Mexico's Continuing Drug Wars

Soldiers ride on pickup trucks as they patrol the streets of Morelia on September 17 after deadly attacks on independence day celebrations sparked fears that civilians are now targets in the country's drug wars.

Mexico's President Calderon Has Few Choices In Drug War
-- L.A. Times

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."

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My Comment: Until the supply for drugs changes from the dealers and smugglers to the government .... there is no solution to this war. And for Mexico to win this war .... it is the U.S. that must first change their policies.