Is Mexico A National Security Threat?

By Steve Hynd

Our friend Mark Safranski (Zenpundit) has a provocative post saying the Obama administration isn't facing Mexican reality.

If the current situation in Mexico existed anywhere else in the world, our national security elite would already be discussing the potential for a mass exodus of refugees at given levels of escalating violence. The United States government conceives of the border in terms of an economic immigration problem not as a political mass-migration problem; such an event, spilling over into the hot deserts of the American border states, would very likely overwhelm the capacity for adequate humanitarian response. A Katrina moment in the cacti.

...SECSTATE Clinton, at least, should know all of this very well. The handling of the Marielitos issue by Jimmy Carter probably cost her husband the governorship in Arkansas and led him later as President to enforce a very tough line against Haitian refugees, fearing a deluge of desperately poor Haitians fleeing dictatorship and internecine political violence. It would be far better to prioritize Mexico as a national security issue today, than let it evolve into a transnational powder keg tomorrow. There are, I must observe, far more Mexicans than Haitians in this hemisphere.

But proper response requires empirical investigation and analytical clarity, followed by sensible and determined policy designed to short-circuit negative trends, not empty political assertions designed to tread water, obfuscate and delay action. We have time, but not unlimited time.

Possibly true, although I'm leery of scary stories designed to sell newspapers (especially rightwing ones with an agenda) that don't seem to match what observers close to the border are actually seeing.

Still, to argue this and not acknowledge that the problem has taken far more than 2 months to brew- and that the Bush administration's War on Drugs only made matters worse for 8 years, seems a bit rich.

And here's another reality Mark is ignoring:

Calderon noted that the U.S. demand for drugs and the availability of guns there were fuelling the violence.

"Violence and organized crime is not only a problem for Mexico, and it has been acknowledged by President Obama, this is a common problem," he said.

"It has to do with the fact that our border is the border with the largest drug market in the world and with the main producer and seller of guns in the world," he added.

I'd be interested in what Mark thinks Obama should do. Decriminalise marijuana and institute very tight gun control, thus depriving the cartels of 60% of their income and their primary weapons supply? Close the border? Massive civilain and law enforcement aid? A COIN-based military intervention? What?

Update: Mark responds in comments and I mostly agree with him.

Comments

[zenpundit]

Actually I have for some time been in favor of comprehensive reform of our drug laws with an emphasis on decriminalization and treatment. Legalization, regulation and taxation of marijuana strikes me as consistent with how we deal with alcohol.

In terms of national security, it's the single most effective financial blow we could strike againt against all kinds of nefarious non-state actors. No other contraband activity generates the same level of revenue as does illegal drugs, primarily because they are illegal which creates a risk premium in the sale price.

I'm not a huge fan of gun control and never have been. The cartels get their hands on restricted military equipment, not just small arms, because unimited money talks and the Mexican government pays and funds its officials, police and military poorly, expcting them to supplement their meager salaries with bribes. Gun control over here is less relevant than our prohibitionary drug policy and their indulgent attitudes toward public corruption.

Mexico has to conduct it's own COIN strategy. We cannot do it for them or even with them given the history of US-Mexican relations. Their law enforcement system is too toxic in terms of corruption to make use of the aid. Their military is clean enough to handle COIN training and modest levels of aid. I'm in favor of that but not a flood of money which would end up being counterproductve. You don't need huge fleets of Apache helicopters to do COIN and Mexico's undertaxed oligarchy needs to shoulder most of the financial cost of stabilizing their own country.

What I would also like to see happen is serious interagency planning and stockpiling for a "complex disaster" situation, be it war refugees, multiple hurricaines, a major earthquake etc. to handle displacement of several million people on very short notice. We are not ready for that and my understanding is that no one is taking responsibility either, not even FEMA.

[Steve Hynd]

Thanks for replying, Mark. I live in a city very close to the border so I'm naturally interested. I'm also one of those saying I'm not seeing the spillover into US streets the way folks like Homeland Security Today keep saying it is.

I agree with a lot of what you write, although obviously I'd include gun control measures across the border. When 7 out of ten US weapons are sold in the civilian market and the vast majority of Cartel arsenals are of non-military hardware, you can't just blame a corrupt Mexican military and have done with it.

Your last 'graf I particularly agree with. It dovetails with my own worry that pretty soon the US military will have gathered all the practical tools of foreign aid and nation-building to itself and will become the de-facto department of choice for such situations domestically too. IMHO FEMA should be replaced by a vastly more robust civilian nation-building and aid department with a remit to do reconstruction/aid be it foreign or domestic and a cabinet post in its own right. Otherwise, the DoD is going to swallow all that ability and further imbalance both the budget and inter-departmental turf fights in its own favor.

Regards, Steve