U.S. to Help Mexico Step Up Covert Ops in Fall

Take Mexico, for instance. In what otherwise would have appeared to be the uneventful procurement of two-and-a-half dozen vehicles, the Narcotics Affairs Section (NAS) of the U.S. Embassy in Mexico City this week made clear that a new phase of U.S.-Mexican counterdrug operation is about to unfold. The overt purpose of the bid request, which NAS on Aug. 15 listed on the federal Electronic Posting System database, is to buy seven pickup trucks; four minivans; 11 sedans; four 4-wheel drive sport utility vehicles; and eight motorcycles for use by the government of Mexico "pursuant to an agreement with the U.S. Department of State."

However, the underlying function of this planned purchase, in the document’s own words, is "to fill requirements for expanding NAS operations in Mexico."

The Mexico’s [sic] office of the Attorney General (PGR) needs vehicles primarily for surveillance and undercover operations. The vehicles must be inconspicuous and suitable for surveillance in support of narcotics investigations, eradication, and interdiction operations. The vehicles must be consistent with those commonly seen on the road in Mexico. Normally, vehicles assembled in the U.S. would pose a problem in that they typically identify the occupants as police or other government officials; however, vehicles assembled in Mexico and elsewhere and commonly driven in Mexico without appearing conspicuous may be proposed.

NAS on or around Sept. 30 will coordinate the transfer of the vehicles to the Federal Agency of Investigation -- the Mexican equivalent of the FBI known as AFI, or La Agencia Federal de Investigaciones. AFI is the successor organization to the former Policia Judicial Federal (PFJ), or Federal Judicial Police, which DEA once described in a publicly available Intelligence Brief as an organization plagued with "corruption, inadequate training, and low morale."