The latest bad news includes the following:
- The Associated Press (AP) reported on August 18, 2011 that the Mexican navy found four bodies that could include three marines and one naval cadet that had been kidnapped by drug cartel gunmen earlier in August. This is not the first time that drug cartel members had kidnapped and killed members of the Mexican armed forces. The article also reported on a gun fight between Mexican soldiers and suspected drug cartel gunmen which resulted in the death of eight gunmen and the confiscation of 10 automatic rifles, 2,000 rounds of ammunition, and military uniforms.
Imagine if this situation happened in the United States: soldiers being actively kidnapped and killed, soldiers deployed in the streets of America conducting Wild West shootouts with violent drug gang members. We would not tolerate it and yet our political class seems to ignore the whole illegal drug issue, both in our country and in Mexico, while the violence gets worse and worse.
- An AP article on August 18, 2011 reported that the Federal government had busted a drug trafficking ring that was being operating in San Diego by Mexico's most powerful drug cartel. The twist on this typical case is that the drug cartel was in a partnership with Iraqi immigrants who were not only trafficking illegal drugs but were also involved with assault rifles, grenades, and homemade explosives. The bust found 18 pounds of methamphetamine, cocaine, 3,500 pounds of marijuana, four land mines, and more than 30 guns.
Some of the Iraqi suspects who were arrested have ties to an Iraqi criminal gang based in Detroit. The article asserted that many of the Iraqis involved were in this country illegally, having been smuggled into the U.S. via Mexican connections. Part of the bust included information gathered from a DEA undercover agent who was shown a grenade and told more grenades could be bought, with the source of the grenades being the Mexican military.
Here we have an example where a lost "war on drugs" strategy combined with a leaky border is resulting in not only drugs being funneled into the country, enriching the cartels in Mexico, but now we are seeing Mexico acting like a funnel for people from around the world and illegal armaments. The unanswered question in the article is how much of the illegal drug sales cash and illegal weapons from this operation ended up with their criminal allies in Detroit and possibly other American cities?
- Illegal Iraqis' in the country and in cahoots with known, violent drug cartels dealing drugs and weapons. What an ominous new twist. However, not to be outdone, consider another AP story, this one published on August 20, 2011, that discussed how not only are illegal drugs being smuggled into the United States but illegal drugs are now being smuggled from the United States into Mexico.
Confused? According to the article, a Los Angeles doctor and 14 other people have been arrested and charged with conspiracy to smuggle prescription drugs into Mexico from California. It seems that it is easier to sell large amounts of illegal pills to pharmacies in Mexico than to keep a low profile and sell small amounts to street dealers in the United States. Once the Mexican pharmacies have the illegal pills from the United States, American addicts can take the short trip into Mexico to purchase all of the illegal pills that they want.
The economics are apparently quite lucrative. A smuggler buys thousands of pills in the United States for about $2 a pill, drives into Tijuana and sells those thousands of pills for $3.50 each to the pharmacy. The pharmacy turns around and sells the pills to addicts, from both Mexico and the United States, for $6 a pill, all done without the need to get a valid prescription from any legitimate doctor.
- A New York Times article that appeared in the August 7, 2011 issue of the St. Petersburg Times described how the United States was expanding its role in the Mexican government's fight against the drug cartels. We have already deployed CIA personnel into the country along with retired military personnel and are considering sending in private security contractors to help in "turning around a multibillion dollar effort that so far has shown few results" relative to fighting the drug cartels. Besides working with Mexican military units to gather intelligence about cartels and helping plan operations against the cartels, plans are being considered to physically embed a U.S. team of military contractors into a Mexican counternarcotics unit.
I realize that we have a serious problem with the drug cartels but I am not sure this is the right approach. It seems to be only treating a symptom where the illness is the use of illegal drugs in the United States. The use of military contractors in Iraq proved out to usually not be a good strategy and the CIA track record of operating in foreign countries is also not perfect by any stretch of the imagination.
Just seems we are randomly groping and trying to fix a problem that the political class and the Federal government does not understand. No matter how many people we send to Mexico and how many drug kings are arrested or killed and how many drug trafficking networks are crashed, the underlying root cause of our problems, drug usage, will still exist and new people will arise to supply that usage.
- There is also a political issue of sending large numbers of CIA agents, retired military people, and military contractors to Mexico. An article by Lydia Cacho, writing in El Universal, an article that was summarized in the August 19, 2011 issue of The Week magazine, worried that Mexico was moving towards military rule as the Mexican military assumes more and more government responsibility and flexibility to address the drug cartel violence and problems, destroying the Mexican democracy in the process.
Apparently the current Mexican president wants to allow the military to take over domestic police functions, override civil liberties and install wiretaps as needed, all of which could easily lead to a military regime. Ms. Cocha writes "giving the army more authority won't vanquish crime, it will only vanquish our freedom."
And who might get blamed for the loss of democracy if Ms. Cocha's fears become reality? How about the United States who is trying to improve the abilities and effectiveness of the Mexican military? By sending people into Mexico to help the military, we are likely to get painted as accomplices if the Mexican military does eventually destroy the democracy.
What a mess. We are no longer dealing with only drugs. We are dealing with illegal Iraqis dealing with guns and grenades in addition to drugs, a reverse illegal drug pipeline into Mexico in order to make illegal drug sales easier, increasing violence against anyone in Mexico fighting the drug cartels, and a very real possibility that U.S. illegal drug usage will entangle U.S.military and intelligence resources in the toppling of the Mexican democracy. All of which will do nothing to effectively remedy the current illegal drug situation.
Why do we think the root causes of all of the above chaos will not get resolved? Consider an MSNBC report that appeared on their website on June, 2, 2011, "Global War On Drugs Has Failed, Key Panel Says." A United Nation's commission has reported that the "war on drugs" has failed and that governments should consider legalizing marijuana and other controlled drug substances. The commission included former heads of state, a former UN secretary general, and others.
The Global Commission On Drug Policy has concluded that the "war on drugs has failed, with devastating consequences for individuals and societies around the world." I am sure most Mexicans would agree with this conclusion. The report went on to state that "repressive strategies will not solve the drug problem, and the war on drugs has not, and cannot, be won."
Unfortunately, the report felt that the political classes around the world should have the courage to move towards this solution of the problem, a trait that is usually sorely missing from our political leaders. That is why Step 26 from "Love My Country, Loathe My Government" needs to be implemented. This step provides a process to address this issue which minimizes any courage required by our political class. Waiting for them to step up and resolve this problem is no longer a possibility, given that we are forty years into the "war on drugs" and no progress has been made by our politicians.
Every week the situation gets worse in Mexico. And every week, the American political class ignores the danger to not only our addicted citizens but to democracy abroad and possibly within this country in the future.
Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at http://www.loathemygovernment.com/. It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday
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http://www.reason.com/
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