U.S. HAS DUAL ROLE IN DRUG WAR

WASHINGTON - The U.S. military is in a better position to provide
Mexico's military with training, resources and intelligence as its
southern neighbor battles deadly drug cartels, Defense Secretary
Robert Gates says.

More than 1,000 people have been killed in Mexico in drug-related
violence this year. In 2008, the toll doubled from the previous year
to 6,290. The United States and Canada have warned that murders
related to drug activity in parts of Mexico, particularly along the
border with the United States, raised the level of risk in visiting
the country.

"I think we are beginning to be in a position to help the Mexicans
more than we have in the past. Some of the old biases against
cooperation with our - between our militaries and so on, I think, are
being set aside," Gates said in an interview broadcasat Sunday on
NBC's "Meet the Press."

"It clearly is a serious problem," he said.

Gates praised Mexican President Felipe Calderon for taking on the
cartels and sending the army into the fight.

"What I think people need to point out is the courage that Calderon
has shown in taking this on, because one of the reasons it's gotten as
bad as it has is because his predecessors basically refused to do
that," he said.

The Mexican government is deploying another 1,000 federal police
officers as part of a wider effort to restore order in Ciudad Juarez,
the nation's most violent city, officials said.

Some of those uniformed federal officers began arriving in the border
city Monday, two days after about 2,000 soldiers landed there in a
related military buildup. Those soldiers were the first of an expected
5,000 additional troops who will be sent to help perform basic police
functions.

The military reinforcements will bring to more than 7,000 the number
of soldiers in Ciudad Juarez, more than doubling the army presence
there.

President Barack Obama's chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, said Obama and
Calderon agreed to work together to stabilize the border when they met
shortly before Obama's inauguration. Calderon was the first foreign
leader Obama met as president-elect.

Guns Going South

A U.S. report has found that weapons in the drug killings are coming
from north of the border. Mexican authorities are outgunned by the
drug cartels because the criminals are receiving their high-powered
arms from the United States, Mexican Attorney General Eduardo Medina
Mora told The Associated Press in an interview Feb. 26.

Calderon says the United States should aggressively enforce gun
laws.

Their complaints were supported by a recent U.S. State Department
report that weapons bought or stolen in the United States were used in
95 percent of the killings.

The report also said cartels are increasingly carrying out contract
killings inside the United States, part of a wave of violence that
also includes a sharp rise in kidnappings in Phoenix.

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder announced in February that the Drug
Enforcement Administration had rounded up 755 suspected Sinaloa cartel
members and seized more than $59 million in drug money in the past 21
months.

Congress is also paying attention. Lawmakers included $10 million in
the economic stimulus package for Project Gunrunner, a federal
crackdown on U.S. gun-trafficking networks.

The Brookings Institution has estimated that 2,000 guns enter Mexico
from the United States every day. The ATF says more than 7,700 guns
sold in America were traced to Mexico last year, up from 3,300 the
year before and about 2,100 in 2006.

Cartels turn to the United States because Mexico's gun laws are much
stricter - gun buys must be pre-approved by the Mexican defense
department and are limited to light weapons, no higher than the
standard .38-caliber. Larger calibers are considered military weapons
and are off-limits to civilians.

North of the border, cartel representatives often pay U.S. citizens to
purchase assault rifles for them at gun shows where background checks
aren't required and sales aren't easily traced.

Securing The Border

Emanuel said the two nations have a mutual interest in securing their
common border.

"They want to clearly stop the guns from the United States going
south. We want to stop the drugs coming north," Emanuel said on "Face
the Nation" on CBS. "That border is important to us, and Mexico is a
key ally of ours."

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, who had experience
dealing with Mexican issues as governor of the border state of
Arizona, told Congress last week that the drug-related violence in
Mexico was a top priority and that she was working with other U.S.
agencies to end weapons trafficking and to support the Mexican government.

More than 700 suspects have been arrested as part of a wide-ranging
crackdown on Mexican drug cartels operating inside the United States,
the Justice Department said last week.

Information from the Los Angeles Times was used in this report.