Drone Surveillance Missions Along U.S.-Mexico Border 'Could Be A Sign of Future Strikes,' DEA Agent Says

Since late January, the United States has conducted multiple drone and spy plane surveillance missions along the U.S.-Mexico border in an attempt to gather intel on Mexican drug cartels, as both the Trump and Sheinbaum administrations carry out an offensive against the criminal organizations.

But according to a U.S. official, drone flights over Mexico could be a sign of future strikes. Todd Zimmerman, the Drug Enforcement Administration's (DEA) special agent in Mexico City said in an interview that the decision taken by the Trump administration to label cartels as terrorist organizations was a pointed message to their leadership that a possible military intervention remains on the table.

As reported by The Los Angeles Times, Zimmerman said Mexican officials are "worried" because they are aware of the power of the U.S. military. "They know that at any time, they could be anywhere — if it comes to that, if it comes to that — they could be in a car, they could be in a house, and they could be vaporized. They've seen it in the Afghan and Iraq wars. So they know the potential that's out there."

In the interview, the DEA special agent in Mexico City said the pace of fentanyl production has remained "relatively stable" in recent months and praised the Claudia Sheinbaum administration for combating drug cartels with raids by the military.

"We've seen an uptick in operations since Claudia's taken over as president here, which is a very positive sign," Zimmerman said.

Earlier this month, the Trump administration formally designated six Mexican drug cartels as terrorist groups, giving U.S. officials a broader power to hit financial networks that support them. Despite this, some experts say things will not change much.

"The military aircraft, the troops at the border, the talk of drones: It's all a flash in the pan, it's not going to have an impact," Mike Vigil, former head of international operations at the DEA, said according to The Los Angeles Times.

Vigil added that using multimillion-dollar munitions to strike primitive drug laboratories would be a "laughable waste of resources."

"You're not talking about sophisticated laboratories. We're talking about some tubs and pots and pans, kitchenware," he said. "And the labs are not fixed, they're mobile. They move them around, they're not operational 24/7. And these labs are easily replaced. So you're not accomplishing anything," he said.

Amid growing public scrutiny in Mexico, the government is under pressure to clarify the extent of U.S. security operations on its soil. President Sheinbaum recently clarified that the flights are a result of coordination between the two countries.

"These flights are part of the coordination... collaborations that have been going on for many years between the U.S. and Mexican governments," Sheinbaum said during one of her daily press conferences. She added that information gathered is then shared with Mexican authorities.

The U.S. has historically conducted surveillance missions, but the frequency has gone from one a month around the southern border to more than a dozen in the last few weeks, according to a former military official with deep experience in homeland defense.

The Trump administration plans to use the military as the lead agency to tackle border security, but current and former U.S. officials say it remains unclear how the administration plans to leverage information it acquires.

Some of them told CNN that the intelligence flights could be part of an effort to find targets for the U.S. military to strike itself, while others say it could be used to build a body of evidence for further foreign terrorist designations or even identify information that could be shared with the Mexican military.