The Cartel

In its simplest terms, the Cartel is the European Commonwealth of crime, an empire transcending national borders and engaging in illegal commerce. There are no plans for world domination, religious authority, or the advancement of party credo. This is capitalism in it most pure and unadulterated form. It is the unapologetic struggle for power through wealth, regardless of the cost in human life and suffering.
The Cartel is a geo-politically savvy organization because its members hail from different parts of the world and various crime families or state institutions. It’s also young compared to most groups, except, perhaps, for the Russian Mob. It’s relatively unknown because it hides its actions within the machinations of the various world syndicates, but people are slowly becoming aware of it. The major criminal empires were the first to discover the Cartel’s existence, but knew little of the organization, except for the fact they were getting blamed for Cartel affairs. On their heels, law enforcement groups like Interpol and Scotland Yard grew increasingly aware of something moving in the shadows of various syndicates, but only recently have come across the name of the Cartel.
Still, if every viper has its mongoose, then the Cartel’s mortal enemy is the Italian-nationalists called the Carbonari. Headed by Duca Nefando, the Carbonari know about the Cartel and are currently gaining some ground on them in Italy. It’s only natural that the two would come to blows, considering the Carbonari seek to reinforce and strengthen Italy’s national boundaries while the Cartel seeks to open them up.

Structure

The Cartel is like a hydra, but worse because few have any idea of its full size, reach, or numbers. Even more problematic for its enemies, the organization is so compartmentalized that cutting off one head doesn’t seem to weaken the overall organization significantly.

ACQUISITIONS

Acquisitions or assets are independent agents who maintain ties with their original organizations, be it the Turkish Mafia, the Columbian Cartels, the Russia’s vorovskoi mir or the Mexican government. Although listed at the bottom of the totem pole, the Cartel considers them crucial to the organization’s survival, and ensures they’re well compensated for their loyalty. Acquisitions rarely know anyone beyond their handler to prevent the entire system from being compromised.
An asset’s job is to act as the Cartel’s pipeline into their rival’s camp, feeding the Cartel important data or distributing misinformation to the enemy. The acquisition also acts as a recruiter, determining whether specific personnel fit the Cartel’s needs. For this, the asset receives a salary, which the Cartel holds in escrow until the acquisition is ready to leave the enemy camp. Until then, the Cartel doles out an allowance, keeping the asset happy without jeopardizing his cover with a sudden influx of cash.

HANDLER

The handler is an acquisition’s liaison with the Cartel, though he rarely manages more than three assets at a time. This is to protect the different acquisitions from being compromised with the capture of one handler. The handler has no current affiliations with other criminal groups, though he’s likely known to the different syndicates as a go-to guy, a local mercenary of sorts who secretly works for the Cartel. The handler earns a full salary based on his successful management of his assets, as well as his independent contracts so long as they don’t conflict with Cartel interests. He reports to the local fixers.

MAULERS

Maulers are the full-time shock troops of the organization, and may not even know that they’re working for the Cartel. They handle the daily operations of local criminal initiatives for the Cartel, including transportation, protection, smuggling, enforcement, guard duty, persuasion, etc. Essentially anything requiring brawn or a sidearm remains the purview of the mauler. They live in Cartel-purchased homes and work exclusively for the organization. The Cartel terminates any mauler they discover is moonlighting for other contractors unless they’ve been authorized by their fixer to work for a Cartel handler.

SUPPORT STAFF

Just below the position of fixer is a network of people who comprise the Cartel’s support system. These contracted individuals supplement the salary of their daily, legitimate jobs with Cartel work. In fact, it’s their regular jobs that make them important to the organization’s continued operations. They may be accountants and bank executives who launder Cartel money, lawyers to help criminals through their legal dilemmas, truck drivers and transport companies involved in smuggling merchandise or product, bureaucrats who help the organization cut through red tape, and so forth.
Support Staff rarely know anyone beyond their fixer or, potentially, other members of their business (in the case of certain firms and agencies some may not even realize they’re working for the Cartel, believing their employer is another criminal enterprise.

FIXERS

Fixers are the equivalent of mafia lieutenants. They oversee the operations specific to various regions, each handling one aspect of some illegal enterprise in the area. A city may have three fixers, for example, with one managing the local drug-trade, the other the local arms market, and a third handling political corruption. Each fixer has his own maulers and support staff, though they share management of the different handlers (who act as “shared” commodities). Otherwise, the fixers may know of one another and their right-hand men, but the chain of knowledge rarely extends beyond their personal subordinates.

SPECIAL PROJECTS

Not all Cartel initiatives are illegal, at least on the surface. The project groups are compartmentalized initiatives, legitimate enterprises that serve as cover for more covert operations. Lockdown, for example, uses a private prison to raise capitol for the Cartel through the acquisition of super-humans and advanced technologies. So far, it is the costliest venture in motion, but one that is slowly paying off.
Special projects remain under the management of a public mouthpiece and internal director, both of whom carry the responsibility for the endeavor’s success. In the case of Lockdown, the public mouthpiece and internal director are one in the same: Warden Devon Creed. Creed, in turn, reports to a man by the name Deacon Hobbs, the special projects overseer for North America and a dangerous super-human in his own right.

REGIONAL OVERSEER

Regional overseer is a bit of a misnomer since a country may have two or more people handling the Cartel’s various initiatives. One person may be responsible for all the special projects occurring in his sphere of influence, while another might manage drug trafficking. Still, the regional overseer is responsible for coordinating the efforts of the various fixers under his command. He usually specializes in a field of influence, be it drug or technologies-trafficking, weapons-distribution, special projects, political asset management, etc, and so too will all the fixers who fall under his purview. He rarely involves himself with criminal activities directly unless it involves multi-national enterprises. In this case, the overseer coordinates matters with his counterparts, ensuring various shipments have a secure pipeline for transit. Regional overseers generally manage entire countries (Germany, Belgium, etc.) or regions (Mid-West U.S. or Atlantic Canada).

THE RAVENS

Imagine auditors with guns, IRS agents with Special Forces training. The Ravens are the Central Committee’s chief enforcers, ensuring special projects run smoothly, regional overseers turn in the correct percentage of earnings and fixers don’t skim profits. When Ravens appear, Cartel members are expected to cooperate fully; otherwise, the Ravens have the Cartel’s sanction to dispose of the problem with prejudice.
The Ravens hail from a variety of military backgrounds, from Germany’s GSG-9 to Iran’s Pasdaran Inqilab, though the chief operatives seem to be ex-Soviet Spetsnaz. The Ravens travel in groups of three, one specializing in accounting and business, and their arrival is always a surprise. They never show up without a reason, so their appearance always carries an air of accusation.

CENTRAL COMMITTEE

The membership of the central committee remains a mystery, and can be comprised of one person or a council of mob bosses or exnomenklatura members. The central committee roster may also be a surprise to characters, with its membership including an arch-nemesis or, even, respected allies.

History

Few folks within the Cartel itself are aware of their own organization’s history, thanks to its rampant compartmentalization, but there is a rumor the Cartel was built on the carcass of the Soviet Union. Those in-the-know aren’t speaking, but the fact is the Cartel was formed in the halls of the Kremlin, among the highest levels of Soviet society. Known simply as the nomenklatura, these Party elite were the rich capitalists leading the supposedly socialist utopia. Nobody gained a position of prominence or power without their approval, and they watched out for one another. They were a sanctioned body of thieves, practicing codes of silence and pursuing criminal agendas rendering them far more akin to the Mafia than to any governmental body.
The nomenklatura profited on the USSR’s corpse, buying State property and selling it for lucrative profits, auctioning off oil and military hardware. They were Russia’s new kingpins, and they had little to do with the anti-Soviet vorovskoi mir, the so-called “Thieves’ World” or traditional gangsters.

GOING INTERNATIONAL

The proto-Cartel would have remained a Russian phenomenon had it not opened its ranks following the Soviet Union’s dissolution. The Cartel wasn’t interested in borders or nationalism, but it still needed help gaining in-roads into countries where other syndicates were king. So, the Cartel used its wealth to acquire like-minded converts among the various mafias, turning them into double agents. They spread, like a blood infection in the body proper of crime. Their Chechen acquisitions enabled them to tap into the Balkan Routes, using convoys of surplus military vehicles to transport Taliban heroin from Afghanistan into Turkey.
Their Turkish connections expanded the Cartel’s influence into the Middle East through arms shipments to the Lebanese, Turkish, and Israeli oragnized crime. Turkish gangsters, operating with the Sicilian mafia to distribute heroin through Western cities like Amsterdam, gained the Cartel inroads with European acquisitions. In Asia, the Cartel used Hong Kong to launder money, gaining some converts among the Triads and Yakuza based there. Also, through Polish agents (which produces 20% of Europe’s amphetamines for the Chinese and Colombians), the Cartel scored contacts in Colombia.

GAINS AND SETBACKS

The various acquisitions and double agents continue to function in their original organizations, which can be dangerous, but highly lucrative. Still, if the Cartel has had any difficulty, it’s been in gaining a strong foothold in Italy, where the young gangsters are joining Duke Nefarious’ Carbonari to break out from under the control of the older Calabrian Ndrangheta, the Neapolitan Camorra, and the Sicilian Mafia (Italy’s three principle criminal organizations). Because Italy remains difficult to infiltrate for the Cartel, so too does Italy’s strong connection with South American cartels. As it stands, the Cartel has tenuous connections in Peru and Columbia. Thankfully, because money speaks in North America, the Cartel has managed to gain political acquisitions as well criminal allies in the United States, Canada and Mexico.

RECENT EVENTS

In the past few years, despite their setbacks in Italy and South America, the Cartel has grown stronger and richer—wealthier, even than than some G-8 nations. With their secret status slowly eroding, the Cartel is expanding in entirely new directions to deal with the situation.
The first part of this drive to secure their position is to absorb the smaller criminal organizations in Eastern Europe and Afghanistan. As it stands, the Cartel is close to locking down Germany’s criminal underground and launching a new campaign to dominate Cyprus (which has over 20,000 offshore companies used mainly for the purpose of laundering drug money. 10% of these companies are controlled by the Russian mafia). The organizations loss in Italy, however, remains a sore spot.

Type

Illicit, Cartel

Alternative Names

American Security Concerns

Leader

Deacon Hobbs

Notable Members

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