Obviously the US would win in an actual military engagement to take down the Cartels, it would just not be worth the monetary and political cost. If a Mexican civilian is killed by an order from an American while attempting to oust the cartel, you better believe the cartel is going to broadcast the US as evil as possible to stir up sympathetic Americans into fighting the US government to stop the intervention, and get Mexicans to side with them as some sort of revolution against the US which would be quite popular in certain areas. If the US ensures 0 civilian deaths, the cartel automatically wins when they just operate within civilian infrastructure. Targeted raids to limit civilian casualties means boots on the ground and american casualties, which will rile up americans who don’t want americans to die for an internal mexican power struggle.
One of the cartels would have to basically pull a 9/11 level event for an intervention to ever happen, and they will never do that because they know the US is content to leave them be as long as they stay in their own lane, and they’re right because the US doesn’t care about them at all as long as they don’t kidnap american tourists (this is why whenever it does happen, the cartel will happily investigate and bring them into custody)
A lot of mexicans dislike the US and much as they dislike the cartels. Latin american politicians love to blame the US for their own political failings and corruption, so a large minority of people legitimately believes their local warlords have their interests in mind over imperialist usa. I’m mexican (moved to the USA) so maybe I’m biased or maybe things changed over the last few years but the average mexican is more likely to side with Russia than America purely because they dislike usa. I mean even young latin americans that live in america think all of their countries problems are because of america, its not unrealistic to think they will turn around and start fighting the US if there was ever an intervention.
The US federal government has come close to formally designating Mexican drug cartels as foreign terrorist organizations several times in recent years. This would provide the legal justification for direct military intervention, most likely in the form of drone strikes. So far they have held off on the terrorist designation because it would poison relations with Mexico. It would essentially be saying the quiet part out loud and acknowledging that Mexico is a failed state which no longer controls their own territory.
If 80% of the Mexican voters approved US going in guns blazing, then that would be a different conversation, although lets hope it doesn't get that bad to seriously consider this.
One of the cartels would have to basically pull a 9/11 level event for an intervention to ever happen, and they will never do that because they know the US is content to leave them be as long as they stay in their own lane, and they’re right because the US doesn’t care about them at all as long as they don’t kidnap american tourists (this is why whenever it does happen, the cartel will happily investigate and bring them into custody)
A lot of mexicans dislike the US and much as they dislike the cartels. Latin american politicians love to blame the US for their own political failings and corruption, so a large minority of people legitimately believes their local warlords have their interests in mind over imperialist usa. I’m mexican (moved to the USA) so maybe I’m biased or maybe things changed over the last few years but the average mexican is more likely to side with Russia than America purely because they dislike usa. I mean even young latin americans that live in america think all of their countries problems are because of america, its not unrealistic to think they will turn around and start fighting the US if there was ever an intervention.