Whack-a-mole: Military force isn't the answer in Mexico's drug wars

A Mexican scholar speaks to the U.S. about not supporting Calderon's strategy of "hitting a beehive with a stick," an image much like that of "Whack-a-mole."

Military force isn't the answer in Mexico's drug wars: "What Mexicans such as me really want is for the United States to stop using taxpayer dollars to fund military intervention in the ill-conceived 'war on drugs.' As independent Mexican and U.S. organizations have widely reported, this war has a heavy human rights cost. The military has participated in the killing of civilians and terrorized entire communities. That's why it was withdrawn from Ciudad Juarez in the first place. Far from 'courageous,' as the editorial called it, Mr. Calderon's launching of the war against traffickers was like hitting a beehive with a stick - without a plan for what to do next. After four years, the government still doesn't have a plan. There is, instead, only growing desperation." Nov. 5, 2010, Washington Post, letter to the editor from Manuel Parez Rocha, associate fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies.