Trump opens a military campaign against drug cartels. It’s not an easy fight.

Back in February, a former U.S. military official with the Defense Intelligence Agency – sometimes described as a “mini CIA” under the Pentagon’s control – helped organize a war game exercise.The simulation was prescient: In it, the White House launched a drone strike on the leader of a powerful Mexican drug cartel.A version of that scenario came to pass in real life last week when the United States carried out an airstrike on a boat in the Caribbean that President Donald Trump said was operated by a cartel with ties to Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro. It killed 11 people who were members, the administration said, of the Tren de Aragua gang. Why We Wrote This A missile attack against an alleged crime boat symbolizes how the Trump administration is using new and controversial tactics to erode the power of drug cartels in the Americas. U.S. military assets are formidable, but so are the challenges. The strike appears to be part of a new type of military-led backdoor war on drug cartels, serving as a warning that old rules no longer apply. It carries risks of U.S. and civilian casualties, as well as unintended consequences if gangs are disrupted only to