reply to post by burdman30ott6
Wow, very interesting and insightful thread.
Mexico is really disintegrating and this thread really needs to be bumped up.
And yes, I agree with you, logically speaking why the sam heck are we way over in the Middle East when we have our border to the south to protect?
I love warm weather, I mean I really like it hot and I love Mexican food and architecture, so I suggested to my husband and son when we really both
retire we could move south, but with the crazy drug wars down there, no way........and I'm learning Spanish to boot.
Something really needs to be done.
And good question, why is this not played up like Iran?
Because there is big money in the drug trade and some of the fingers in the cookie jar are our very own Alphabet Agencies here in the good old USA,
that's why
On April 23, two patrol cars were ambushed by armed gunman in downtown Ciudad Juarez. In the ensuing firefight, seven policemen were killed as
well as a 17-year old boy who was caught in the crossfire. All of the assailants escaped uninjured fleeing the crime-scene in three SUVs. The bold
attack was executed in broad daylight in one of the busiest areas of the city. According to the Associated Press:
"Hours after the attack, a painted message directed to top federal police commanders and claiming responsibility for the attack appeared on a wall in
downtown Ciudad Juarez. It was apparently signed by La Linea gang, the enforcement arm of the Juarez drug cartel. The Juarez cartel has been locked in
a bloody turf battle with the Sinaloa cartel, led by Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman.
"This will happen to you ... for being with El Chapo Guzman and to all the dirtbags who support him. Sincerely, La Linea," the message read." ("7
Mexican police officers killed in Ciudad Juarez", Olivia Torres, AP)
The massacre in downtown Juarez is just the latest incident in Mexico's bloody drug war. Between 5 to 6 more people will be killed on Saturday, and on
every day thereafter with no end in sight. It's a war that cannot be won, but that hasn't stopped the Mexican government from sticking to its basic
game-plan.
The experts and politicians disagree about the origins of the violence in Juarez, but no one disputes that 23,000 people have been killed since 2006
in a largely futile military operation initiated by Mexican president Felipe Calderon. Whether the killing is the result of the ongoing turf-war
between the rival drug cartels or not, is irrelevant. The present policy is failing and needs to be changed. The militarization of the war on drugs
has been a colossal disaster which has accelerated the pace of social disintegration. Mexico is quickly becoming a failed state, and Washington's
deeply-flawed Merida Initiative, which provides $1.4 billion in aid to the Calderon administration to intensify military operations, is largely to
blame.
The surge in narcotics trafficking and drug addiction go hand-in-hand with destructive free trade policies which have fueled their growth. NAFTA, in
particular, has triggered a massive migration of people who have been pushed off the land because they couldn't compete with heavily-subsidized
agricultural products from the US. Many of these people drifted north to towns like Juarez which became a manufacturing hub in the 1990s. But Juarez's
fortunes took a turn for the worse a few years later when competition from the Far East grew fiercer. Now most of the plants and factories have been
boarded up and the work has been outsourced to China where subsistence wages are the norm. Naturally, young men have turned to the cartels as the only
visible means of employment and upward mobility. That means that free trade has not only had a ruinous effect on the economy, but has also created an
inexhaustible pool of recruits for the drug trade.
Washington's Merida Initiative--which provides $1.4 billion in aid to the Calderon administration to intensify military operations--has only made
matters worse. The public's demand for jobs, security and social programs, has been answered with check-points, crackdowns and state repression. The
response from Washington hasn't been much better. Obama hasn't veered from the policies of the prior administration. He is as committed to a military
solution as his predecessor, George W. Bush.
But the need for change is urgent. Mexico is unraveling and, as the oil wells run dry, the prospect of a failed state run by drug kingpins and
paramilitaries on US's southern border becomes more and more probable. The drug war is merely a symptom of deeper social problems; widespread
political corruption, grinding poverty, soaring unemployment, and the erosion of confidence in public institutions. But these issues are brushed
aside, so the government can pursue its one-size-fits-all military strategy without second-guessing or remorse. Meanwhile, the country continues to
fall apart.
THE CLASHING CARTELS
The big cartels are engaged in a ferocious battle for the drug corridors around Juarez. The Sinaloa, Gulf and La Familia cartels have formed an
alliance against the upstart Los Zetas gang. Critics allege that the Calderon administration has close ties with the Sinaloa cartel and refuses to
arrest its members. Here's an excerpt from an Al Jazeera video which points to collusion between Sinaloa and the government.
"The US Treasury identifies at least 20 front companies that are laundering drug money for the Sinaloa cartel...There are allegations that the
Mexican government is "favoring" the cartel. According to Diego Enrique Osorno, investigative journalist and author of the "The Sinaloa Cartel":
"There are no important detentions of Sinaloa cartel members. But the government is hunting down adversary groups, new players in the world of drug
trafficking."
International Security Expert, Edgardo Buscaglia, says that "of over 50,000 drug related arrests, only a very small percentage have been Sinaloa
cartel members, and no cartel leaders. Dating back to 2003, law enforcement data shows objectively that the government has been hitting the weakest
organized crime groups in Mexico, but they have not been hitting the main crime group, the Sinaloa Federation, that's responsible for 45% of the drug
trade in this country." (Al Jazeera)
There's no way to verify whether the Calderon administration is in bed with the Sinaloa cartel, but Al Jazeera's report is pretty damning. A similar
report appeared in the Los Angeles Times which revealed that the government had diverted funds that were earmarked for struggling farmers (who'd been
hurt by NAFTA) "to the families of notorious drug traffickers and several senior government officials, including the agriculture minister." Here's an
excerpt from the Los Angeles Times:
"According to several academic studies, as much as 80% of the money went to just 20% of the registered farmers...Among the most eyebrow-raising
recipients were three siblings of billionaire drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, head of the powerful Sinaloa cartel, and the brother of Guzman's
onetime partner, Arturo Beltran Leyva". ("Mexico farm subsidies are going astray", Tracy Wilkinson, Los Angeles Times)
There's no doubt that if the LA Times knows about the circular flow of state money to drug traffickers, than the Obama administration knows too. So
why does the administration persist with the same policy and continue to support the people they pretend to be fighting?
In forty years, US drug policy has never changed. The same "hunt them down, bust them, and lock them up" philosophy continues to this day. That's why
many critics believe that the drug war is really about control, not eradication. It's a matter of who's in line to rake in the profits; small-time
pushers who run their own operations or politically-connected kingfish who have agents in the banks, the intelligence agencies, the military and the
government. Currently, in Juarez, the small fries' are getting wiped out while the big-players are getting stronger. In a year or so, the Sinaloa
cartel will control the streets, the drug corridors, and the border. The violence will die down and the government will proclaim "victory", but the
flow of drugs into the US will increase while the situation for ordinary Mexicans will continue to deteriorate.
Here's a clip from an article in the Independent by veteran journalist Hugh O'Shaughnessy:
"The outlawing and criminalizing of drugs and consequent surge in prices has produced a bonanza for producers everywhere, from Kabul to Bogota, but,
at the Mexican border, where an estimated $39,000m in narcotics enter the rich US market every year, a veritable tsunami of cash has been created. The
narcotraficantes, or drug dealers, can buy the murder of many, and the loyalty of nearly everyone. They can acquire whatever weapons they need from
the free market in firearms north of the border and bring them into Mexico with appropriate payment to any official who holds his hand out." ("The
US-Mexico border: where the drugs war has soaked the ground blood red", Hugh O'Shaughnessy The Independent)
It's no coincidence that Kabul and Bogota are the the de facto capitals of the drug universe. US political support is strong in both places, as is
the involvement of US intelligence agencies. But does that suggest that the CIA is at work in Mexico, too? Or, to put it differently: Why is the US
supporting a client that appears to be allied to the most powerful drug cartel in Mexico? That's the question.
THE CHECKERED HISTORY OF THE CIA
In August 1996, investigative journalist Gary Webb released the first installment of Dark Alliance in the San Jose Mercury exposing the CIA's
involvement in the drug trade. The article blew the lid off the murky dealings of the agency's covert operations. Webb's words are as riveting today
as they were when they first appeared 14 years ago:
"For the better part of a decade, a San Francisco Bay Area drug ring sold tons of cocaine to the Crips and Bloods street gangs of Los Angeles and
funneled millions in drug profits to a Latin American guerrilla army run by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, a Mercury News investigation has
found.
This drug network opened the first pipeline between Colombia's cocaine cartels and the black neighborhoods of Los Angeles, a city now known as the
"crack'' capital of the world. The cocaine that flooded in helped spark a crack explosion in urban America
and provided the cash and connections needed for L.A.'s gangs to buy automatic weapons.
It is one of the most bizarre alliances in modern history: the union of a U.S.-backed army attempting to overthrow a revolutionary socialist
government and the Uzi-toting "gangstas'' of Compton and South-Central Los Angeles." ("America's 'crack' plague has roots in Nicaragua war", Gary
Webb, San Jose Mercury News)
Counterpunch editor Alexander Cockburn has also done extensive research on the CIA/drug connection. Here's an excerpt from an article titled "The
Government's Dirty Little Secrets", which ran in the Los Angeles Times.
"CIA Inspector General Frederick Hitz finally conceded to a U.S. congressional committee that the agency had worked with drug traffickers and had
obtained a waiver from the Justice Department in 1982 (the beginning of the Contra funding crisis) allowing it not to report drug trafficking by
agency contractors. Was the lethal arsenal deployed at Roodeplaat assembled with the advice from the CIA and other U.S. agencies? There were certainly
close contacts over the years. It was a CIA tip that led the South African secret police to arrest Nelson Mandela." (The Government's Dirty Little
Secrets, Los Angeles Times, commentary, 1998)
The drug war is the mask behind which the real policy is concealed. The United States is using all the implements in its national security toolbox to
integrate Mexico into a North America Uberstate, a hemispheric free trade zone that removes sovereign obstacles to corporate looting and guarantees
rich rewards for defense contractors. As Ross notes, all of the usual suspects are involved, including the FBI and CIA. That means the killing in
Juarez will continue until Washington's objectives are achieved.
Rest of article & source: www.globalresearch.ca...
Mexico has been very lawless for decades and this situation is getting really scary.
Watch the third video, Alex Jones (who is pretty hairy himself) says these guys along the border are pretty scary.
I feel sorry for the law abiding citizens down around there, it must be hellish to have to live day by day with this lawlessness.
Now, pay particular attention to the last five minutes of the third video. It explains why this is being allowed to happen............
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1-12-2010 by ofhumandescent because: (no reason given)
