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| Caribbean-Latin America |
| New US concern: Mexico insurgency |
| 2010-09-11 |
| [Iran Press] US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has expressed concerns that Mexico's powerful drug cartels are turning into an insurgency force, challenging government's control over its territory. "These drug cartels are showing more and more indices of insurgencies. It's looking more and more like Colombia looked 20 years ago, when the narco-traffickers controlled certain parts of the country," Clinton said in Washington on Wednesday, Los Angeles Times reported. Colombia has recently been fighting a drug-financed leftist insurgency which, at its pick, controlled up to 40 percent of the country. Plan Colombia, the multi-billion-dollar US military and aid program, helped turn back Colombia's insurgents. "We face an increasing threat (in Mexico) from a well-organized network, drug-trafficking threat that is, in some cases, morphing into, or making common cause with, what we would consider an insurgency," Clinton added. Her comments show a U-turn in public comment by the Obama administration about drug war in Mexico, and the loss of more than 28,000 lives since December 2006. The US government has been assisting the Mexican government in its battle against well-financed and heavily armed drug cartels engaged in a bloodbath of assassinations, beheadings, shootouts and car bombings. Clinton's speech comes at a time Washington is considering a sizable increase on the Mexican drug war spending. US officials have also been debating on how to follow up the Merida Initiative, a three-year, $1.6-billion program that started in 2008 to provide equipment, training, and intelligence information to the Mexican, Central American, and Caribbean governments in their drug war efforts. However, the ongoing violence in the neighboring country could potentially spill into the United States' bordering states. Earlier this week, a White House official said, on condition of anonymity, that the joint anti-drug effort with the Mexican government "remains a top administration priority," adding the US government evaluates efforts "to make sure we are doing all we can on this issue." |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #8 "buy up ranches along the border if need be to give the border fence some depth" Hell, Shieldwolf, the ranchers would probably donate the needed land if they were sure a real border fence would be built. |
| Posted by: Barbara Skolaut 2010-09-11 21:55 |
| #7 Memo to America: Stop spending billions of dollars on illegal drugs Kind Regards, Mexico, Colombia, Peru, Afghanistan. |
| Posted by: Gaz 2010-09-11 20:07 |
| #6 Capsule summary of the Mexican Revolution of 1910-1920. 1) Mexico was ruled by Porfirio Diaz, a strongman intent on modernization, whose legacy of a high quality railroad system is still one of Mexico's strong points. Many parallels with the later Shah of Iran. 2) After many years of hard work and strong control, Diaz eased up, figuring the people had earned the right to enjoy their labor, and democracy. But Mexico had (and still has) the "Old Europe disease" where a few wealthy families control almost all the wealth. So this easing was seen as a sign of weakness. 3) Soon, three revolutionary leaders popped up. These were Emiliano Zapata, Francisco "Pancho" Villa, and Pascual Orozco. They soon captured enough of the North and South so that Diaz had to flee. 4) He was replaced by the weakling, liberal democrat, Francisco I. Madero, very comparable with his even more pathetic peer of the time, Aleksandr Kerensky, president of democratic post-Czarist Russia. Nobody like Madero, and it is only a matter of time before he is deposed. 5) Diaz left behind the commander of the Mexican army, General Victoriano Huerta, who overthrew Madero and had him shot. Everybody hated Huerta, and the revolutionary bloodbath began in earnest. 6) Three bandito revolutionary leaders in the North, Villa, Alvaro Obregon, and Venustantio Carranza, and Zapata in the South, as well as the Mexican army went on a butchery spree. Huerta bugged out, then Carranza declared himself president. Villa immediately turned against him. 7) Villa captured Mexico City. Fighting continued until Villa, Zapata, and Obregon got together. This didn't last, and so the brawl continued until Zapata was tricked and murdered. Obregon finally ended up as president. 8) During the Revolution, about 1,000,000 Mexicans fled to the US. Eventually the US started a program to systematically send them back, during the Great Depression. |
| Posted by: Anonymoose 2010-09-11 12:42 |
| #5 Mexico is a failed state. Long past time to protect our border-- before the number of illiterate/semiliterate illegals goes from 11 million to s.t. like 30 million. When that happens, we truly will be a latin-style oligarchy with a bankrupt state and a massive, illiterate underclass squeezing the middle class out of existence. |
| Posted by: lex 2010-09-11 10:05 |
| #4 and of course, we know how the Democrats have treated Columbia lately, bitchy because Uribe was a democratically elected non-leftist who managed to crush FARC (a Donk wet dream organization) |
| Posted by: Frank G 2010-09-11 10:00 |
| #3 "These drug cartels are showing more and more indices of insurgencies. It's looking more and more like Colombia looked 20 years ago, when the narco-traffickers controlled certain parts of the country," Clinton said in Washington on Wednesday, Los Angeles Times reported. Something she was briefed on, or read about in a book possibly. She certainly had no interest in it at the time. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2010-09-11 06:49 |
| #2 Build the damned fence from California to Texas and make it a GOOD one -- buy up ranches along the border if need be to give the border fence some depth. Then really push to deport all illegals including imprisoning the CEO of corporations that hire them (the law already exists). After that, give Mexico helicopters, Hummers, and MRAPs to fight the narcoterrorists; don't reward the Mexican ruling class's bad behavior by continuing to allow them to dump their overflow population on us. |
| Posted by: Shieldwolf 2010-09-11 04:04 |
| #1 MAHICAN DRUG CARTELS versus YNETNEWS > REPORT: US MUST DEAL WID DOMESTIC RADICAL PROBLEM. Homegrown Xtremis, that is. |
| Posted by: JosephMendiola 2010-09-11 01:18 |