Thread: US Cables: Mexico drug war lacks clear strategy

guardian.co.uk
KATHERINE CORCORAN

US Cables: Mexico drug war lacks clear strategy



Associated Press= MEXICO CITY (AP) — Mexico's 4-year-old assault on drug cartels lacks a clear strategy and a modernized military, and suffers from infighting among security agencies, according to U.S. State Department cables leaked to WikiLeaks.

The classified and secret memos posted on several media websites Thursday stand in stark contrast to the public declarations by Mexico and the U.S. about the success of the war on organized crime. The cables call into question many of the efforts publicly touted by the two countries, from the use of the Mexican army, which is described as outdated, slow and risk averse, to the United States' $1.4 billion Merida Initiative, which is seen as ill-conceived and doing little so far to fight drug traffickers.

In one cable, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton asks about how the stress is affecting President Felipe Calderon's "personality and management style," while a cable by U.S. Ambassador to Mexico Carlos Pascual notes that Calderon has admitted to having a tough year and has appeared "down" in meetings.

"Calderon has aggressively attacked Mexico's drug-trafficking organizations but has struggled with an unwieldy and uncoordinated interagency and spiraling rates of violence that have made him vulnerable to criticism that his anti-crime strategy has failed," reads a Jan. 29 memo called "Scenesetter for Opening of the Defense Bilateral Working Group" that also criticizes competition among Mexican security agencies, corruption and Mexico's abysmally low prosecution rate.

In a memo date Oct. 5, 2009, then-Undersecretary for the Interior Geronimo Gutierrez Fernandez, who oversaw domestic security, "expressed a real concern with 'losing' certain regions."

"It is damaging Mexico's international reputation, hurting foreign investment, and leading to a sense of government impotence, Gutierrez said," according to the memo.

"If we do not produce a tangible success that is recognizable to the Mexican people, it will be difficult to sustain the confrontation into the next administration," the memo quotes him as saying.

Calderon has insisted that the spike in violence that has killed more than 28,000 people since 2006 is a sign that the drug cartels are on the ropes and that the government controls all areas of the country.

U.S. officials stage public ceremonies for the handover of helicopters and other Merida Initiative equipment and talk about Mexico's reform from a closed to an oral trial system a key tool in fighting the drug war. Privately the U.S. notes: "Prosecution rates for organized crime-related offenses are dismal; 2 percent of those detained are brought to trial. Only 2 percent of those arrested in Ciudad Juarez have even been charged with a crime."

Calderon's office said Thursday afternoon it had just seen the cables and had no immediate comment.

The Oct. 5 cable the U.S. says it would be willing to provide Mexico more training and technology, particularly in intelligence gathering, but that it will take "the development of strong trust through proper vetting." The cable also says "it would be excellent to get to the point where there is no longer impunity for (Joaquin) Chapo Guzman," Mexico's most-wanted drug lord.

One bright spot are the Mexican Marines, which led what U.S. Ambassador to Mexico Carlos Pascual called in one memo "a major victory for President Calderon" — the offensive a year ago that killed drug lord Arturo Beltran Leyva, head of cartel that bears his last name.

Since then, the marines, "with extensive U.S. training," according to the cable by Pascual, have also taken down drug lords Sergio Villarreal Barragan, who was fighting for control of the Beltran Leyva gang after its leaders death, and Antonio Ezequiel Cardenas Guillen, or "Tony Tormenta," a top leader of the Gulf cartel.

But Pascual also notes that the U.S., who had information locating Beltran Leyva, originally took it to the army, which refused to move quickly.

The Jan. 29 cable notes friction between the army and the marines.

An Oct. 28, 2009 cable from the U.S. Embassy in Mexico City describes a proposal by Mexican Defense Secretary Gen. Guillermo Galvan Galvan to control the violence with a type of state of emergency suspending, some constitutional rights in several cities, including Ciudad Juarez, a city across the border from El Paso considered one of the most violent in the world.

The cable noted that the Mexican government had not taken such action since World War II.

But then-Interior Minister Fernando Gomez Mont batted down the idea, and in the cable, then-Charge d'Affaires John Feeley said that U.S. government analysis showed the benefits were "uncertain at best, and the political costs appear high."

An Oct. 5 cable describes a dinner that the Mexican Attorney General's Office hosted for a delegation from the U.S. Department of Justice, quoting Gutierrez as saying the Merida Initiative was too hastily crafted to be effective.

"In retrospect he and other GOM (Government of Mexico) officials realize that not enough strategic thought went into Merida in the early phase," the memo said. "There was too much emphasis in the initial planning on equipment, which they now know is slow to arrive and even slower to be of direct utility in the fight against the DTOs (drug-trafficking organizations.)"

Both the U.S. and Mexico have said recently that Merida money in the future would be directed toward creating more effective institutions.

The Jan. 29 memo notes that military surges in Ciudad Juarez have not worked.

Gutierrez and National Security System Coordinator Jorge Tello Peon said Calderon has to stop the violence in Ciudad Juarez, according to the cable.

"Politically ... Calderon has staked so much of his reputation there, with a major show of force that, to date, has not panned out," the cable said Gutierrez and Peon told U.S. officials at the dinner.

Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/feedarticle/9389556

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