News arrives from Monterrey: the Mexican city is preparing for the 2026 World Cup by deploying Black Hawk helicopters and robotic dogs. One cannot help but roll one’s eyes at this spectacle. It is as if the city fathers have raided a Hollywood prop warehouse and decided that the best way to welcome football fans is to mimic a war zone.
The Black Hawks, those icons of American military might, now hover over a nation that knows well the cost of such hardware. The robodogs, those mechanical terrors from Boston Dynamics, will patrol the streets. This is not security; it is theatre.
It is the sort of garish, over-the-top display that would make a Roman emperor blush. Monterrey, a city with a complex relationship with cartel violence, seems to think that the solution to its image problem is to out-macho itself. But the World Cup is not a battlefield.
It is a carnival. And yet, here we are, preparing for a festival of sport with the trappings of a police state. The irony is thick enough to cut with a knife.
One recalls the ancient Romans, who used gladiatorial games to distract the populace from political decay. Here, we use flying machines and robotic hounds to distract from the fact that the city’s fundamental problems remain unsolved. The drug lords will not be deterred by a few drones.
The fans, however, will be mightily impressed. That is the point. This is a performative exercise, a way for the Mexican government to signal to the world that it is in control.
But control is an illusion, and the Black Hawks are merely a backdrop. The real question is: what happens when the show ends? The robodogs will be packed away, the helicopters will return to their hangars, and the people of Monterrey will still live with the same fears they had before.
The World Cup will come and go, leaving behind a trail of empty stadiums and broken promises. But at least the photographs will look impressive. That, ultimately, is what this is about: the image.
The substance is irrelevant. We live in an age of intellectual decadence, where the signifier has replaced the signified. The Black Hawks are not security; they are a symbol of security.
The robodogs are not protection; they are a novelty. And the people, the poor people of Monterrey, are expected to applaud. They will, of course.
They always do.
