From that Wikipedia article:
Do we know the fates of other Mexican community self-defense groups? How many survive, and why?
Thing is, continuing with the stupid war on drugs* means that it is not only in Mexico were the power of the drug traffickers will increase.
Why The War on Drugs Is a Huge Failure
- A lot of the power that we have seen in Mexico recently has been thanks to the war on drugs that paradoxically continues to make drug trafficking to be more profitable than before, leading to corruption in both developed or developing nations (and the US is not immune to that) and an increase in the power of gangsters. Not only in Mexico but also in the US.
The Economics Behind the U.S. Government’s Unwinnable War on Drugs
Out-bluffing the government, and actually defeating them on the battlefield, are two really really different things, this is not a clever “Gotcha”, it’s not the same man. And you know it.
With that said, this sounds like the kind of situation where Mexico’s allies ought to offer military aid. Right? I’m not asking this rhetorically - is it something that could actually be worked out?
The prison industry is a business just like the drug cartels are a business. In this case they happen to be working hand in hand.
No, Mexico is far from a failed state.
Government has many purposes. To provide security, health, education, infrastructure, economic management, jobs, promote agriculture and tourism, foreign policy, etc.
Mexico remains a deeply religious country. It has acceptable health, education and management. Its current president is generally well liked, and has done a reasonable job of dealing with Trump and the US.
Mexico has some areas which are problematic. There are gangs in some areas, and journalism and mayor can be dangerous professions in some cities. The army and police are not always able to solve some problems, which are becoming more severe. But Mexico remains an attractive place to live, and able to attract wealthy mega corporations, tourism and investment. There have been some measures to deal with corruption, though success has been limited. However, the President is motivated and is personally considered to be honest.
I’m not actually arguing that Mexico is a failed state, but I don’t really see the relevance of this sentence. Somalia, the archetypal “failed state”, is also a “deeply religious country”. Before Somalia, Lebanon was another notorious “failed state” for a long time, and was also “deeply religious” (in the case of Lebanon, one issue was that not all of the Lebanese were deeply adhering to the same religion, or to the same sect of the same religion).
I agree the statement isn’t that significant — religious countries can be violent. It was more to emphasize that daily activities for most Mexicans have not been changed. Social structures like religion, health and education systems go on. In failed states, they do not.
There is a good article on this weeks Economist discussing the raid. It seems to have been poorly planned with very limited backup, resulting in a very public crisis. The magazine argues the President favours a diplomatic approach rather than strengthening the police and judiciary. It is true violence seems worse when the government is aggressive, but the strategy has not yet been successful. The article suggests economic reforms may be more successful in the long run, which is controversial, and these reforms will take time.
What allies are those? The Americans? The last I heard they want to wall us in and send us the bill. And you might want to learn the history of all the gringo invasions for the last nearly 200 years.
I know I will get in trouble for saying this but people posting about México on this thread really have no clue about the true situation we live in. And to even suggest some type of military invasion is typical. Maybe you should try to figure out how to stop the war on drugs that has had horrible consequences for us as a nation and as people that want to live peacefully. Maybe you could do a bit better curbing your drug problem that funds this lawlessness. That would help far more than adding to the violence by sending unwanted foreign military aid(?).
Not suggesting that anyone “invade” Mexico. Not suggesting either that America is the specific ally who could offer military aid to Mexico. Mexico has other allies. And I’m in agreement with your take on the drug situation anyway.
We belong to the OEA which has a very loose military agreement among its members. But other than the US, none would even think of any kind of military assistance. It wouldn’t even be considered. Most members have plenty of their own security issues to deal with to intervene in anothers.
Besides, Calderón tried a heavy miltary response against the cartels and that only worked to increase the violence and add to human rights abuses. AMLO proposes a different approach and that will fail also. There will never be any winner in a drug war. Other countries such as Portugal have realized this and instituted a successful strategy of treating it as a public health problem and not criminal. Drug abuse there has been greatly reduced along with a big decline in the crime rate.
We do not need a third world country at our back door. the people of Mexico deserve our help in defeating these drug cartels. Mexico is a beautiful place and holds large amounts of the worlds natural resources .we never hesitate in flexing our military might around the world, why not in our own back yard? I suspect the corruption is on both sides of the border.
Why not? Well, flexing our military might has an… imperfect… record, for starters. Also, flexing military might is hard to distinguish from going to war, and not going to war with or in your direct neighbors is generally seen as a good thing. But the main reason is that military intervention is not likely to address what causes and perpetuates the cartels’ abilities to thrive in Mexico.
As to a failed state, while not universal, significant chunks of law enforcement and judiciary are ineffective, for hire or for sale, or actively engaged in crime. That would put Mexico closer to failed than not, imo. What’s not helping Mexico is that they are engaged in fighting a problem that isn’t theirs: drug smuggling. If they entirely ignored the drugs, but used those resources to combat murder and kidnapping, it’d be interesting to see what would happen.
What happens now? It isn’t correct to say that U.S. government or police forces have a monopoly on force, or that they don’t sometimes lose a battle. Not only did this happen lots of times during the Civil War, but more recently, the branch davidians forced the ATF squad sent to arrest them to retreat.
So the ATF lost the battle…but they didn’t lose the war. Overwhelming forces surrounded the compound and while it was unfortunate (and somewhat of a PR disaster) what happened to some of the hostages, the key thing is that no one who shot at U.S. government forces came out of the compound except in cuffs or a body bag.
I would assume that this is what the Mexican authorities are expected to do? Prevent anyone who might be associated with the cartel from leaving culiacan, surround the city, and crush any resistance one street at a time?
In the first place, our military has the means to combat the cartels. It isn’t a problem of firepower. They fought the cartels during Calderón’s term and much of Peña Nieto’s. It only served to increase casualties of innocents.
Too much is being made of the failed attempt to get Chapo’s sons. It was simply a poorly planned operation. Incorrect tactics. Once the cartels detect large movements of troops and equipment, they quickly head for their hideouts in the Sierra Madre. So they went with a smaller force and that turned into a disaster.
If the narcos were getting rich off of drugs, they wouldn’t be so heavy in the secuestros and the extorsión and all of that other, lovely stuff. If you legalized drugs, and even if the USA legalized drugs, do you thing that these guys would just lay down their guns and start hugging each other?
No, of course not. But drug money is what finances the infrastructure that enables the other operations. And it frees resources to combat other types of crime. It wouldn’y happen overnight. And maybe the real waelthy narcos would be content sinking their money into legitament businesses with no risk of jail or death.
Godfather III vibes, here.
I would argue that the US harms Mexico in three ways:
- Dutiful, hard working Mexicans migrate to the US during their prime years to earn money for the rest of the family, leaving behind all the ones who couldn’t be sold on the idea that they had a duty to be a good son/daughter. Basically, the country’s entire 20-40 year old population segment is highly skewed towards slackers and deadbeats.
- Tourist money, similarly, helps to keep the Mexican economy afloat and even encourage it to stay “rustic” so that there is no need for the country to advance and modernize.
- And, obviously, the US serves as a giant consumer of recreational drugs and Mexico is a good staging ground for what is a multi hundreds of billions dollar industry. Remember that the budget for NASA is only something like $10b a year. Drug cartels have the financial resources - if they can corner the market - to put satellites into outer space.
#2 has kept Mexico from ever advancing. But, I think, the increase in #1 has helped the cartels to really take off.
Whether to call that “a failed state”, I don’t know, but it’s a more significant problem than anyone in the US is really considering.
None of those are the US’s responsibility, and at any rate, the first two are questionable- what evidence is there that Mexico is full of lazy, stupid deadbeats because the smart, hardworking ones are in the US? And I’d wager that the VAST majority of US/Mexico tourism is in 3 areas- the beach resorts like Cancun, the border cities like Matamoros or Tijuana, and then the archaelogical sites like Chichen Itza. None of that is keeping the country rustic.
The third is less questionable, but at any rate, it’s an effect of the US illegal drug trade, not something deliberate that we’re doing to Mexico. It just happens that Mexico is a convenient and economically advantageous place to funnel drugs to the US and to grow a great deal of them as well. But if Mexico wasn’t convenient or advantageous, that trade would find other ways to satisfy that demand.
What is the USA supposed to do about this “harm,” if by merely existing, we draw the “dutiful, hardworking” Mexicans into the USA? Should we…build a wall?