More embarrassment for the US, this time closer to home. Wikileaks diplomatic cables show little confidence in Mexico’s handling of violent drug wars that have claimed thousands of lives. The memos accuse the Mexican military of being slow and risk averse.
The US does not believe that Mexico’s military is capable of winning the country’s violent drug war, classified memos released by WikiLeaks have revealed.
US diplomats drew a highly critical picture of the country’s armed forces, which were described as bureaucratic and unfit to take on “sophisticated” drug trafficking organisations (DTOs), in cables published on Thursday.
The diplomatic memos paint a picture of an embattled Mexican government, nervous about losing whole areas of the country to the drug cartels…
…Felipe Calderon, the Mexican president, has gambled his presidency on a high-profile military crackdown on the drug gangs, involving about 50,000 troops and launched when he took office four years ago, following disputed elections.The cables’ assessments contrasted with Calderon’s insistence that as a US ally, Mexico is gaining ground over the drug gangs.
“Prosecution rates for organised crime-related offenses are dismal; two percent of those detained are brought to trial,” a US cable read, only a day after Calderon lauded the record number of drug lords arrested under his administration.
“Mexican security institutions are often locked in a zero-sum competition in which one agency’s success is viewed as another’s failure,” the cable added.
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