Mexican Civil War: Could US Be to Blame?

Here is a veiled propaganda article about a supposedly new development in the Mexican civil drug war. American women with clean records are being paid to buy firearms for soldiers of Mexican drug cartels. Here’s an example of the propaganda, couched in weasel words.

Some of the largest and most deadly gun smuggling operations in the country have involved women. The development highlights the key role straw buyers are playing to keep what Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., once characterized as the “Iron River” of guns flowing from the U.S. to Mexico.

Deputy Attorney General David Ogden has described the role of straw purchasers as the spark which has led to “horrific acts of violence.”

“It’s a nationwide problem,” Ogden said, “that requires a nationwide commitment.”

In a case outlined in court documents unsealed here last year, an organization of 23 buyers, including at least one woman, was linked to purchases of 339 guns during a 15-month, $340,000 buying spree across the region.

As you can see, the author (Kevin Johnson from USA Today) is advancing the notion that we need some kind of federal solution to this problem. That would mean that the United States is to blame for Mexico’s civil war, because we allow these morally defenseless women with inexplicably benign legal records to break the law brazenly by buying firearms on behalf of someone else, who works for an illicit foreign army.

Do you understand the point Mr. Johnson is advancing with his careful sentences and selective quotes?

Now consider this. The legitimate Mexican army apparently has organizational and supply problems. Can that be blamed on the United States?

Another article states (in what may have been translated into English by the sound of it) “The weaponry occupy Mexico’s towns and cities and include grenade launchers, TNT, machine guns, rifles, anti-tank rockets and other heavy arms used to equip a military during a civil war or conflict.” Do you think that the weapons bought through morally-defenseless Texas women includes grenade launchers, TNT, machine guns, and anti-tank rockets? (Why did the author, Tala Dowlatshahi, include rifles among “other heavy arms” in that list?) The fact is, it would be impossible for those poor women to buy such things here, because it’s illegal in the United States, and perhaps unlike Mexico, we tend to enforce those laws consistently. (On the other hand, I understand it’s much easier to buy such things in Mexico.)

Consider that the same article claims that some of these “heavy arms” come into the hands of the illegitimate drug armies through the legitimate (but corrupt) Mexican army, and that an estimated 90% of firearms imports come from the United States, through a federal attempt to arm and train the Mexican military (called the Merida Initiative).

Now, do you suppose that 339 privately American-bought rifles or pistols over a 15-month period are more or less of a problem for the legitimate Mexican army than grenade launchers, TNT, machine guns, and anti-tank rockets? Bear in mind that most of those rifles or pistols must have come from either capturing or killing the illegitimate soldiers that carried them. Also bear in mind that these 339 traced firearms represent a miniscule number of weapons actually chosen in Mexico for tracing, the weapons more likely to be successfully traced than the thousands of weapons that were not chosen. Also bear in mind the difference in scale between the reported $340,000 “buying spree” and the reported $1.6 billion budget of the Merada Initiative. (Let’s see… $1.6 billion divided by $340,000 equals… 4,705.)

The latter article mentions that the United Nations will be having a conference on disarmament in Mexico. No doubt there will be propaganda about how the United States is to blame for the warfare in Mexico, because we allow our own law-abiding citizens to obtain, keep, and even bear arms. Some of this propaganda has already been floated in our own federal government. But finally, consider this: if the Mexican problem arises from the constitutionally-protected freedom we enjoy in the United States, then why is that problem manifested in Mexico? If our freedom is the problem, then shouldn’t we be the ones in a civil, shooting war? After all, the freedom exists here. Maybe instead of focusing on disarmament, the UN should help the Mexican government to arm and train all of its own law-abiding citizens. That might result in more peace south of the border, like we have now in the United States.