Plan Mexico, not so new

by Stan Gotlieb

In Mexico, it’s a case of “close the doors, they come in the windows.” Even as “The Merida Initiative” (NewSpeak for “Plan Mexico”, a rehash of the “failed” “Plan Columbia”) is being debated in the Mexican congress, the invasion of Mexican territory has already begun.

“Plan Columbia,” you may recall, was sold to us as a way to reduce the production and importation of illegal drugs that daily flow into our cities and towns in ever greater volume and potency, at ever cheaper prices. I put the word failed in quotes, because if we believe the liars in Washington who sold us this multi-billion dollar boondoggle—that drug interdiction was the real purpose—then it has indeed failed. On the other hand, if we have a more correct understanding of the purpose of selling all those helicopter gunships, crop spraying equipment, and millions of gallons of herbicide to the Columbian army—along with contracts to hire U.S. mercenaries (otherwise known as “civilian contractors”)—namely to destroy the rural-based, pro-democracy, anti-globalist resistance (along with the crops which they need to feed themselves) – then the program has been, in the short run, a huge success. It has propped up the right-wing government of Columbia’s strong-man president, Alvaro Uribe, for longer than he might otherwise have ruled. It is a classic case of repression of dissent in the name of drug interdiction.

Mexico is a country devastated by the neoliberal globalist policies so beloved by the radical right here at home. A good measure of how bad things are is that in spite of the collapsing economy and the falling dollar, and not withstanding the ever larger number of border patrol, army and national guard units, and vigilante groups, not to mention the ever taller and longer fence backed up by satellite surveillance and infra-red sensors, Mexicans continue to pour into the U.S.
Past efforts to “bring the drug war to Mexico” have failed. The reason is obvious: the past governments of Mexico have never seen it to be to their advantage to stop the flow of drugs. Mexicans know that the current “crackdown” on drug trafficking and the violence committed while squabbling over territory between various gangs is a sham; that the real goal is to suppress anti-government speech and behavior. Nobody believes that the politicians, the “law enforcement” agencies, or the Army will altruistically give up the river of money flowing their way for ignoring the drug trade. The occasional seizures are seen for what they are: one government agency, operating as an arm of one drug gang, grabbing the goods from a rival gang.

Surely, if the average citizen in Mexico knows this, it cannot be a secret from the intelligence-rich legislators and administrators of our own government. Surely, the DEA knows this, as does Army intelligence. Still, they cling to the political line that Plan Mexico is about drugs. Why do they do that? Because they don’t dare tell the truth: that Plan Mexico is about suppressing rural resistance to strip mines in Oaxaca state that will destroy hundreds of thousands of acres of forest, pollute major rivers and aquifers, and drive people whose ancestors have lived there for hundreds of years off their land (and most likely into the migrant stream); that it’s about the privatizing and corporatizing of Mexico’s last remaining resources; that in order to accomplish that, dissidence must be suppressed; and that the soldiers and private contractors that will accompany the gifted helicopters and intelligence gathering equipment and money will be training and supervising Mexican “law enforcement” in “counter-insurgency” techniques (read: repressing dissent). Wonder if there will be a class in “waterboarding 101.”
Here’s just one example of how it’s done: A project funded by the Department of Defense and run from the University of Kansas has come to Oaxaca to map “changes in land ownership” and “attitudes” in strategic areas of the state. The grant proposal cited “failures in intelligence” gathered by satellite and electronic eavesdropping. A project run by the geography department with a large “sociology” element, it will identify dissident families by name and location and provide that information to the Mexican authorities, either directly or through cut-outs. Good academics in the service of transnational capital.

In the midst of all this, it is good to remember that the current president of Mexico, and the current governor of Oaxaca, are in office following elections that were strongly tainted with evidence of fraud, murders of opposition leaders, and acceptance of illegal outside funding. Oaxaca, while recovering from the police violence that ended a months-long popular rebellion a year ago, is still seething with unrest, as is most of southeastern Mexico.

The cost in human suffering as a result of Plan Mexico will be enormous. Some in the U.S. Congress are raising questions. They should be supported.