The Mexican army got him. After years of being the country’s most elusive criminal, Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, known as “El Mencho,” was killed during a dawn operation in Tapalpa, Jalisco on Sunday. He was seriously wounded during the firefight and died while being airlifted to Mexico City. It’s the kind of headline that feels like a victory, and technically, it is one.
But here’s the thing: we’ve seen this movie before.
The Operation That Actually Worked
The Mexican defence ministry didn’t hold back with the details. They announced that multiple cartel members were killed, several armoured vehicles were seized, and rocket launchers were recovered from the scene. Three military personnel were wounded in the operation. The US State Department had apparently supplied intelligence that helped make it happen, and Washington had been dangling a $15 million reward for information leading to El Mencho’s capture.
So this wasn’t some lucky break. This was coordination between Mexican military forces and international intelligence agencies. It was planned, it was executed, and it worked. That matters.
The immediate fallout was visible within hours. Cars burning on the streets of Jalisco. Armed men appearing in public. The governor issued a code red warning. The US issued a shelter-in-place alert across multiple Mexican states including Jalisco, Tamaulipas, and parts of Michoacan, Guerrero, and Nuevo Leon.
It was chaos, but it was understandable chaos. A power vacuum in a major crime organization creates immediate instability.
Why This Actually Matters (And Why It Might Not)
El Mencho wasn’t just a cartel boss. The CJNG had expanded from its Jalisco stronghold to operate across Mexico with an almost nationwide presence. That’s a remarkable level of control for any criminal organization. Removing him from the equation genuinely disrupts operations, at least in the short term.
Former US Ambassador Christopher Landau called it “a great development for Mexico, the US, Latin America, and the world” on social media. That’s not hyperbole. The arrest or death of the most wanted man in your country is objectively significant.
But here’s where we need to be honest: cartel leadership deaths don’t always translate to cartel collapse. History shows us that. When Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán was captured, the Sinaloa Cartel didn’t disappear. It fragmented, adapted, and continued operating. The infrastructure, the money, the networks, the supply chains, the corruption that enables these organizations to function, those don’t vanish when one person dies.
The Real Question
What happens to CJNG now matters less than what it says about Mexico’s security challenges more broadly. Can the government maintain this momentum? Can they capitalize on the disruption to weaken the organization further? Or will a successor emerge and stabilize operations within weeks?
The burning cars and armed men in the streets on Sunday suggest the organization still has teeth, still has reach, still has the ability to respond immediately to crisis. That’s not nothing. That’s a reminder that El Mencho’s death, while significant, doesn’t represent the end of anything. It represents a transition point.
Mexico’s most wanted man is gone, but the system that created him, that sustained him, that allowed him to operate with near-impunity for years is still very much in place. So celebrate the operation, acknowledge the military’s success, recognize the international cooperation. But don’t pretend this is a conclusion to anything. It’s a chapter break at best, and what gets written in the next chapter depends entirely on what Mexico does with this moment.
