The Dallas Morning News articles about the Mexican drug cartel war spilling into America have been thorough and disturbing. If the cartels are planning a substantial move into the U.S. beyond intramural skirmishes and lugging tons of drugs into the American interior, we should be paying much more attention. ["Drug wars' long shadow"]

Authorities fear that the growing border violence has moved up the I-35 corridor to Dallas, whose major roadways and airports make it among the most important drug distribution points in the country, drug authorities say. In early June, a federal task force arrested more than three dozen people, most of them in Dallas, in a major drug bust that officials said involved Mexican drug cartels.

Phil Jordan, a former Drug Enforcement Administration agent who has worked in Texas and Florida, said drug traffickers have come to see Dallas as a prime hub for moving into drug-starved cities in the rest of the country.

"Dallas is the new Miami for transiting drugs," said Mr. Jordan, former head of the DEA's El Paso Intelligence Center, which studies the drug trade. "Drug traffickers kill for I-35."

The Gulf cartel's muscle is pumped up by the Zetas, Mexican military personnel who went private.

The Zetas, as they are known, originally were trained in the U.S. by Army special forces to battle drug lords back in Mexico. But a small group broke away from the Mexican military in 2001 for more lucrative jobs as Gulf cartel enforcers.

In fact, the Zetas constitute a serious escalation in the level of crime brought to America by open borders. ["Cartel enforcers operate in Dallas"]

"U.S. law enforcement have reported bounties offered by Los Zetas of between $30,000 and $50,000 for the killing of Border Patrol agents and other law enforcement officers," the bulletin said. "If a Zeta kills an American law enforcement officer and can successfully make it back to Mexico, his stature within the organization will be increased dramatically." [...]

Officials on both sides of the border know of special training camps in the Mexican states of Tamaulipas and Michoacan, where newly recruited Zetas take intensive six-week training courses in weapons, tactics and intelligence gathering.

Training camps for military-style killers threatening the security of the United States? Mexican drug cartels have yet another fascinating similarity to the Taliban!