An unspecified number and type of drones have reportedly been used in the attempted assassination of General Jorge Alejandro Gutiérrez Martínez, the newly appointed commander of Mexico’s 42nd Military District.
The attack took place near the town of Dolores, between Guadalupe y Calvo and La Leghuguilla in the state of Chihuahua in northwestern Mexico. Four people were said to be wounded, including Gen. Martínez, two soldiers and a policewoman.
(Gen. Martínez photo via El Financiero)
The following video of the attack has been proliferating across numerous social media platforms and accounts. It appears to show a coordinated attack by multiple drone operators against the small military convoy carrying Gen. Martínez and his security detail. However, it should be noted that other sources attribute this video from a different attack in Tamaulipas.
Regardless of its provenance, the video’s content is pretty clear.
Some of these posts claim the drone(s) used was a Mavic 30T, but at this juncture there is no way to confirm this independently.
Although the results of the attack were lackluster at best (except, of course, from the perspective of the four casualties that took shrapnel), it is attracting a substantial amount of attention. First, due to the rank of the intended victim. Second, and much more sensationally, due to recent reports that narco-traffickers are planning drone attacks on US Border Patrol and other LE and military elements on the border.
For instance, the New York Post recently published excerpts from an “internal memo” which warned, in part,
“On February 1, 2025, the El Paso Sector Intelligence and Operations Center (EPT-IOC) received information advising that Mexican cartel leaders have authorized the deployment of drones equipped with explosives to be used against US Border Patrol agents and US military personal currently working along the border with Mexico…”
Officer safety notifications of this nature (though not this content) are commonly distributed in the LE world to notify LEOs of emerging or imminent credible threats in an AO, a jurisdiction, or against law enforcement in general.
Additional reports of border security personnel exchanging gunfire with Cartel members have ratcheted up tension regarding border issues, though cross-border drone use and attacks against USBP agents are not all new. Mexican transnational criminal organizations have been using drones for years now in a number of ways. And though direct attacks by weaponized drones against either rival organizations or local security forces have not been reported in any great numbers, a comparison to drone use by Ukrainian and Russian forces is inevitable.
And probably righteous. If it hasn’t happened yet, it certainly will, though the wisdom of sustained, direct attacks on US military and law enforcement personnel is dubious from a strictly business Cartel perspective.
Some past examples of Cartel drone use include:
- 2014 Reports of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles transporting as much as 30 pounds of cocaine and other drugs from Queretaro, Guadalajara, and other Mexican cities to drop sites on the U.S. side of the border.
- 2020 Reports of drone use by the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) against military, police, and civilian militia (UAVs described as “…plastic containers filled with C4 and ball bearings).
- 2024 Seizure of a CJNG vehicle modified for drone defense after a gun battle with military personnel in Jalisco in late 2023.
These examples are just a tithe of what could be reported, though to date, we haven’t seen a systemic and coordinated combined arms style attack utilizing drones and Cartel gunmen such as the ones that are now commonplace in Ukraine.
See the referenced NY Post article.
DRW
