To better understand the current militarization of Mexico – part of a broader militarization of the Drug War – it is helpful to place it within the historical context of U.S. intervention in Latin America. Three important characteristics of intervention must be viewed together to grasp a larger picture of the ways the United States intervenes in Latin America, and especially in Mexico. These include the economic bases, the ideological rationales, and the means of intervention. Whereas 150 years ago the predominant reasons for intervention in Latin America were expansionist and a century ago were economic, benefiting the interests of industrial robber barons and railroad tycoons, the ideological rationale was based on manifest destiny, the God-given rights proscribed by the Monroe Doctrine. The methods were often direct troop intervention. (La Feber 1993) Today economics still determines foreign policy, the ideological rationale has shifted to more insidious arguments about drugs and the methods have become more devious and hidden. But the basic model remains the same.

Historically, and in contemporary U.S. policy toward Latin America and Mexico, the underlying reasons for military and intelligence intervention are economic. (La Feber 1993) In the late 19th century the economic philosophy that guided U.S. foreign policy interests was classical “free market” liberalism. Today, in the late 20th century, a reconstituted version of this “free market” ideology known as neoliberalism holds sway in the global economy. (Agnew and Corbridge 1995) Neoliberal economics guides U.S. policy toward Mexico, as evidenced by NAFTA and by IMF and World Bank induced privatization and deregulation schemes. The bottom line is that Latin America remains a source for raw materials and cheap labor for North American capitalists. Maintaining economic control and domination over Latin America is at the core of all U.S. policy in the hemisphere, including its military policy and drug policy.

Aside from its interests in maintaining Mexico’s quiet presence along the U.S. southern flank, Washington has other reasons for wanting to develop friendly relations with Mexican military and security forces. The country is the second most important source of strategic raw materials for the United States, supplying petroleum, strontium, fluorspar, and antimony. (Barry 1992)

Over the course of this century, the methods for intervention have become less direct and more covert. At the beginning of the century the United States did not shy away from sending in the Marines to Latin American countries. (La Feber 1993) But due largely to domestic opposition to direct intervention of U.S. troops, a phenomena that the right-wing has labeled the “Vietnam syndrome,” the United States began to employ covert means. Counterinsurgency campaigns orchestrated by the CIA and aided by U.S. military advisors behind the scenes became the modus operandi of U.S. intervention in Latin America following World War II. (Blum 1995) The CIA assisted coup against Arbenz in Guatemala in 1954 established a model that would be repeated again and again. Out of the policy and practice of covert counterinsurgency emerged the doctrine and strategy of Low Intensity Conflict (LIC). (Klare and Kornblum 1988) As mentioned in the latter part of the preceding chapter, Information Warfare as applied to U.S. intervention in the “third world” can be viewed as an enhancement of traditional LIC strategy, and part of the continuum from counter insurgency. One of the objectives in the movement away from overt direct intervention toward covert indirect intervention is the removal of the U.S. “warrior” from the field of battle. Sophisticated Information Warfare technologies help to achieve this objective by allowing for Low Intensity Conflict to be managed digitally from secure remote locations.

In this century the United States has not intervened in Mexico militarily except for on several occasions during the Mexican Revolution. (Knight 1989; Hart 1989) Mexico’s strong nationalism, translated as anti-Americanism, meant that overt U.S.-Mexico military and intelligence cooperation remained a low priority. After the onset of the Cold War, and with it the fear of communism spreading north, the United States used Mexico as a hub for intelligence gathering for all of Latin America. (Agee 1975; Ross 1995) The U.S. Embassy in Mexico City became a central node in a hemispheric intelligence system. Despite the collapse of the Soviet Union, and therefore the end of Cold War arguments about the spread of a red menace in the Americas, the U.S. security and intelligence role in Mexico and the rest of Latin America has not abated. According to then U.S. Ambassador to Mexico, James Jones, in a meeting with University of Texas at Austin students in the spring of 1996, the American Embassy in Mexico City now has the largest staff of any American embassy in the world. The importance of intelligence has not ended simply because the threat of communism has subsided. Many of the same intelligence systems put in place in the Cold War era are being used in the war on drugs, as John Ross, author of Rebellion from the Roots, related.

The U.S. embassy in Mexico City has always held strong cards in this suit. With one of the biggest staffs of any State Department enterprise outside of Washington and the largest physical plant of any U.S. outpost in the Western Hemisphere, the block-wide bunker-style installation was designed to counter Soviet expansion into the Americas in the 1950s and ‘60s. The national security threat presented by the phantasmagoria of red revolution on the U.S. southern border, has kept the intelligence mills humming on Reforma for 40 years. Now, as the red menace fades to black, the mission of U.S. intelligence assets in Mexico has turned to other hot button issues – drugs and immigration, to name two themes that are not always handled through diplomatic channels. (Ross 1995, 39)

In addition to within the American Embassy in Mexico City, several important U.S. intelligence assets are headquartered in the United States, not far from the U.S.-Mexico border. The Air Intelligence Agency and interestingly the Air Force Information Warfare Center are housed at Kelly Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas. (U.S. Air Force n.d.) The Army Intelligence Center is based at Fort Huachuca, Arizona, adjacent to the U.S.-Mexico border. (Dunn 1996) The Drug Enforcement Administration’s intelligence center is based in El Paso, Texas. (Dunn 1996) The National Reconnaissance Office, the federal agency responsible for Cold War satellite espionage development, has an important facility, the Air Force Space and Missile Systems Center, at Los Angeles Air Force Base in El Segundo California. A major Naval radar transmitter for Naval Space Command’s surveillance network is at Lake Kickapoo, Texas, southeast of Wichita Falls. (U.S. Space Command n.d.) Finally, while not near the border, NORAD, which is now significant to the war on drugs, is stationed under Cheyenne Mountain in Colorado. The U.S.-Mexico border area has been undergoing heavy militarization since the 1980s, largely due to the Drug War and to the war against immigrants entering the United States from Mexico. The military technologies in place along the border are as sophisticated as many of those used in the Gulf War. (Dunn, 1996)

For most of this century since the Mexican Revolution,  Mexico’s military has not been a significant force. (Camp 1992) Until the 1980s Mexico’s army played a role similar to that of national guard units in the United States, engaging in disaster relief or squelching domestic unrest. Contemporary Mexico has not had to worry about an external aggressor. Beginning in the early 1980s, concern over possible northern expansion of the conflicts in Central America and, in the late 1980s, classification of drugs as a national security threat gave cause for modernization efforts of the Mexican armed forces. The acquisition of F-5 fighter jets from the United States during the de la Madrid administration may be considered a turning point in the contemporary modernization period. (Dziedzic 1994)

Under the Salinas and now the Zedillo administrations in the 1990s, Mexico began to seriously upgrade its army, navy, and air forces. The Drug War and now new security threats posed first by guerrillas like the Zapatistas, beginning January 1, 1994 and the EPR in Guerrero, beginning June 28, 1996, have been the prime motivation for this modernization effort. The progress of military modernization can be understood by looking at the increased military spending, at the new military hardware, equipment and training, especially the sophisticated communication technologies, and at the greater cooperation between United States and Mexico, in terms of the military and intelligence agencies, but also in terms of greater police and other law enforcement cooperation. (Lumsdaine 1995)
 

In the latter part of the 19th century, after the United States effectively stole half of the Mexican territory in the 1846-1848 U.S.-Mexican War, U.S. soldiers engaged in minor border incursions across the Rio Grande to pursue thieves. In 1866, a General Sedgwick occupied Matamoras for three days, ostensibly to protect U.S. citizens. In 1913, “marines landed at Ciaris Estero to aid evacuating American citizens and others from the Yaqui valley.” (Blum 1995) During the Mexican Revolution there were three instances of direct U.S. troop involvement, as Knight explained in U.S.-Mexican Relations, 1910-1940.

During the decade of armed revolution (1910-20) the United States mounted two major and one minor armed incursions into Mexican territory: The marines seized the port of Veracruz in April 1914; General Pershing led a sizable expedition deep into northern Mexico, fruitlessly pursuing Pancho Villa (1916-17); and American forces helped dislodge the ragtag Villista army from Ciudad Juárez in June 1919. (Knight 1987, 1)

The American intervention at Veracruz in April 1914 constituted the focal point of the U.S. government’s effort to control events in Mexico. It began with an attempt to oust Huerta but quickly became a means to gain concessions from Carranza. The Americans controlled an immense strategic stockpile of arms there. The military equipage included over 4,500 crates of armaments and filled three warehouses to overflowing, each of which measured 57.5 yards in width and length and over 21 feet in height. More arms including machine guns and artillery were placed in reinforced depositories, among them the Baluarte of Veracruz, the Benito Juarez lighthouse, and the San Juan de Ulloa fortress. (Hart 1989, 14)

In addition to being able to trace U.S. military involvement in Mexico back to the decade of the Mexican Revolution, the Drug War in Mexico is shown to be rooted in that period by Walker in Drug Control in the Americas.

Only Mexico, of the Latin American countries crucial for control, tried in any way to restrict drug-related activity. Early in 1916 the de facto government prohibited opium importation. The following year President Venustiano Carranza sought to outlaw opium transactions in Baja California, but his own lack of control and the alleged complicity of the governor there in the trade . . . nullified Carranza’s efforts. (Walker 1989, 22)

As late as the mid 1920s, relations between Mexico and the United States had not cooled. In 1926, “possible war with Mexico became one of the hottest issues of the day” over disputes around oil and Nicaragua. (Knight 1987) It was during this time that Mexican officers began to train abroad, as Roderic Camp, one of the few American scholars on the Mexican military, noted in Generals in the Palacio. Ironically the United States would eventually be the “revolutionary” government’s biggest military supporter.

Since the 1920s selected officers had studied abroad after having attended Mexican military academies. . . . Not surprisingly, the United States, although an enemy of Mexico in the nineteenth century, is the most popular location for foreign military training. (Camp 1992)

Based upon its record in the early 1930s, the government in Mexico City appeared willing to act with the United States to stop smuggling. In 1930 the two countries concluded an informal agreement for the exchange of information on drugs. The following year officials sent a special agent to coordinate antidrug activity with Consul William Blocker in the Juárez-El Paso region. Mexico next requested that agents of both countries be permitted unrestricted border crossings there pursuant to their duties. The State Department and the Bureau of Narcotics turned down the request, although United States agents would continue to cross into Mexico with Anslinger’s express approval. By mid-1932 all the Mexicans had achieved was another informal arrangement for the exchange of information. (Walker 1989, 81)

Around 1930 private planes began smuggling drugs out of Mexico. In response, an antidrug air patrol operated from various sites in Texas starting in 1931. During the first two years of the program no drugs were seized, only liquor. Yet authorities remained convinced that smuggling by air was a prime means of getting drugs into the United States. (Walker 1989, 81, 82)

Scholars of Mexican national security point to World War II as an important moment in U.S.-Mexico military relations. One assertion is that this world war caused “a degree of diplomatic, military, and economic collaboration which would have been unthinkable a decade before.” (Knight 1987) Another view, in Civil-Military Relations in Mexico, (Zinser 1990) stressed the uniqueness of Mexico declaring war on the Axis powers and Mexico’s role in assisting the United States.

World War II altered the picture significantly and promoted a climate of understanding that was reflected – for the first and only time in history – in a military pact whereby Mexico declared war on the Axis powers and committed itself to provide the United States with strategic commodities for the Allied military effort. (Zinser 1990)

In 1940, the Joint Mexican-U.S. Defense Commission was established. Following the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, the United States wanted Mexico’s total support. In December 1941, the Mexican Senate authorized full use of ports and airports by the United States. Radar installations were set up, principally in Baja California, to detect Japanese ships and submarines. Transit airports were built for military aircraft flying toward the Panama Canal, and Mexico contributed in a symbolic way with an air squadron in the Philippines. Food and minerals needed to supply the armies and produce armaments were also provided. (Manaut 1996)

Indeed, the Mexican military has fastidiously maintained relative independence from the United States. In 1951 Mexico refused a U.S. invitation to negotiate a defense assistance pact that would have channeled important military aid to Mexico. Looking at the period from 1950 to 1978, Mexico ranked 15th among the Latin American nations receiving military assistance from the United States. Only the smallest Latin American nations received less aid than Mexico – Costa Rica, El Salvador, Haiti, and Panama. (Williams 1984, 195)

Because of the strategic importance of Mexico to the US, its size and proximity, and the abundance of enemy activities, the Mexico City station is the largest in the hemisphere. Altogether the station has some fifteen operations officers under State Department cover in the Embassy political section, plus twelve more officers under assorted non-official covers outside the Embassy. In addition, a sizable support staff of communications officers, technical services, intelligence assistants, records clerks and secretaries bring the overall station personnel total to around fifty. (Agee 1975, 524)

Dominating the station operational programme is the LITEMPO project which is administered by Winston Scott, the Chief of Station in Mexico City since 1956, with the assistance of Annie Goodpasture, a case officer who has also been at the station for some years. This project embraces a complicated series of operational support programmes to the various Mexican civilian security forces for the purpose of intelligence exchange, joint operations and constant upgrading of Mexican internal intelligence collection and public security functions. (Agee 1975, 524)

Through the LITEMPO project we are currently providing advice and equipment for a new secret communications network to function between Diaz Ordaz’s office and principal cities in the rest of the country. Other joint operations with the Mexican security services include travel control, telephone tapping, and repressive action. (Agee 1975, 526)

The militarization of the U.S.-Mexico border, marked by an influx of sophisticated military hardware into the region, is largely a phenomena of the 1980s. But as early as the 1960s, the Pentagon was assisting the U.S. Border Patrol with laser equipment, as described in Drug Trafficking in the Americas.

The Border Patrol specifically began using Department of Defense (DOD) assets in the 1960s, acquiring access to laser equipment that was being phased out of the Indochina war. At present, the Border Patrol receives aircraft, other specialized equipment training, instruction, and help from the photographic commission. . . . (Lemus 1995, 433)

Although Mexican efforts to eradicate drugs and eliminate drug trafficking – with and without U.S. support – can be traced to the 1920s, the current militarization of the Drug War has roots in the experiences of the past 30 years. To understand the contemporary history of the militarization of the Drug War in Mexico it is useful to examine four distinct periods. The first covered the time from 1968 to 1980, during which the Mexican military began to modernize, counterinsurgency campaigns against guerrilla movements were waged, and combating drug trafficking intensified. The second period encompassed most of the 1980s, under the Reagan administration in the United States and the de la Madrid sexenio in Mexico. Drugs were declared a threat to national security, further justifying a military role in drug interdiction. The third period involved the tail end of the 1980s through 1994, during the Bush and Salinas presidencies, when the Drug War experienced new vigor from both countries. Finally, the fourth period lasts from 1994 to the present, following the implementation of the NAFTA accord and the Zapatista uprising in Chiapas. In Mexico: A Country Guide, Barry offered a summation of the relationship between the Drug War and militarization over the course of the last 30 years.

Used for all aspects of the drug war, including detection, eradication, intelligence, and interdiction, U.S. anti-drug assistance has boosted the technological capabilities and professional skills of Mexican law enforcement and military forces. This has been the case since the 1960s, when U.S. agents were sent to the country as advisers. The programs expanded during the 1970s to include support for Mexico’s eradication activities. By the 1980s the United States was backing a full spectrum of projects aimed at training and equipping Mexico’s police and military forces, under the auspices of narcotics control. For instance armed Huey UH-1H helicopters – and training to fly them – were provided through a U.S. assistance package in 1990 designed to support Mexico’s interdiction efforts. Likewise, the U.S. Air Force has provided computer software, installation, and training in its use. (Barry 1992, 334)

In 1968 people all over the world were revolting. Rage spilled out into the streets and Mexico City was no exception. But student uprisings in Mexico in the summer of 1968 ended in violent clashes with army by fall. These events are said to represent a turning point in the process of modernizing Mexico’s armed forces

October 2, 1968, was the starting point of a new crisis in Mexico: on that date, an interval began during which the country lost confidence in its present, ceased celebrating and consolidating its achievements and miracles, and began to confront daily, and for more than a decade, its own previously ignored insufficiencies, failures, and miseries. . . . (Camin and Meyer 1993, 201)

Then on 18 September the army violated the autonomy of the National University by occupying Ciudad Universitaria (University City), the central campus where over two hundred thousand students were enrolled. Two weeks later, at the Tlatelolco Plaza of Three Cultures, some fifteen thousand students demonstrated against the army’s occupation. In what amounted to an ambush, the army responded with firepower, killing close to three hundred and arresting several thousand. (Hodges 1995, 116)

The government’s decision to modernize the military probably dates back to social turmoil that surrounded the 1968 massacre. The subsequent rise of guerrilla movements and the increasing military participation in anti-narcotics operations reinforced the initial determination to modernize the military by increasing its size, streamlining its organizational structure, upgrading equipment, and improving the education of the officer corps. The oil boom of the late 1970s gave the government the funds to pay for this modernization effort, while at the same time pointing to the rising need to protect the industry’s expanding production facilities. The 1982 economic crisis forced the government to scale down the military’s modernization planes and to rein in its budget, although the military budget was not as drastically affected as other parts of the public sector. (Barry 1992, 57)

The environment for the military’s resurgence in the policy area evolved from serious economic problems, which during the 1960s led to sharpened sociopolitical tensions. The military’s role in suppressing the student-led demonstrations in 1968 catalyzed the resurgence, and several initiatives during the 1970s solidifies it – the most salient being the military’s role in anti-guerrilla and anti-drug campaigns. (Williams 1984, 182)

Operation Intercept was Nixon’s first attempt to strike at the source. The operation deployed two thousand agents on the Mexican border in September 1969 to search automobiles and trucks crossing the border in what was officially described as the ‘country’s largest peacetime search and seizure operation by civil authorities.’ It netted little except Mexican animosity. (Bertram, Blachman, Sharpe, and Andreas. 1996, 106, 107)

Since 1968, Mexico has not sought any credit under the U.S. Foreign Military Sales Program. In the 1960s, only Cuba, Haiti, Mexico had no Military Assistance Advisory Group (MAAG); in 1978, MAAGs operated in all of the Latin American nations except Cuba, Costa Rica, Paraguay, Uruguay, and Mexico. In any relative sense, United States-Mexican military intercourse has been extremely modest.’ (Williams 1984, 195)

Camp (1992) pointed out that of the U.S. Drug War funds and equipment that began to flow into Mexico in the mid-1970s, probably some of that aid went to the armed forces.

Even by the mid-1970s drugs were a significant part of Mexican-United States relations. From 1973 to 1978, Mexico received $47,567,000 in assistance under the International Narcotics Control Program, more than any other Latin American nation. It is not unlikely that some of the money and equipment found its way to the military. . . (Camp 1992)

In a rather different context, the Mexican military also gained prestige and received valuable training in anti-guerrilla and anti-drug campaigns during the 1970s. By mid-decade, the military had defeated insurgents in the southern state of Guerrero, and it thereby achieved another increment to its growing prestige. At about the same time that the guerrilla movement was controlled, the Mexican military assumed primary responsibility for the suppression of drug production and trafficking. The operation has provided valuable training for Mexico’s military, and military leaders have rotted officers and men through the anti-drug campaign to spread the benefits of that experience. (Williams 1984, 183)

The Mexican army’s role in anti-drug operations under the Mexican Attorney General’s Office expanded sharply in 1977 with the establishment of the Plan Condor Task Force to combat drug traffickers in the states of Chihuahua, Durango, and Sinaloa. . . . this program has been expanded with similar but smaller-scale operations beginning in the states of Oaxaca, Guerrero, and possibly Veracruz. . . . (Cuningham, 1984, 174)

While in the 1970s guerrillas and drugs gave the military its raison d’etre, the discovery of oil in the early to mid 1970s and the oil boom that followed from 1978 to 1982, enabled Mexico’s economy to grow at a high rate of 8 percent which gave the military the necessary funds to expand and modernize. (Camin and Meyer 1993, 209) Barry (1992) stated: “With the injection of oil monies into the economy in the 1970s, the military saw the opportunity to become more high-tech.”

Prior to that time, much armament was of the same vintage as display pieces commonly found in front of veteran’s halls. Indeed, all three services continue to rely on equipment dating from World War II and Korean War eras (e.g. M-3 and M-5 tanks, circa 1945; AT-33 aircraft, circa 1950; and Gearing and Fletcher class destroyers, circa 1945). (Dziedzic 1994)

The discovery of major oil reserves off the Mexican coasts in 1972 and 1976 prompted a call in the United States for a fresh assessment of United States-Mexico relations, and President Jimmy Carter’s National Security Council (NSC) eventually obliged by producing an unusually long ‘Presidential Review Memorandum’ (NSC-41) entitled ‘Review of United States Policies Toward Mexico’ in November 1978. The paper (now partially declassified) recognized in its opening sentence that relations with the Mexican government were ‘increasingly important and delicate,’ and went on to analyze in a series of annexes 13 aspects of United States interests in Mexico, including energy, trade, migration, and narcotics. (Doyle 1993)

In 1981, the U.S. Congress amended the Posse Comitatus Act “in order to enable the military to assist law enforcement agencies, so long as such assistance would not harm military readiness.” (Mabry 1988) The amended Posse Comitatus Act “permitted the Pentagon to provide information, equipment, facilities, training, and advisory services to domestic law enforcement agencies.” (Isenberg 1992) As an early example of “actual Pentagon assistance in antidrug efforts in the Southwest during the period 1981-1985, . . . the Army conducted surveillance operations in Texas using OV-1 Mohawk aircraft equipped with infrared radar.” (Dunn 1996, 110) A year after the amended Posse Comitatus Act, in 1982, in Operation BAT in the Bahamas, “the U.S. military first started aiding the suppression of drug activities in the Caribbean and Latin America by loaning equipment and coordinating some of its activities with those of law enforcement officials.” (Mabry 1996)

The establishment, in 1982, of the South Florida Task Force on Organized Crime, a group headed by then Vice President Bush, was the “first instance of major military involvement in drug interdiction efforts,” wrote Dunn (1996) in The Militarization of the U.S.-Mexico Border, who also stated that the “task force was to serve as a model for future antidrug efforts along the U.S.-Mexico border (and elsewhere) that would involve a wide variety of forces.” By “elsewhere” it is assumed Dunn meant this task force also was a model for the interior of Mexico and other Latin American countries.

The assortment of military support used in the South Florida project was extensive. A partial list includes E-2B, E-2C, P-3 radar and surveillance aircraft and UH-1H helicopters, as well as hydrofoil, frigate, and destroyer sea vessels, for the Navy; AWACS (or E-3) radar aircraft and aerostat radar balloons for the Air Forces; and UH-1H, Cobra, and Blackhawk helicopters, as well as OV-1 Mohawk tracker aircraft, for the Army. (Dunn 1996, 108)

At the same time the United States under the Reagan administration was setting in place the legal framework and precedent for using the military in its domestic and foreign anti-drug endeavors, Mexico at the end of the Lopéz Portillo (1976 - 1982) and the beginning of the De la Madrid (1982 - 1988) administrations was entering a new phase in the modernization of its armed forces, marked by the acquisition of sophisticated fighter jets, the initiation of a higher level of military education for its officer corps, and the expansion of military presence along its southern border.

In 1981, Mexico purchased a dozen Northrop manufactured F-5 Tiger II jets from the United States for the Mexican Air Force. “These aircraft. . . are capable of performing both interceptor and close air support roles. For a functioning air defense capability, however, the country also required an air defense radar system.” (Dziedzic 1994) In 1982, Mexico graduated the first class from its new National Defense College, “the capstone of the Mexican military’s education system” that “provides studies on national and international security matters, military strategy, and resource management.” (Cuningham, 1984, 171) And in 1983, Mexico created another military zone in Chiapas based in Tapachula, “clear evidence of the concern that Mexican federal authorities have for what is going on in Central America and its spillover potential.” (Cuningham, 1984, 176)

As noted already, Dunn suggested that the South Florida Task Force was a model for later anti-drug efforts along the U.S.-Mexico border, one of which was the National Narcotics Border Interdiction System (NNBIS), created in 1983 by Reagan and headed by Bush. “Its mission was to act as an ‘interface’ between the Department of Defense and the civilian law enforcement community in order to coordinate resources for drug-interdiction efforts.” (Dunn 1996, 109)

The Southwest contained a large pool of military resources for the NNBIS to establish a collaborative relationship with, as there were over 25 military bases in the region, approximately half of which were in California. The NNBIS coordinated numerous evaluations for civilian law enforcement agencies of military resources in the region, including Army air cavalry (helicopter) training operations in West Texas, Army and Marine radar systems, and Air Force ground radar installations in southern New Mexico. . . . In addition, NNBIS officials requested the loan of night-vision goggles for Customs Service officials from Fort Sam Houston and Fort Bliss in Texas and Fort Huachuca in Arizona. . . . (Dunn 1996, 109)

While the U.S. Army Intelligence School was monitoring the Mexican border region, the Central Intelligence Agency began increased monitoring and surveillance of the Mexican interior. In the mid 1980s, the CIA was worried that Mexico, like its southern neighbors in Central America, could explode. In 1984, CIA Director William Casey “ordered stepped-up intelligence-gathering on Mexico and De la Madrid that produced a flood of data.” (Woodward 1987)

In 1985, Enrique Camarena, a U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agent, was tortured and murdered by drug traffickers in Guadalajara. Evident complicity of local and federal police in Mexico “set into motion an intense international campaign of discredit of the Mexican police apparatus, in particular, and of the Mexican political system, in general.” (Camin and Meyer. 1993, 235) After the assassination of Camarena, in 1985 and through 1986, “the bashing of Mexico became the rule.” (Aguayo 1988, 160) Even though Mexican security forces had been involved in the murder of agent Camarena, “United States activities in Mexico intensified as supply-side control strategies took hold in Washington.” This included “the establishment of an information center at the United States embassy in Mexico City and the purchase of a computer system for it.” (Doyle 1993)

The murder of Camarena also “was a specific spur” to 1986 legislation aimed at Mexico. (Treverton 1988)

. . . the U.S. Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 contained a number of sanctions pointed directly at Mexico: the president was compelled to withhold US $1 million in drug aid to Mexico until he reported on Mexican progress in bringing Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) official Enrique Camarena’s killers to justice; and the Act suggested that the president ‘should consider’ additional sanctions against Mexico – a travel advisory and other cuts in aid and multilateral bank loan or trade benefits. (Treverton 1988, 209)

On April 8, 1986, President Reagan, in National Security Decision Directive (NSDD) 221, declared drug trafficking to be a threat to national security, thereby opening the door for the militarization of the war on drugs and an intensified application of sophisticated military technology. (Bagley 1991; Doyle 1993)

Explicitly calling international narcotics trafficking ‘a threat to United States national security,’ the directive widens the circle of national drug enforcers to include the Departments of Defense, Treasury, Transportation, Justice, and State, the Central Intelligence Agency, and the National Security Agency (responsible for intercepting global electronic communications.) According to this briefing, the NSDD directs the military to actively support for the first time a range of international counternarcotics activities, such as the planning and execution of large anti-drug operations, intelligence collection, combined exercises, the training of foreign military forces, and technical and matériel support to foreign governments. (Doyle 1993)

Operation Blast Furnace conducted in Bolivia in 1986 “was our government’s first attempt at curtailing drug processing and export from a foreign country. US Southern Command was tasked by the Joint Chiefs of Staff to conduct and plan this operation.” (Hertling 1990) In this operation “the US Army used six Black Hawk helicopters and 160 soldiers to help Bolivian narcotics police destroy cocaine laboratories.” (Mabry 1988)

Operation Alliance was created in August 1986 by then Vice President Bush and former Attorney General Meese. As “an ongoing effort to interdict drugs along the border, based on the coordination of local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies, with the military playing a support role,” Operation Alliance was the “most fully developed joint venture between the military and civilian law enforcement agencies in border drug enforcement during this period.” Department of Defense support for Operation Alliance included “the provision of aerial surveillance and extensive loans of such resources as night-vision equipment and portable ground radar.” (Dunn 1996, 113) Dunn’s research uncovered an extensive list of military hardware provided by the Pentagon to Operation Alliance.

DOD equipment support provided to Operation Alliance was extensive. It included such advanced aircraft as two E-2C radar planes, four Blackhawk helicopters, two high-speed interceptors (unspecified), six aerostat balloons outfitted with radar (placed along the length of the border), one C-12 aircraft outfitted with sophisticated radar, one P-3 radar plane, and an unspecified number of large, high-tech AWACS radar planes. Further, in 1989, the Customs Service requested the loan of twenty UH-1H (Huey) helicopters from the Department of Defense, in order to support ‘ground interdiction missions’ in the U.S.-Mexico border region. National Guard forces also supplied a great deal of support to Operation Alliance, including equipment such as forward-looking radar (FLIR) and side-looking radar (SLAR), especially useful for monitoring activities across the border). Other support included flying photo reconnaissance missions, making available satellite and secure voice-radio communications, conducting ‘covert’ intelligence gathering and surveillance operations with the Border Patrol, and providing ‘specialized training.’ Overall, DOD resources provided to Operation Alliance appeared to be quite extensive and included a plethora of sophisticated equipment. (Dunn 1996, 114, 115)

The Armed Forces have been actively assisting DEA authorities in the interdiction effort for the last few years, and in Fiscal Year 1987, contributed $303.8 million to the campaign. Airborne aerial surveillance (from Air Force AWACS, Navy E-2Cs, Coast Guard Aerostats and Army UH-60s), Coast Guard patrol boats, Navy ‘go fast’ boats, Army ground surveillance radars (part of Operation Groundhog at Fort Huachuca, Arizona) are all part of the Department of Defense (DOD) aid to interdiction efforts. (Hertling 1990)

In May 1988, before a Congressional hearing on “The Role of the Military in Drug Interdiction,” the U.S. Border Patrol called for more sensors along the U.S.-Mexico border and for the establishment of an interagency surveillance network.

At the time of the hearing, there were only 300 radar units in place, and Border Patrol officials felt they could use an additional 1000. Requesting that the military upgrade equipment that was already in place and suggesting the development of transportable sensor systems, the Border Patrol also suggested that a surveillance network linking interagency intelligence and interdiction efforts should be established and that strategic and tactical intelligence be developed, analyzed, and distributed to support interdiction and investigative efforts of all civilian law enforcement agencies along the border. (Lemus 1995, 433)

The three “statutory missions” this Act assigned to the Pentagon were “to serve as the single lead federal agency for detecting and monitoring aerial and maritime transit of illegal drugs into the United States; to integrate U.S. command, control, communications, and intelligence (C3) systems dedicated to the interdiction of illegal drugs into an effective network; and to provide an improved interdiction and enforcement role for the National Guard.” (Isenberg 1992)

In Drug Trafficking in the Americas, Mabry explained that an advantage to making the Pentagon the lead agency in the Drug War was its technological assets developed in the Cold War, the same that made the Gulf War possible, and the same that are attributed as basic tools for waging cyberwar or Information War.

Another presumed advantage in making DOD the lead agency for detecting drug smugglers was its extraordinary technical capabilities developed from its long experience in monitoring the skies and the waters for incoming Soviet or other hostile military aircraft, warships, and missiles. As events in Operation Desert Storm demonstrated, the U.S. military’s ability to use its integrated satellite, radar, and communications technology may be unsurpassed. Acquisition of the ability to react against suspected smugglers in ‘real time’ (fast enough to intercept them before they crossed the U.S. border or escaped) is clearly desirable and comparable to the mission of such agencies as the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), whose goal is to detect hostile military acts against the United States quickly enough for the military to react. (Mabry 1996, 45)

In an article in Covert Action Quarterly, Isenberg described some of NORAD’s capabilities that were available to drug interdiction efforts.

NORAD employs a network of 44 ground radars designed to warn of high altitude penetration of U.S. airspace. Low-flying aircraft will be covered by 16 land-based aerostats (balloons carrying radar antennae) which will form a detection fence along the southern border. It also has 48 interceptor aircraft which can assist Customs and the Coast Guard with tracking missions. (Isenberg 1992)

Around the same time, the Mexican military announced it had obtained a $40 million mobile radar system, purchased from the American firm Westinghouse and funded in part by a loan from the Export-Import Bank. The radar was to be installed near the Guatemalan border for use in the interdiction of planes carrying drugs from Colombia. (Reuter and Ronfeldt 1992; Doyle 1993)
 

The new presidencies of George Bush in the United States and Carlos Salinas de Gortari in Mexico, in 1989, “brought about a significant shift” in the discourse and ideology of the Drug War. Once again the assertion that drugs were a threat to national security emanated from both Washington, DC, and Mexico City. (Doyle 1993) The era of these presidencies was also characterized by an emphasis on developing economic alliances between Mexico and the United States. Mexico entered a phase of heightened application of neoliberal economic policies. Within 5 years NAFTA was proposed, debated, and became a reality. The privatization of Mexico’s nationally owned companies, and hence the opening up of Mexico’s economic assets to greater foreign ownership and control, on the one hand, and increased militarization of Mexico due to an even greater perceived national security threat of drugs, were the results of this Bush-Salinas era.

Keep in mind, as noted earlier in this chapter, that vice president Bush served as the head of the South Florida Task Force, starting in 1982, and the head of the National Narcotics Border Interdiction System, beginning in 1983. By the time Bush became president he had at least 7 years experience as an anti-drug warrior. Drug War Politics showed that when Bush finally attained the office of the presidency he instituted even more aggressive drug policies.

Bush took unprecedented steps to widen the authority of federal agencies to fight drugs. Like his predecessors, he used executive orders and administrative regulations to expand the reach of drug enforcement. A 1989 executive order, for example, directed all federal agencies to check for drug violations before awarding hundreds of federal benefits. To a degree unmatched by previous presidents, he used his power as commander in chief to draft the U.S. military into the drug war, elevating what had been a sporadic and relatively minor role in assisting in civilian enforcement into a major national-security mission for the armed forces. . . . (Bertram, Blachman, Sharpe, and Andreas. 1996, 114)

The fight against drugs is a high priority in my government for three fundamental reasons: because it constitutes an assault on the health of Mexico’s citizen’s, because it promises to affect Mexico’s national security, and, finally, because the community of nations must stand together on this issue. (Reuter and Ronfeldt 1992)

In the past, the fact that post-revolutionary Mexico had no significant external enemies meant that it had little need for sophisticated military equipment obtained from foreign sources. As a result both U.S. influence and that of other major arms-supplying countries was minimized. With the advent of the drug war as a matter of U.S. national security policy, however, Mexico has increasingly drawn into U.S. initiatives requiring technologically advanced equipment and training, especially in the fields of communications and detection and tracking devices. For example Mexico purchased specifically outfitted tracker aircraft that work in conjunction with U.S. radar facilities located in international airspace. (Barry 1992, 335)

A crucial turning point in the expansion of DOD participation in drug enforcement activities was the secretary of defense’s designation in September 1989 of the drug fight as a ‘high-priority national security mission’ for the Department of Defense. This move caught many in the Pentagon off guard, as the designation was traditionally used sparingly, and had far-reaching implications for Pentagon operations. Its applications indicted that the Department of Defense was to take a central role in the War on Drugs. As a result, Pentagon officials reported that subsequent military support to civilian law enforcement agencies expanded significantly and took myriad forms in the U.S.-Mexico border region. These included conducting small-unit and long-range reconnaissance patrols in hard-to-cover areas; providing intelligence support; clearing brush and improving roads along the border; training law enforcement personnel in intelligence analysis and survival skills; providing air transport of law enforcement personnel in interdiction and eradication efforts; staffing listening and observation posts; using remotely piloted reconnaissance aircraft; staging military exercises in suspected drug trafficking zone; conducting radar and imaging missions; providing operational planning assistance; and providing DOD personnel to develop data bases as well as mapping and reconnaissance folders for Border Patrol sectors. (Dunn 1996, 124)

In November, the Pentagon created an anti-drug military intelligence center with personnel specifically aimed at undertaking “limited incursions into Mexican territory” under the Mexican government’s authorization. (Cabildo 1990) Forces Command established the Joint Task Force 6 (JTF-6) at Fort Bliss army base in El Paso, Texas. “JTF-6 marked the formal establishment of ongoing participation by active-duty U.S. military forces in antidrug efforts on the U.S.-Mexico border. As such, it was the most prominent indication that the military had put aside many of its previous qualms about such active involvement in drug enforcement matters within the United States. . . .” (Dunn 1996, 133) Isenberg elaborated on JTF-6’s mission in Covert Action Quarterly.

Forces Command (FORSCOM), which coordinates military forces in the U.S. established JTF-6 at Ft. Bliss, Texas, in November 1989. It supports counterdrug operations along the 2,000 border, including the southern third of California and all of Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas – more than 58,000 square miles. JTF-6 builds and maintains border fences, installs floodlights and remote sensors, and conducts surveillance missions. It coordinates support to Operation Alliance, which coordinates federal, state, and local antidrug efforts. (Isenberg 1992)

At the end of December, the United States, in Operation Just Cause under the direction of Bush, invaded Panama to pursue and capture General Manuel Noriega.

Five hundred-something Panamanian dead is the official body count, what the US and Panamanian governments admit to; other sources, with no less evidence, insist that thousands died, their numbers obscured in mass graves; 3,000-something wounded; 23 American dead, 324 wounded. (Blum 1995, 305)

• mobile ground radar stations for Bolivia, Peru, and Colombia;
• increased training of regional anti-drug teams in jungle combat, night operations, map reading, and intelligence;
• Air Force AWACS planes to surveil drug routes along the Gulf of Mexico;
• the use of ground and air radar stations of the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) near Colorado Springs to relay intelligence on drug movements to law enforcement agencies;
• military exercises on the U.S. side of the Mexican border designed to intimidate drug traffickers, and;
• expanded military support of the U.S. Border Patrol, Customs, and local police. (Johns 1992)

One indication of how the United State’s surveillance assets were to be used in the Drug War was that “by early 1990, U.S. spy planes were flying missions near Colombia tracking beeper signals from agents on the ground in an attempt to assist in the manhunt of Pablo Escobar.” (Johns 1992) Another indication became public knowledge in March, 1990, when it was revealed that an American satellite had been making estimations of Mexico’s marijuana production. The satellite derived estimates, incidentally, were reportedly 10 times higher than Mexican counts. (Chabat 1995a) If remote sensing imagery from American satellites can be used to observe marijuana production, it can also be used to observe people, like the Zapatistas in Chiapas.

By 1990, due to reported increases in the amount of cocaine entering the United States via Mexico, the use of “aerostat radar units were to gain prominence in the drug war.” Mexico began to “upgrade their radar systems.” (Lemus 1995, 429)

The first phase, which cost $70 million, was to be completed by February 1990. The radar system was activated in December 1991 to track aircraft suspected of illicit activities heading north from South America. A Western diplomat disclosed that a drug-interdiction system was also being built along the Guatemalan border with Mexican support. (Lemus 1995, 429)

Other knowledgeable sources said the tactical analysis team in Mexico City has installed sophisticated new communication equipment in the embassy to collect intelligence from a wide variety of the U.S. military sources, including the Colorado-based North American Air Defense Command and the Panama-based Southern Command. (Jehl and Miller 1990)

Several years later Newsweek reported that similar tactical analysis teams had been deployed to “10 Central and South American countries, working with the DEA and CIA to assemble intelligence dossiers on trafficking organizations.” (Lane 1992)

In June, 1990, Proceso reported that then U.S. Ambassador Negroponte had confirmed the existence of the U.S. military’s tactical analysis team in the American Embassy, and that it was dedicated to decoding signals transmitted by U.S. satellite from North American Air Defense Command (NORAD) near Colorado Springs, Colorado. In addition to being in permanent communication with the Mexican Attorney General’s office and a base in Monterrey, this team was also in communication with a radar installation in the Istmo de Tehuantepec and with American P-3 radar planes charged with detecting aircraft coming from Colombia. (Cabildo 1990)

Reuter and Ronfeldt, in an article in the Journal of Interamerican Studies and World Affairs, described some of the “furor” generated by public knowledge of the tactical analysis team in Mexico.

The publicity that broke in June 1990 implied that the tactical team belonged to the US military, and the P-3s were routinely overflying Mexico in violation of its sovereignty. This provoked a furor in the press and heavy criticism of Salinas by political opposition. Mexico’s Ministry of Foreign Relations (Secretaría de Relaciones Exteriores or SRE) expressed outrage at US behavior and had the P-3 overflights suspended. The tactical team was reportedly closed down, and Salinas found him denouncing the presence of any foreign military assistance unit on Mexican soil. (Reuter and Ronfeldt 1992)

A Mexican government report released through the Office of the Attorney General of the Republic confirmed in June 1990 that an ultra-modern military communications team is in place in the U.S. Embassy in Mexico City and that a ‘military anti-drug base’ acts in conjunction with other centers located in Monterrey and uses a radar unit installed by the Office on the Isthmus of Tehuantepec. The report also confirmed that, using drug trafficking as an excuse, P-3 radar aircraft acting in coordination with the Fort Bliss base in El Paso, Texas, are already operating over Mexican territory. (Saxe-Fernandez 1994a)

The manifestation of U.S.-Mexican collaboration most relevant to the border region was the development of Mexico’s Northern Border Response Force (NBRF). Formed in 1990, this unit was a rapid-response team made up of agents from the notorious Mexican Federal Judicial Police, whose forces had been widely cited for humans rights abuses (as noted previously). The NBRF had six helicopter bases in border cities, and another five in northern Mexico within 200 miles of the border. The unit’s objective was to apprehend drug traffickers and break up their networks in northern Mexico as they landed at airstrips before attempting to cross the border. The United States was instrumental in establishing, supplying, and training the force. A U.S. military counternarcotics team based at the American Embassy worked closely with the unit, providing intelligence information. Meanwhile, ‘advisers’ from the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency [sic] worked more closely with the unit on an ongoing operational basis. . . . (Dunn 1996, 139)

By the summer of 1990, General Maxwell Thurman, commander of the Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) and architect of the Panamanian invasion, had begun planning a low-intensity conflict in Colombia, Bolivia, and Peru, one in which local military forces aided by the U.S. military, would launch ‘simultaneous’ strikes against drug traffickers. (Mabry 1996)

In October, 1990, a new U.S.-Mexican counternarcotics agreement was announced that “specified conditions under which P-3 aircraft may overfly Mexico” and provide information to the Attorney General’s Office. The Attorney General’s Office also announced that it “would acquire two Cessna Citation fixed-wing aircraft with advanced down-looking radar; these aircraft would be operated exclusively by Mexican crews. Moreover, the United States planned to loan to Mexico approximately 20 Bell UH-1H (Huey) helicopters. The program also included training for PJF officers.” (Reuter and Ronfeldt 1992)

In November, 1990, the Defense Intelligence Agency stated in a memorandum, obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request by the National Security Archives, that “the Mexican Army has expressed great satisfaction with intelligence information that the United States provides, and the relations between Mexican and United States military personal has improved considerably.” (del Rio 1994)

At the end of 1990, a ground radar system became operable at Santa Eulalia, Chihuahua. Through a communication channel via the Morelos 1 satellite the ground radar station could be accessed by the Monterrey center for SENEAM,
Servicios a la Navegación en el Espacio Aéreo Mexicano (Services of Navigation in Mexican Air Space). The Mexican military and the Attorney General’s Office had installed three-dimensional radar and had begun training their personnel at civilian air control towers with the goal of detecting aircraft carrying drugs. (Gutiérrez 1993)

U.S. funding for Mexican counternarcotics efforts increased. In 1991, the State Department’s Bureau of International Narcotics Matters (INM) supported Mexico with $20 million to control drugs. Between 1978 and 1990, the INM contributed $150.3 millions, an average of $12.5 million per year. (Castañeda 1993) INM budget submissions included requests for aerial surveillance and computer operators.

. . . according to its 1991 budget submission to Congress, the State Department planned to sponsor an aerial survey project to evaluate eradication efforts. If the project is funded, the INM will finance training programs for pilots, photo-interpreters, and computer operators, as well as other aspects of the endeavor. (Barry 1992)

The deployment of U.S. military assets to the Persian Gulf region, prior to, during, and after the aerial bombardment of Iraq, was a drain on military resources in the Western hemisphere used to fight the Drug War. For Mabry, this exposed a flaw in the strategy of a military solution to drugs.

The Persian Gulf War demonstrated the inherent problem in making the military the lead agency in antinarcotics smuggling. The military’ Defense-in-Depth surveillance and interdiction strategy requires the use of large numbers of aircraft and ships. Using these resources is easy, albeit expensive, when the military is in a waiting status but in wartime many of these resources must be quickly reassigned to war zones, thus creating holes in the surveillance net. During the Persian Gulf War, AWACS planes and navy ships were redeployed to the war theater, reducing coverage of the Caribbean Basin. (Mabry 1994, 121)

There is also a Hemisphere-wide Drug Control Information System (SHICOD) which integrates the intelligence network against drug trafficking at the continental level. The Mexican government has promoted the building up of this network and is linked to it through the Drug Control Planning Center (CENDRO), which . . . is an inter-ministerial level agency coordinated by the Office of the Attorney General of Mexico, responsible for collecting and assessing all the information necessary in planning the fight against drug trafficking. (PGR 1992, 34)

In September, 1991, the Mexican Air Force received from the United States the first two of more Black Hawk UH-60L helicopters that it would acquire. (del Rio 1994) Black Hawks are equipped with global positioning equipment that allow pilots to zero-in on targets if the latitude, longitude, and altitude are known. (Lumsdaine 1995) These coordinates can be obtained from aerial surveillance by satellites or reconnaissance planes. Black Hawks were used in Operation Blast Furnace in Bolivia in 1986.

In November, the Los Angeles Times reported that an “18-month-old partnership between Washington and Mexico City over the use of U.S. Customs planes to help Mexican officials interdict drug shipments” was in trouble because of a November 7 incident in which Mexican military forces shot and killed seven federal drug agents on an airstrip near Veracruz. The Los Angeles Times stated that: “In Washington, U.S. officials said the Mexican drug agents killed during the raid had been working closely with the DEA for months as part of the new response team, which relied heavily on the radar intelligence gathered by military and U.S. Customs radar planes operating off the Mexican coast.” (Miller and Jehl 1991)

In December, the radar system in southern Mexico along the Guatemala border, purchased from Westinghouse with a $40 million loan from the US Export-Import Bank, became operational under the command of the Mexican air force. (Doyle 1993)

If the radar is ultimately deployed for use in the drug war, it will serve as another means for sharing intelligence between United States and Mexican security personnel. Through the embassy-based tactical assistance team, the United States has already increased information exchanges with Mexican police units, and will continue to do so as United States and Mexican drug agents make their communications gear operate together, a project currently under way. (Doyle 1993)

But also in December, the General Accounting Office (GAO) issued a report that cast doubt on the effectiveness of the Department of Defense’s high-tech drug interdiction systems. And, “because the interdiction has not stopped the flow of cocaine into the United States, the Inter-American Commission on Drug Policy recommended reducing funding for interdiction.” (Mabry 1996, 45)

By 1992, halfway through the Salinas presidency, it was clear that the Drug War was responsible for major military expansion in Mexico. In the fiscal years 1990, 1991, and 1992, the Mexican army purchased more that $400 million worth of military arms and equipment from the United States. According to Proceso this amount is 25% of all the military expenditures during the decade of the 1980s. In addition, during these three years, the number of Mexicans who participated in the United States’ IMET (International Military Education Training) program increased markedly. Proceso reported that between 1950 and 1979, 1,022 Mexicans participated – an average of 35 per year. Between 1982 and 1988, under de la Madrid, 388 Mexicans received IMET training – an average of 65 per year. While during the first half of the Salinas administration the figure had risen to 392 – an average of 131 per year. The IMET program, according to Proceso, includes training in anti-drug operations, counterintelligence, and the use of advanced equipment. Prior to 1990, Mexico did not participate in the United States’ Military Assistance Program (MAP), a program for the sale of equipment and defense services. But in 1990, Mexico received $876,000 under MAP. (Puig 1991)

Commercial exports of defense articles, services, and technical data are licensed by the Office of Defense Trade Controls in the Bureau of Political-Military Affairs of the Department of State. Between 1950 and 1979, Mexico purchased $11,241,000 worth of military equipment and articles – an average of almost $0.4 million per year.  Between 1980 and 1989, Mexico spent $377,000,000 – an average of about $63 million per year. But in 1990, 1991, and 1992, Mexico bought $395 million in defense equipment – an average of $131 million per year.

The Mexican Air Force, reported Proceso, benefited the most from this increase in military expenditures since the early 1980s, with the establishment of a squadron of F-5E fighter jets, Bell 212 helicopters, and C-130 transport planes. (Puig 1991)

In 1992, the U.S. Department of State believed the “most important” indicator of Mexico’s commitment to the Drug War was the “Salinas administration's decision to make the drug issue a national security priority.” (U.S. Department of State 1993)

The Department of State reported that in 1992, “the United States and Mexico maintained close, effective counternarcotics cooperation,” that U.S.-Mexican law enforcement cooperation included “sharing intelligence on the activities of narcotics trafficking groups operating in Mexico and the U.S.,” that part of U.S. policy was to assist Mexico in building “an effective and efficient field support infrastructure to support crop control and enforcement activities,” and that together the United States and Mexico were “working to build a coordinated hemispheric response to the drug threat.” (U.S. Department of State 1993)

This cooperation included the participation of 20 personnel from Mexico’s Attorney General’s Office in “aviation maintenance training courses” in the United States, training programs “focused on air, land, and sea interdiction,” and joint anti-drug operations in international waters between the Mexican Navy and the U.S. Coast Guard and Navy. The United States also supported the Attorney General’s Office’s counternarcotics efforts with “information management.” (U.S. Department of State 1993)

According to the Department of State, “under the Salinas administration, the military has expanded its eradication efforts and has initiated an aerial survey program.” The International Narcotics Control Strategy Report (1993) stated:

The Mexican Army conducts extensive manual drug crop eradication, but it also supports law enforcement agencies in interdiction missions; the Air Force's ground-based radar system supports the Mexican air interdiction effort. The Mexican Navy is responsible for maritime drug interdiction and eradication of drug crops in coastal areas. (U.S. Department of State 1993)

In January 1992 President Bush authorized for Mexico more helicopter repair, equipment support and technical assistance valued at $26 million. (Castañeda 1993) And in January, Newsweek reported that, “A network of 18 ground-based radars in South and Central America and the Caribbean, supposed to be completed in 1992, is a year behind schedule.” (Lane 1992)

In February, according to the Department of State, President Salinas participated in the San Antonio Summit, “joining the work begun by the Andean nations and the U.S. at Cartagena in 1990.” Also in February, Mexico leased 12 UH-1H transport helicopters from the United States “to support the mobile basing concept and increase safety and flexibility,” bringing the Northern Border Response Forces’ UH-1H fleet to 21. Through mobile forward bases, Mexico “hopes to respond more quickly against suspect flights.” “DEA and NAS advisers in Mexico worked closely with the PGR to enhance NBRF operations and the U.S. Customs Service provided advanced training to the pilots of the PGR's Citation II tracker aircraft.” (U.S. Department of State 1993)

In July, 1992, Mexico announced that under a concept of “Mexicanization” it “would assume the remaining costs of counternarcotics programs previously supported by U.S. narcotics control funds.” Rather than provide funds, the United States support role began to “concentrate on specialized training and technical assistance.” In August, Mexico “confirmed its decision to assume financial support in 1993 for programs which previously received” Bureau of International Narcotics Matters’ funding. In September, Mexico hosted the UN Heads of National Law Enforcement Agencies conference. In October, CENDRO's 24-hour operations center opened. In early December, a U.S. “interagency team visited Mexico to discuss ways to enhance information exchanges between CENDRO” and similar U.S. agencies. (U.S. Department of State 1993)

By the end of 1992, Bush’s presidency was about to come to a close and William Clinton was set to be the next president of the United States. The U.S. militarization of the Drug War had been underway for over 10 years. Reagan’s declaration that drugs were a national security threat was over 6 years old. It had been 3 years since former Secretary of Defense Cheney’s assertion that combating drugs was a national security mission of great priority. The experience of Panama and Iraq was informing the U.S. military establishment with new insights about conducting war. And the revolution in military affairs brought on by the so-called information and communication revolution was in the incipient stages of what would be soon called Information Warfare. The Fall 1992 issue of Covert Action Quarterly underscored the communication and information technology assets available to the Pentagon that were being utilized in its antidrug efforts. Undoubtedly, these assets were being made available to Mexico.

The number of military agencies involved in antidrug efforts has blossomed like poppies in warm summer sunshine. The Defense Communications Agency is responsible for implementing the Drug Enforcement Telecommunications Plan. It identifies specific secure telephone, radio, and satellite communications equipment needed to interconnect voice, data, and record communications among DoD and LEAs. To provide secure antidrug communications systems and allow LEAs to share information and access various databases, the Pentagon has created a computerized Anti-Drug Network. (Isenberg 1992)

On January 1, 1993, in accordance with a 1992 policy decision to "Mexicanize" its Drug War, Mexico “assumed full responsibility for funding key programs such as maintenance of the air fleet of the Attorney General's Office, which is critical to both cocaine interdiction and eradication of marijuana and opium poppy.” According to the State Department, “Mexicanization of the GOM's counternarcotics efforts has helped to move the relationship beyond that of donor-recipient to one of active collaboration between partners. This effort is reflected in increased information sharing, operational coordination and international collaboration.” (U.S. Department of State 1994)

U.S.-Mexico anti-drug cooperation has not been without problems. In February, 1993, reported Proceso, the American Embassy in Mexico revealed that not all the high frequency radio bases and mobile radio units provided by the U.S. Department of State to the Mexican Attorney General’s Office for the purpose of counternarcotics work by that agency’s Rapid Force team were being utilized. In addition a “Master Plan of Communications” supposed to be complete by then was still in development. The impetus for such a plan came with the recognition as early as July 1990 that poor equipment hindered communication between the P-3 radar planes in the air, Mexico’s Rapid Force team on the ground, and the control center housed in the American Embassy in Mexico City. The Department of Defense recommended a communications plan be developed for the whole country. (Puig 1993)

On March 20, two Mexican military officers were killed in Chiapas, outside San Cristobal de las Casas, very close to the powerful radar station on Cerro del Extranjero (Alien Hill). (Guzmán and Vera 1993) This was believed to be the Zapatistas “first run-in with the military. . .” (Ross 1995, 86) “The Mexican military’s response to the killings was swift and brutal. 400 troops from the 24th Motorized cavalry, stationed in Comitán, sealed off the village and swept through the 40-family settlement.” (Ross 1995, 24)

As of April 1993, Mexico had 7 long distance radar installations each with a coverage of 200 nautical miles. Mexican air space was divided into four control centers of aerial traffic. El Centro Mérida covered the states of Yucatan, Chiapas, and Campeche. El Centro México covered central Mexico. El Centro Mazatlán covered Guadalajara, Nayarit, Aguascalientes, Sinaloa, Sonora, Baja California Sur, and parts of Baja California. El Centro Monterrey covered Nuevo León, Tamaulipas, Coahuila y Chihuahua. (Gutiérrez 1993)

The assassination of Cardinal Posadas on May 24, 1993, in Guadalajara, was “one decisive event in the radicalization of the drug wars,” according to one Mexican drug policy analyst. “It is difficult to know if this crime was a product of a more confrontational policy toward drug trafficking or the detonator of it. The fact is that President Salinas declared total war to drug trafficking four days after the Cardinal’s death.” (Chabat 1995b)

On June 17, Mexico established the National Institute to Combat Drugs. The INCD became responsible for “planning, executing, supervising, and evaluating all counternarcotics activities in Mexico.” Mexico requested and funded U.S. technical advice and training for INCD personnel. (U.S. Department of State 1994) In August, the “first class of narcotics investigative police cadets” graduated from the newly created National Institute to Combat Drugs. (U.S. Department of State 1994)

In November, Clinton issued Presidential Decision Directive 14, also known as the U.S. Policy on International Counternarcotics in the Western Hemisphere, “which changed the focus of the U.S. international drug control strategy from interdicting cocaine as it moved through the transit zone of the Caribbean and Mexico to stopping cocaine in the source countries of Bolivia, Colombia, and Peru.” This change in strategy “reduced the detection and monitoring assets in the transit zone.” (GAO 1996a)

As 1993 drew to a close, interest was peaked by the impending implementation of NAFTA, set to go into force on January 1, 1994. A November article in Proceso discussed areas of U.S.-Mexico mutual concern and focused on the Drug War as the vehicle for increased military cooperation, concluding that indeed Mexico’s move toward greater military involvement in combating drugs was increasing reliance on the United States for military assistance.

The warm relations between Washington and Mexico City also have strengthened the knot between the military structures of both countries. The Mexican armed forces are among the most nationalistic on the continent, but the increasing role of the Mexican military in antinarcotic operations and the governmental emphasis for supporting the army in modern equipment and training, has opened the road for increased assistance from the United States. (Castañeda 1993)

Just a half-hour before, the New Year had detonated in the boom of bottle rockets, muffling the moves of the interlopers on the outskirts of town. One group had busied itself felling stout pine trees on the north end of the Pan American Highway in an effort to blockade the sole paved road up from Tuxla Gutiérrez, the state capital 60 miles northwest. Two other detachments had secured the PEMEX gas stations at both ends of San Cristóbal. An attack team had been dispatched to take the public justice center ministry headquarters south of the city, at Maria Auxiliadora. Now short figures, wrapped in black wool chujs (serapes) and carrying a motley array of weapons that ranged from AK-15s and UZIs to axes and sledge hammers, entered the 31st of March Plaza, surrounded the Municipal Palace and its tiny unguarded police station, and began to smash down its doors with their ‘marros’ (sledges) – the weapon of the Indian street laborers of San Cristóbal. (Ross 1995, 8)

The helicopters in the military’s fleet were the building blocks of the air campaign. Drug war largess had given Mexico the wherewithal to purchase over 100 HUEYS and Bell 212s. 82 choppers in the fleet are under military control and at least 22 more are leased to Mexico for a nominal fee and fall under the purview of the federal prosecutor’s office (PGR) for exclusive use in anti-narcotics raids. There is little doubt that the U.S. aircraft was used by the Mexican military to wage war on the Indians of Chiapas. (Ross 1995, 102)

The average soldier’s experience is more likely to have been in providing disaster relief or refurbishing dilapidated public facilities. In some cases, the army has even repaired household appliances in remote rural villages. But of the 105,000 soldiers on active duty, only 25,000 are assigned to fighting drug traffickers, which military analysts say is the closest a Mexican soldier normally comes to combat. (Robberson 1994)

. . . a U.S. official quoted by Reuter news service said Mexico had been using helicopters that were provided for drug interdiction in the campaign against the rebels. He said that after review of the U.S. restrictions, Mexican officials assured that the craft had been returned to antinarcotics duty. (Robberson 1994)

But La Jornada later reported that Jane Therry of the U.S. House Subcommittee of Western Hemispheric Affairs stated “during the rebellion of Chiapas, in January,
Mexico attacked the civilian population with helicopters the United States sold to it to combat narcotrafficking.” (Hernández 1994)

Perhaps in an attempt to downplay the U.S. military role in Mexico, in February, 1994, it was reported that the U.S. supply of arms and military equipment to Mexico had tapered off. These figures may have reflected the process of “Mexicanization” of the Drug War initiated under Salinas. The Austin American-Statesman reported that “in fiscal year 1992. . . the United States delivered arms and other military equipment to Mexico valued at $19.1 million. This compares with deliveries of $72.8 million on 1982 and $60 million in 1990.” (Kay 1994)

Nevertheless, figures for 1994 show an increase that exceeds spending levels in 1982, 1990, and 1992. The 1995 Human Rights Watch World Report stated that:

Mexico received a relatively small amount of security assistance from the U.S. but it did purchase large amounts of U.S. weaponry through governmental and commercial channels. In fiscal year 1994, Mexico acquired an estimated $110 million in arms purchases from private U.S. companies and the government and its fiscal year 1995 request was higher than for any other Latin American country. The U.S. continued to make or approve arms sales to Mexico, without considering the human rights situation, as required by law. (Human Rights Watch 1995)

In the International Journal of Politics, Culture, and Society, Saxe-Fernandez, an economics professor at the Autonomous University in Mexico City and close observer of U.S. economic interests in Mexico, suggested that following the Zapatista uprising the U.S. Department of Defense has encouraged the Mexican military to focus more on counterinsurgency rather than on its traditional roles.

It is estimated that 3,000 vehicles for military use were imported during the first three months following the Chiapas insurrection. The U.S. Department of Defense is now taking advantage is the Zapatista movement to increase its influence on the Mexican military by promoting changes in its command and intelligence structure and mission, and by supporting a shift away from the military’s traditional roles and missions (such as the defense of territorial integrity and the protection of strategic oil, gas, and mineral resource sites) toward greater focus on internal and highly repressive police-related functions similar to the counterinsurgency of the Cold War. (Saxe-Fernandez 1994b)

A drug policy analyst at the Centro de Investigación y Docencia Económicas believed there was a logical correlation between the Zapatista uprising and governmental calls for increased attention to drug trafficking. Through the Drug War, it was easier to justify increased militarization.

Probably one factor that reinforced the Salinas’s perception of drug trafficking as a threat was the Chiapas uprising in January 1994, even when there are no indications of a linkage between drug trafficking and the guerrilla ‘zapatista.’ Notwithstanding, it sounds logical that in a moment of political crisis, like at the beginning of 1994, a tight control over the security forces was a high priority of the Mexican State. (Chabat 1995b)

In 1994, “close law enforcement cooperation between the Mexico and the United States continued,” reported the State Department. “The United States continued to provide technical advice and training” for personnel of the Mexican National Institute to Combat Drugs (INCD) and “the interdiction of cocaine shipments by the Northern Border Response Force (NBRF) remained the focus of bilateral interdiction efforts.” Two joint operations between the U.S. Coast Guard and the Mexican Navy were conducted and were “successful regarding information sharing, professional exchanges, shipriders, and direct communications.” (U.S. Department of State 1995)

Another government agency reported problems with U.S.-Mexico anti-drug cooperation. A General Accounting Office report stated that:

. . . in mid-1994, the Drug Enforcement Administration’s Attaché in Mexico cautioned that the primary drug interdiction initiative in Mexico – known as the Northern Border Response Force – had been jeopardized by the loss of detection and monitoring coverage in the transit zone. (GAO 1996b)

. . . the Office of National Drug Control Policy has designated Mexico as the second most important country in the international narcotics program – behind Colombia – even though Mexico is listed as a transit-zone country. Moreover, the Drug Enforcement Administration Attaché in Mexico recommended that Mexico be reclassified as a source country so it can be considered for more resources under the strategy. (GAO 1996b)

. . . the primary goals of this initiative are to make Mexico's law enforcement and justice system officials more accountable to the Mexican people; to establish a greater degree of separation of powers; to rationalize Mexico's duplicative systems of public security; and to eliminate official corruption within law enforcement and the judiciary. (U.S. Department of State 1995)

Even given the General Accounting Office’s reported problems with the Northern Border Response Force, the Department of State remained positive, stating Mexico:

. . . continued to build on strong U.S.-Mexican cooperation in its operations against general aviation aircraft used by traffickers. The program also continued to expand its capabilities to move against overland and maritime trafficking as well. (U.S. Department of State 1996)

In February, 1995, U.S. and Mexican law enforcement and diplomatic officials “began an unprecedented series of law enforcement plenaries.” Six meetings were held through the year. Counternarcotics cooperation was among the topics regularly discussed. (U.S. Department of State 1996)
 Also in February, the Pentagon released its annual report to the President and Congress. The report contained information about the Department of Defense’s Special Operation Forces as they are used in counternarcotics operations.

Special Operation Forces continue to support U.S. drug law enforcement agencies in counterdrug operations in Latin America. SOF trained and provided expert advice to host-nation armed forces dedicated to the counterdrug mission, primarily through exercises, joint planning and assistance teams, and mobile training teams. SOF teams conducted over 285 counterdrug missions in support of the Drug Enforcement Agency, the U.S. Information Agency, and the U.S. Country Teams’ Narcotics Affairs Staffs. (U.S. Department of Defense 1995)

During the 1995 February offensive against Zapatista strongholds in Chiapas, which began on February 10, “the Mexican army used Black Hawk helicopters and parachuting units to take over formerly held Zapatista towns such as Guadalupe, Tepeyac, Ibarra, and San Quintin.” (Lazaroff 1995) As noted earlier, Black Hawk helicopters come equipped with Global Positioning System equipment that when used in conjunction with signals from aerial reconnaissance planes or satellites can pin-point targets on the ground. (Lumsdaine 1995) On February 11, reported La Jornada, “two military attaches from the United States today tried to enter the conflict zone in the state of Chiapas, in which the Mexican Army is developing an offensive against the Zapatista National Liberation Army (EZLN), but they were stopped at a military checkpoint.” La Jornada also reported, “the officials denied that the United States was loaning assistance to combat the Zapatista guerrillas, and rejected also the idea that with this military operation, which is being developed with great secrecy, is violating human rights.” (La Jornada 1995)

According to an April issue of Latin America Weekly Report, in reference to the Zapatistas in Chiapas, the Mexican military “claim that, thanks to the use of satellite reconnaissance and of helicopters equipped with heat-seeking devices, they have been able to pinpoint every movement of the rebels.” (Latin America Weekly Report 1995)  On May 23, the Clinton administration announced that Mexico was negotiating to acquire more U.S. military helicopters to be used in the fight against the narcotrafficking. (Cason and Brooks 1995b)

During the summer of 1995, “President Zedillo formally raised the profile of the Mexican military in counternarcotics activities” and “enhanced the military's involvement in interdiction.” In June, Mexico, with Guatemala and Belize, in “Operation Triangle,” conducted “two international counternarcotics surge operations.” This “tri-border effort” was a precursor to Operation "Unidos" that happened later in the year. In August, “one of the most important drug seizures by the Mexican Navy took place” when “1,125 kg of cocaine was confiscated as a result of a firefight with narcotraffickers trying to cross the Usumacinta river from Guatemala into Mexico.” (U.S. Department of State 1996)

On July 25, U.S. government sources informed La Jornada that the Mexican government was looking to quadruple the number of U.S. helicopters it had deployed in the war against narcotrafficking. At that time, the Mexican Attorney General’s office was renting 18 UH-1H Huey helicopters, but wanted to increase that amount to 90. La Jornada also reported that the Attorney General’s office was interested in purchasing an unspecified number of Sikorsky S-70 Black Hawk helicopters, but that there was some opposition to this among U.S. officials who thought maintenance and operation costs would be too high. (Cason and Brooks 1995c)

The August issue of Jane’s Intelligence Review included a long list of recent Mexican military acquisitions. The publication stated that in 1995 Mexico had obtained “608 laser designators and 208 night-vision devices.” JIR predicted:

The Mexican air force (FAM), however, is likely to turn to the USA for additional equipment, particularly helicopters of the UH-1, UH-60, and MD500 types already in inventory. Once in Mexican service, they could be equipped with machine gun/rocket pods for counter-insurgency duties. (Montes 1995)

In August, La Jornada reported that “the Mexican Army had substantially increased the purchase of arms” in 1993 and 1994. The report stated “sophisticated equipment, ” including “telescopic night-vision gun sights” and “white laser designators,” had been “fundamentally destined to special units and to the Military Police” and that “during the last three years it registered an important increase in the potential of the Mexican Air Force through the purchase of he