MEXICO'S PRESIDENT CALDERON HAS FEW CHOICES IN DRUG WAR

Though An Attack On Civilians In Morelia Has Tested The Public's
Stomach For The Increasingly Savage Conflict, The President Has
Little Room To Pull Back From His Crackdown.

MEXICO CITY -- Stretched thin in an uphill battle against drug gangs,
the government of Mexican President Felipe Calderon faces increasingly
stark options at a pivotal moment.

A fatal Sept. 15 grenade attack on civilians in western Mexico, coming
on top of a steadily rising death toll nationwide, drastically altered
the stakes in the nearly 2-year-old crackdown.

Calderon now has little room to pull back without appearing beaten.
But the attack, which killed eight people during an Independence Day
celebration in Calderon's home state of Michoacan, is testing the
public's stomach for the increasingly savage conflict.

"The violence is not going to stop soon. There will be more actions,"
political analyst Alfonso Zarate warned last week in the daily El
Universal newspaper. "However, neither the government nor the public
can turn back."

The crisis has reopened debate over alternatives, including legalizing
drugs. Many Mexicans wonder aloud whether Calderon should revert to
the practices of earlier governments, led by the Institutional
Revolutionary Party, that tolerated traffickers as long as they kept
the killings of noncombatants down and bribes up.

Calderon's aides have publicly ruled out any peace deals with the drug
underworld.

"There are two options: to fight it or not fight it," security analyst
Jorge Chabat wrote in El Universal last week.

Walking away from the battle would worsen corruption and could leave
the Mexican government critically weakened, he said. Staying with the
crackdown will almost surely mean more bloodshed.

Turf wars among drug-trafficking groups have killed more than 3,000
people this year, according to news reports, aggravating public
anxiety over a rising rate of kidnappings and other crimes.

Since the Sept. 15 attack in Morelia, the president and top aides have
vowed to continue their crackdown and urged residents to unite against
a foe they say threatens national security.

The administration already had deployed 40,000 soldiers and 5,000
federal police officers as part of its nationwide campaign, which
began shortly after Calderon's inauguration in December 2006. The
offensive has yielded several high-profile arrests and major seizures
of drugs and money, including a recent $26.2-million haul in northern
Sinaloa state.

"From the start of his administration, when he proposed this as a
priority, President Calderon indicated clearly that this was going to
be a long-term battle," Atty. Gen. Eduardo Medina Mora said in a
television interview last week.

During a visit to New York on Sept. 23, Calderon again called on the
United States to help by stanching the cross-border flow of arms into
his country. He also said Mexico was "paying a very high price" for
U.S. drug consumption.

But in raising the specter of a possible terrorism campaign, the
grenade attack has left Mexicans feeling more at risk than at any time
since Calderon launched the offensive.

Mexican authorities Friday announced the arrests of three men
suspected of carrying out the attack. They were said to be members of
the Zetas, the armed wing of the so-called Gulf Cartel that has
decapitated rivals and carried out scores of other killings.

Although polls show most Mexicans support the crackdown, they also
indicate that people increasingly question whether this type of
campaign can succeed.

The administration acknowledged during a congressional hearing last
week that the intelligence service lacks the agents and
information-gathering capacity for a nationwide campaign against
organized crime.

Interior Secretary Juan Camilo Mourino also confirmed what everybody
already suspected: that drug gangs have infiltrated police forces so
thoroughly that authorities can't fully guarantee public safety. And
he expressed concern that drug money could make its way into midterm
congressional elections in July.

The election campaign may complicate matters for Calderon in other
ways, by sharpening criticism over his anti-crime strategy and giving
political foes opportunities to grandstand.

When Mourino, Medina Mora and Genaro Garcia Luna, the nation's public
safety chief, appeared before Congress last week, opposition lawmakers
jeered and held up signs saying, "Resign."

The leftist Democratic Revolution Party, which holds the
second-highest number of seats in the lower house of Congress, refuses
to recognize Calderon as president, saying his 2006 election victory
was fraudulent. Many leftists believe Calderon launched the drug
crackdown to gain legitimacy after the disputed vote count.

Public opinion remains a wild card. In a poll in the Milenio newspaper
last week, two-thirds of respondents said they were afraid to go to
public places after the grenade attack.