A historic meeting is being held in Mexico today focusing on the ever-escalating, ruthless violence of the drug cartels. Mexican President Felipe Calderón will sit down with a five-star contingent of U.S. officials, including Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano, Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Michael Mullen.
At the top of the agenda is aid to Mexico. What has happened to the aid expended thus far? While the aid has been much appreciated and assisted in the fight to some degree, often in prior instances, if the equipment is not specifically placed in the hands of individual law enforcement officers, neither the equipment nor the funds can be accounted for. The bureaucratic procedures established to rectify the problem are now serving as an impediment. The issue? Corruption and coercion, on the one hand; on the other hand, when certain equipment is provided, it is from older, poorer-quality stores and does not function optimally, as does new, high performance equipment. Clearly this is not what policymakers had envisioned when the financial assistance was originally proposed. The resources need to reach those battling the cartels on the front line.
Working with our friends and neighbors in Mexico is the key. Embedding fully vetted U.S. agents with fully vetted Mexican law enforcement in a secure location (whether in the United States, Mexico or Canada) would appear to have two goals: improving working relationships and enhancing intelligence. Another goal must be paramount as well: Information must be protected from the drug trafficking organizations and their agents.
Can these goals be achieved? The answer is, yes, they can, but they require a foundation of mutual trust — and trust is hard to come by in these days and times of border violence.
Trust is best built through productive working relationships toward a common goal. Trust also requires that all the individuals involved be thoroughly vetted for drug trafficking connections and be protected from drug trafficking intimidation and retaliation. A good start would be placing any joint collaboration effort in an unknown, low-profile location, where drug trafficking organizations are less established, and participants are less likely to face retaliation or other pressures.
Second, both sides should begin efforts by sharing limited information. This allows both sides to gain comfort with the nuances of their endeavors and work through the legal frameworks of the two nations, such that all issues of the information sharing framework can be thought through proactively. As trust is gained, information sharing is expanded.
Third, those placed in these critical positions by both countries must, in turn, be trusted for guiding the process, its timing, and judging appropriate steps to take. Seasoned analysts should not be rotated rapidly through the process: Every time a new participant is brought on board, some modicum of trust must be rebuilt, and rapid turnover will doom the effort to lower levels of trust and lower effectiveness.
Finally, the United States must also recognize its role in cartel violence. A key root of the problem is drug usage within our borders, and the enormous revenue generated from the trade. Drug users in New York, Los Angeles and across the nation do not take ownership of the violence they are creating, the lives they are ruining, and the price they and their children will pay. Most are recreational users, and think their habits are harmless and “cool.” Their “recreational” dollars are fueling a nightmare.
If the revenues from drug sales dry up, the weapons trafficking from the United States to Mexico will decline, money laundering will dip, and a lower crime level will result. With a drop in drug demand, what has been a downward spiral of violence can become an upward spiral of recovery.
The time has come for a massive advertising campaign to educate users of all sorts around the country of the brutality they are responsible for — the beheadings, executions and sociopathic behaviors. Concurrently, drug prevention campaigns for school-age children should be reinvigorated. Perhaps emphasis on these types of measures has been limited in recent years, because the “Woodstock generation” is currently in positions of leadership, and our culture still promotes the concept that answers to problems can be found in a pill. Is this the message to teach our children?
Joan Neuhaus Schaan is the fellow in homeland security and terrorism at the Baker Institute, Coordinator of the Texas Security Forum, and serves on the Advisory Board of the Transborder International Police Association. She has served as the executive director of the Houston-Harris County Regional Homeland Security Advisory Council and on the board of Crime Stoppers of Houston, Inc.