Ecuador entered the global spotlight last week when Time magazine featured the country on the cover of its issue titled “Trump’s War.” The cover displayed eight red MAGA caps, replacing “America” with the name of a different country. Ecuador was among them.
The Time article focused on President Donald Trump’s military offensive in Tehran. However, it also noted ongoing US joint military operations in Ecuador targeting designated terrorist organizations. The first kinetic strike reportedly took place on March 6.
TIME’s new cover: Trump’s war.
— TIME (@TIME) March 5, 2026
After a strike that killed Iran’s supreme leader, President Trump tells TIME how he made the decision and what comes next. Read it here: https://t.co/lFiFz9y5L9 pic.twitter.com/imIIEuVFPA
One day later, Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa attended the Shield of the Americas Summit in Miami, Florida, convened by Trump. The meeting resulted in the creation of a 13-country regional alliance to combat transnational organized crime.
Partner nations have not revealed further details on the agreement. However, Ecuador is apparently assuming a key role in regional security, given that neighboring Colombia and Peru are not part of the alliance.
As Ecuador enters a new phase of security cooperation with the United States, the country must address four challenges if this partnership is to produce lasting results.
1. Ecuador’s prisons are in bed with organized crime.
In January 2026, prison overcrowding surpassed 34 percent, up from 13 percent in 2023. At the same time, Ecuador recorded its highest homicide rate in history in 2025, reaching roughly 50.9 murders per 100,000 inhabitants. That places Ecuador among the worst handful of nations for murder, with the coastal hubs being targets for gang warfare.
These trends highlight the prison system’s shortcomings. Over the past two decades, Ecuadorian prisons have become hubs for criminal organizations. Gang leaders have bought off administrators and coordinated trafficking, extortions, and assassinations from behind bars.
Without meaningful reform, new arrests will do little to dismantle criminal structures. Necessary measures include rotating prison staff, isolating criminal leaders, and separating inmates charged with nonviolent offenses. Dedicated facilities for low-risk prisoners, combined with agile reintegration programs, would reduce gang recruitment inside prisons.
2. Criminal groups evade enforcement by spawning and adapting.
Trump said the Shield of the Americas agreement is “a commitment to using lethal military force to destroy sinister cartels and terrorist networks.” Such strategies often fragment armed groups, weakening them temporarily but creating opportunities for new factions to emerge.
Since January 2024, when the Noboa administration declared an internal armed conflict against criminal groups in Ecuador, gangs have proliferated rapidly. At least 12 splinter groups have emerged from the four main organizations: Los Tiguerones, Los Chone Killers, Los Lobos, and Los Choneros.
To secure survival and expansion, factions often partner with transnational criminal organizations, opening the door to new actors in the country. For instance, Los Lobos emerged as dissidents from Los Choneros—linked to the Sinaloa Cartel. Los Lobos subsequently aligned with the Jalisco New Generation Cartel.
To prevent splinter groups from filling power vacuums, authorities must implement contingency plans. After dismantling a network or capturing a leader, they should immediately deploy territorial control protocols.
3. The Shield of the Americas lacks sufficient members.
When the United States and Colombia implemented Plan Colombia between 2000 and 2015, drug cultivation and trafficking declined within Colombia. However, much of that activity shifted to Ecuador, particularly cocaine exports to Europe and the United States.
The lack of cross-border coordination allowed criminal networks to expand within Ecuadorian territory. Local gangs became key logistical partners to powerful cartels, including Mexican and Albanian groups.
As Ecuador has strengthened its fight against organized crime, the pattern appears to be repeating. Criminal activities are already relocating to Peru. To prevent further displacement, Ecuador should encourage the participation of Colombia, Peru, and Mexico in the Shield of the Americas.
4. Extradition to the United States is rare.
In the 2000s, Colombia widely used extradition, sending hundreds of drug traffickers to the United States. Since many feared US prisons more than domestic prosecution, the policy weakened cartel leadership structures.
Given organized crime’s infiltration of the judiciary, Ecuador should expand the use of extradition to the United States—even if that means legal reforms to streamline the process. Doing so could disrupt the command structures of criminal groups and limit the ability of imprisoned leaders to continue operating.
US support may provide Ecuador with intelligence, operational capabilities, and international pressure against criminal networks. However, foreign assistance alone will not resolve the structural weaknesses that allowed organized crime to flourish in the first place.
To reverse the trajectory of violence, Ecuador must pair Shield of the Americas cooperation with institutional reforms, prison restructuring, and broader regional coordination. Additional steps beyond the scope of this article include stronger financial tracking and regulatory reforms that reduce incentives for black-market activity.
