Extremely likely to be accurate.
I spent a couple of weeks listening to a series of podcasts on the golden age of piracy a while back.
A couple of parallels stand out.
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Pirates were extremely feared by the general population.
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They were perceived to be particularly savage. (not true in the early days but that's a different story)
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When faced with regular naval forces, they pretty much always got their asses handed to them.
Why? For the same reasons that the cartels will.
They're drunk, disorganized and untrained at combined warfare.
They're strong against an unarmed populace but no trouble at all for regular military.