Obama and the War on Drugs
When he takes office in a few weeks, Obama must address the growing violence in Mexico. In this Editorial Los Angeles Times suggests dealing with the use of hard drugs at home.
The wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan takeover of the president's attention as soon as Obama takes office, but should also make time for war on our borders, in which the Mexican government is opposed to drug traffickers. In Mexico in the past two years, drug-related violence has claimed over 6,800 lives, and has been introduced in dozens of U.S. cities that are markets for illicit drugs. This war is as ugly as the others, with beheadings, kidnappings and clashes in the town that threaten Mexico's stability and U.S. national security.
The cost is staggering, as journalists have documented the Times: 1,300 killed in Ciudad Juarez so far this year, and 350 killings in Tijuana since September. In Mexico City the drug-related corruption has reached the highest levels of the police, the most important anti-narcotics chief of the country was on the payroll of drug traffickers. And in the suburbs of San Diego, alleged members of a Tijuana drug gang have been charged with at least a dozen murders and kidnappings in the past twenty three years.
Forbes magazine recently asked whether Mexico was a failed state because of its inability to stem the flow of blood and drugs. The state is weak, but failed. After seventy years of party rule, the executive and legislative branches are evolving, and the country is trying to build an independent judiciary. The problem is that President Felipe Calderon is struggling to regain control of the posters before end corruption and impunity. Have not yet been fully established strong law enforcement and the rule of law.
The war on drugs is a bilateral problem. According to a recent report by the Brookings Institution, about two thousand guns enter Mexico daily from the United States. Drug use in the United States has not disminudo so important in the last quarter century, with a total of six million users of heroin, cocaine and methamphetamine. Although it has risen slightly since Calderon began his offensive last year, the price of cocaine on the street is, however, a third of its value in 1990, indicating a steady supply through the Mexican smuggling routes.
The United States would agree that Calderon won the war, because a failed state in Mexico would mean chaos at the border and immigration, among other consequences. Under the so-called Merida Initiative, the U.S. must provide Mexico with $ 1.4 billion in equipment and training interception in the next three years. Last week it reached an agreement on the first delivery expected in January. This should be accompanied by close cooperation between U.S. and Mexican law enforcement agencies. The Obama administration should increase its efforts to intercept shipments of money, chemicals for methamphetamine production and high-powered weapons to the north. Some weapons come from legal gun shops and fairs, but Mexican officials say that other items are illegal aliens, apparently deposits of United States Army and National Guard. Finally the U.S. must seriously address drug use while providing prevention and treatment programs. After all, it is demand that sustains drugs.
