Rudy Giuliani says the US should bomb Mexico
Rudy Giuliani is insane. I am not a doctor, so I cannot say if he has a mental disease or dementia or is affected by chronic alcohol abuse. But to a layman, his behavior and thinking are abnormal.
On his Sunday WABC radio show, Giuliani explained how he would advise a president to deal with cartel violence in Mexico.
"If I were advising a president, I'd say, come on, let's show a pair of cojones here; let's go to Congress and have a declaration of war against the cartels. Let's actually declare war against them and say, we're gonna go take them out, and we're gonna set up a peace zone."
I am also not an expert on international law, but I doubt a country can legally “declare war” on private organizations. Should the US declare war on “the cartels,” I suspect the Mexican government would consider it an attack on their sovereignty. Especially as Giuliani’s plan involves potentially bombing Mexico.
As Rudy further explains, while role-playing a President getting tough with our southern neighbor and second-largest trading partner.
"I'm gonna set up a safe zone between the United States and Mexico. And when you get control of it, pal, fine. But cartels, get the hell out of the safe zone because I'm going to bomb the hell out of you."
There is no “between the United States and Mexico”. Rudy’s safe zone would have to be on one country's territory. He means it to be in Mexico.
This imposition is absurd. But for the sake of argument, I will play along. How wide is this safe zone — one mile, a hundred miles? How is it marked? How will the US know when the safe zone is cartel-free? What is the definition of “get control.” How long do we keep bombing? And most importantly — where do we drop the bombs?
The cartels are part of the fabric of the areas of Mexico where they run drugs. If you want to bomb them, you will necessarily bomb civilians. Perhaps Rudy‘s plan involves relocating Mexicans out of the safe zone and making it a literal no man's land.
That is a heavy lift. The border towns of Tijuana, Mexicali, Nogales, Cuidad Juarez, Nuevo Leon, and Matamoros have a combined population of 6.1 million. And that is just the tip of the iceberg. The Mexican border states have 22.8 million residents in total.
Without knowing the limits of Giuliani’s “peace zone” it is impossible to know how many will have to move. But it would be a historic war-driven population relocation. Not that conservatives would care. After all, they think that Mexicans — most of whom are deeply religious — are mostly murderers, thieves, and rapists.
(Aside: I wonder why Rudy never proposed bombing Brooklyn and Queens to root out and destroy the Mafia. Also, Giuliani is an Italian name, and Rudy is from the Outer Boroughs — that must make him a member of organized crime — no?)
Back to reality — Rudy will not be joining us — even if his plan worked, it would not do a damn bit of good. You could stop every single drug shipment from Mexico and make no difference to the availability of drugs in the US.
It is hard to put an exact dollar amount on the size of the illegal drug market in the US — the industry issues no annual reports — but in 2016, Americans spent an estimated $150 billion on street drugs — close to what they spent on alcohol.
There is no way any criminal organization will leave that kind of money on the table. If you close the supply lines from Mexico (which will never happen, even with Rudy’s safety zone) there are still the Canadian border and the ocean coasts — wide open and inviting enterprising drug free-marketeers.
One group that will cheer Rudy on is American bomb manufacturers. American law enforcement has fought the 53-year War on Drugs mostly on the supply side. It has been an unmitigated and expensive disaster. The war in Ukraine revealed that a slew of Russian defense money ended up in plutocrats’ pockets. It should make you wonder where the $1 trillion of US drug war money went. If Republicans want to audit war expenditures, they should start there.
At this point, Giuliani is no more than a malevolent and impotent celebrity with no role in guiding US policy — and celebrity culture in the US adds little to the nation’s value. But at least most of these famous for being famous people are not lobbying to go to war with an ally.