MEXICO USING SPECIAL SQUAD IN DRUG WAR

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP98-01394R000200030040-1
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 27, 2016
• Document Release Date: July 25, 2013
• Sequence Number: 40
• Publication Date: April 19, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/07/25: CIA-RDP98-01394R000200030040-1
WASHINGTON POST
NEW YORK TIMES A ( I
WALL STREET J.
. WASHINGTON TIMES
USA TODAY
d ?
h ? ? ?t " Government Widens Training
.Mexico Using
Special Squad
In Drug War
? .-
?? ,
By LARRY ROHTER
? ? -* Special le The New York Times
' MEXICO CITY, April 12 ? They in-
elude police officers, engineers, doc-
74.; tors, teachers and former soldiers ? a
select group of men and women be-
tween the ages of 22 and 35 from large
cities and small villages. At the Na-
tional Institute of Penal Sciences here,
.this cross section of Mexican society is
;.'being trained as a new elite in the coun-
try's stepped-up war against drug Vat-
* -ticking.
?By July, about 1,200 of these trainees,
04 mix of veteran officers and newcom-
ers to police work, are expected to be
;deployed across Mexico in "special
? .groups?of the Federal Judicial Police.
? p ; In the ,monthilo come, they will be the
shock troops commanded by the Mexi-
.colVAttorney General's newly created
? Anti-Narcotics Investigation and
Operations Division.
- `The new force is a direct outgrowth
. o( a pledge to step up efforts against
drug trafficking made by President
Carlos Salinas de Gortari in his inaugu-
ral address on Dec. 1.
"I will create a new area in the Attor-
' ;key General's office dedicated exclu-
sively to its combat, with more person-
, ??" nel and greater training," Mr. Salinas
, promised. "Narcotics trafficking has
t become a grave risk to the security of
the nation."
? Some members of the new force
? ?11've already been assigned to an anti.
*drug campaign along the United
.States-Mexico border, where in recent
days they have made some major co-
- ..caine seizures and arrests.
Others will soon begin working with
? .4,:the veteran officers involved in the
? spectacular capture on Saturday of Mi-
guel Angel Felix Gallardo, whom At-
- torney 'General Enrique Alvarez del
, Castillo described this week as the
'?,",No. 1 narcotics trafficker" in Mexico..
a
? As part of the same effort, the Gov-
?ernment is stepping up its recruitment
? , and training in other sections of the
. -Eederal Judicial Police, seeking what
, Fernando Ventura, commander of its
? .Anti-Narcotics Operations, calls the
???????-?
? , ?standardization and homogenization
"of the force at higher levels."
' The current class of police recruits,
..who reported April 3 for four and a half
riwnths of training, includes 112 men
? -and 8 women, more than double the
size of previous classes, who were
chosen from 2,030 applicants.
,,? ,,, Federal police officials say that
-more than half of the new officers will
? ,b4 thrown directly into the war against
" drugs. The rest will be assigned to in-
. ,.
? s'yestigate other federal crimes; which
-range from bank robbery and kidnap-
_ ping to contraband and illegal posses-
glen of arms.; ? ?
? ?
Training in Tough Terrain
? The trainee's day begins early, with
two hours cif demanding exercise and
drills. As joggers and dog walkers in
the Glalpan Forest watch curiously,
they run and crawl through terrain in-
tended to duplicate the conditions they
will find in remote and mountainous
areas of Sinaloa and Michoacan states,
where poppy and marijuana plantings
are most common.
"We're a group, and we work to-
gether as one!" Mr. Ventura barked
when a group of veteran officers, now
responding to roll-call in a parking lot,
failed to perform to his Satisfaction one
morning this week. "Here, if you make
a mistake, you die."
"In January, we revised our curricu-
lum to give more emphasis to the bat-
tle against narcotics, so that more than
a third of our material is now devoted
to that struggle," said Ernesto
Mendieta Jimenez, director of training
at the National Institute of Penal Sci-
ences.
Corruption Poses a Problem
Mr. Felix Gallardo was arrested,
along with officers of the Federal High-
' - -way- PolicerState _Ittfilcial Police and
the Attorney General's OffTcealrOf
them accused of furnishing him with
'protection or intelligence in return for
bribes.
Aware that corruption has greatly
hindered the effectiveness of past drug
campaigns, the Government is seeking
to insulate the special group, and new
recruits in general, from that tempta-
tion.
It has not yet leen determined how.
much money .members of the task
force will earn. But the intention is to
"bring their wages more in line with
their counterparts in the United
States," a senior Mexican law enforce-
ment official said, mentioning a base
salary of .about $1,100 a month as the
likely figure.
?Nevertheless, the Government is
counting on something More than what
? .ts"; by Mexican standards, a very good
? wage, to motivate the force.
?? -''We've got to instill a mystique, a
? code, a vocation to serve," said Mr.
, ? .Yentura, who since January has de-
? ?ioted all his time to training and re-
, fresher programs for recruits and vet-
erans.. ?
Spies 'Detected and Expelled
,Mr. Mendieta said that narcotics
traffickers, alarmed by the new re-
solve the Mexican Government has ex-
pressed in fighting the drug trade, have
tried to infiltrate hirelings into the
training program. But these spies were
quickly detected and expelled, he
added.
To avoid such problems, the special
groups are following rigorous recruit-
ment procedures. All the veteran offi-
cers have been recommended by their
commanders, and both the' and the re-
cruits are subjected to physical and
psychological tests to determine their
fitness and dedication to duty.
"I'm in this out of conviction, not out
of obligation," said Ignacio Perez Orta,
a 32-year-old former physical trainer
who joined the police four months ago.
"The drug trade is a plague that has
to be exterminated one way or an-
other," he said. "If we don't combat it,
will take the reins and we will go
down the road Colombia has taken:"
S AP R
DATE
STAT
STAT
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/07/25: CIA-RDP98-01394R000200030040-1