Successful operation or drop in the bucket?
The Secretary of the Navy (Semar) announced with great fanfare the “Operation Sealing the Gulf of California.” The loot: six buckets and a drum. The content: 314 liters of toluene. The place: the port of Topolobampo, Sinaloa.
For those who do not have a PhD in organic chemistry, I translate. Toluene is an essential chemical. Essential for what, you ask. For the manufacture of synthetic drugs, mainly methamphetamines. It is not for making paint or cleaning tools.
“This substance is classified as an essential chemical product, the nature of which was confirmed by specialized identification equipment.”
The official version says that they found him during a routine check on a parcel tractor-trailer. One more vehicle among the many they reviewed. What a timely coincidence.
The material and the truck were made available to the Federal Public Ministry in Los Mochis. Semar was quick to highlight the coordination with all levels of government and the strict adherence to the legal framework. Always the legal framework, that favorite rhetorical shield of the institutions.
They reaffirmed their commitment to the rule of law and port security. They say it every time they make a discovery like this. Memory is short, but precedents are long: Sinaloa continues to be the main outlet to the Pacific for chemical precursors arriving from Asia.
Three hundred and fourteen liters sounds like a lot until you remember the tons that are moved each month. It’s like announcing that you stopped a bucket of water in the middle of a tsunami. The uncomfortable question that no one asks: where are the other 30,000 liters that surely passed this week?
