A Tale of two Laredos

How the Gamboa family's woes are linked to US-backed law enforcement operation
Todd Bensman, GlobalPost
19 March 2009
Article URL: http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/mexico/090319/tale-two-laredos

This is not a story about Rosarito but Nuevo Laredo, another of the many Mexican border towns that are plagued by the ongoing violence arising from the drug cartel situation. It seems ironic that no more than two months ago, John Burnett of NPR had filed a story about the gradual return of peace and a sense of normalcy to the town because the in-fighting among the various cartel factions were abating (apparently because one side was taking its operations elsewhere). And then this happened. This latest piece by Bensman only goes to show the fragile and often illusory nature of peace that our neighbors south of the border are living under.

I chose to comment on this story because there was something in the way the article's narrative was framed that arrested my attention almost immediately. I'm not sure if this is indeed happening, but I do suspect that elements of the U.S. media are gradually starting to develop the narrative about the violence in Mexico from a broader geopolitical perspecitive - one that recognizes the hand that America plays in the ongoing crisis, rather than a scapgoating of the southern nation that seemed to be the preferred route of the past.

Even until recently, Alex Johnson's MSNBC story on 9 March this year was, though a useful piece in providing a big-picture perspective to the drug situation and how the fortunes of Mexico are inexorably linked to the well-being of the U.S., a couple of steps short of framing the drug demand in North America as the engine for the continued supply from the south. This GlobalPost article, however, contains a key theme that the Mexican government had been trying to convey to the U.S. media, especially those in California and Texas, but had hitherto been unable to gain much traction: That tourists are rarely hurt or deliberately targetted in the violence; most of the victims have some sort of involvement in the drug trade.

A separate but equally interesting theme that cropped up is the key role the U.S. government plays alongside the Mexican federales in combating the cartels. Granted that in the case of Bensman's story, it is really a tale of a cross-border collaboration gone awry, thus jeopardizing the lives of the two Gamboa families (Alex Gamboa had leased the house to the US agents, but it was Ricardo that got kidnapped and is how feared murdered). But still, taking a step back and examining this from a broader perspective of gaining public mindshare, I would argue that having more such coverage that acknowledges the complexity of the cartel violence, and the consubstantiation between the U.S. and the Mexicans (e.g. the recent 16 March Rasmussen Report that cited how Obama Administration would soon unveil a plan that aims at stopping U.S. weapons and money from drug sales here from pouring back into the gangs in Mexico) would gradually develop a more balanced public perception of the emergency. Even if most Americans were to continue supporting tough actions such as the staging of troops along the border to combat potential violence, any resultant positive swing in perceptions from an anti-Mexico hysteria would be coup in the grand scheme of things.

But coming back to Bensman's article, I do have some questions to ask about the way certain events were played out.

While it's saddening to learn about how two potentially innocent families were dragged into this cycle of violence because of the alleged faux pas of the U.S. government, I think the circumstances in which Alan Gamboa had rented the house to the agents seem questionable. I'm not sure what Alan Gamboas thought about the likelihood of low-ranking counsulate officials arriving in a couple of armored SUVs, because that seems to suggest anything but a simple and ordinary transaction. Was Alan promised protection and a large sum of money in exchange for making the house available? This is somethign we'll never know for now.

However, if Alan's allegations are true, then one has to wonder about the competence of the U.S. agents, isn't it? Wouldn't traveling around a cartel-controlled town in armored vehicles be asking for trouble? Doesn't it seem that it was their rather cavalier actions that may have compromised the situation right from the onset?

Or, is it as the U.S. government says, that the Gamboa brothers' records aren't as clean as they appear to be? Thus, could it be the exact theme - that the victims tend to be those that are involved in the trafficking - playing itself out in reality after all?

Well, who knows for sure? What's certain right now is that a man has been kidnapped and is presumably dead, while his despairing wife and children are fearing for his safety as well as their own.

Despite all odds, I truly hope there will be a more fairytale-like ending to this story than the route it currently appears to heading. Where innocent lives are concerned, any life lost is always one life too many...