MEXICO MAY SHIFT DRUG-WAR APPROACH

Fox Looks To Gradually Demilitarize The Police

WASHINGTON -- Along with congratulations offered Mexico's President-elect
Vicente Fox during his recent visit to the White House, U.S. drug czar
Barry McCaffrey gave some advice:

"Be careful of what you do."

McCaffrey, director of the White House Office of National Drug Control
Policy, warned Fox not to move too quickly in eliminating the role of the
Mexican military in the drug war.

Years earlier, McCaffrey and the Clinton administration had encouraged
Mexican President Ernesto Zedillo to use the military, concerned that the
country's civilian police forces were corrupt. Zedillo took the advice.

But now under Fox, the pendulum appears poised to swing in the other direction.

Fox, whose opposition party election victory upended 71 years of rule by
Mexico's Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, has promised to pull
the military out of the fight against the billion-dollar drug trade. He
wants to turn narcotics-busting solely into a police activity.

Fox's advisers say that they want to shift the drug-fighting effort away
from the military to keep law enforcement in line with a constitution that
prohibits the military from making arrests in domestic criminal cases. It
is similar to a provision in U.S. law that restricts the military from
making civilian arrests, limiting its role in the drug war.

"We will develop a strategy of gradually demilitarizing the police forces,"
said lawyer Jose Luis Reyes and Sen. Francisco Molina, coordinators
appointed by Fox to work out legal reform proposals.

U.S. law enforcement officials are closely monitoring Fox's plans to beef
up the police forces, and are cautiously evaluating what role the United
States might play in intelligence sharing between the two countries.

Nowhere is the impact of the evolving relationship between the two
countries in the drug war felt more than along the San Diego-Tijuana
border, where one of the world's most notorious cartels, the Arellano-Felix
organization, carries out its deadly business.

In a recent interview with Copley News Service, McCaffrey said he warned
Fox about the pitfalls of moving too quickly away from the military in the
anti-drug effort.

McCaffrey said he told Fox: "Until you have other institutions and ways of
going about it, be careful of what you do."

"We've seen the Mexican military units backing up the police under some
circumstances; we've seen Mexican military people loaned to other police
agencies," McCaffrey said. "There is no short supply of Mexico's armed
forces and Navy's courage. They've had people killed and wounded."

Despite his concerns, McCaffrey insisted he did not lean too heavily on
Fox. The president-elect said he hopes to reorganize his nation's police
system and create a new law enforcement unit similar to the FBI.

"How Mexico organizes themselves internally ought to be their business,"
McCaffrey said. "It's really up to Mexico to do what they have to do."

McCaffrey said he will resign as director of the Office of National Drug
Control Policy on Jan. 6, two weeks before President Clinton leaves office.
Analysts who monitor Mexico's drug-fighting efforts believe Fox's long-term
proposals are consistent with Zedillo's long-term plans to reduce the
military's role in anti-drug operations.

The military has been praised by McCaffrey and others in the Clinton
administration for its drug eradication efforts and improved relationship
with U.S. authorities, especially for increased narcotics seizures on the
Pacific Coast.

But the Mexican military also has been hit by corruption, though not as
hard as that country's police forces. The most embarrassing episode
occurred in 1997 when then-Mexican drug czar Gen. Jesus Gutierrez Rebollo
was arrested after it was disclosed that the head of the Juarez drug cartel
had been paying him off.

"The increased role of the Mexican military (in the anti-drug effort was
partly) the result of Gen. McCaffrey's interest in engaging the Mexican
military," said Armand Sverdrug, a Mexican analyst with the Center for
Strategic and International Studies, based in Washington.

"What Fox is saying is that we have some fundamental problems with our
justice system. What he has proposed won't reap benefits until 15 years
down the road."

While the Mexican military is taking steps to begin pulling itself out of
the drug war, so is the U.S. Department of Defense.

The American government has drastically reduced the military's role in
anti-drug efforts following several controversial incidents. An outcry
followed a Marine's fatal shooting of an 18-year-old in Texas three years ago.

The U.S. military's decreased role in drug fighting has curtailed law
enforcement's ability to gather intelligence and share it with countries
such as Mexico, according to congressional investigators.

The General Accounting Office said the Defense Department met less than
half of the Southern Command's request for intelligence, surveillance and
reconnaissance flights in the anti-drug effort in Latin America and the
Caribbean.