'Immediate' US aid in drug war slow to help Mexico

[May 21, 2010]  MEXICO CITY (AP) -- The United States has spent a fraction of the $1.1 billion it promised Mexico between 2008 and 2010 to make "an immediate and important impact" on surging drug cartel violence, according to documents obtained by The Associated Press.

While President Barack Obama and Congress pledged strong, continued support to Mexican President Felipe Calderon in Washington this week, State Department spreadsheets provide the first definitive information about how the United States has -- and hasn't -- spent the money pledged by President George W. Bush under the 2007 Merida Initiative.

The records show that in the third year of what was to be a three-year program, Washington is just starting to help Mexico fund its bloody battle. After bureaucratic tie-ups limited spending to $26 million in two years, cash began to flow this year, with $235 million projected by year end, and at least $331 million expected in 2011.

"The leaders of the Mexican military made the point (that) the house is on fire now," U.S. Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates said recently after meeting with military counterparts in Mexico. "Having the fire trucks show up in 2012 is not going to be particularly helpful."

In Washington on Thursday, Calderon asked Congress for "more cooperation" and noted that his own government is sinking $10 billion a year into the battle. The United States has a moral obligation to help more, he argued.

"My neighbor is the biggest consumer of drugs in the world," he said, "and everyone wants to sell drugs through my window."

It was a tropical spring day in colonial Merida three years ago when Bush and Calderon laughed, slapped backs and announced unspecified intentions to "increase cooperation." While the leaders made small talk, their advisers plotted out what Assistant Secretary of State Thomas Shannon called an "urgent" aid package that could have "an immediate and important impact in the fight against organized crime."

Since then, 23,000 people have been killed in Calderon's battle against the cartels as Mexico waited for U.S. funds.

Obama has agreed to extend Merida at least one more year under a program called "Beyond Merida." But it's doubtful top government officials realize how little has been done.

Administration leaders often talk about how the U.S. has sent $1 billion to help Mexico.

Calderon told reporters this week: "We have received about $400 million."

In fact, it's $161 million.

That includes $66 million for five rugged Bell helicopters, $2.7 million for four bullet-tracing devices; $2.4 million for 337 lie detector machines and $1.4 million for 13 bulletproof Suburbans. There is also $15 million to train civilian watchdog groups, money laundering investigators and drug-sniffing dog handlers. A prison was revamped with $191,000 in first aid kits, training rifles, defibrillators and a new weight machine.

Adding in all of the $680 million promised so far, the budgets show that spending for 13 helicopters and five airplanes dwarf all other outlays, amounting to $507 million. Some of them won't get to Mexico until 2014.

The rest of the money -- $440 million -- remains in federal accounts, unassigned and unspent along with another $200 million allocated beyond the original Merida for 2010.

The holdups are not political. They are bureaucratic.

Merida Initiative funds sit in three accounts, managed by more than a dozen federal agencies, each with unique budget rules. Sometimes letters of offer and letters of acceptance must be signed before checks are written. Other times, requesters must submit spending plans spelling out strategy, goals, actions to be taken and anticipated results.

Both countries agreed that at least initially, the bulk of the funding would go to aircraft, and buying those can be slow: six months to review bids and sign contracts, two years build an airplane with high tech requirements.

Nonetheless, Mexican officials are sanguine.

"The implementation of the Merida Initiative resources are progressing as established by the governments of Mexico and the United States, as the projects have to comply with legal requirements of both countries," Mexican government officials wrote to AP in response to queries about the spending. "While this can be time consuming, the results provide transparency in the exercise of spending."

But transparency has been an issue as well.

In August 2009, the AP filed a Freedom of Information Act request with the U.S. State Department seeking details of the spending. That request remains pending. AP filed a similar request under Mexico's federal public records law and heard back three weeks later with a general budget breakdown but few details.

Late last week, a State Department official who insisted on remaining anonymous became frustrated at the delays and sent the spreadsheets to the AP. A few days later, the same numbers were buried as a 20-page appendix to a U.S. Senate committee report.

The nature of the spending so far underscores the Obama administration's quandary: Having acknowledged to the AP that the 40-year War on Drugs hasn't worked, Drug Czar Gil Kerlikowske last week said the U.S. will emphasize drug abuse prevention and treatment. But like the $15.5 billion U.S. drug control budget that emphasizes prison and police funding, financial aid to Mexico -- when it comes -- is focused almost entirely on law enforcement.

Washington insists that the numbers don't tell the full story, in part because training is cheaper than airplanes. So far, about a tenth of the money spent has been for training about 15,000 Mexicans.

About 10,000 of those were community members, participating in USAID-sponsored watchdog or citizen advocacy courses, while 5,000 federal police officers were put through basic investigation courses. About 550 Mexican prosecutors have taken legal courses, learning forensics, interviewing and courtroom arguments. An elite group of 43 senior Mexican federal police officers spent four weeks studying at the FBI Academy, the budgets show.

Washington also says its focus is changing and that the funding needs time to catch up.

"The Merida Initiative has moved beyond its early focus on deliveries of equipment toward a greater emphasis on institution and capacity building," said Assistant Secretary of State David T. Johnson.

Not everyone agrees. David Shirk, director of the University of San Diego's Transborder Institute, says the new round of funding is moving slowly toward the administration's stated goals.

"But this is not a game of inches," he said. "We're talking about a massive effort that will take at least a decade of very substantial investments in promoting rule of law."

[Associated Press; By MARTHA MENDOZA]

Associated Press writer E. Eduardo Castillo contributed to this report.

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