Mexico by George W. Grayson

Author:George W. Grayson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Transaction Publishers

Table 7.3

States and Municipalities with Military Men in Senior Public-Safety Posts

Source: Jésica Zermeño, “Toman Generales Mandos Policiacos,” Reforma, February 15, 2009; Zermeño et al., Optan estados por mando militar,” Reforma (“Enfoque”), February 15, 2009; “Encabezan los hermanos Ayón Rodríguez mandos policiacos en el país,” February 15, 2009, E-consulta www.e-consulta.com/index; and “Border Militarization Spreads and Deepens,” Frontiera NorteSur, March 19, 2009.

Fourth, generals, admirals, and colonels have the background to bring a culture of discipline to civilian police forces that have often acted in a venal, free-wheeling manner—to the point that thousands of serious kidnappings and other felonies go unreported because many citizens believe that the cops are in league with the miscreants.

Even if military leaders cannot change behavioral patterns, they can oust incompetents and malefactors. For instance, General Salinas Altés removed 200 elements of Acapulco’s Municipal Preventive Police when he took over as Guerrero’s security boss.

Fifth, officers are in a good position to recruit active-duty or retired members of the armed forces as policemen in the jurisdictions that they serve.

Finally, every public-opinion survey shows that the military enjoys a much better reputation than do the police. Praise centers on their efforts in disaster relief, as well as their anti-crime missions.

The Other Side of the Coin

These factors must be weighed against the different professional preparation of Army and Navy personnel vis-à-vis officeholders. The former are taught to employ force to subdue an enemy. While encouraged to acquire diplomatic skills, repression is emphasized. In contrast, good politicians need to negotiate with average citizens who are angry or agitated, attempting to resolve disputes through conciliation rather than resorting to a physical or armed response.

As Carlos Luken, a Mexico-based businessman and consultant, astutely observed:

A soldier is trained to fight, kill and be victorious. When a good soldier does his job, he uses tactics and strategies, not rights and negotiation. People get hurt. A politician is trained to buy time for argument, concession and to seek accommodation. Their methods are totally different. It is a colossal error to have one and ask him to behave like the other. Doing so is not only fruitless and confusing, but dangerous as it eventually pits them against each other. In the short outcome the rules of engagement eventually overrun the rules of order, while in the long run both lose.122

Respected author Charles Bowden agrees. In an article enlivened with grisly anecdotes, he implies that the Mexican Army is the “biggest cartel of all” and focuses not on Calderón’s successes but on “a second Mexico where the war is for drugs, where the police and the military fight for their share of drug profits, where the press is restrained by the murder of reporters and feasts on a steady diet of bribes, and where the line between the government and the drug world has never existed.”123

Then, there is the danger that these men face. Los Zetas, in particular, have homed in on military personnel. They are believed to have decapitated the eight Army officers and enlisted men in Guerrero in December 2008.

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