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| Secretary of Defense General Salvador Cienfuegos speaks to troops, where he addressed the latest case of torture. Photo: Cuartoscuro |
Translated by Amanda Moody
Now what do we do with the army? Or worse, what do we do without the army? Organized crime has swept away all State institutions in many regions of the country and not even the armed forces have been able to stand up to the cartels, although they do constitute the only resource providing a measure of containment, even if it is short-lived. The problem is that after ten years on the streets the inevitable excesses that come with an army of occupation have become a political burden for the regime and a source of resentment among officials.
No one explains it better than their senior leader. In an interview published in SinEmbargo.mx on March 16, the Secretary of Defense, General Salvador Cienfuegos, said it without beating around the bush:
“The Army is not intended for the work it does today. None of us who have command responsibility in the institution have been prepared for police duties. We do not do them, we did not ask for them, we do not feel comfortable with them, we are not comfortable with the role.
I repeat it today, but also say that we aware that if we do not do it, there is no one else to do it right now. It is an order we have from the President, supported by the Constitution itself. We are complying with the order, and when we are given an order, we fulfill it as well as we can. This is what we are doing. It is not our plan to remain as the police force, but until there is a police force trained in the responsibility that police forces must have, surely, we must continue to do this.”And “this” is something that is starting to become a heavy weight for an institution that had become accustomed to being the object of Mexicans' respect and admiration.
The video of the torture of a 22-year-old woman, Elvira Santibañez, at the hands of two soldiers (one of them a woman) and a federal policeman shocked national and international public opinion. This is the latest in a string of stories which are increasingly embarrassing for the military.
Not only embarrassing but also dangerous. Among the officers, the fear is starting to spread that they will be the subject of judicial investigations in the future and will be brought before national or international courts. To their way of thinking, they follow orders from politicians to clear a region of kidnappers and drug dealers, that is, to do the dirty work of fighting the cartels. And they are convinced that those same politicians, or those that follow, will not hesitate to sacrifice them before the courts in order to save their own skins.
The root problem is that the soldiers lack any training in police investigation work. And indeed, they turn up in a town or village, literally in the guise of an occupying army, to participate in a war where the enemy blends in with the local people. That is, an environment that fosters excesses, abuses and eventually disgraces such as those shown in the video or in the Ayotzinapa tragedy.
On Saturday, General Cienfuegos offered a public apology for these practices and called upon the military to respect human rights. But deep down, the generals feel trapped. It is impossible to monitor the behavior of 60 or 70 thousand individuals deployed throughout the territory, many of them immersed in a savage and brutal struggle against a ruthless enemy.
The military know they are in a battle that they will not win. Worse yet, a battle in which they have a lot to lose, both individually (some of them) and institutionally (all of them).
In national public opinion, the Army has been the entity that has generated the greatest confidence, together with the church and the universities. In September 2007, ten months after becoming involved in the war against the cartels, they were the institution with the greatest approval, according to a survey that Mitofsky undertakes annually: they received a rating of 8 (on a scale from 1 to 10). In the most recent survey, in 2015, they were ranked third, and their rating had dropped to 7.
At the heart of the matter, the army is paying the price for the Federal Government’s mistaken strategy in the drugs war. Resorting to the last resource, as Calderón did, and failing in the attempt, left us vulnerable and powerless. There is no military solution to defeat drug trafficking. But it appears that, with the current strategy, we can’t do without the soldiers either. And even if we wanted to return them to barracks, how do you do that? How do you put the toothpaste back into the tube?
Spanish Original
*Jorge Zepeda Patterson is an economist, writer of novels, political analyst and journalist. He holds a Masters in Social Sciences from the Latin American Faculty in Social Sciences (FLASCO) and did studies for a Doctorate in Political Science at the Sorbonne in Paris. He was a journalist for El País in Madrid, Spain. In 1991 he founded the newspaper Siglo 21 (Twenty-first Century) in Guadalajara. He has been a director of the newspaper, El Universal. In 2011 he founded the online news site www.sinembargo.mx, which he directs. He is also a professor at the University of Guadalajara. @jorgezepedap www.jorgezepeda.net
*Jorge Zepeda Patterson is an economist, writer of novels, political analyst and journalist. He holds a Masters in Social Sciences from the Latin American Faculty in Social Sciences (FLASCO) and did studies for a Doctorate in Political Science at the Sorbonne in Paris. He was a journalist for El País in Madrid, Spain. In 1991 he founded the newspaper Siglo 21 (Twenty-first Century) in Guadalajara. He has been a director of the newspaper, El Universal. In 2011 he founded the online news site www.sinembargo.mx, which he directs. He is also a professor at the University of Guadalajara. @jorgezepedap www.jorgezepeda.net