Guadalajara's time was over, and a new organization was emerging. The attribute that enabled Guzman to stand out was not only his intelligence and shrewdness, but also his clear thought process.
His drug smuggling method was different from others. He didn't go by sea, but overland.
Many people understood that although sea drug trafficking was highly profitable, it also carried significant risks. If intercepted, an entire ship's cargo could be lost instantly.
The drugs produced in Mexico, without tight packaging, would be impossible to salvage if thrown into the sea. In effect, it would mean throwing the entire ship's cargo into the water.
During the war on drugs, the CIA and the U.S. Navy took advantage of this very fact, intercepting smugglers' ships and disposing of all the drugs at sea, regardless of whether the people onboard were killed.
After several such incidents, even a large organization like Guadalajara couldn't bear the losses, which led to its collapse, partly due to economic reasons.
Guzman, on the other hand, abandoned sea transportation and opted for land transportation. However, land customs were not to be trifled with either. Human-smuggling wasn't efficient when it came to larger shipments, and bribing customs officials required a large amount of funds, making it unprofitable.
The new method Guzman found was digging tunnels.
Of course, in the distant East, this wasn't considered a fresh idea, but in the South American continent, smuggling drugs through underground tunnels was indeed a novelty.
Guzman dug an underground tunnel in Santiago to massively transport drugs into America, a fact that has been substantiated. Additionally, when he was arrested, his escape method followed the same strategy: his drug-smuggling team dug a tunnel straight to the prison to rescue him.
This literal mole was a huge problem for the US government at one point. The tunnel method required large initial spending and yielded slow returns, but once completed, it was extremely difficult to combat.
Of course, in the first half of 1989, the short-statured Guzman had not yet become dominant and the Santiago tunnel was not yet finished. However, in every country whose primary industry is agriculture, root cellars are indispensable storage facilities. The wisdom of farmers should not be underestimated; even tunnel warfare originated from this.
Actually, Oliver hadn't anticipated that the movement he developed would progress so smoothly. At first, he was at a loss, acting primarily from a sense of guilt and wanting to compensate the farmers who had been harmed by the Quin Group's drug trafficking business.
At the beginning, his Spanish was very rusty and he had to mix English with sign language for communication. Fortunately, Oliver was very clever and learned the language quickly. He only needed to master the most critical phrases and then communicate them to the farmers he acquainted with.
But to his surprise, the farmers of Sinaloa State were enraged. The moment Oliver first uttered "violence is the only way," it was as if long-suppressed emotions had erupted. With constant cursing in Spanish, they all decided to join the movement.
Later, Oliver understood that their response was related to the recent policies of the Mexican Government and the local situation.
Previously, Mexico had capital controls, meaning that foreign capital could not easily enter Mexico. But in 1989, the same year, the Mexican Government abolished capital controls, leading to an influx of foreign investment into the country, including many short-term speculative investments.
Anyone with basic economic knowledge would know that foreign investment helps to cover current account deficits and also raises the value of a country's currency. But once the currency value rises, the competitiveness of the Mexican export goods would weaken.
As a result of the influx of foreign capital, the Mexican Government severely underestimated the risk of a current account deficit, leading to a bigger deficit, which required more foreign capital, and consequently weakened the competitiveness of export goods.
Once the current account deficit reaches a certain ratio of the gross domestic product, it triggers a terrifying market crash. History proved this right; in 1994, the Mexican economic crisis swept the globe.
Once capital controls were lifted, the first to be hit was the local agricultural sector, the backbone of the economy. When foreign capital entered the country, besides investing in existing industries, the first demand was for land, which the farmers relied upon.
On top of that, the Mexican Government lacked the capacity to regulate all foreign investment. The first farmer whom Oliver met had his land sold without his knowledge and the factory that was set up there was merely a shell, never starting operations, nor providing any jobs. So, he and his wife were left unemployed.
He found the same situation in other places, with landless farmers everywhere. Even those with formal jobs faced a similar situation. The local enterprises had no space to survive, and foreign enterprises did not provide them with better jobs.
Oliver discovered that although these people hadn't studied theory, they had gleaned one truth from their ordeal: in such circumstances, violence was the only way.
And the theories that Oliver brought, along with his remarkable intelligence, supplemented the final element they lacked. Therefore, the vigorous movement of Mexican farmers and workers began.