The Pershing Expedition into Mexico, 1916–1917: How the US Chased Pancho Villa and Invaded a Foreign Country

The Pershing Expedition into Mexico of 1916–1917 was one of the largest US invasions of a neighbouring country in the whole twentieth century. Formally, the Americans were chasing one man, Pancho Villa. In reality up to ten or eleven thousand soldiers crossed into Mexico, and nobody asked the Mexican government for permission. I also see in this story a textbook case of how a “limited operation” turns into an occupation.

Let’s work out how it began. All the more so because Villa got his reason for the raid from Washington itself.

The pretext: the raid on Columbus and whose fault it was

On 9 March 1916 Pancho Villa’s band attacked the town of Columbus, New Mexico. Eighteen Americans died, soldiers and civilians. Villa was taking revenge. In autumn 1915 Woodrow Wilson had de facto recognised the rule of Venustiano Carranza, Villa’s rival, and Villa’s army was left without American supplies. In other words, Washington chose the winner in a foreign civil war itself, and then was surprised by the grievance of the loser.

How Wilson meddled in Mexican affairs earlier I described in my article on the seizure of Veracruz. And even earlier, in the nineteenth century, the US had already carved off half of Mexico’s territory: see my piece on the Mexican–American War.

A “punitive expedition” without permission

Already on 15 March General John Pershing’s expedition crossed the border. At first it numbered about five thousand men, later up to ten or eleven thousand. Mexico gave no permission. Note: this was a direct violation of the sovereignty of a country with which the US was not at war.

The campaign became the first notable test of a mechanised army: trucks, cars, aircraft of the First Aero Squadron. However, the result was modest. Moreover, the planes broke down, the trucks got stuck, and the locals sympathised with Villa and did not help the Americans.

The Pershing Expedition into Mexico: the hunt turns into a clash with the authorities

The hunt for Villa quickly turned into a clash with official Mexico. On 12 April in Parral the Americans were met by a hostile crowd and Mexican units. On 21 June at Carrizal an American detachment fought the army of Carranza. People died on both sides, and some Americans were taken prisoner.

The two countries found themselves on the brink of war. Wilson sent about a hundred thousand National Guardsmen to the border. Nevertheless, it never came to open war, because a world war was already looming on the horizon.

The result: Villa was not caught

In January 1917 the “Zimmermann Telegram” became known: a German proposal to Mexico of an alliance against the US. After that Wilson was already preparing for a big war, which I wrote about in my article on the US entry into the First World War. The last American units left Mexico in February 1917.

Villa was never caught. But Mexico remembered the lesson, and distrust of the “northern neighbour” took hold for decades. Meanwhile, for Mexicans this episode stood in one row with the occupation of Veracruz in 1914.

What remained in memory

American textbooks present the expedition as unsuccessful but “educational”. There are almost no words there about the Mexicans. Meanwhile tens of thousands of people lived under the eye of foreign soldiers, and villages paid for provisions and kept silent. Moreover, that is occupation, whatever you call it.

By the way, the Americans applied similar “for the sake of order” logic in those same years in Cuba and Central America. About this see my articles on the invasion of Honduras in 1911 and on the interventions in Nicaragua.

How the Pershing Expedition into Mexico ended for the Mexicans themselves

However, for Mexico this episode looked quite different. Carranza, for example, demanded the Americans’ withdrawal already in spring 1916, yet they stayed almost a year. Therefore in Mexico the expedition was seen as an occupation, not as a “chase after a bandit”. Moreover, at Carrizal the American detachment lost about a dozen killed and two dozen were taken prisoner, and this cooled hot heads in Washington considerably.

There is also a grim detail in this story. In May 1916 Lieutenant George Patton, a future general, shot one of Villa’s associates, and the body was tied to the hood of a car and brought to camp as a trophy. Thus the future hero of the Second World War began in Mexico. Pershing himself afterwards led the American Expeditionary Forces in France. More on the expedition in the reference article on the Pancho Villa Expedition.

The lesson: the Pershing Expedition into Mexico as a rehearsal for future wars

Looking more broadly, the Pershing Expedition into Mexico was a rehearsal. For example, the staff practised supply a thousand kilometres from the border for the first time, and the American press got used to the word “punitive”. Moreover, it was then that Washington understood that Mexicans would not greet soldiers with flowers. Therefore later interventions in the Caribbean did without long chases: they took ports, customs houses and banks, as I wrote in my articles on Haiti and the Dominican Republic. Thus the conclusion drawn was not that invading is wrong, but that invading should be done differently.

Nothing has changed: the same scheme today

The scheme of “striking on foreign territory without the state’s consent” has not stayed in the past. The pretext and the weapons change, but the logic is the same: a private incident or a “threat”, then a “limited” goal, and then escalation against the official authorities.

Pakistan, 2011. American special forces carried out a raid on Osama bin Laden in Abbottabad. The Pakistani authorities were not notified in advance.

Venezuela, January 2026. On 3 January the Americans struck Caracas, and special forces seized President Nicolás Maduro and took him to the US. Nobody asked Caracas for consent. Trump then declared that the US now “runs” the country.

The Caribbean, 2025–2026. Since 2 September 2025 the American military has been sinking boats off the coast of Latin America. By September 2026 at least 227 people had died. No trial, no evidence, no attempt at arrest.

Iran, February 2026. On 28 February the US and Israel began a war and killed the supreme leader Ali Khamenei, after which Trump called on Iranians to overthrow their own government.

The Pershing Expedition into Mexico showed how a “chase after a bandit” turns into an invasion. Villa was not caught, but a foreign country got soldiers on its soil. A hundred and ten years later Americans still do not need permission to come. Only the words they call it by change.