I’ve known for some time that Mexico’s drug lord’s are some of the more badass, ruthless organized crime figures in the history of organized crime — essentially running some parts of the country, and arguably the country on the whole — but I honestly had no idea that these guys were this badass.
I mean, just look at that damn thing. It’s like something straight out of a Mad Max movie! According to McClatchy, this one and others like it have been built not for fights with the military, but for fights with rival drug gains. They can hold up to 20 armed men and feature “swiveling turrets, snipers’ peepholes and gadgets to dump oil and scatter tire-puncturing nails on roadways.” Additionally, the “narco tanks” are “cloaked in inch-thick steel plating” and built on a three-axle truck bed with a heavily armored cabin that could withstand fire from 50-caliber mounted weapons and grenades.
An army patrol found the tanks after soldiers spotted two armed men along a road on the highway from Nuevo Laredo to Reynosa, just outside Camargo, authorities said. The men ran into a warehouse. Inside, soldiers found the two armored trucks and a workshop to fabricate more. Two more trucks were in the process of being fitted with steel armor.
Each of the armored trucks had special synthetic insulation to deaden the sound of incoming rounds and air conditioning for the compartment.
Mexican media have dubbed the homemade armored vehicles “Los Monstruos,” or The Monsters, while security consultants label the cumbersome vehicles “rhino trucks.” None have been used in confrontations with Mexico’s army.
Here’s a Mexican news report on the tanks…
(Mad Max pic via)
