Anti-Cartel Mexicans versus Mexican Police. Huh?

Anti-Cartel Mexicans versus Mexican Police

Mexican police have reportedly pulled down a banner posted by Mexicans wanting to unite the population against the narco-terrorists.

The banner pulled down said, "If organized crime is organized, why aren't we?"

Why was the banner pulled down?  Mexican authorities are reported to have noted the sign did not direct specific action be taken and because the banner was not signed.

Comment:  Mexican authorities are undermining their own effort; that is if the authorities directing this move do not collude with the cartels in some way now.  While the sign does not specify what direct measures should be taken against the cartels, the sign plants an idea, possibly hope, that there are other silent oppositionists resisting cartel contamination.  This is kind of energy is what is needed to mobilize a population, especially as they are fighting a narco/criminal insurgency. 

Here’s a quote from the late 1960s counterinsurgency expert, David Galula.   What you take away from the quote is that the Mexican authorities may be undermining their own support base- the population. 

“The technique of power consists in relying on the favorable minority in

order to rally the neutral majority and to neutralize or eliminate the hostile

minority.

In extreme cases, when the cause and the circumstances are extraordinarily

good or bad, one of the minorities disappears or becomes negligible,

and there may even be a solid unanimity for or against among the population.

But such cases are obviously rare.

This holds true for every political regime, from the harshest dictatorship

to the mildest democracy. What varies is the degree and the purpose to

which it is applied. Mores and the constitution may impose limitations,

the purpose may be good or bad, but the law remains essentially valid

whatever the variations, and they can indeed be great, for the law is applied

unconsciously in most countries.

It can no longer be ignored or applied unconsciously in a country beset by

a revolutionary war, when what is at stake is precisely the counterinsurgent’s

power directly challenged by an active minority through the use of subversion

and force. The counterinsurgent who refuses to use this law for his own

purposes, who is bound by its peacetime limitations, tends to drag the war

out without getting closer to victory.”

-COUNTERINSURGENCY WARFARE- Theory and Practice, 1964

Source article:  Associated Press.  Mexico City police remove anti-drug cartel banner. 26Nov10; accessed 27Nov10.