Via N.T.A. we have two reports that show the cartels are expanding operations and capabilities in an alarming way. First from KRGV:

MEXICO CITY (AP) – Mexican marines say they have found a clandestine workshop in northern Mexico where presumed drug traffickers made copies of military uniforms.

The navy says hundreds of camouflage pants, shirts and vests were found at the workshop in the northern border city of Piedras Negras., across the border from Eagle Pass, Texas.

The uniforms are part of an effort by criminal gangs to damage the reputation of the marine corps, the navy said Thursday.

Drug gangs in Mexico have also used fake military uniforms to set up road blocks and carry out kidnappings.

They’ve also launched another car bomb attack which is clearly inspired by the Muslim groups the Cartels work with:

The newly commissioned officers, who hail from around the state, were staying in the hotel until permanent barracks were built. Mexican police frequently requisition hotels in the absence of official barracks, or when threats make it unsafe for them to live at home.

The head of state police and Tamaulipas’ attorney general said three of the wounded officers had third-degree burns, while the rest had minor injuries.

The attack on the hotel took place around 7:15 a.m. on one of the main streets in Nuevo Laredo, less than four hours after unknown gunmen hurled gasoline bombss at the Maranho, one of the city’s most popular nightclubs. The club, which was closed at the time, was badly damaged by fire but there were no injuries, authorities said.

Minutes after the hotel attack, gunmen opened fire on the Nuevo Laredo Institute of Technology, a science-focused university.

Nuevo Laredo is a stronghold of the Zetas. It has been the scene of vicious turf battles between the gang and its former ally, the Gulf cartel, which is now allied with the Zetas’ biggest rival, the Sinaloa cartel led by Joaquin “El Chapo’’ Guzman.

The border city has seen a series of gruesome mass killings in recent week. Fourteen bodies were found in a van in downtown Nuevo Laredo on April 17, and 23 people found hanged or decapitated in the border city on May 4.

Thursday’s attack came less than a week after a high-ranking member of the Zetas was arrested and accused of orchestrating the dumping of 49 mutilated bodies in a northern Mexico town square in order to create terror and confusion as part of a battle with the Gulf and Sinaloa cartels.

That attack has a definite Taliban style feel to it and was clearly done with the sole purpose of publicly declaring that they are in charge of the area.

On our side of the border a hollow state overrun by criminal paramilitaries has led to Americans forming their own paramilitaries which are challenging governmental authority:

Lawmakers killed a bill that would have created a state-sanctioned border militia, but that didn’t squelch the Minuteman impulse in Arizona.

Neither did the movement’s ties to border-militia leader and neo-Nazi J.T. Ready, who killed four people and apparently killed himself May 2 in Gilbert.

People in the cause remain committed to patrolling spots near the Arizona-Mexico border to stop what they see as an invasion by smugglers or illegal immigrants, said participants, their supporters and their critics. Some may be even more motivated now that their plan for state organization was ended by a legislative maneuver.

“There is a large military veteran population in our state who would go down there and do the work that the state needs done under the state flag,” said Michael Frye of Spring Valley, Ariz., who supported SB 1083, which would have created the Arizona Special Missions Unit. Now, he said, “There’s really no other choice but for those folks like myself to form citizen militias.”

A longtime Arizona border-militia leader, Jack Foote, worked for a period with the group that wrote the bill and said its demise is motivating sympathizers of the border-militia movement.

“We have now washed our hands of our state’s Legislature,” Foote, of Cottonwood, said via email. “Now we are going to do things our own way.”

I’ve been talking about the three way dance on the border between American citizens tired of being victimized, Mexican criminal groups and National Socialists for a while and despite what the media would have you think J.T Ready and his ilk were never welcome among the border groups. They were welcomed with open arms by Occupy but that’s another story.

The point is when the shooting starts in earnest you will have Cartel paramilitaries and neo-Nazis shooting it out with American patriots who no longer believe in the American government’s ability to protect their lives and property.

The Blaze has more.