Mexico’s war on drugs
Another high profile murder in Mexico. Politicians, police chiefs and officers; drug gangs kill whoever threats them in Mexico. Today a mayor in Western Mexico was shot to death.
President Calderon’s crackdown on drug gangs has resulted in massive bloodshed. This year, according to NY Times estimates, more than 1.400 people have been killed in related violence. The US initiative named Merida was supposed to bring $ 1,4 billion to Mexico’s aid, to be used for aircraft, training and equipment. US lawmakers cut down this amount to $ 500 million, with less focus on militairy type support. Mexico will need not only money, but it seems that it would need to build its law enforcement potential from scratch.
A lot of police officers were replaced for fears of corruption in the fight against drugs. Whole units were disarmed by the military. Recruits are still being trained and have no experience in the arena they are about to enter. The security network has largely been dismantled, perhaps resulting in a less corrupt force, but also in diminishing intelligence. The Mexicans are fighting in the blind. Insiders report that the Mexican police can not perform large scale investigations with undercover operations, confidential sources, money laundering investigations, surveillance and wiretaps.
53% of the Mexican people believe that the drug gangs are winning the fight against the government. Stunning. But when even top security officials, surrounded by the best security professionals in Mexico, are murdered on broad daylight this feeling can be explained. Most striking example is the killing of a heavily guarded police chief. He slept in a different house every night but was welcomed by a murderer upon arriving in his safe house for the night. Obviously an inside job and a clear sign of power. Or failure.
Ralph Blumenthal of NY Times reports that the US-Mexican cooperation could be as succesful as the US-Italian cooperation was against the mafia in the 1980′s. Since drug smuggling out of Mexico to the US is one of the main business of the Mexican gangs (laundering the proceeds is ofcourse the other main business), the US has jurisdiction to come to the rescue. The US can offer witnesses the Federal Witness Protection program and US agencies can use informers, wiretaps, undercover agents and electronic surveillance to chart the gangs and gain intelligence and evidence. DEA and FBI agents are training Mexico’s officers on these issues and on the latest in asset forfeiture legislation that Mexico adapted based on US example.
More than the money for more equipment, the Mexicans need the US to train and educate their law enforcement agencies to showresults in the future and get a grip on the situation. Let’s hope the results come in the near future. In a US-Italian cooperation, they got the Italian mafia under control, did they ??
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/26/world/americas/26mexico.html?scp=1&sq=mexico+police&st=nyt
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/28/world/americas/28briefs-7FEDERALPOLI_BRF.html?scp=3&sq=mexico+police&st=nyt
