Comparing Plan Columbia and the Merida Initiative

The resolve of this paper volition be to everyplacehear a comparison among the Colombian medicine contracts at the shape of the nose candy with the mexican cartels today. The object of this comparison lead be to order the effectiveness of large scale millitary intervention against do doses cartels. I will assess weather this comparison is not wholly justified unmixedly in any way usefull in understanding how struggle a well funded well armed non- invoke enemy.This is a response to public comments by high ranking United States officials making this comparison ( to the highest degree notably monument of state Hillary Clinton) succession pledging a signifi vernacular amount of American resources to such(prenominal) an effort. I will also attempt to answer any(prenominal) of the assorted questions that be begged by this nature of action. Most flock do not trueize the sheer lucrativeness of the do do drugss trafficking business especially on an industrial scale. T he (Mexican) cartels bear built a ne twainrk of dealers in 231 U. S. cities from coast to coast, fetching in ab extinct $39 billion in sales annually, check to the U.S. Justice De subtractment. (*1)To put that into perspective, In 2009 Canadas total annual military using up was just over half (21 billion USD) of the total annual take in of the Mexican drug cartels in the United States. (*2) Comparing capital of South Carolina and Mexico The initiative thing that is obvious when making this comparison is the fact that Mexico is over double the size of capital of South Carolina both in land mass and in population. In terms of governance Columbia was in a state of profound political inst capacity from as early as the 1940s while Mexico enjoyed a congenatorly stable PRI political science follo extension phone he Mexican civilised contend.Geographically the two countries train nothing in frequent but their proximity to each miscellaneaer(a). Mexico is a largely flat terra in that poses no unfeigned riddles to transportation and proposes little in the way of cover. By teleph oneness line Columbia has a large mountainous bea covered in tropical fo lies, the major(ip)ity of the drug production takes target is these remote aras. From a organizational standpoint, the Colombian government is largely decentralized compared to the federal organise in Mexico.Due to the federal government and the larger tax initiation the Mexican government has some extra capacity when it comes to overall resources available before assistance. As far as the method in which the governments of these two countries approach dealing with traffickers is quite diffrent, Mexico has up until very latterly favorite(a) to use its jurisprudence agitates to deal with drug traffickers while Colombian governments start preferred to use their military as a patrol force, which is much(prenominal) than common in most Latin American countries. The Mexican Cartels on that point are essentially two major Cartel convocations within Mexico that fight each other for a large piece of the drug trade. The premiere is made up of the Tijuana cartel and the Gulf cartel make up the first major group and operates primarily out of North of easternmost Mexico. A group kn bear as The Federation is made up of of many smaller cartels and is led by representatives of the Sinaloa, Juarez and Valencia cartels. (*3 p. 4) members of this group as scattered all throughout the rest of Mexico. Even though these groups are concentrated in certain areas on that point isnt a place in Mexico that is off limits to any of these groups.All of these groups operate independently and it is not rarified for alliances to be fickle amongst drug traffickers. None of the Mexican drug trafficking organizations are cognize to have any political allegiances or tell commodious term mark other therefore to make property and control as much turf as possible in order to achieve that e nd while minimizing the damage to the hatful of their own groups. The Mexican cartels were not always as uncivilized as they are today, the fall of the PRI along with a strengthen of the Mexican practice of law force is said to have resulted in the upswing in violence. other contri besidesing element the recent escalation in violence is that since the fall of Major Columbian cartels (replaced for the most part by smaller scale processs) Mexico and its drug trade began to have to subscribe to the void that was left in the US market for a item of time, greatly strengthening their financial base and ability to purchase weapons and to rent a larger number of foot soldiers from misfortunate communities (usually with family ties to promote change magnitude loyalty to said group and a deeper anchor within the topical anesthetic community).Florida was actually the main entry point for drugs during the early 80s but the strengthening of the American navy and coastguard geared to contendds stopping smuggling led to Mexico change state the transit point it is today. It is most important that though Mexican serviceman have been used largely overdue to the ineffective and corruption of the police department I would not classify it as a war. The the States is simply there to do carry out the actions of a police force be construct he regular police for cannot be trusted. There is no way for either side to declare a complete victory. It is my credence that steady if all(prenominal) drug trafficker in Mexico dropped dead this sunup there would be a new group forming to take its place by nightfall and it wouldnt take them long to gain momentum dandy and weapons. Likewise a drug gang can never truly triumph against the state without any political agenda.The majority of the murders are between rival gangs, though there have been many police officers and politicians killed the involution is essentially between the cartel groups and each other not with the sta te. The change magnitude military strength is simply a self defence response. I would argue that if the Mexican cartels were 1 hegemonic group you would probably see at least a 10 fold drop in violent crime. Columbia at the hight of the culumbian drug trade You cant tell the yarn of the Columbia drug trade without talking about Pablo Escobar.In 1989 Forbes time estimated that was the 7th richest man the world with personal assets estimated at over 25 Billion dollars. This however is not what made him a unique, he was go as an extremely charitable man by many of the poor citizenry in Columbia giving them land, housing, employment and even create football fields, building a lot of good will among the raft something that you capture little evidence of on the side of the Mexican cartels.The Medellin cartel he was a part of is thought to have controlled about 80% of the coca plantin market in the early 1990s and was the most prominent of the Colombian cartels at the turn of the century. This cartel was rivalled by the Cali cartel who emerged largely due to weakening of their rivals the Medellin cartel. The biggest difference between Columbia at the turn of the century and the situation in Mexico today is the personifyence of the various rebel groups that existed in Columbia, many of which are still in existence.The lines are often brumous between these guerrilla groups and the drug traffickers themselves. The standard arrangement between these guerrillas and drug traffickers was essentially protection of traffickers production and processing areas in exchange for a handsome percentage of the profits. The profitability on investment on cocaine grown in Columbia being about 200$ for every 1$ invested, there was more(prenominal)(prenominal) then enough capital to go around. The wars between these various guerrilla groups enveloped Columbia in a civil war since eginning in the 1960s, this was far before Columbia drug trafficking organizations began to f ulfil with the leftist guerrillas. By comparison Mexican cartels have no real political allegiances, their allegiance is to the dollar and the dollar alone. The fact that the terrain in Columbia is so difficult and entrance money to remote areas is much more unaffixed to control, these various groups are able to hold territory much more effectively then the Drug Cartels in Mexico.The flavor of some of these guerrilla groups that unfeignedly begins to attract the United States attention for obvious closes is their leftist/ socialistic ideology. The oldest and most notable of these groups is FARC or The revolutionary armed forces of Columbia. This group has been fighting the Colombian subject area army as well as right wing paramilitaries. At first glance the conflict between these two groups seems to be one for control over the Colombian drug trade and various areas of Columbia where drugs are stimulated.A closer work out reveals a much more sinister reality. There are a numb er of noticeable irregularities in the accounts of the violence. Over the course of my reasearch I unbroken hearing certain terms to describe the columbian drug war that you dont hear when you read on the mexican drug war. legion(predicate) mentions of benignant rights abuses as well as massacres with large numbers of innocent people being killed, you hear of much violence in mexico but are always termed drug related murders implying that those killed were afiliated in organized crime.When you take a closer look at the right wing guerrillas, first of all its just about imposible to find a video of any of their leaders with any kind of mission statement or anything of the sort, second you cannot find any documentation anywhere of any known ally. Now, you tell me how does a heavily armed paramilitary group, even with drug specie, take part in over 30 years of civil war including asseverate armed conflict against the US millitary, without any support from any government or even an y other criminal organization?If everything where as it pops at 1st glance it results in a paradox, how does major world-wide drug trafficking organization not even have ONE known ally/accomplice? It just doesnt make any sense purely on a business level. If you look up any of the Mexican cartels as well as FARC you can find known allies. Additionally, wherefore is there a right wing guerrilla group for decades with a right wing government in power? Finally, Why is one side of the guerrillas (FARC) involved in negotiations with the Colombian government and not the other?Even if they were to sign a peace treaty they would still be at war. The conclusion that asking these questions leads you to is that the Paramilitary groups were actually an unofficial protraction of the Colombian armed forces that traces its roots back its formation during the cold war where they were apt by US army officers in tactics of counterinsurgency at the School of the Americas, these tactics are said t o specifically target the civil population without the support of which the guerrillas cannot continue to function.This groups true purpose is to combat commie guerrillas by what ever means necessary. Statistics show that these right wing paramilitaries are responsible for 80s of the political killings in Colombia, which upon closer examination seem more like like acts of widespread political re take the fieldion of the Colombian people spanning approximately a half a century and crossing the line of homosexual rights abuse with regularity virtually without any opposition from anyone inter field of studyly, opposed simply domestically by FARC.Accounts from former Colombian army officers allege that the national Colombian armed forces maintained contact regularly with right wing paramilitary groups and directlyed them to many of the areas where they are accused of committing human rights atrocities. (*9) It has been alleged that the right wing paramilitaries acting in concert w ith the Colombian national army tried to remove the rural population from certain areas on the whole forcing them to become urban refuges and further isolating the FARC forces. In 2005 Columbia had the third largest internal refuge population in the world.Not still that but the paramilitaries are responsible for just as much if not more of the Colombian drug trade then FARC making computer programme Columbia truely appear to be a futile action according to its officially tell goals. Assessment of Plan Columbia 1998-2010 (lessons learned) Assessing the success of plan Columbia really depends on what you consider to be a success. If you consider the uncreated impersonal of the operation to be to simply return control of certain areas of Columbia back to the Colombian government then it would be considered a success.However, if the primary coil objective was to irradiate the drug trade recent statistics show that though production of cocaine in Columbia did take a pure(a) hit in the early 2000s it has been on the Rise again since 2006. What this confirms is that the drug trade there has not ceased but in fact evolved to meet the challenges of a changed environment. Drug trafficking organizations today are still operating but simply doing it in a more discrete manner their predecessors. Another example of the evolution that Plan Columbia sparked is the guerrillas branching out to other harmonical paramilitaries and paramilitary terrorist groups.Members of FARC have informly instituted the help of various allies individual retirement account including the since the increased military pressure. An article in British newspaper The electrify (*8) highlights how the increased military presence in the countryside as well as an increase in the Colombian urban population has forced FARC forces to modify the way in which they conduct warfare. The article highlights significant advancements made by FARC in both explosives as well as counter apprehension and urba n warfare.FARC is currently considered the most well armed well trained and well funded guerrilla group in the world. The destruction of crops which was on paper, the primary objective of Plan Columbia is something that is very temporary, unless you were to actually salt the earth there is nothing to prevent anybody from planting a new crop in the same place. The compoundd states has increased the amount of toxic defoliant that is spays on Colombia and its citizens every year of Plan Columbia. Many have made the comparison to agent orange in Vietnam.Many health problems have already been reported with relationship to the defoliant chemical and there are concerns that this chemical is starting to embitter some the amazon basin and subsequently effecting other Latin American countries to the south. This defoliant kills all crops including the ones, many of the poorest peasants who grow bananas simply for subsistence have their whole crops undone on a regular basis. Some have raised the discern that perhaps this alone constitutes a grave human rights violation. A impertinent power spraying toxic chemicals on the population of another is something that is unhearable of in the past.The most inditing fact to the type of military action undertaken is most obviously that it has been a commitment that the United States has not been able straighten up back on after over 6 years no decrease in spending in this area is expected. Not only that but now that the Colombian drug traffickers have evolved were seeing a resurgence in drug activity in the country. No theme how you look at it Plan Colombia was almost a complete failure, Colombian left wing guerrillas persist, drug use in the US has never been higher, cocaine production in Columbia is increasing.The only ay in which this operation is a success is that the overall violence seems to have died down and that in the paramilitary groups, which the US created in the 1st place have been disbanded and are no longer committing horrendous atrocities against innocent people for the sole purpose of turning public opinion against FARC. It might be viewed in that congressman as a success, I was about half way into my query before I heard/read anything to do with FARCs side of the story. Venezuela, Ecuador and Cuba are the only counties to formally voice support for FARC. (*10) Evaluating the Merida InnitiativeOne the important things to know about the Merida initiative is that the entirety of the money (400 million to start) approved by the US congress all went to American companies, to train police, to build helicopters, not one dollar of the funding of this operation ends up in non-American hands. It is expected, as was the care with Plan Columbia that the United states will exclusively employ cliquish American defence contractors to do all the work on the ground. The reason for this is not strong enough to justify the use and possible passing of American soldiers.Also use of American soldiers to fight an urban drug war such as the one in Mexico and might cause a PR nightmare if US Soldiers are viewed as shoot on Mexican population, which the drug members of the cartels can hide in plain sight, unlike the Colombian guerrillas they are not in uniform. My investigation into Plan Colombia led me to the conclusion that the comparison made by the US writing table of defence between Colombia at the turn of the century and the Mexican drug war today to be a very poor and unjustifiable one.As previously stated I contend that the situation in Colombia was actually a war where as the Mexican situation is simply a police ineffectiveness issue. While the comparison between the who conflicts themselves is unjustifiable both Plan Columbia and The Merida initiative officially have a primary goal to reduce the outflow of drugs into the united states and can still be compared in that instance. The comparison is one that mostly highlights the extreme ineffectiveness not only in terms of r esult but in terms of price of this kind of policy. It essentially doesnt solve any of the problems of drug trafficking.The demand in the US for drugs is the real source of this problem. Persistent Problems (police, penal system,banking) A continuing problem that has been acknowledged but not dealt with in any meaningful way in the fact that poor farmers who have been driven into destitution by the international agricultural business (and its dominance by the west) have no better feasible options then to grow the plants that are converted into drugs. In Plan Columbia the Colombian government instituted a program to offer coca growers money to grow alternative crops, offering them a nerve center in the range of 2 million pesos a year (about 950$). *7)Many coca farmers argue is not enough to live. When growing coca (rather then crops such as plantains and Pineapples) not only is the crop worth more but the drug traffickers come right to their doors to pick up the coca paste they c onvert the plants to. When growing the crops they are being encouraged to grow they have to transport these tons of produce on vehicles they dont have, on roads that dont exist to sell to markets both internal and external that they dont have access to and to fight with an international aggro business . (*7- 551)It simply not a audio development plan. less then 20% of the Plan Columbia compute is allocated towards this end) instead the budget is spent on air fumigation spaying defoliant on coca cultures. Secondly the way that the penal system is set up just about everywhere in the world makes the incarceration of major drug lords almost completely futile, they still maintain control over their organization and administer it from prison. The leaders of the Tijuana and Gulf cartels made the agreement to unite while they were both in prison (*3 p. 4), consolidating their power against the rest of the cartels in the The Federation.There is also a persistent (though easilly remedied ) problem that the Mexican prisons themselves are not able keep powerful people in there. In the last year alone over 250 prison yard birds have been broken out of prison by cartels, most recently 191 were released from from a prison in Tamaulipas by the Los Zetas cartel. This creates even more problems on other fronts, it makes it alot harder to extract information from prisoners then it is in the united states. If an inmate gestates its only a matter of time before he gets out he has no reasons to co-operate in any way, no real curse to guard against.Finally, probably the most important continuing problem is money laundering, this allows for drug operations to run smoothly by giving it a seemingly legitimate flow of cash to use for Bribes, vitiateing up legitimate real estate and other things. Without being able to access the real money of drug kingpins makes it hard to do them any real damage that wont easily be recovered from in a very short time. Many large US banks are com plicit in this activity and it is a massive source of capital for them. An article from the Bloomberg press highlights the involvment of American banks such as Wachovia Corp.Bank of America and Wells Fargos direct complicity in money laundering operations for the mexican cartels. Wachovia admitted it didnt do enough to spot illicit money in handling 378. 4 billion for Mexican-currency-exchange houses from 2004 to 2007. (*1) To say they didnt do enough to spot 378 billion dollars enter their bank is laughable. There have reportedly been some efforts to pass more stringent anti-money laundering laws which have met some oppostion from the banking lobby for obvious reasons.The police force continues to be a significant problem, all the training in the world still isnt going to stop corruption, even if a relative victory is acheived and the army pulls out it would seem to me only to be a matter of time before things return to their previous state. Possible roots In order to fix the pr oblems associated with prisons I stand for a simple solution would be to transfer people associated to drug cartels to offshore or even just send them to the other side of the world somewhere a pay country X to keep them in isolation. Reducing their ability to communicate is key.Something that I think the world may sooner or later move towards provided the proper technology be available is to assure the drug trade is simply an irradiation of hand held currency. Cash is what funds all of these organizations. This is why they have to launder drug money, its dirty, you cant buy jet planes and like with cash. If you eliminate cash, how can anyone buy drugs illegally? You cant have a large elligal operation which risks lives dailey if people can only barter for your drugs and every legitimate product is purchased through some form of debit entirely controlled by the government.In conclusion I beleive that the Merida innitiative will probably succeed to a small degree in hold back viol ence but not the drug trade itself. I think it will be a costly (perhaps everlasting) failure as long as people are beating a dead gymnastic horse with tactics that are proven not work. The more troubling aspect of this whole research paper for me is the notion that gets brought up by several(prenominal) in various documentaries I watched in doing research of the American government attempted to make security policy which violates many individual freedoms with admiration to terrorism all encompassing.If you can keep enforcing the notion that the drug is on the same wavelength as terrorism it gives you the right to treat all people involved in drugs (about 80% of Americans at least once in a lifetime) as people involved in terrorism and produce a progressive erosion of civil liberties which some already believe has gone to far with legislation such as The Patriot Act. trading operations in mexico and Colombia set a precedent for the United States intervening (without take in the ca se of mexico) in domestic affairs of its neighbours using military force. I would also argue that much of this action could be perceive as just another extension of the US military industrial complex in action.Referenceshttp//www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-06-29/banks-financing-mexico-s-drug-cartels-admitted-in-wells-fargo-s-u-s-deal.htmlhttp//www.policyalternatives.ca/sites/default/files/uploads/publications/reports/docs/Canadian%20Military%20Spending%202009.pdfhttp//www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL34215.pdfhttp//blogs.mcclatchydc.com/mexico/2010/12/jail-breaks-and-cartel-manpower-woes.htmlhttp//www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/1559348/IRA-training-haunts-Colombias-guerrilla-war.htmlhttp//www.gwu.edu/nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB166/index.htm