Decaying Army

The front page of El Universal is occupied by an article on the decline in readiness of the nation's military. Generals and admirals, including the Secretary of Defense, have been calling for the procurement of more extensive stuff for a while, but Congress has evidently ignored the call. According to a new Department of Defese report, now the problem has advanced "to such a notable point that in five years it could become irreversible."

A military procurement expert I most certainly am not, so I really can't comment on the logic (or lack thereof) of the military heirarchy's requests (although 12 F-16s for a middle-income country of 100 million people doesn't seem excessive). I do think it's interesting that none of the requests featured in the article related to counter-narcotics work, nor were any of the declines in readiness alleged to be a result of the military's increased role in combating drug traffickers under Calderón. Of course, that's political too; the Department of Defense would be burning Calderón were it to paint the shortages as a result of the drug wars, and really it probably just wants to burn Congress.