This article by Luis Hernández Navarro originally appeared in the April 28, 2026 edition of La Jornada, Mexico’s premier left wing daily newspaper.
A specter is haunting national politics. Following the deaths of two of its unaccredited agents in a car accident in Chihuahua, the role and presence of the CIA has stirred enormous controversy. The role of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in the fight against drug trafficking, in alliance with local governments (such as that of Chihuahua), operating independently of the federal government, is now under debate.

Journalist Manuel Buendía, he exposed CIA operations in Mexico and state collusion and was murdered on May 30, 1984.
The intelligence agency was created at the initiative of US President Harry Truman, in the midst of the Cold War, at the end of World War II, following the signing of the National Security Act on July 26, 1947. The CIA began operating in September of that year. It has also been called the Company, the Farm, and the Invisible Government.
Mexican journalist Manuel Buendía, murdered in May 1984, dedicated himself to investigating and exposing the CIA’s men and actions in Mexico. He considered it one of the most important tasks of his professional life. As a result of this work, he published a groundbreaking book in 1983, an essential reference work, compiling the columns he wrote for El Día, El Sol, El Universal, and Excélsior about the Company’s espionage network in Mexico: The CIA in Mexico.
The book presents the results of his research into the links between Mexican officials and U.S. agents who financed the Nicaraguan Contras, created to fight the Sandinista government. Some believe Buendía’s murder was related to the disclosure of these connections.
Philip Agee was a CIA officer from 1957 and carried out espionage work in Mexico between 1960 and 1963. In 1975, his groundbreaking book on the agency’s dirty work, Inside the Company: A CIA Diary, was published. In it, he revealed the agency’s operations in Latin America and Mexico. According to him, local politicians, such as former presidents Gustavo Díaz Ordaz and Luis Echeverría Álvarez (known as Litempo-14), and the Federal Security Directorate were key allies of the CIA’s secret service, La Granja.
Persecuted by the U.S. government, he found refuge in Havana. Upon his death in 2008, an obituary appeared in Granma describing him as: “a loyal friend of Cuba and a fervent defender of the people’s struggle for a better world.”

Philip Agee (left)
The Company, as depicted in books such as The CIA and the Cult of Espionage by former agent Victor Marchetti and John D. Marks; The CIA as Organized Crime by Douglas Valentine; CIA: History of the Company by Eric Frattini; and The CIA and the Cultural Cold War by Frances Stonors Saunders, is the empire’s primary instrument of espionage and counter-espionage, propaganda apparatus, and disseminator of toxic information. It is allied with the worst dictatorships on the planet and has a long history of destabilizing progressive governments through illegal methods and without any ethical considerations.
As Valentine shows, the Invisible Government financed and armed death squads in El Salvador, Guatemala, Somoza’s Nicaragua, South Korea, Iran, Chile, and Uruguay. It carried out covert operations to overthrow the democratic government of Salvador Allende and collaborated with the Chilean military to compile a list of 20,000 people to be eliminated on the morning of the coup.

The CIA plays a fundamental role in the war on drugs in Mexico, even surpassing the DEA. The designation of drug cartels as terrorist organizations, and therefore as a matter of national security for Washington, strengthened the agency’s presence within the country.
According to a Reuters special report on the CIA’s secret war against drug cartels, dated September 10, 2025, the agency has been conducting covert operations for years in collaboration with special counter-narcotics units within the Mexican Army. With the authorization of the Mexican government, it provides training and equipment to these units, as well as financial support for activities such as travel.
“Units of the Mexican Army and Navy, investigated by the CIA, have played a key role in planning and executing most of the high-profile drug trafficker captures in recent years. The Army is composed of hundreds of CIA-trained special forces and is considered the most capable military force in Mexico for capturing heavily armed drug traffickers entrenched in fortified mountain hideouts, according to security sources,” the report stated.
On September 12, 2025, President Claudia Sheinbaum emphatically denied the report. “What Reuters says is false. That report claims that there are CIA agents working with the Mexican Army in these operations. That is absolutely false, it is not true,” she stated at her morning press conference.
The tragic accident in Chihuahua is just adding insult to injury. According to the Los Angeles Times, the CIA has participated in three anti-drug operations in the state this year. If true, Governor Maru Campos would be committing a very serious offense. After offering different versions of what happened and meeting with Secretary Omar García Harfuch, the governor thanked the President for her openness and willingness to cooperate.
The events have been used by both the PAN and Morena parties to position themselves for the upcoming state elections. The PAN is portraying its governor as a great stateswoman committed to the fight against drugs. Morena is using it to accuse her of treason. What happened doesn’t appear to be an “exception.” The matter goes beyond an electoral issue. What’s at stake is a question of sovereignty and the difficult relationship with the United States. With the governor remaining silent, many questions remain unanswered.
-

News Briefs
April 28, 2026April 28, 2026
A new photo contradicts the Chihuahua Prosecutor’s story about the two CIA agents, operating illegally in Mexico, who died in Chihuahua last week.
-

Analysis
April 28, 2026April 28, 2026
What happened doesn’t appear to be an “exception.” What’s at stake is a question of sovereignty & the difficult relationship with the US. With Chihuahua’s governor remaining silent, many questions remain unanswered.
-

News Briefs
April 27, 2026April 27, 2026
The National Minimum Wage Commission says that last year’s wage increase still outpaced even the sharp inflation which hit the basic basket of goods.
The post The Company & National Policy appeared first on Mexico Solidarity Media.
From Mexico Solidarity Media via This RSS Feed.