Mexico Reconsiders Drug War

Mexico Reconsiders Drug War

Mexico Reconsiders Drug War
By David Cox

This post on “Mexico Reconsiders Drug War” is a commentary by David Cox who has lived 30 years in Mexico.

You can find the article posted on Mexico News Daily.

War on drugs was a mistake: Osorio Chong

What Chong is essentially saying is that Mexico’s government was not aware of the kickback of pressuring the containment and capture of those who grew, fabricated, and distributed these drugs. Somehow they thought that they could just take the drugs off the streets without causing alarm or reaction from the drug lords that put those drugs on the street.

This is a complex problem so let me explain it as I understand it.

The Problem with Mexico

I love Mexico, and it is the birthplace of my wife, and I have dedicated most of my life to reaching people for Christ in Mexico. Unfortunately, the problem here is that Mexico is milk-toast on some things when they need to be strong.

If we go back into the history of Mexico, back in the 1970s, there was a revolt by College students at UNAM, the big national state university. Instead of contending with it as any other government would (send in riot police, charge and jail those destroying property, let the rest go), they sent in the army in helicopters with machine guns shooting the students on the ground in the housing complex where they lived and were protesting.

Overkill is an understatement. With thousands that went missing and rumors of soldiers dressing up in Emergency Ambulance personnel uniforms, and carrying the wounded out to the deserts to never be heard from again, and then in the days afterward, a lot of the more important key figures in the student movement being searched for and likewise missing, the issue is a black eye for Mexico.

The key point to understand (from the point of view of an outsider) is that the government took a position of meekness after that. Really meek is a biblical trait, but this was more outright cowardice. They refused to do hard confrontation after that on almost a unilateral basis.

Ripples into Mexican History

While ex-president Filipe Calderon may have done some things incorrectly in his presidency, he understand that Mexico was getting to the point where the elected government had lost control of the machine. The drug lords had their people within the government, and through them, they controlled everything. The declaration of war of drugs simply was a salvo across their bow, saying “no more.”

But this lack of “intestinal fortitude” resurfaces over and over in Mexican political figures. The answer is to cave in rather than confront. Mexico as a whole is simply letting the drug trade dictate what their laws are going to be. There is a cowardice that grows each year, and while most Mexicans hate what they see that drugs are doing to their country and to their own family and friends, they don’t have the guts to confront it. Rather than confrontation, they see the “best” road for them as the other ex-president, Vicente Fox, to legalize marijuana (and all drugs). These “convictions” could very well just be their real position because they are or would like to be drug users. But in reality, I don’t think that is as much a motivator as is the threats and benefits of falling into coersion with the drug lords.

Coersion with Drug Lords

I had an interesting conversation with somebody in the higher ups of the police in Mexico City. They commented to me that Mexico City was reducing their actual policemen on the street by about 70%. I commented that, “then we have no police force really”. This person said, “no”. What is going on is that the drug lords in Mexico City is in negotiation with the politicians. The politicians don’t like the murders, the kidnappings, and the robberies. (Notice no mention of drug use). They don’t like the gangs.

The drug lords said, “Let us control things and all that will disappear. You let us sell our drugs without any real opposition, and we will take care of the rest, and you get rid of the policemen (except for a token force for good looks).” The politicians accepted. Since the drug lords are jealous, and they don’t allow other independents outside of their cartel to “do business on their turf,” they have eyes and ears everywhere. Any independents are silenced and stopped. When you see a drug bust on TV, it is not the cartel’s people but the competition.

So this is like old Chicago’s Al Capone’s world. The drug lord and his cartel become the government. El Chapo Guzman’s home town praises him because he comes giving gifts to be pictured as a modern day Robin Hood.

My Opinion

If the general population doesn’t find the intestinal fortitude to confront villians and gangster mofia types, then they will lose their country to these people, and Mexico will enter into a kind of slavery like the old world times. Right, justice, and righteousness seem to be lost values in our world today. Moreover without a Christian foundation, these things just don’t work. If you look around, the key religions in Mexico don’t preach or teach morality. Homosexuality is rappant. Homosexual and lesbian couples are adopting children as per Mexican law. Drunkenness seems out of control, and now it is a growing problem among teenagers and younger kids. Is this in any way beneficial to Mexico? No it is not. But that is what is happening. Pray for Mexico.