Nothing changes in the war on drugs
By Jaime Díaz
Hooray for the war on terror! Hooray for the war on drugs! These battlefronts continue to show success after success don’t they?
The media has shown Mexican military officers arrested for working with Beltran Leyva’s organization—the "Gulf Cartel" and in December of 2008 even beauty queen Miss Sinaloa,
Well, it sounds like a happy ending, right? Not really. Because the Gulf Cartel is only one of the many Mexican drug cartels in the country—attacking and weakening one cartel only increases market-share for the others. The Calderón government argues that they are winning this war on drugs even if the majority of the drug dealers being arrested, extradited, killed and harassed tend to belong to Beltran Leyva’s Gulf Cartel.
There are daily accounts about the escalating violence in Mexico being fueled by arms that come in from the US. And the violence itself is deemed a clear indication by Calderón’s government that the war on drugs and terror is being fought and won, and that brave Mexican soldiers, police and civilians are giving up their lives in defense of their country.
But escalating violence means Mexicans can no longer travel safely outside of their own homes. Shootouts and murders along the highways connecting cities and towns have become common
. Gangs and narco-traffickers extort and kidnap openly and freely as they regroup and expand their operations into other parts of the country. On Mexican Independence Day in 2008, several civilians, including children, were killed by grenades thrown at the celebrating crowds in Morelia’s plaza. The attack was said to be narco-related.To offset illegal importation of arms used by cartels, the US plans to send armored vehicles to bolster the Mexican army. But if you ask US or Mexican officials, "Mexico has not become a failed state." Clouding Mexican sovereignty is a US mantra that became apparent with the Bush Administration and somewhat continued by the Obama Administration that claims US efforts and support of the war on drugs must be strong to prevent Mexico’s narco-trafficers from entering the US market, even if this means compromising Mexico’s sovereignty.
But how did this Mexican war on drugs begin? Didn’t it seem like this problem used to be a lot less violent?
In July of 2006, the Mexican presidential elections were in full swing and the race was close. On Election Day, former Head of Government of the Federal District, Andres Manuel López Obrador, and the former Governor of Michoacán, Felipe Calderón, were neck and neck and it looked as if a recount would be inevitable.
Despite the small and contested 0.56 percentage point lead that was used to declare conservative PANista (Partido Acción Nacional) Felipe Calderón the victor, Partido de la Revolución Democrática candidate López Obrador and his supporters struggled to rally international observers and Mexican law to their cause, but the media and US officials painted López Obrador as little more than a sore loser. The result—the Michoacano PANista was deemed the winner and exiting President Fox left the presidency in the hands of a fellow party member. However, the actual Mexican people were much less inclined to rally behind Felipe Calderón as their president-elect.
Sound familiar?
Having "won" the election, whether legitimately or illegitimately, Felipe Calderón encountered a country deeply mistrustful of him and his party. He even had to sneak into office to take the presidential oath. What’s a president to do in such a situation? Who to look to as a role model? Bush! Of course!
And so began his campaign against the drug cartels and their evil ways. At least that is the smoke and mirrors presented to the public, because in reality, the war against the narco-traffickers has really been applied against only one cartel and any opposition to this rule has been attacked in this ever-expanding war on drugs. Throw in some H1N1 hysteria and guess what happens? The Mexican people are scared and want to feel safe. Calderón’s approval ratings in June, 2009 reached an all-time high.
But who is benefiting from this violence? Will Mexico finally be free of drug dealers—narcotraficantes—and their cartels once the violence winds down? What has Mexico lost by trusting in Calderón?
We know the Mexican people have lost peace because of this new violence. We know the Gulf Cartel continues to take heavier losses than any other drug cartel. We know Governor López Obrador "lost" the election. We know the US continues to build a wall at the border where hundreds of lives are lost every year. The sum of all these errors eventually leads to the same conclusion that history has taught us time and again—people get hurt in conflicts, poor people usually bear the brunt and drug problems persist. Yet we fail to listen to history’s lessons and insist on repeating them.
For example, take Colombia in the 1980s. Former Senator Pablo Escobar had his immunity status removed so that he could be prosecuted as the leader of the Medellín Cartel. He ordered the executions of any judges, police, army soldiers, informers and anyone else who dared attack him. He ordered bombings in the capital of Bogotá. His goal was to terrorize the nation into submission and it almost worked.
Back then in Colombia, government officials argued that this was a war against a drug baron and that the country was winning. Increased bloodshed and violence were seen as a positive sign—the government was winning; when a rat is cornered, it fights. And so the bloodshed continued and the government sought the help of los PEPEs (a group comprised of right-wing paramilitaries, competing drug cartels from Cali, and other evil elements that supported the elimination of Pablo Escobar and his cartel). Extraditions to the US moved his allies into new markets.
Finally, with the help of los PEPEs’ brutal tactics, the government cornered and executed Pablo Escobar. The war on terror had been won. The country was saved. Right?
Today we know the war on Pablo Escobar only weakened the Medellín Cartel and allowed its competitors to gain an advantage against them by working with government troops and resources. In sum, a competitor in the drug trade was eliminated; nothing more, nothing less. Their civil war continues to this day. The drug trade has continued to thrive and Colombia has become even more synonymous with cocaine and heroin than it was in the past. Violence is commonplace. Civilians are terrorized in the countryside as drug dealers move into their lands. Colombian nationals traveling abroad are treated with suspicion. Nothing has changed.
The future may hold a similar fate for Mexico. It will show that Mexico’s remaining drug cartels have benefited from the war on drugs, just as the ones left behind in Colombia did after the Medellín Cartel’s power was diminished. Mexican cartels will benefit by having one competitor, the Gulf Cartel, weakened and gain market share. The drug business will continue; they will continue to bribe police and other officials to join their sphere of influence and continue to bring down those who refuse to work with them and those working for competitors. These new PEPEs will become the beneficiaries from Felipe Calderón’s illusory war on drugs. Nothing will change.
But Calderón will find it harder to get the Mexican people to believe his lies as they begin to see through his smoke and mirrors. They will continue to see a failed president. They will realize that declaring H1N1 an epidemic really just crashed the economy and left its borders closed to its own business exporters. They will continue to see a failed president who, rather than fighting for the rights and needs of his countrymen would rather meet with President Obama to discuss how they can work together to fight Calderón’s war on drugs, while avoiding the country’s real social and economic problems. And so nothing changes.
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