transnational Crime: Security Threats, U.S. Policy, and Considerations for Congress," focuses primarily on the group's fundraising in the Western hemisphere — not operational support for the group. While millions of dollars are channeled back to Lebanon every year by criminal enterprises, those operations aren't typically owned or operated by Hezbollah members, the report says. Instead, the criminals are donors who support the group for religious, ideological or personal reasons.

They noted this same area plays host to a large number of criminal syndicates including Chinese and Korean triads. Based on the same sources used by the 'American enterprise Institute' you could just as easily write a paper called "Korean Triads Eyeing Southwest Border", but that doesn't create the same culture of fear they love fostering.