Rachel Nolan: Unraveling the Hidden Flow of Guns
Across the US-Mexico Border In her recent analysis for the London Review of Books, Rachel Nolan, Assistant Professor of International Relations at Boston University’s Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies, provides an in-depth exploration of gun trafficking between the United States and Mexico, challenging prevailing narratives about border violence.
Reviewing books by Ieva Jusionyte and Jason de León, Nolan reveals what she calls the “iron river” of gun trafficking. “Damage to another human body is slower and harder with a knife or machete,” she writes. “Killing another person with a gun is so easy that a child can do it (and does).”
The statistics are sobering: an estimated 200,000 US firearms are smuggled into Mexico annually, with 70 percent of firearms recovered at crime scenes originating from US purchases. Mexico maintains extraordinarily strict gun control, with only two legal gun stores in the entire country, both located on military bases.
Nolan highlights the systematic nature of this trade. “Border agents are mostly trying to catch people coming north, not guns going south,” she explains. This creates what she describes as “an endless loop: guns and money going south and drugs and people going north.”
The research unveils a world of specialized language among gun traffickers. Bullets are called “frijoles” (beans), guns are “juguetes” (toys), and a new, unused gun is referred to as “vegana” (vegan) because it “hasn’t eaten meat.”
De León’s work adds human complexity to these economic patterns. Nolan quotes one smuggler who candidly describes the dangerous yet lucrative nature of his work: “Hell yeah! Cuz every day it’s weed, coke and beer for me, foo. I fucking love coke! I mean I like this job, but it is dangerous.”
The article exposes the broader implications of US gun policies. “Mexico can pass as many gun control laws as it likes,” Nolan writes, “but it is unlucky to sit just south of a much more powerful country over which it has little leverage, a country with more guns than anywhere else in the world.”
Nolan argues that the situation goes far beyond simple economic exchange. “The dynamics of gun trafficking and human migration are the same,” she notes. “If you have a country with higher wages on one side of a border and one with lower wages on the other – never mind violence versus relative safety – the disadvantaged will cross the border.”
Rachel Nolan is a historian of modern Latin America. Her research focuses on political violence, Central American civil wars, childhood and the family, historical memory, and U.S.-Latin American relations. She is currently completing a book manuscript on the history of international adoption from Guatemala. Read more about Professor Nolan on her faculty profile.