The Morelia attack is atypical of the drug cartels. Is a rightwing neo-Nazi party being born?

A Mexican soldier stands guard as experts investigate the crime scene in Morelia, Michoacan, where two grenades were hurled into a crowd during Independence Day celebrations, killing eight and wounding hundreds.

The Morelia attack is atypical of the drug cartels. Is a rightwing neo-Nazi party being born?

September 17, 2008

By Pedro Echeverria V.
Translated by Scott Campbell
[Spanish original]

1. Members of drug-trafficking cartels have shown (up to today) that they don't kill people by throwing bombs at them, like what happened in Morelia on the night of September 15. These cartels, for all they've done, only kill those who go after them, deceive them, and speak out against them, be they members of the same cartel, police officers, soldiers and their commanders, journalists, and, certainly, they are always ready to put an end to the politicians who order them hunted down. Ostensibly, they kill people by producing and selling them drugs, but according to published accounts, the humble inhabitants begin to care for them because they are the only ones who help, giving them jobs and gifts (Escobar Gaviria, Caro Quintero, etc.). Though the drug-traffickers could have changed their strategy, we should consider this fact, avoiding accepted wisdom and propaganda.

2. On the other side, a leftist guerilla organization always fights for the exploited, poor and oppressed. That's what it's born to do. Genaro Vazquez, Lucio Cabanas, the EZLN, the EPR, etc., never acted against the people, but very much to the contrary, arose from the people to defend their rights. Some have attacked banks, have kidnapped business and land owners, to obtain money for their struggles, but they've never gone against their own ideology which is to fight for the indigenous, the peasants, the workers.  When they carry out propagandistic actions, placing bombs, they've always sought to ensure that no one dies. This has become more than clear through the experiences in Mexico and the world. No leftist organization would be able to keep their name if it didn't defend the interests of those from below.

3. On the contrary, Hitler, Mussolini, Franco, Pinochet, Videla, Somoza, representing the economic and political interests of businessmen, having the conception of inferior and superior races, considering that the poor should only produce because they are incapable of governing, always showed disdain for the people.  Do you happen to remember that all of these disastrous rightwing military dictators immediately massacred the people when they were protesting against their miserable living conditions? Who killed the student masses on October 2, 1968 and June 10, 1971? To throw a bomb into a poor and miserable crowd can only be an action of those who are against the crowd, of those they consider incapable of doing anything that isn't working, to produce wealth for the exploiters.

4. The question then should be: Is a rightwing Nazi party being born, like the various ones in Europe and the U.S., to persecute and kill the people and the forces associated with them? How many businessmen and powerful priests would support with great determination an extremely radicalized Yunque/PAN party?* People such as the "friends of Fox," Velasco Arza (adviser to Fox), Salinas Price and his son Salinas Pliego (owner of TV Azteca), Servidje (owner of Nestle), Azcarraga (owner of Televisa) and a thousand other businessmen most certainly would be very pleased at the appearance of armed, anti-communist commandos, such as those that have appeared in Germany, Italy, Spain, or the U.S. Their objective is to stop the struggles of the people and to assassinate those political activists who assist in the strikes, the taking of lands, and the takeovers of unoccupied homes.

5. Look at the cynical statements of one of the largest capital and television magnates. To bolster his thesis regarding the importance of business owners in the formation of MURO**, researcher Gonzalez Ruiz drew upon one of the few existing declarations from a businessman about the issue: that of Hugo Salinas Price, father of Ricardo Salinas Pliego, owner of TV Azteca. In his memoirs, "My Years With Elektra," he writes: "At the beginning of the seventies I felt a great uneasiness. The strong charisma of Fidel Castro made the middle and upper classes fear that the Cuban phenomenon would repeat itself in Mexico. I wrote articles published in Excelsior. Sometimes the Institute for Economic and Social Research, headed by my friend Agustin Navarro Vazquez, would republish my articles in their publications.

6. "I always supported Navarro Vazquez, a true hero of freedom who has not been given the acknowledgement he deserves. He outlined to me the advantage of creating a youth gang, in effect to counteract the leftist terror amongst the students. It would be called MURO (University Movement of Renewed Orientation). It's most likely that various people supported them, but I never knew who else supported this group; the result was very effective in giving the leftists a taste of their own medicine. MURO had a house on Division del Norte Avenue, where the boys practiced martial arts. On one occasion, MURO decided to have a protest at UNAM (National Autonomous University of Mexico). They burned an effigy of Fidel Castro. It was fun; my brother-in-law and I were there. His photo was in the following day's paper, next to the effigy in flames."

7. These types of rightwing groups have always relied on the strong funding of powerful business and clerical circles. A Civic Front of Revolutionary Affirmation, headed by former rightwing president Miguel Aleman and the most influential politicians and bankers in each state of the country, lined up houses for the "Cuban exile" (read gusanos) that in the end became concentrated in Miami. Those recipients then became rightwing terrorists who came to be accused of being accomplices in the assassination of President Kennedy.  In Mexico in the sixties, thousands of free official textbooks were burned in public plazas for their "communist ideas" and the "Christianity, yes; communism, no" groups organized in the churches to cover the country in anticommunist propaganda.

8. Or perhaps they're exaggerating the terror so that "the Mexican people are united under the direction of their president Felipe Calderon" who every time loses support? Is this the moment when they forget their differences and ideologies so that Calderon be recognized in spite of his electoral sham? I am reminded of Hitler blaming the foreigner for the German crisis and seeking to unite the people around him and the war-profiteers; as with the Argentinean military dictators, with the slogan that the "people should unite to defend the Malvinas," searching for the support of the people that it never had. Are they going to try to keep the army in the streets, with the ensuing thousands more dead, while they play "high politics" that only throws mud and blood over the people being taken advantage of by rightwing paramilitaries? Please, we don't have to fall for that feint. Calderon is desperate to be acknowledged.

Pedro Echeverria V. is an independent Mexican journalist.

Translator's notes:

* El Yunque is a Catholic, ultra-rightwing secret Mexican society with strong connections to the PAN, the rightwing National Action Party of presidents Fox and Calderon.

** MURO or Movimiento Universitario de Renovadora Orientacion (University Movement of Renewed Orientation) was a militant, ultra-rightwing anticommunist organization that participated in attacks on leftist students. It has been claimed MURO was a front group of El Yunque. "Muro" means "wall" in Spanish.

Scott Campbell editor of the blog http://angrywhitekid.blogs.com/, and a member of Tlaxcala, the network of translators for linguistic diversity. This translation may be reprinted as long as the content remains unaltered, and the source, author, translator and reviser are cited.