Decapitation and the cartels

The cartels use decapitation to make their point but the forces of good use a decapitation strategy--killing or capturing a cartel boss--too combat the cartels. The Commander of NORTHCOM says the strategy isn't working.

After a few trials and some tribulations, the military learned in Iraq and Afghanistan that killing the most senior insurgent leaders was actually less effective than killing the mid-level facilitators. Rand wrote about it back in 2002.  I suspect that the counter-cartel establishment is going through a similar learning experience.