What the Matamoros Kidnapping Says About the State of Cartel Violence in Mexico

The recent armed attack on four U.S. citizens in the Mexican border city of Matamoros, Tamaulipas state, illustrated well-documented security risks in Mexico's many crime hotspots, where gang and cartel violence disrupts daily life and hinders business operations. But while the demonstrated risks are nothing new, much about the incident was out of the ordinary, including the abnormal targeting of American civilians, the subsequent calls by U.S. Republicans for military intervention, and the cartel's highly out-of-character note apologizing for the whole affair. The oddities of the incident and the response to it by the cartel, as well as the Mexican and U.S. governments, confirm and expand on long-standing security, political and logistical risks from organized crime in Mexico....