Mexico debates stepped-up drug war

Leaders cite arrests, seizures, but some say price has been violence

12:50 PM CDT on Monday, July 4, 2005

By LENNOX SAMUELS and LAURENCE ILIFF / The Dallas Morning News

 MEXICO CITY – Mexico finally is fighting the war on drugs that the U.S. government has demanded for decades: a frontal assault on drug barons, their organizations and their merchandise, using the police and military in concert with U.S. intelligence.

The results, Mexican and U.S. authorities say, have been impressive. Forty-six thousand people jailed on drug charges, President Vicente Fox said in a recent speech, 97 tons of cocaine seized, more than a million marijuana plants destroyed. It's been four years, Mr. Fox and U.S. officials said, of steady progress.

But a rising chorus of voices in Mexico and the U.S. says the real results are record levels of violence, instability and corruption in Mexico, resurgent drug cartels, nearly 200 dead police officers and soldiers, along with millions of wasted dollars in a country where half the population of 105 million is poor. Mexico receives almost no aid from the U.S. government.

And the result in the U.S.? No noticeable drop in the supply of cheap drugs – and an actual decline in the price of cocaine, according to a new U.N. report.