Counterpunch: Mexico has sent 10,000 troops to the border

The United States froze for a month the imposition of duties of 25% on goods from Mexico after its authorities ordered to send 10,000 military personnel to its northern border to combat illegal migration and trafficking of fentanyl. The drug kills more than 70,000 people in the US each year. Donald Trump's trade measures threaten the Latin American state not only with economic costs, but also with strengthening the position of cartels in the region. Why Washington blames Mexico City for the fentanyl crisis and whether to expect a new war between the Mexican authorities and cartels - in the material of "Izvestia".

Why Mexico fears Trump's trade duties

About 10 thousand military on the order of the Mexican government in the near future will be in 18 cities on the northern border of the country. They will have several tasks: to fight illegal migrants, in particular, to find tunnels that are used to move from Mexico to the United States, as well as to control drug trafficking.

Such a measure was chosen by the authorities to avoid the introduction of 25 percent trade duties on Mexican goods promised by Donald Trump. On February 3, President Claudia Sheinbaum managed to reach an agreement to freeze this punitive measure for one month.

Canada also managed to reach a similar agreement with Washington. According to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, his country will spend $1.3 billion to reinforce the border with new helicopters, technology and personnel. Ottawa will also add drug cartels to terrorist lists and deploy joint forces with the US to fight organized crime, fentanyl shipments and money laundering.

In the U.S., about 70,000 people die each year from fentanyl overdoses, and the states blame it mostly on Mexico, which they believe allows cartels to make deals with U.S. drug traffickers. However, according to some reports, most of the fentanyl is smuggled by U.S. citizens themselves - in 2022, 84% of the time, the substance was seized from those who crossed the border legally.

Canada and Mexico are the closest economic partners of the US. Thus 83.1% of Mexican exports are sharpened for the US, and American goods make up 40.2% of Mexican imports. U.S. duties will have a serious effect on Mexico City. One consequence could be more criminalization of the border.

Economic hardship in Mexico will lead to more unemployment, and therefore more people looking for a way to get to the U.S. in search of a better future. For lack of a legal way to cross the land border, they will turn to coyotes, who in turn must pay a tax to the cartels that control the border area, which will only make the groups stronger, said Gladys McCormick, a professor at Syracuse University in the United States.

Can Sheinbaum start a war against the cartels

Mexico already has a history of fighting cartels by force. In the early 2000s, then-President Felipe Calderon declared war on them, and as a result, the presence of soldiers on the streets and open confrontation between the army and the cartels became commonplace for Mexicans.

However, behind the television picture of an active and brutal war against the cartels there was large-scale corruption, and all government activities were in fact directed in favor of the Sinaloa cartel, with which the former Minister of Public Security, Genaro Garcia Luna, was associated. He was later sentenced in the U.S. to 460 months in prison and ordered to pay a $2 million fine.

The victims of the war on cartels from 2006 to 2021 were about 350 thousand people and about 72 thousand are missing, some are still not found. Moreover, some of the victims are, in fact, innocent people. For example, in 2015 in the state of Michoacan, police killed at least 16 people who defended themselves against them with sticks, and in July 2020 in the state of Tamaulipas, the military executed a man in cold blood after a shootout.

Another consequence of the war has been the increase in the number of armed groups through fragmentation. If in 2009-2010 they were present in 11% of municipalities, in 2019-2020 the figure rose to 29%. In addition, their means of making money have also expanded. Before Calderón's declaration of war, the cartels controlled the supply of drugs to Europe, the United States and South America, but then they became active in the trafficking of people, organs, fuel and medicines.

The government of Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador approached the problem from a different angle - it began not to fight the cartels, but to look for the root cause. Claudia Sheinbaum is now following a similar tactic, so her border policy is unlikely to devolve into a military clash with the groups.

In her first week in office, she declared: "The war against Calderon drug traffickers will not return. We will not turn to extrajudicial executions. What are we going to do? Engage in prevention, pay attention to the causes, use intelligence and be present on the ground."

She suggested expanding social programs for youth, helping poor families, reducing poverty, and fighting inequality. The expert community also believes that the U.S., instead of threats, should work in tandem with Mexican authorities.

"The main type of cooperation would be U.S. support for Mexico in obtaining resources to finance Sheinbaum's plans. If the U.S. government were more ambitious, it would be more active in trying to slow the flow of weapons into that country," says Mexican security expert Armando Vargas.

In addition, the two governments should work together to share intelligence to uncover the routes used by traffickers, and in the case of fentanyl, they need to understand how many people are using the substance and which populations are most susceptible to addiction.