Blog about sports and politics and whatever else seems interesting from a guy (formerly) in Mexico.
Monday, July 13, 2009
Admission of Failure
The Mexican army will be withdrawing from street patrols in Juárez, having concluded that despite some encouraging results early on, the operation was a failure. The army will remain in Juárez, but focused more on intelligence and police work than patrols.
7 comments:
jd
said...
Reading the series of pieces on Juarez in El Uni today, I'd say failure is an extreme understatement. The combination of sheer numbers of violations coming to light and increasing documentation and confirmation by human rights groups of soldiers committing the most serious crimes in the book - torture, murder, disappearance - is dramatic, and tragic, stuff. If the government can't put a halt to it and enforce basic human rights norms within the armed forces, it should absolutely face international legal repercussions. Obviously "some incidents" are inevitable, but the articles - which don't carry the whiff of yellow journalism - are documenting things that might make me re-think my resistance to the notion of "Colombianization" in Mexico. And, by the way, how's that police reform that will allow the army to return to the barracks going?
(Not to mention the rampant STDs and explosive growth in the sex trade, which, as noted in the article, is par for the course with concentrations of soldiers.)
Yeah it's disturbing, there's no question. I picked up this weeks Proceso, and I feel like I'll need a glass of whiskey to one side as I read it. But I think some good can come out of it. First, with all the publicity coinciding with the change of hands in congress and with more attention from the US congress, I think there's a chance that Mexico's pols could actually address this. The biggest thing would be taking military trials out of military jurisdiction and making them a civilian matter, but also punishing the brass for stuff that goes on under their watch. Even if the response from the government is insufficient, I also think more attention in general is a healthy thing, because the Mexican military is so isolated from the rest of the nation. Second, I think it could offer a pretty good study in the limits of the army in fighting drug gangs.
I agree, as far as the fuero militar issue Mexico is behind the curve - it's quite well-established in the Inter-American system that violations of civilian human rights are to be tried in civilian courts. Confronting the military is the hard part, and I'm not sure what political faction in Mexico has both the balls and the clout to do so. The PRI seems like the least probable of all.
To compare with Colombia, it took years to get rid of even the worst army commanders, even after collusion in horrible acts was obvious to all (Google the name Rito Alejo del Rio). You've got to empower the faction within the army that is relatively enlightened and sack the most brutish types. Unfortunately powerful military men almost always have both powerful allies and powerful secrets, especially where drug money is involved.
As for limits of army use, definitely. It's been said a million times: The military is not trained for police work. All this talk of "temporary control until police are improved" is bs unless a) the reformation actually occurs and b) the army is held accountable for its actions. Things are not looking good right now.
Yes, I agree, the attention could matter. Mexico does take its image seriously, and the US Congress will suspend the contingent portion of the Merida funds if it has to. But if all these new reports are true (and there's no reason to doubt them) the best opportunity for adherence to human rights norms, which was to control the army from the beginning, is over, and it'll be a difficult slog to get things moving in a better direction.
As far as the attention from the Mexican congress, it'd be better if the PRD had won in that respect. It would definitely be a change in previous practice for the PRI to go that route, so maybe my optimism is unwarranted.
"You've got to empower the faction within the army that is relatively enlightened and sack the most brutish types."
I'm not sure we know which faction is which in Mexico. I certainly don't, and I'm not aware of a whole lot of reporting on the army itself. As a result, I think we're a long way from having a very good idea of the scope of these abuses, which would seem to be an important first step. It seems like that's a gap that might need to be filled before the army can make more than marginal improvements, because if Mexico bounces ten of the worst apples tomorrow, how does the public know that their replacements are going to be any better? This may just be a whole in my knowledge, though, it may be that there is a pretty big body of research and public knowledge on the Mexican military.
True, the public impact of getting rid of bad apples might be limited, but that's ok - in fact, maybe it's easier to quietly shift someone to a different position before they've acquired public notoriety. It is possible that nobody really knows - especially in terms of who the enlightened actors are - but it is much more likely that there is some high-level knowledge of which commanders are the brutes. If Los Pinos lacks such knowledge, that would be a bad sign about civil/military relations.
I bet Los Pinos does know, and I'd be for sacking the worst offenders in short order just to make an example of them. I just think that sort of thing could fail to get at the heart of the abuses. You seem to more about this than I, but I guess the question would seem to be whether or not those tactics are institutionalized across the army, and how and why they were if so.
I can't claim to know much about the depth and breadth of institutional problems in Mexico, and it certainly takes years to change an institutional culture anywhere, but command is very important. I've been told in recent years by Colombian rights workers that the difference in respect for human rights between units led by old-liners used to collaborating with paras and a new generation more well-schooled in human rights issues is vast. Soldiers are of course not always controllable, but the degree to which they see cutting corners as the most effective and expected way to go about their jobs depends to a large extent on the tone set by commanding officers. Mexico may be well behind Colombia in the institutionalization of rights training (and Colombia still obviously has a long way to go) since much of that training came at the insistence of the US and other international donors - I just don't know. But using the principle of "soldiers follow orders" as a way to induce top-down change seems like a necessary element of any reform process.
7 comments:
Reading the series of pieces on Juarez in El Uni today, I'd say failure is an extreme understatement. The combination of sheer numbers of violations coming to light and increasing documentation and confirmation by human rights groups of soldiers committing the most serious crimes in the book - torture, murder, disappearance - is dramatic, and tragic, stuff. If the government can't put a halt to it and enforce basic human rights norms within the armed forces, it should absolutely face international legal repercussions. Obviously "some incidents" are inevitable, but the articles - which don't carry the whiff of yellow journalism - are documenting things that might make me re-think my resistance to the notion of "Colombianization" in Mexico. And, by the way, how's that police reform that will allow the army to return to the barracks going?
(Not to mention the rampant STDs and explosive growth in the sex trade, which, as noted in the article, is par for the course with concentrations of soldiers.)
Yeah it's disturbing, there's no question. I picked up this weeks Proceso, and I feel like I'll need a glass of whiskey to one side as I read it. But I think some good can come out of it. First, with all the publicity coinciding with the change of hands in congress and with more attention from the US congress, I think there's a chance that Mexico's pols could actually address this. The biggest thing would be taking military trials out of military jurisdiction and making them a civilian matter, but also punishing the brass for stuff that goes on under their watch. Even if the response from the government is insufficient, I also think more attention in general is a healthy thing, because the Mexican military is so isolated from the rest of the nation. Second, I think it could offer a pretty good study in the limits of the army in fighting drug gangs.
But maybe I'm too optimistic.
I agree, as far as the fuero militar issue Mexico is behind the curve - it's quite well-established in the Inter-American system that violations of civilian human rights are to be tried in civilian courts. Confronting the military is the hard part, and I'm not sure what political faction in Mexico has both the balls and the clout to do so. The PRI seems like the least probable of all.
To compare with Colombia, it took years to get rid of even the worst army commanders, even after collusion in horrible acts was obvious to all (Google the name Rito Alejo del Rio). You've got to empower the faction within the army that is relatively enlightened and sack the most brutish types. Unfortunately powerful military men almost always have both powerful allies and powerful secrets, especially where drug money is involved.
As for limits of army use, definitely. It's been said a million times: The military is not trained for police work. All this talk of "temporary control until police are improved" is bs unless a) the reformation actually occurs and b) the army is held accountable for its actions. Things are not looking good right now.
Yes, I agree, the attention could matter. Mexico does take its image seriously, and the US Congress will suspend the contingent portion of the Merida funds if it has to. But if all these new reports are true (and there's no reason to doubt them) the best opportunity for adherence to human rights norms, which was to control the army from the beginning, is over, and it'll be a difficult slog to get things moving in a better direction.
As far as the attention from the Mexican congress, it'd be better if the PRD had won in that respect. It would definitely be a change in previous practice for the PRI to go that route, so maybe my optimism is unwarranted.
"You've got to empower the faction within the army that is relatively enlightened and sack the most brutish types."
I'm not sure we know which faction is which in Mexico. I certainly don't, and I'm not aware of a whole lot of reporting on the army itself. As a result, I think we're a long way from having a very good idea of the scope of these abuses, which would seem to be an important first step. It seems like that's a gap that might need to be filled before the army can make more than marginal improvements, because if Mexico bounces ten of the worst apples tomorrow, how does the public know that their replacements are going to be any better? This may just be a whole in my knowledge, though, it may be that there is a pretty big body of research and public knowledge on the Mexican military.
True, the public impact of getting rid of bad apples might be limited, but that's ok - in fact, maybe it's easier to quietly shift someone to a different position before they've acquired public notoriety. It is possible that nobody really knows - especially in terms of who the enlightened actors are - but it is much more likely that there is some high-level knowledge of which commanders are the brutes. If Los Pinos lacks such knowledge, that would be a bad sign about civil/military relations.
I bet Los Pinos does know, and I'd be for sacking the worst offenders in short order just to make an example of them. I just think that sort of thing could fail to get at the heart of the abuses. You seem to more about this than I, but I guess the question would seem to be whether or not those tactics are institutionalized across the army, and how and why they were if so.
I can't claim to know much about the depth and breadth of institutional problems in Mexico, and it certainly takes years to change an institutional culture anywhere, but command is very important. I've been told in recent years by Colombian rights workers that the difference in respect for human rights between units led by old-liners used to collaborating with paras and a new generation more well-schooled in human rights issues is vast. Soldiers are of course not always controllable, but the degree to which they see cutting corners as the most effective and expected way to go about their jobs depends to a large extent on the tone set by commanding officers. Mexico may be well behind Colombia in the institutionalization of rights training (and Colombia still obviously has a long way to go) since much of that training came at the insistence of the US and other international donors - I just don't know. But using the principle of "soldiers follow orders" as a way to induce top-down change seems like a necessary element of any reform process.
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