Mexico, the next Iraq?

[ara87]

Mexico: The next Iraq?

March 25: MSNBC's Contessa Brewer talks with retired U.S. Army General Barry McCaffrey about officials warning President Obama that drug cartels have become "criminal insurgents."

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/29876041#29876041

[cynthiak]

If there were no demand, there would be no supply. spending hundreds of millions of dollars into Mexico or elsewhere to fight drug traffickers would certainly not solve America's drug problem. The problem lies at home and as long as more and more Americans continue to consume huge amount of drugs.

[Pedro Xaramillo]

Most of the drug cartels in the US and in Mexico come from Colombia an ally of the US who openly grows drugs and has commited terrible atrocities, leaders were before charged on basis on violation on human rights but sadly America always give its tacit approval to allies

Everytime the non Anglo parts of Anahuaca and Cenahuaca produce decent leaders they are usually attacked by the US or CIA, look at Allende, look at Castro, Chavez, the Sandanistsa, etc

[freakyfreaky]

Try this one on for size. It's too big, we can't let it fail. Yeah, right. Almost completely beyond control and in complete disrepair.

If they were not a militaristic state before, I see a junta in their future.

The socialists are threatening and the democrats (if you can call em that) can't (or, won't stop) the violence.

The rise of the left and continued threat of drug cartel violence at our Southern border and into South America is the biggest non-story, story of the last decade and the War on Terror/Shock and Awe in Iraq kept the media and U.S. leaders off the ball on the (and I say this sarcastically) existential threat of a failed state to our south.

[Pedro Xaramillo]

Er, sorry freaky but your posts is a little confusing, care to be a little more concise in your explanation, its confusing as you aren't naming exactly who, what and why and which you are referring to, a tad more clarity please man

[Eddo211]

Since the ongoing major crack down By the US and the Mexican Government against transit routes and underground tunnels across the borders of California and Texas, the drug cartels have been battling it out over disappearing profitable routes and territory.
It has become so bad that Mexican gang bangers (In LA) are going over to Mexico to fight for their rights. Many bodies with missing heads, these vatos are not happy. There has been talk of legalizing pot here (I think that will solve half of US illegal drug problem). National Guard is on standby.

How should the Mexican government combat drug cartels? With everything they got without getting killed themselves.

[hipeter924]

Its scary there. :(

And it will only get worse.

[Pedro Xaramillo]

Okay, but everyone forgets the Colombians and Cubans, there are more drugs coming from them, there are Colombian cartels all over the US

Funny thing when people say Latino gangs, they forget that can mean El Salvadorian, Guatemalan, Panamanian, etc. Mexico by far doesn't produce the ammount Colombia does and has none of the human rights abuses Colombia has but because its a US ally it can do what it wants

[freakyfreaky]

Er, sorry freaky but your posts is a little confusing, care to be a little more concise in your explanation, its confusing as you aren't naming exactly who, what and why and which you are referring to, a tad more clarity please man

First, look at what the Mexican President had to do in Juarez within the last 3 months. They had to infiltrate the city with 6,000 troops to stabilize the violence laden border town.

Second, the last two presidental elections in Mexico almost ended in revolution with the left angered by losses some blamed on manipulation. Atleast Calderon is more proactive than Fox dealing with the drug cartel problem. During Fox's tenure, the cartels had infiltrated local and Federal police agencies.

Third, Mexican drug cartels have spread their operations into Southern California with marijuana growing operations in national forests and meth manufacturing labs in desert and outlying communities. Its gone beyond having distribution channels in place in the U.S. like the Columbians arranged, now they're producing in the U.S.

Fourth, its not the 80s anymore, the Mexican cartels are just as big now and powerful and brutal as the Colombians. And, they are on the U.S. border.

Fifth, you aren't any more specific than the specificity you require.

[freakyfreaky]

The biggest sham is this stupid "War on Drugs" that is mostly led by America's never ending grip on these hypocritical "morals, morals morals."

Why was there never a "drug problem" prior to the middle of the 20th century? Inquisitive minds want to know.

War on Terror is the progeny of the War on Drugs. Was there never "terrorism" prior to 2001?

Neo-con psychobabble. The former promised democracy to the Muslim world, the latter promised democracy in Latin America. Both brought to fruition in a Bush presidency.

While democracy made gains in the 1990s, during Bush, Jr.'s presidency those gains retreated to a strong leftist resistance.

We can only wonder what the Middle East will look like in a decade.

[freakyfreaky]

But it remains that the Mexican cartels have every incentive to profit from this as the drug has to come along their byway, to the biggest drug consuming nation on the planet, America. That is why it isn't the Colombians or El Salvadorians or Guatemalans that are profiting from this in the form of cartels operating along the border - it is the Mexican gangs.

All of this of course ignores the fact that America can stop this in one swift stroke by stopping this ridiculous "drug war" and just legalizing it, which will effectively take it off the black market.

Good stuff, Mouse.

[Valerian2]

The biggest sham is this stupid "War on Drugs" that is mostly led by America's never ending grip on these hypocritical "morals, morals morals."

Why was there never a "drug problem" prior to the middle of the 20th century? Inquisitive minds want to know.

Because there were fewer corrupt dishonest and hypocritical officers like Capt JJ Jones! "That's what I call irony"

[freakyfreaky]

20 yrs. ago today.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2202234/posts

U.S. Attorneys Office abruptly halted prosecutions in 1993
The Brownsville Herald ^ | March 7, 2009 - 6:54 PM | Emma Perez-Trevino

Posted on Sunday, March 08, 2009 8:25:51 PM by Paleo Conservative

After the bodies of 13 victims who fell prey to a drug-trafficking group that practiced black magic were uncovered in 1989, the U.S. Attorney's Office secured warrants of arrest and indictments against the group's members led by Alfonso de Jesus Constanzo, but these were abruptly dismissed in 1993 without a stated reason.

The U.S. Attorney's Office would offer no explanation.

Beginning April 14, 1989 the group's members were charged with several counts of conspiring, possessing and importing 1,800 pounds of marijuana from Mexico into the United States from March 1, 1989 to April 11, 1989.

April 11, 1989 is when the body of Mark J. Kilroy and 12 other victims were uncovered from the Rancho Santa Elena, about 20 miles west of Matamoros, Mexico.

By the time the charges were dropped in federal court on June 10, 1993 at the request of the U.S. Attorney's Office, two of the suspects, Constanzo and Martin Quintana Rodriguez had long died. Six of the suspects, Sara Maria Aldrete Villarreal, Alvaro de Leon Valdez, Serafin Hernandez Garcia, Elio Hernandez Rivera, David Serna Valdez, and Sergio Martinez Salinas, also had long been arrested by police in Mexico, and are still serving sentences for Kilroy's murder and that of other victims.

However, two of the suspects, Ovidio Hernandez Rivera and Malio Fabio "El Gato" Ponce Torres, were never arrested. They are still wanted in Mexico for Kilroy's murder, according to George Gavito, who is now police chief of the Brownsville Navigation District, but they are no longer wanted in the U.S.

The U.S. Attorney's Office directed The Brownsville Herald to case files, but these don't reflect why the charges were dropped against all the suspects, including the still-at-large Hernandez Rivera and Ponce Torres.

"I don't work for the federal government. I work for the state. That's really not a question for me to be able to answer," Gavito said.

He does believe, however, that the charges were initially filed in the U.S. in case the suspects were located here, they could be held.

None of the former assistant U.S. attorneys, who served in the U.S. District Court, Southern District of Texas in 1989 and into the early 1990s and whom the Herald contacted, recalled the case. All declined to discuss the Constanzo case.

Gavito, who was a lieutenant with the Cameron County Sheriff's Department and joined in the search for Kilroy, believes that U.S., local, county, state and federal law enforcement dropped the ball after Kilroy's body was found.

In retrospect, then Cameron County Sheriff Department Lt. George Gavito, who now is the police chief at the Brownsville Navigation District, said that he and other law enforcement officers from the county and federal agencies could have done more.

"We could have put together a task force to follow this up, who knows, maybe we would have found other cults. There could have been a lot of information there, but I feel that we didn't do enough after the fact. I think we did everything we could up to the point that we found Mark, but I think afterwards, I think we all kind of dropped the ball," Gavito said.

He said the investigations didn't proceed because of jealousy between departments. "You had federal agencies that were kind of putting the task force together and there was just jealousy between departments back then and they just couldn't work together," Gavito said.

"I think we would have found out a lot more," Gavito said, emphasizing that the problems among law enforcement branches are long passed and that all today have a firm and cooperative relationship.

Gavito said that they could have found out who Constanzo was, who taught him to include human sacrifices in his rituals and why he did it. Gavito added further investigation could have shown "who did he teach that we didn't even catch or we don't even know about?"

"Remember we caught the people in Matamoros, but what about the people in Mexico City, the different groups that he might have had throughout the United States, throughout Mexico and Miami that might be doing the same thing or could have been doing the same thing?" he asked.

Constanzo, a Cuban-American, was raised in Miami and also lived in Mexico City.

But in the course of 20 years, apparently no one that Gavito knows pursued it, including himself. "I think a lot of people just wanted to forget it, put it behind them, a ‘it didn't happen type of thing,' and ‘let's just move on,' " Gavito speculated.