A New Front in the Fight Against Mexican Organized Crime

There hasn't been this much fuss over Mexico since President George W. Bush welcomed Mexican President Vicente Fox in 2001 with fireworks over the White House.

The Obama administration is aggressively developing a "comprehensive strategy" toward the United States' southern neighbor, and Congress has held five hearings on Mexico in less than two weeks with more to come. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is scheduled to go to Mexico City this month, her first trip to the Americas since joining the State Department, followed later by Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and Attorney General Eric Holder. President Obama himself plans to go by mid April.

This time around, the pyrotechnics are more urgent than celebratory. The attention has been triggered by the surge in violence south of the Rio Grande, much of it caused by infighting among drug traffickers and between them and police and military forces. The situation, often featured on the U.S. nightly news, has prompted Texas Gov. Rick Perry to ask for U.S. troops to be deployed along the border.

"Violence has been the wake-up call," said Andrew Selee, the director of the Mexico Institute at the Woodrow Wilson Center, who was among a dozen guests at a recent private dinner on Mexico hosted by Clinton -- the third such dinner she has hosted on a specific foreign policy issue. Selee said the violence has made Obama officials realize it "is one of the issues they need to deal with early on," but also recognize that the response "has to be much broader.".

That the United States is even considering such broadening is a big change. Mexican organized crime became a foreign policy concern last June, when Congress approved the Merida Initiative, a three-year, $1.6 billion anti-drug assistance package for Mexico and Central America. Now the issue is becoming a domestic concern too. Washington appears willing to accept more responsibility and to do more inside U.S. territory. "This is a whole-government problem, and I think the best response is an integrated approach," Gen. Victor Renuart, head of U.S. Northern Command, told a Senate hearing on March 17.

The root causes of the Mexican violence -- drugs, money and weapons -- demand not just crucial aid to bolster Mexican security forces, but also the kind of response Renuart described.

Somewhere between $15 billion to $25 billion in narcotics sales on U.S. streets find their way to Mexican drug cartels every year. Also, last year, 95 percent of the drug-related killings in Mexico involved firearms purchased or stolen in the United States.

Beyond demand reduction, many experts suggest that tools developed to fight international terrorism could be employed here. Controls against terrorist financing could be used to identify drug profits as they enter the U.S. financial system as money transfers or foreign exchange purchases. Also, mechanisms now used to pre-clear containers being shipped to U.S. ports could be adapted to scrutinize cargo on the backs of trucks heading into Mexico.

A comprehensive strategy will demand a radically different approach to the border too, long viewed in the United States as a retaining wall. As Carla Hills, a former United States trade representative said, it is time for the United States to realize that "you can't keep a problem like that out when you are part of the problem. You got to be part of the solution."

Hills and others envision the creation of a joint border authority to improve coordination between U.S. and Mexican efforts. "The current situation is: 'I do what I want on my side of the border and you do what you want and if we are lucky there will be some coincidence,"' said Andres Rozental, a former Mexican diplomat. "That is a recipe for dysfunction and confrontation."

Still, Rozental, among the most knowledgeable experts on the U.S.-Mexico relationship, said that past attempts to improve coordination along the border have stalled. Mexico has proven reluctant to accept U.S. "meddling." Also Washington's attitude after the terrorist attacks in 2001 cooled toward Mexico, said Rozental, with Bush officials showing no interest in cooperating at the border, which they called their last line of defense against terrorism.

The current hype and high-level attention from Washington and Mexico City may not last or may prove insufficient to generate the political will necessary to leave behind a long history of mutual distrust. For now there is a palpable sense that relations could evolve toward more shared responsibility and cooperation to a level not yet seen between the United States and any Latin American country.