MEXICO POLICE AGENTS ARE KILLED IN ALLEGED RETRIBUTION

MEXICO CITY -- Twelve undercover federal police agents were captured,
tortured, and executed by a relatively new and dangerous Mexican
cartel calling itself La Familia, or The Family, officials said Tuesday.

The killings are a major psychological blow to President Felipe
Calderon's war on drugs. The bodies of 11 men and one woman were
found by locals on the side of a highway in Mr. CalderA'n's home
state of Michoacan on Monday. The victims had their hands and feet
tied, showed signs of torture, and had all been shot in the head at
close range.

The agents had been in Michoacan to gather intelligence on the
cartel, said Federal Police spokesman Juan Carlos Buenrostro.
Officials said they believed the killings were connected to the
weekend capture of Arnoldo Rueda Medina, one of the cartel's major operators.

Since the Saturday arrest, gunmen believed to be working for the
cartel have gone on a rampage, attacking police stations, army
patrols and hotels in several different cities in Michoacan with
grenades and high-caliber weapons like AK-47s and AR-15 semiautomatic
rifles. The attacks killed two soldiers and six other federal police
agents, and wounded a further 18 agents.

Together with the executions, the toll from three days of violence
climbed to 18 federal police agents killed, as well as the two
soldiers -- not including about a dozen other civilian victims,
police said. That would mark one of the bloodiest single episodes
against federal forces since Mr. Calderon launched a crackdown on
drug cartels shortly after taking power in December 2006.

The violence highlights the increasing power, brazenness, and
operational capability of Mexican cartels like La Familia. Within a
day of Mr. Rueda's arrest, gunmen attacked a hotel where police were
staying in Apatzingn, federal police barracks in the tourist town of
Ptzcuaro, a police base in Huetamo, and a police convoy on a rural
road -- all in different parts of the state.

Since Mr. Calderon took power, more than 12,000 people have died in
Mexico in drug-related killings.

The killings could raise political pressure on Mr. Calderon to
retreat in the battle against drug lords. While the war on drugs is
popular, many opposition politicians say it is only stirring up
trouble and causing more violence. On Monday, leftist senator Carlos
Navarrete called on Mr. Calderon to scale back the war on drugs,
partly because traffickers could target senior law-enforcement and
government officials.

The killings are also a major blow to the Federal Police. Mr.
Calderon's government has invested millions in training, technology
and arms for the agency, essentially a two-year-old institution being
fashioned after the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation. It has been
part of a national effort to clean up police agencies that have
traditionally been corrupted by drug cartels.

Federal police have been dispatched across Mexico in joint operations
with the military to take on drug organizations in areas where the
local and state police are suspect. The officers work in two-to
three-month shifts before being sent to a new hot spot. The reasoning
is that if they are there any longer, the risk that the officers
might succumb to offers of money or threats by the drug gangs becomes
too great.

Responding to the violence, Mr. Calderon said that the cartels were
increasingly desperate due to the crackdown by the federal
government, which has included sending 45,000 troops to patrol
cities. "In these cowardly attacks, brave members of our federal
forces have lost their lives," Mr. Calderon said Tuesday. "They have
fallen thinking it is possible to construct a safer Mexico. They have
fallen fighting for the safety of all of us." A new poll by Mexican
pollster GCE, however, showed that 51% of Mexicans believe the
cartels have the upper hand in the drug war, while only 29% think the
government is winning.

Of Mexico's major drug cartels, perhaps none is as dangerous as La
Familia, a relatively obscure trafficking organization that has
gained notoriety in the past year. Founded in part by a charismatic
leader who preaches family values, the cartel first gained attention
in 2006 in grisly fashion: By rolling the severed heads of five men
onto a dance floor at a Michoacan disco, along with a hand-scrawled
note warning off rival traffickers.

La Familia has tried to cast itself as a Robin Hood-type cartel, a
quasi-legitimate business that gives back money to the poor, abides
by a code of ethics such as not selling certain drugs like
methamphetamines in Michoacan, and metes out justice to its enemies
only when it is double-crossed. Experts say it recruits heavily among
recovering drug and alcohol addicts. It has published manifestoes in
local newspapers. One golden rule: "family" members of traffickers
should be off-limits to both other traffickers and the federal government.

"It's a bit like a cult, a mixture of evangelicals with new-age
self-help that gives members a sense of belonging and creates a very
disciplined organization," says Alberto Islas, a security consultant
based in Mexico City.

Federal officials say the cartel has infiltrated the state government
to a shocking degree. Soldiers arrested 10 mayors in MichoacA n, as
well as 17 police chiefs, in May.