IN MEXICO, A WAR EVERY CENTURY

Mexico City - EVERY 100 years, Mexico seems to have a rendezvous with
violence. As the country gathers on Wednesday night for the ceremony
of the "grito" - the call to arms that began the war for independence
from Spain - we are enduring another violent crisis, albeit one that
differs greatly from those of a century and two centuries ago.

In 1810 and 1910, revolutions erupted that lasted 10 years or more
and were so destructive that both times it took decades for the
country to re-establish its previous levels of peace and progress.
Both episodes furthered Mexico's political development, however, and
our collective memory centers on these two dates that have taken on
such symmetrical and mythical significance.

In 2010, Mexico is again convulsed with violence, though the size and
scope of today's conflict does not even remotely approach that of
1810 or 1910. This war is unfolding within and between gangs of
criminals, who commit violent acts that are fueled only by a
competitive lust for money. This is strikingly different from the
revolutions of 1810 or 1910, which were clashes of ideals.

In 1810, Mexican-born Spaniards - the creoles - saw no recourse other
than violence as the means to gain independence from Spain. Their
principles were inspired by the doctrines of 16th-century thinkers
like the Jesuit Francisco Suarez, who argued for "popular
sovereignty." But the creoles were also driven by specific
grievances: they had long resented domination by men from the Iberian
Peninsula; they were also indignant that the seemingly inexhaustible
wealth of New Spain had been the principal financial resource for the
frivolousness and senseless wars of the Spanish empire.

Yet the crown repeatedly ignored opportunities that might have
avoided violent revolution - Spain certainly could have loosened
connections with its overseas dominions and granted Mexico some
degree of independence. When the provincial priest Miguel Hidalgo y
Costilla shouted his call to arms, the grito, from the steps of his
Dolores church, the war for independence finally exploded.

Shortly afterward, a vast, mostly Indian army, armed mainly with
slings, stones and bludgeons, conquered various regional capitals,
stopping just short of Mexico City itself. Though Father Hidalgo was
captured and executed in 1811, the uprising continued under the
leadership of another priest, Jose Maria Morelos, who would also be
seized and killed by the Spanish government. But Mexico would finally
gain its independence in September 1821.

From 1810 to 1821, the war for independence cost about 300,000 lives
in a population of around 6 million. Afterward, state income,
agricultural, industrial and mining production, and, above all, the
availability of capital for investment did not reach their pre-1810
levels until the 1880s. And the material desolation was followed by
almost five decades of insecurity on the roads, political instability
and grievous civil and international wars.

There was also a series of confrontations between the country's
Liberal and Conservative factions until the victory of President
Benito Juarez over the Conservatives and the French army that
supported them. Following this unstable period, the Liberal
government separated church and state and adopted a stable, electoral
political structure.

Unfortunately for our fledgling democracy, Porfirio Diaz, Juarez's
greatest general, seized power in 1876. Still, under his long
authoritarian regime, Mexico achieved notable material progress in
the development of industry, the transportation network and foreign trade.

In 1910, after more than three decades of dictatorship, a large
portion of the population believed that violence was the only way to
overthrow Diaz. A brief, purely democratic revolution attained its
aim but was soon reversed through a military coup supported by the
American ambassador.

This new assault on the honor and well-being of the country - along
with other accumulated grievances of peasants, workers and the
nationalistic middle class - led to the first true social revolution
of the 20th century.

The revolution of 1910 was even more destructive than the one in
1810. About 700,000 of some 15 million Mexicans died in warfare or
through illness or starvation. An additional 250,000 emigrated to the
United States. Industrial production plummeted. Ranches, haciendas
and cities were demolished. And from 1926 to 1929 came the additional
devastation of the Cristero war between Catholic peasants and the
anti-clerical government; the state's eventual victory took 70,000 lives.

Beginning in 1929, the country re-established a central government
(though unlike the Juarez presidency, it was not a democratic one)
under the hegemony of the Institutional Revolutionary Party. The
government carried vast agricultural reforms, substantially improved
the conditions for workers, established public institutions for
social welfare that are still alive and well and oversaw decades of
growth and stability. In the view of most historians, the great
social reforms accomplished by later governments justified the
Mexican Revolution's decade of violence.

Today, a handful of powerful criminal groups has unleashed a
blood-soaked and utterly illegitimate wave of violence against the
Mexican government and Mexican society. This "war," which rages in
too many cities and states of my country, has created a truly
Hobbesian situation of human brutality.

This situation is, in part, an unintentional result of Mexico's
definitive transition to democracy. In the past 10 years, there has
been a centrifugal effect on power, loosening the authoritarian hand
of the president and giving more latitude to local forces that,
unfortunately, have included drug cartels and other criminal enterprises.

This war, though, will have to be won - and economic growth will have
to be revivified - within the rules of democracy. Congress and
President Felipe Calderon must agree on reforms to make the economy
more open, competitive and efficient. And the struggle against
organized crime will require a centralized police force that is more
honest and professional; secure prisons; better control of the
customs apparatus and the flow of money; and changes in the judicial
system, along with nationwide campaigns against drug addiction.

Despite a bloody mythology that venerates the great protagonists of
1810 and 1910, most of whom met brutal deaths, the common
denominators of our national history have been social, ethnic and
religious coexistence; the peaceful construction of cities, villages
and communities; and the creation of a rich cultural mosaic. Many of
us want to believe that we are living through a nightmare from which,
one morning, we will simply wake up, once again at ease.

But this is not the way things are. We are dealing with a situation
generated, to a great extent, by the market for drugs and weapons in
the United States and by the refusal of many Americans to recognize
their own portion of responsibility in these tragic events. The drug
war will have to be resolved on both sides of the border.

Nonetheless, on Wednesday night, as we have on every Sept. 15 for 200
years, Mexicans will gather together in the central squares of our
cities and towns, even in the smallest and most remote villages. At
midnight, we will hear a local governing official re-enact the grito
uttered by Miguel Hidalgo, the "father of the fatherland."

All the plazas across Mexico will be filled with light and music and
color. And in the historic center of Mexico City, we will watch the
fireworks and the parades and we will hear President Calderon ring
the church bell once sounded by Miguel Hidalgo and then we will
shout, jubilantly, with genuine feeling: "Viva Mexico!"