NR: "So, America, get
serious or stop complaining."
Saturday, March 14, 2009
Length: 9:22
LARGE (129.5 MB)
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SMALL (11.6 MB)
In a special hour of NewsRoom, Fredericka
Whitfield hosts a sort of revolving panel
discussion on the Mexican drug cartels and how the
US is affecting them and vice versa. Michael is
part of the first segment and the final one. (Not
sure whether the point he wanted to make at the end
of the first segment is something he covered at the
end of the program.)
FREDERICKA
WHITFIELD: We've got a great panel here. CNN's
Michael Ware who spent some time in Juarez, Mexico,
El Paso city council member Emma Acosta who helped
commandeer a town hall meeting, a discussion taking
place in El Paso today. We'll get her take on how
that went as we try and work out the audio. And CNN's
Josh Levs who has been fielding a lot of your
e-mails, I-reports, your questions and concerns about
how it got here.
Now, Emma Acosta, can you hear me?
EMMA ACOSTA, EL PASO CITY COUNCIL MEMBER: Yes, I can.
WHITFIELD: Let me begin with you because you have
this town hall meeting today for very good reason.
People are afraid. You are right across the border
from Juarez, Mexico, which has seen a lot of
violence. What do people say today?
ACOSTA: Well, first of all, they were very happy that
I actually had this panel of law enforcement experts
in our discussion today.
WHITFIELD: And what were people asking? What do they
want to know from law enforcement?
ACOSTA: Well, they were asking, you know, what
happens? What happens when an individual is shot at
the bridge? And then, you know, he's taken to one of
our hospitals. And do they all interact? And I wanted
to assure them today that our law enforcement
agencies are working with each other to make sure
that our community is safe.
WHITFIELD: So when we look at the numbers of nearly
7,000 people who have died in the past year in Mexico
as a result of drug cartel violence and it's spilling
over into the borders, your border town is being hit
hard. Have you seen deaths related to the drug
cartels, and if so, in a big way?
ACOSTA: Well, what we see is every day when you pick
up the newspaper, we'll see murders occurring, you
know, 10, seven, five, every single day. Last month
in February we had over 200 murders that occurred
across the border. We are so, in such close proximity
to Juarez that wherever you stand in El Paso, you can
probably see our sister city of Juarez, Mexico. It's
so close to us that I think it's, for me to say no
I'm not afraid would be inaccurate.
Because obviously, you know, the violence is there.
It's happening within our eyesight. So we need to be
concerned. We need to make sure that our law
enforcement agencies are actually working together.
And they are. You know, we're very confident that
they are working together. Along with our local
enforcement as well.
WHITFIELD: Yes and I understand you grew up in El
Paso. So you really have a reference point of how it
has changed over the years. I want to ask you about
that throughout this hour. Meantime, Michael Ware
joining us now from New York. You spent some time in
Juarez. And you were focusing primarily on the
trading and the smuggling of U.S. weapons into
Juarez. Describe how bad you think the situation is.
MICHAEL WARE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, certainly
American authorities say that, you know, over the
last several years there's at least 62,000 weapons
that have crossed from America into Mexico, into the
hands primarily of the cartels. Now that's just the
weapons that the authorities say they're aware of.
Let's look at what these cartels are armed with. And
what we're seeing is a fight that's being bitterly
fought with American weapons on both sides. The
government and the cartels, indeed, particularly some
of these former special forces military types for the
Mexican army who have moved on to form organizations
like the Lazetas. These men know what they're doing.
And their armaments include 50-caliber Barrett sniper
rifles. Made in the U.S., weapons that are deadly
effective over perhaps a mile and which I've only
ever seen in the hands of U.S. marine sniper teams or
army sniper teams. These guys also have U.S.-made
grenades, American-made ak-47s, you know, IR-15s.
America is very much fuelling this fight, not just in
its taste for illicit drugs, but in the actual
weapons that are being used to kill.
WHITFIELD: Well this is fuelling discussions in
households across America. Josh Levs has been
receiving a whole lot of e-mails throughout the day.
What are people saying about their worries about a
full-out war unfolding right in their backyard.
JOSH LEVS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: A lot of passion, Fred.
A lot of big concerns and I'll tell everyone who is
just joining us, right now. There are two big ways to
join us. Let's zoom in on the board. You can tell us
whatever you're thinking at my Facebook page right
now, joshlevscnn. We're going to monitor it
throughout the hour, and also some of the e-mails at
[email protected]. We're going to start off with his
from Joanne.
Listen to this. And this is a great question for
Michael. "How do I feel about the obvious and ominous
threat of Mexican drug cartels setting up both shop
and housekeeping in our country? After watching a
History Channel special I was scared out of my skin.
We absolutely need to make closing our borders and
routing out drugs and gang lords the highest priority
or we will have our own Afghanistan right here."
WHITFIELD: Michael, do you see that? You've spent
time in Afghanistan. Do you see any parallels?
WARE: Yes. There's a certain degree to which, you
know, the dynamic in Afghanistan in terms of the drug
trade is relevant here. And also the dynamic in Iraq
where for better or for worse I lived for six years
in terms of the fight on the ground, which is an
insurgency. I mean, this is the thing. You really do
have an insurgency right on the U.S. border.
And despite the efforts of the combined agencies of
American authorities operating in Texas and Arizona,
the real fight is on the other side of the border.
And there it's not being won. And what I saw on the
ground -- in a week where eight police officers were
killed in the city of Juarez alone, forcing the
police chief to step down -- there's no future where
I can see that there's an imminent tactical victory
on the ground in sight. We really need to approach
this with a whole different way of thinking.
WHITFIELD: And we're going to talk about that a bit
more, too, the approach the U.S. is thinking about
later on in this hour. Josh, we got one more e-mail -
LEVS: I do.
WHITFIELD: - before we need to go to break.
LEVS: Yes, let's take a quick look at this. Because
some people are saying it's really the opposite. That
this is getting blown out of proportion. Let's zoom
in quickly. This is from Anton, "Stop with all this
Mexico border bashing. I plan on visiting very soon.
I have friends there. They're all just fine. You're
more likely to get shot anywhere in the United States
than in Mexico. Is there any truth to that these
days?"
WHITFIELD: Miss Acosta.
ACOSTA: Well, we haven't seen a lot of shootings here
in El Paso. But we've certainly has seen or heard
about the shootings across our sister city of Juarez,
Mexico. So we know that the violence is occurring in
Juarez. We know that it's happening. That kind of
violence has not spilled over into El Paso. So while
we see people that are getting shot, some of them
coming across and going to our hospitals. But we're
not seeing the actual violence occurring here in El
Paso.
WHITFIELD: Too close for comfort.
ACOSTA: But we're not seeing the actual violence
occurring here in El Paso. We're still the
third-safest city in America. And I want to make sure
that everyone knows that.
WHITFIELD: Okay. Too close for comfort. We're going
to take a short break. Michael, I know you have a
thought. We're going to try to get to that in a
moment. We know this has not popped up in the last
couple of weeks, but this is pretty entrenched and
it's far reaching. How did we get to this point?
WHITFIELD: And that is exactly the sentiment that
we're hearing from a lot of e-mailers, too, that Josh
has been fielding.
LEVS: I'll show you, Fredricka and Emma, because this
is the last big topic we're getting on Facebook and
in e-mail. Let's zoom back in. I'll let everyone
know, the conversations continuing even after the
show at the Facebook page here: joshlevscnn.
Check this out, Fred.
This is Waseema, who says, "I'm leaving for Cancun
Riviera Maya at the end of April. Is the cartel
violence throughout the entire country of Mexico, or
is it just the border areas?"
And a similar e-mail here. "We have plans to go to
Cabo San Lucas in a few weeks. Do you have any
specific information about Cabo and any crime
incidence in that resort town?" From Sandy.
So how do they know if they're safe or not?
WHITFIELD: Yes.
Let's ask our Michael Ware, who's back with us in New
York, to kind of round out the whole discussion this
hour.
Michael, any safe spots?
MICHAEL WARE, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well,
yes, obviously the violence is certainly concentrated
in particular areas that are of vital importance to
the cartels. Is there a security threat across Mexico
for foreigners? Yes. Is it this raging drug war
violence that we see in the border town of Juarez
necessarily? No. Go to Mexico, but keep your eyes
open. Bottom line here is, America has effectively an
insurgency on its border. It's an insurgency that
America is fueling with demand for drugs and with the
guns with which that insurgency is being fought.
This is going to be a war that's going to be battled
over the hearts and minds of the Mexican population,
much like a counterinsurgency. When the people feel
safe, they'll be able to turn on the drug cartels.
WHITFIELD: All right.
WARE: So America, get serious or stop complaining.
WHITFIELD: And we're going to see that getting
serious. In the next couple of weeks, the U.S.
Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, heading to
Mexico to have direct talks with the Mexican
government about how to try to contain this.
Big thanks to everyone involved in the hour-long
discussion. Very riveting stuff.
Michael Ware; Ione Molinares with CNN en Espanol;
Craig Shagin out of Philadelphia; Emma Acosta out of
El Paso, Texas; Sam Quinones, Los Angeles; Josh --
did I forget anybody? Oh, Professor George Grayson,
also, thank you so much from William and Mary.
LEVS: Big team today, Fred.
WHITFIELD: Thanks so much to all of you.
I'm Fredricka Whitfield.