TSR: "We need new
strategies on both sides of the border."
Monday, March 23, 2009
Length: 6:12
LARGE (86.3 MB)
-----
SMALL (7.6 MB)
Michael talks to Wolf about the current plans to
help Mexico fight the cartels. The need for a
counterinsurgency-style rethinking of the situation
makes a lot of sense -- but how do we cut the
demand for illegal drugs here in the US? Sure,
there are renewed discussions about legalizing
marijuana, but cocaine? I don't see that idea
forming a sentence, let alone a dialogue. (Hey, we
could always nationalize the Afghan poppy fields;
that way we could undercut the cartel sales AND
fund the wars all at once!)
Also, not sure what Michael is talking about at the
end of the piece when he cracks that something Wolf
says is libelous -- as a former lawyer, he would
certainly know that libel is written defamation,
not spoken. I suspect it is some sort of inside
joke; he even seems to be imitating someone else's
voice as he says it.
WOLF
BLITZER: The Obama administration is ramping up a
plan to move federal agents and equipment to the
border to help Mexico in its desperate struggle
against ruthless drug cartels. Mexico says the drug
wars claimed some 6,500 lives last year alone.
Let's go to CNN's Michael Ware.
He's just spent some time in Mexico -- I know you're
heading back, Michael, as well.
Is this going to make a difference, the beefing up of
the U.S. border with Mexico?
MICHAEL WARE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, you certainly
have to applaud any measure. But I have to say, from
what I've seen so far in Mexico -- and I'm about to
be spending a lot more time there -- this is a drop
in the bucket, finger in the dike stuff.
I mean let's not forget what's driving this war. It's
two things. One is the profit motive of the cartels.
And beefing up the border even more hasn't stopped
them so far. When they closed the routes through
Florida and the Caribbean for the Colombian cartels,
that's when the Mexican cartels took over and said
we'll get it in.
I don't see that being stopped. We can disrupt it,
make business more expensive, but it's not going to
stop.
BLITZER: Because they have...
WARE: The other...
BLITZER: They have all that coastline. Ships could
easily be bringing in weapons into Mexico if that
border -- the land border, for example, were shut
tight.
WARE: Well, you'll never shut it tight, is my
opinion.
And have you seen the drug subs?
The guerrillas in Colombia actually built drug
submarines that were able to skim just under the
surface of the water, carrying as much as a ton of
cocaine. And in the last couple of years, there's
been increasing interceptions of those.
BLITZER: These drug cartel troops, if you will -- the
guys who are actually involved in working for these
various drug cartels -- first of all, do we have any
idea how many they are, and, secondly, how well-armed
are they?
WARE: Oh, boy, Wolf. Conservative estimates that I've
been reading in the last couple of weeks say 100,000
foot soldiers divided amongst all these fiercely
warring cartels, armed with fully automatic weapons,
grenades and, indeed, they're even intercepting, in
the hands of the cartels, .50 caliber Barrett sniper
rifles.
Now, these are a military weapon that I've only ever
seen in the hands of the Marines and the U.S. Army.
BLITZER: It sounds, Michael, like -- you're painting
a picture of more foot soldiers working for the drug
cartels, heavily armed, than insurgents in the
al-Anbar Province -- the Sunni insurgents. And all of
us remember the years you covered the war in Iraq.
Give us a comparison.
WARE: Well, I'm very shy of making comparisons
between a holy war or a political insurgency in Iraq
and a profit-motivated drug war in Mexico.
However, I have to say, when I was in Juarez -- the
city that's right on the border with El Paso, the
front line town -- I couldn't shake the feeling that
I was in the midst of an insurgency.
Now, for my mind, there's two extreme options that
are currently available to the Obama administration.
One is cut the demand for the drugs. America is
what's fueling this war. That demand is never going
to go away. So you either legalize or somehow you cut
the demand.
The other option is move in and fight this war
seriously. Scattering DEA agents and ATF agents and
increasing intelligence-sharing and trying to watch
cars crossing from America with the guns that the
cartels are fighting with just ain't going to do it.
BLITZER: Doesn't the Mexican government -- the
Mexican Army -- don't they have that capability
and...
WARE: Oh, Wolf -- Wolf, please. Please. Look, already
the Mexican military has as many as 45,000 troops in
the field, in their own country, fighting their own
citizens. Now, this is a military trained like anyone
else's military, to defend the sovereign territory of
their country. And now they're being turned into
super armed policemen, because you can't trust the
local police. They're riddled with corruption. You
can't...
BLITZER: But you're not really saying, are you,
Michael, that you -- you think the United States
should send in thousands of American troops onto
sovereign Mexican soil to fight this war?
WARE: Well, good -- heaven forbid that that should
ever happen. But you either legalize these things and
cut the demand or you're going to have to intervene.
Now, what I'm looking to the White House and
President Obama for is a third way. Now, that's what
he's going to have to find -- some measure between
those two things, because America is responsible for
this war, Wolf. It's American demand for the illicit
drugs that's fueling it. It's being fought on both
sides with American weapons. And it's been neglected
by the United States pretty much since 9/11.
BLITZER: Well, as you know, the Secretary of State,
Hillary Clinton, will be in Mexico later this week.
The president is planning a trip there next month.
The Homeland Security Secretary, Janet Napolitano,
will be going over there pretty soon for meetings
with the Calderon government. I assume they're coming
up with some sort of new strategy.
WARE: Well, we also know that the head of Southern
Command, Admiral Stavridis, went down there, as well.
And then -- just a couple weeks ago. And then he went
to the White House the next day and briefed President
Obama.
What I sincerely hope that the Admiral told the
president is that the way this war is being fought,
it cannot possibly be won. We need new strategies on
both sides of the border, because you have a Mexican
president who is not beholden to the cartels, who had
to send the military into his own cities because he
had no other choice. And that military is outmanned
and outgunned.
BLITZER: It's a sign of the times that we're sending
Michael Ware to cover this war in Mexico.
WARE: That's libelous, Wolf!
BLITZER: Good luck, Michael.
We'll be talking to you from Mexico.
Michael Ware reporting excellently, as he always
does.