Flow of aid to Mexico delayed

Posted 24m ago
By Chris Hawley, USA TODAY

MEXICO CITY — Mexico may have to wait up to another year for the U.S. aircraft it says it needs to prevail in a fight against drug syndicates that shows no sign of waning.

Five helicopters that arrived Tuesday are only part of the U.S. aid package agreed to in 2007 to help combat cartels, said Rep. Jose Luis Ovando, chairman of the security committee in the Chamber of Deputies, Mexico's lower house of Congress.

"The time frames have not always been what one would like, and the flows of money have sometimes left something to be desired," he said.


LAW ENFORCEMENT: Police step up in Mexico's drug wars
BACKGROUND: Mexican drug gangs wage war
INTERACTIVE: Villa Ahumada, in the cross fire of the drug war

The $1.3 billion assistance package promised to Mexico under the Bush administration is caught up in U.S. bureaucratic delays, says a Dec. 3 report by the Government Accountability Office (GAO). As of Sept. 30, 3% of the funds had been spent since the deal was struck.

The delays come as Mexican authorities are locked in an increasingly bloody battle against the drug cartels. The U.S. Defense Department says Mexico's deadliest drug cartels have reached a combined force of 100,000 foot soldiers, which rivals the size of the Mexican army.

In 2006, President Felipe Calderón stepped up the fight by dispatching troops to cartel strongholds along the central Gulf and border states. The cartels are fighting back, and more than 13,000 people have died in the violence since.

In the central Mexican town of Tancitaro, the mayor, city council and police force resigned this month because of threats from cartels.

What Mexico is up against

The major cartels earn billions of dollars annually and use it to buy protection, fighters and arms. Among their ranks are former members of elite army units turned hit men. Automatic weapons, bulletproof vests and helmets are standard equipment for cartel soldiers, who are armed with rocket launchers, submarines and even anti-aircraft missiles.

Their might has made Mexico a major producer and supplier to the United States of heroin, marijuana and methamphetamine and the major transit country for cocaine, the Congressional Research Service says. It was with this in mind that President Bush sealed the Merida Initiative.

The initiative funds aircraft and surveillance equipment to track and break up trafficking networks, as well as vehicles that can manage the terrain where cartels sometimes operate. It also provided funds to improve police ranks, weed out corruption and bolster the courts.

Aircraft account for half of the package. Mexico requested aircraft to hunt down marijuana and poppy farms, speedboats carrying Colombian cocaine and planes carrying marijuana.

The government is also building a network of police bases, each with a heliport, so that authorities can send federal reinforcements anywhere in the country within minutes.

In a Tuesday ceremony, U.S. military officials handed over the first five helicopters to the Mexican air force, but 15 other aircraft may not arrive until 2011, the GAO said.

"It's frustrating," said Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, D-Ariz., a member of the House subcommittee that oversees aid for Mexico. "The slow pace was something we didn't anticipate."

Yet to arrive:

• Up to eight UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters for the air force and federal police.

• Up to four Casa 235 Persuader surveillance airplanes for the navy.

• Up to eight Bell 412 helicopters for the Mexican air force.

'Cumbersome' logistics

The GAO said the delay is due to a miscalculation of time and logistics. Haggling with manufacturers over aircraft contracts takes up to six months, and the State Department has had to negotiate with Mexico and other agencies over equipment and delivery of the aircraft, the GAO report said.

In March, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton admitted the helicopter purchases had been "cumbersome" and said her department would try to speed the process.

The State Department said it has delivered other big-ticket items, including 26 armored vehicles, 30 ion scanners for detecting drugs and explosives, five X-ray vans and forensic equipment for tracing bullets. U.S. trainers also are teaching investigative skills to thousands of Mexican federal police recruits at an academy in the central city of San Luis PotosÃ*.

It wasn't until September that the U.S. government signed contracts with Sikorsky Aircraft Corp. of Stratford, Conn., for the first three Black Hawk helicopters. Building those helicopters will take an additional 12 to 18 months, the GAO report said. That would put their delivery date in late 2010 or early 2011.

The surveillance planes will take even longer to build: 18 months to two years, the report said.

Mexico says it needs the help to match the strength of the cartels.

"We have before us a task that is still challenging and inconclusive," said Julian Ventura, Mexican undersecretary of foreign relations for North America. "Our societies demand and deserve strong and safe communities, communities that can develop without the threat of violence and drugs."

Hawley is Latin America correspondent for USA TODAY and The Arizona Republic

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