Secreto A Voces

My column in The News of Mexico City

A curious reversal in the histrionics of the narco-politico stage last week is eroding the validity of the Mexican government’s position against the cartels. While the military unloads on its citizens, the Gulf Cartel is hiring them away, offering $500 a week and better food than the Top Ramen fare that serves as an MRE. The creepy little bastards are even upping the bennies; a new banner went up yesterday in Tampico, along the Gulf Coast, offering life insurance, and a brand new car.

The military and the cartels are now, it appears, fighting for the soul of Mexico.

First, a message appeared in Ciudad Juárez newspapers, radio and television stations last week: “Attention citizens, if you see anybody dressed like the Mexican Army attacking your neighbors or violating your rights, it wasn’t us, it was the narcos.”

The Juárez Cartel, the military claimed, was going to attack the citizens of the city, violate their women, invade their homes, and brutalize the people. They were going to disguise themselves as Mexican Army soldiers, then film these exploits, the military said, and then publish them on YouTube.

Then a second message appeared, this one in the form of colored flyers scattered throughout Reynosa: “We are soliciting ex military to form an armed military group. A good salary. $500.” A phone number at the bottom.

And in Nuevo Laredo, a banner was stretched a busy downtown street offering gigs to former soldiers, with a good salary, meals, and special attention for their families.

Who’s telling the truth anymore? Who’re the bad guys and which are the good?

The national Human Rights Commission found that Mexican Army troops sparked a massacre of four unarmed men in Badiraguato, Sinaloa, last month. Badiraguato is no angelic place. It’s the birthplace of Sinaloan drug lord, Joaquín “Shorty” Guzmán and numerous killers of the narco-syndicate that has dominated northern Mexico for much of the last 40 years.

But in this case, the commission found, the soldiers had attacked the Hummer the four men were riding in, murdering them without provocation. No shots were fired from inside the vehicle, the commission said. Adding to the nightmare, the soldiers had also killed two of their own, an incident that was at best, “friendly fire” and, at worst, murder.

I find it … interesting … that the military unleashed its warnings about the workings of the Juárez Cartel one day after the human rights commission released their findings about the Sinaloa killings.

Just who is who anymore?

While the Gulf Cartel is busy offering work to former soldiers, the Army is offering fear and much, much doubt.

Mexican citizens may be living under a public security crisis, but they are not fools.

As twisted as this is, but we are talking about Mexico after, all, the narcos are offering jobs and benefits with this “help for your family” thing.

The Army, already guilty of launching murderous attacks on the citizenry, is now casting doubt on itself with the message, “if you see a soldier acting up, it wasn’t us.”

I have to say, the strategy on the part of the narcos is sheer genius.

The military, not so much.

Pres. Felipe Calderón started his reign with a clearly focused moral higher ground. He was fighting the good fight against the criminals that threatened the national security of his country. And he was using the cleanest corps at his disposal, the Army.

He’d been warned, as early as last year when he took office, that the heavy hand of the Army was going to give his administration the air of a military regime – a past that nobody cares to revisit in Mexico.

He chose to ignore those warnings and that’s fine; he’s been lucky, there haven’t been many incidences like the one in Sinaloa.

But the problem with high ground is that it doesn’t take much to bring you down in the public’s eye. Particularly when the public is already suspicious of the State. Particularly when someone else comes along with an offer.

Let the Army get away with a few more murders like those in Sinaloa and those flyers and banners waving in the winds of Nuevo Laredo are going to start looking much more appealing.

– Michel Marizco