A recent U.S. government travel advisory on Northern Baja California underscores the need for boaters to remain alert to activities on the water when cruising along the so-called “Smuggler’s Corridor.”

Photo by: U.S. Coast Guard Crewmembers from the Coast Guard Cutter Narwhal offload bales of marijuana recently jettisoned from a fleeing ’go-fast’ vessel off the coast of Baja California.

On March 2, the U.S. Justice Department’s Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives took the unusual step of urging college students to avoid parts of northern Mexico during spring break.

Citing out-of-control violence, the bureau’s Los Angeles field division issued a Travel Warning urging thousands of students to stay out of Tijuana and Rosarito Beach during spring break.

More than 6,000 Mexican citizens died last year in violence related to organized crime. More than 1,000 have been killed so far this year.

In Northern Baja California alone, more than 1,000 victims of murder, torture and kidnapping simply disappeared last year, according to the human rights group Citizens United against Impunity. In January, Mexican authorities arrested a man suspected of disposing of more than 300 bodies of Mexican nationals in vats of industrial chemicals in Tijuana.

Mexico is in the grips of a violent war between rival drug smuggling cartels. The fact that the bloodshed shows no signs of abating does not bode well to the safety of boaters cruising along a coastline increasingly used for smuggling operations.

Smuggler’s Corridor Expands
Although tourists and recreational boaters are not primary targets, “the uncertain security situation poses serious risks for U.S. citizens,” according to a separate Travel Alert released in February by the U.S. State Department. “Common-sense precautions” include avoiding areas where drug dealing might occur, according to the alert.

While it is may be possible to avoid dark alleys and back rooms of shady bars, Southern California recreational boaters may unknowingly find themselves operating in waterways shared by drug traffickers.

Fortification of the U.S./Mexico border fence system began under Operation Gatekeeper in 1994. Fencing improvements included increased manpower and a series of double walls, lights, motion sensors and other technology along the border at San Ysidro and part of Otay Mesa. The project was designed to force smugglers away from southern San Diego urban areas and into the rural East County.

But shortly after Operation Gatekeeper began, the Coast Guard noticed an increase in smuggling attempts by sea. Maritime smuggling efforts became so widespread that Southland boaters began referring to the nearshore waterways directly adjacent to the border as “Smuggler’s Corridor.”

So named for maritime narcotics and illegal-alien smuggling, Smuggler’s Corridor for years extended roughly from Ensenada (approximately 60 miles south of the border) to Del Mar, California (approximately 30 miles north of the border).

But after the fence along the U.S./Mexican border was lengthened and strengthened as part of the 2006 Secure Fence Act, authorities noticed a surge in maritime narcotics smuggling activities farther south along Baja California’s Pacific coastline.

Since November, U.S. Coast Guard cutters have intercepted more 7 tons of marijuana in the waters off San Quintín, approximately 160 miles south of the border. San Quintín is a popular fishing destination for trailerboaters and a charted harbor used by coastal passage makers.

Authorities believe that -- much as the strengthened land border has caused drug cartels to attempt more maritime smuggling -- increased interdiction efforts in the waterways between Ensenada and the U.S./Mexican border have forced smugglers to stage their drug runs farther south.

Some feel it is only a matter of time before a boater winds up “in the wrong place at the wrong time” or becomes a target of kidnapping or piracy.

For boaters to understand the potential for being caught up in violence offshore, it is important to know that major drug smugglers have changed methods and personnel.

Drug Traffickers Employ Gangsters
“Mexican drug trafficking organizations control a greater portion of drug production, transportation, and distribution than any other criminal group,” according to the 2009 National Drug Threat Assessment published by the U.S. Department of Justice.

Highly sophisticated major Mexican drug trafficking organizations employ advanced communication technologies and techniques to coordinate their illicit drug trafficking activities including advanced communication centers that utilize voice over Internet protocol, satellite technology (including broadband satellite instant messaging), encrypted messaging, cell phone technology, two-way radios, scanner devices, text messaging, and high-frequency radios with encryption and rolling codes.
These organizations increasingly rely on gang members to accomplish their goals.

“Members of most Mexican cartels -- Sinaloa, Gulf, Juárez and Tijuana -- maintain working relationships with many street gangs and outlaw motorcycle gangs,” the National Drug Threat Assessment stated.

“Mexican drug trafficking organizations also continue to strengthen their relationships with U.S.-based street gangs, prison gangs, and outlaw motorcycle gangs for the purpose of expanding their influence over domestic drug distribution,” the assessment added.

“Although gangs do not appear to be part of any formal Mexican drug trafficking organizations structure, several Mexican drug trafficking organizations use U.S.-based gangs to smuggle and distribute drugs, collect drug proceeds and act as enforcers. Mexican drug trafficking organizations use gang members for these illegal activities to insulate (themselves) from law enforcement detection,” the report concluded.

It’s a misconception that the average maritime marijuana smuggler is an out-of-work fisherman aboard an 18-foot panga with a 40 hp outboard. In fact, several recent Coast Guard interdictions off San Quintín underscore the high level of sophistication cited in the National Drug Threat Assessment.

In five separate interdiction efforts, U.S. Coast Guard personnel aboard fixed-wing aircraft, helicopters and cutters discovered they were facing a new breed of criminal. No longer chasing down slow-moving smuggling pangas, Coast Guard personnel are trying to keep pace with ultra-fast drug-running vessels that could be crewed by violent gang members.

Violence Spreading
While some may shrug off such events as occurring too far from their local marina to register on their radars, recent large-scale shootouts between Mexican authorities and drug cartels in Tijuana, Chihuahua City and Ciudad Juarez should remind boaters that violence may erupt anywhere, at any time.

“Large firefights have taken place in many towns and cities across Mexico, but most recently in Northern Mexico,” according to the State Department Travel Alert. These altercations resemble small-unit military combat, with cartels employing automatic weapons and grenades.

A string of machine gun and grenade attacks recently occurred in two popular yachting destinations in and near Acapulco.

According to an Associated Press report, assailants lobbed a grenade at a hotel in Zihuatanejo on Feb. 7. A prison director and police chief survived grenade attacks the same day.

“The incident marked the third grenade attack in less than a week on Mexico’s Pacific coast,” the report stated. “On Feb. 6, grenades were thrown at a police station and the office of local prosecutors in Acapulco, slightly injuring one police officer. On Feb. 3, assailants tossed two hand grenades at the home of Zihuatanejo’s police chief, injuring a policeman who was guarding the home. No one has been detained in any of the attacks.”

According to other published reports, the entire 300-member Zihuatanejo police force walked off the job after the police station attack, demanding increased compensation for rising dangers associated with drug violence.

“Grenade attacks have become a fixture in Mexico’s brutal cartel-related violence,” the Associated Press report stated. “Last week, five civilians and an officer were wounded in a grenade assault on a police patrol in western Michoacan state.”

U.S. Citizens Not Targeted
Mexican Tourism officials complain that U.S. federal travel alerts and warnings are unfair.

Baja California’s Tourism Secretary Oscar Esobedo told San Diego KPBS radio reporter Amy Isackson that such warnings are unjustified because drug cartels have not targeted tourists.

“What’s happening is between the people who are in drug trafficking may be 98 percent of it,’ Escobedo said. “And to the rest of the population, you could say it is safe to visit Baja California.”

But the U.S. State Department disagrees:

“The situation in Northern Mexico remains fluid; the location and timing of future armed engagements cannot be predicted,” according to the State Department Travel Alert. “Ciudad Juarez, Tijuana and Nogales are among the cities which have recently experienced public shootouts during daylight hours in shopping centers and other public venues. During some of these incidents, U.S. citizens have been trapped and temporarily prevented from leaving the area.

“In recent years, dozens of U.S. citizens have been kidnapped across Mexico. Many of these cases remain unresolved. Criminals have followed and harassed U.S. citizens traveling in their vehicles in border areas including Nuevo Laredo, Matamoros and Tijuana.”

Southland boaters who may still believe they are insulated from being caught up in violence or perhaps becoming targets of kidnappings or piracy should be aware that shots have already been fired in American waters.

Last summer, violence spilled over onto Smuggler’s Corridor when U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents were forced to open fire on a suspected drug-smuggling vessel that refused to stop 12 miles northwest of Point Loma.

The 25-foot boat contained one-half ton of marijuana.