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Caribbean-Latin America
Clinton: U.S. can do more to help Mexico fight drug cartels
2010-10-17
Mexico could do more to fight drug cartels ...
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the U.S. can do more to help Mexico battle drug cartels that have started operating more like terrorists and insurgent groups.

"It is one of my highest priorities," Clinton said Friday during a speech in San Francisco at the nonpartisan Commonwealth Club. "This is one of the most difficult fights that any country faces today. We saw it over the last couple of decades in Colombia."

"We are watching drug traffickers undermine and corrupt governments in Central America, and we are watching the brutality and barbarity of their assaults on governors and mayors, the press, as well as each other, in Mexico," she added.

Clinton said the U.S. can do more than sending the Blackhawk helicopters it promised Mexico.
Done that. Blackhawks were used in the air/ground assault that killed 22 Los Zetas in Tamaulipas last month.
She said the U.S. is helping Mexico create an anonymous tipline to report drug cartels.
Done that, too. Nearly every state attorney general has an anonymous hotline; some even for cattle rustling which is a huge problem in rural Mexico, as do most police corporations.
However, she said, it can also help Mexico rebuild its criminal system and train its police force.
Doing that now, except I would argue it's the wrong thing to do: further central police functions, as they already are.
The Mexicans know what to do. Mexico lacks the political will to do it. The Mexican 'Forty Families' like Mexico the way it is.
We've done the training thingy. I think they're now called Los Zetas.
She likened recent drug cartel violence to terror groups. "For the first time, they are using car bombings," Clinton said. "You see them being much more organized in a kind of paramilitary way."
Posted by:Steve White

#7  One solution that citizens on both sides of the border agree on, but the political leaders of both countries refuse to do is to seal the border. Mexicans seem to think that were the border sealed traffickers have nowhere to go, and that were the Mexican government to issue one modern weapon per head if household, their problem,and therefore America's would be cleared up inside of two years.

And I believe them.

And I also believe that the Mexican government had better get in front of this tsunami, because whether or not Mexicans get issued modern weapons, the pushback is coming. Mexicans as no other national identity know they don't need modern weapons for a revolution.
Posted by: badanov   2010-10-17 11:45  

#6  #4 If it seems so, just look at the same old crowd in the Beltway who manage both.

We have to protect our phoney baloney jobs here, gentlemen! We must do something about this immediately! Immediately! Immediately! Harrumph! Harrumph! Harrumph! - Governor William J. Le Petomane Posted by: Procopius2k 2010-10-17 10:05

Channeling Mel Brooks...I love it.
Posted by: WolfDog   2010-10-17 11:39  

#5  Well, we were pretty successful in Columbia and that was a very long hard slog. Just as you stated, it takes political will and that does not come from a country that must have the Inauguration ceremony of it's chief executive behind closed doors.
Posted by: newc   2010-10-17 10:55  

#4  If it seems so, just look at the same old crowd in the Beltway who manage both.

We have to protect our phoney baloney jobs here, gentlemen! We must do something about this immediately! Immediately! Immediately! Harrumph! Harrumph! Harrumph! - Governor William J. Le Petomane
Posted by: Procopius2k   2010-10-17 10:05  

#3  It seems that the war on drug is doing as well as the war on terror. Or is it vice versa?
Posted by: Willy   2010-10-17 08:59  

#2  Tell local law enforcement to start learning/developing counter-sniper tactics because if Los Zetas cross the border you can bet they will bring snipers with them.

Survey probable firing points and fields of fire because Los Zetas will already have that information in hand before they start crossing the border.
Posted by: badanov   2010-10-17 07:36  

#1  Back a few years ago when SOCOM called the drug cartels out #1 threat we should have done what Ms Clinton is talking about. But NO, we did little more than toss the political football around over SB1070 and the fence. Now that the drug cartels have placed execution teams in Arizona she wants to send Mexico training and Blackhawks??? WTF??? We need counter insurgency teams in Pima country and intel nets set up to counter this war that is about to happen here. I believe in the next 24 months we will see the exact same violence here in Arizona that you see across the border. It is too late to stop it, if you try you will be called racist and Holder will come after you, IE Sheriff Joe. All I can say is ammo up and carry everywhere, it wont be long.
Posted by: 49 Pan   2010-10-17 00:36  

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