How a Texas border city’s drone-tracking system became Mexico’s model for fighting drug traffickers

The Tijuana-San Diego border now has its own anti-drone operation, and it is a direct copy of a test run that took place five months ago along the Texas border, between Ciudad Juárez and El Paso.

Mexico’s Defense Ministry (SEDENA) says the operation lasted from March 17 to 31. It established the model now in use in Baja California, with Mexican and U.S. forces each working inside their own territory under a “mirror operations” framework tied to the bilateral Grupo Bilateral de Implementación México-Estados Unidos, tracking and stopping the drones smugglers employ.

The Texas Test Case

SEDENA kept quiet about the details of the earlier effort, never disclosing troop numbers, equipment specifics or results for the El Paso-Juárez pilot. The operation seems to have served mainly as a proof of concept, tested before Mexico expanded the model to a second, larger border corridor.

The situation in Texas stands as part of a wider increase in drone operations near the border. Across Mexico, authorities report about 165 anti-drone teams operating nationwide.

A review has documented roughly 670 cases of armed drone activity since 2018, and over 72% of them took place between January 2025 and August 2026. The pace has picked up sharply, driven mostly by cartel conflict in places such as Sinaloa and Michoacán.

How the Operations Compare

The contrast in openness is stark. The Mexican military’s department disclosed the entire strength of the Tijuana-San Diego force — 800 troops — along with the precise zone it covers, a five-kilometer span close to Mesa de Otay. By contrast, for the pilot operation at El Paso-Juárez, no details were made public beyond the dates themselves.

Drone Incidents by the Numbers

The scale of the issue is considerable. A recent examination has uncovered roughly 670 cases of armed drone activity stretching back to 2018, with well over 72% of those taking place between January 2025 and August 2026.

The stretch of intense activity lines up with fighting between cartels in places such as Sinaloa and Michoacán.

The U.S. Response

The Lone Star State continues to play a central role on the American side of the response to cartel activity. The U.S. Northern Command’s Joint Task Force-Southern Border has brought down well over 300 cartel-linked drones this year alone.

Officials at the Department of War say that roughly 100 were killed in August alone, according to reports. Since Aug. 24, U.S. forces have expanded their operations on Texas soil, deploying a high-energy laser system near the Rio Grande Valley to take down drones.

Mexico’s defense secretary has stated that his country is not currently working on that capability for its own side of the border.

What the Tijuana Deployment Has Not Yet Shown

SEDENA has yet to reveal whether the Tijuana-San Diego operation, which runs through Sept. 21, has caught any drones. It has also not announced when results from the corridor — or how they compare with the earlier El Paso pilot — will be made public.

In both instances, the underlying pattern remains consistent. The mirror operations structure, the cross-border coordination via Grupo Bilateral de Implementación México-Estados Unidos, and the method of identifying and shutting down threats all draw their origin from the Texas test.

The two projects were treated very differently when it came to how their information was handled. The El Paso-Juárez pilot kept its work hidden and never reached publication, whereas the Tijuana-San Diego deployment has been described openly since the beginning.

The Pattern of Disclosure

Each operation shares a common framework yet rests upon its own distinct standard for information. The source lays out the details for both, setting forth their separate measures.

• The El Paso-Juárez pilot ran quietly, with no troop numbers, equipment specifics or results disclosed.
• The Tijuana-San Diego deployment announced its size — 800 troops — and its area — a five-kilometer stretch near Mesa de Otay — from the start.
• Both operations worked under the same mirror operations framework tied to the bilateral Grupo Bilateral de Implementación México-Estados Unidos.

SEDENA’s decision to disclose the Tijuana operation’s details while withholding everything about the El Paso pilot suggests a deliberate approach to information management. The ministry may have wanted to show the public that the model works before committing to a second corridor.

What stands out about the pattern is just as telling as what it includes. The source makes no mention of whether the El Paso pilot succeeded or failed. It offers no word on whether the Tijuana deployment has intercepted any drones at all. And it says nothing about whether the two operations will ever be compared publicly.

The space between the two deployments is considerable. A side-by-side examination would allow officials to judge whether the approach works across different border crossings. Without such a test, the Tijuana operation remains a distinct trial rather than a confirmed expansion of the earlier effort.

The template stays whole. The mirror operations design, the cross-border teamwork through the Mexico-US Bilateral Implementation Group, and the detection-and-disable method all began with the Texas test. What changed was how the information was handled, not how the operation was carried out.

SEDENA has not confirmed whether the Tijuana-San Diego operation, which runs through Sept. 21, has already caught any drones. It has also not announced when results from that corridor — or a comparison against the earlier El Paso pilot — will be made public.

anti-drone · border security · el paso · mexico · tijuana