It has been a trying week for US -Mexico relations, which have been deteriorating steadily since 9/11 . Although the Christian Science Monitor article suggests that the Mexican government has been of immense assistance in the Global War on Terror (GWOT), evidence to the contrary abounds. Failures on the part of the Mexican government to curtail illegal border crossings by Mexican nationals and/or other than Mexicans (OTMs) far outnumber their successes. A violent incursion into the US this week, by suspected Mexican military personnel engaging in drug smuggling operations, resulted in curse diplomatic notes between US Ambassador Tony Garza (see photo left) and Mexican Foreign Relations Secretary Luis Ernesto Derbez (see photo in next column). The incursion follows the release of an internal Department of Homeland Security memo, reporting over 215 incursions by Mexican soldiers into the US in the last 10 years. This week’s discovery of a 2,400-foot drug smuggling tunnel from a warehouse near the airport in Tijuana to a warehouse in San Diego places further strain on Mexico-US relations. Finally, the creation and subsequent termination of a Mexican government-funded program to provide illegal immigrants with maps showing highways, rescue beacons, and water tanks in the Arizona desert to increase their chances of successfully crossing the US-Mexico border resulted in protests from various congressional members and state governors.

Extensive explanations have been forthcoming from both the Mexican and US government to dispel notions that the former is inept in controlling its border. Media wish to paint a rosy picture of relations between the US and Mexico while choosing to ignore the well documented findings that the internal state of the Mexico is growing more perilous and is increasingly being controlled by drug cartels and other nefarious criminal organizations. However, 2006 is an election year in Mexico, forcing the Bush administration to tone down its rhetoric concerning Mexico while highlighting the successes achieved by joint US-Mexico border programs.