The Battle against Guns

The trafficking of firearms feeds violence around the world. It is part of the origin of terrorist acts, of irregular militaries, of murders committed by disturbed minds and of massive executions perpetrated by members of organized crime. Its growing presence in Mexico is the cause of justified concerns.

Weapons acquired by merchants of terror have led to the deaths of thousands of people, strengthened the drug cartels’ capacity for intimidation and terrorized millions of citizens. Fighting against the traffic of weapons requires various measures, some within Mexico, and others within the world’s principal provider of firearms, the United States.

Eighty percent of the weapons that come to Mexico originate from U.S. border states. Therefore, the battle to halt this traffic depends on advances made in that country. Unfortunately, measures to regulate the buying and selling of weapons encounter multiple problems in the United States. Any attempt to place restrictions on the free trade of firearms reverts immediately to the freedoms established by the Second Amendment of the Constitution, giving rise to bitter debates between opposing camps of those conscious of the lethal effects of the indiscriminate sale of guns and those defending powerful economic and ideological interests.

There is a strong political movement that has fought to establish regulations seeking to prevent firearms from falling into criminal hands. Manifestations of this movement include Michael Moore’s excellent film “Bowling For Columbine” and legislative initiatives promoted by very active, highly visible organizations such as the Mayors Against Illegal Guns coalition.

Acting in opposition is the National Rifle Association (NRA), one of the most powerful organizations uniting and giving voice to the most conservative public figures in the United States. The NRA moves immense financial resources to support the campaigns of representatives and senators, whose most urgent concern is to obtain resources and correctly interpret voter sentiment in order to win reelection.

The NRA has convinced many lawmakers of the advisability of believing in two myths: first, that taking a position in favor of gun control is a sure path to losing an election; and second, that gun control is useless because those eager to obtain guns will get them by any means, in spite of existing regulations.

The strength of the NRA has been felt recently. At the start of last month, the House of Representatives defeated a bipartisan initiative seeking to establish controls on the sale of guns and explosives to those suspected of criminal activity. Along the same lines is their refusal of President Obama’s request to grant authorization to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), to develop a registry of persons who buy or sell semiautomatic or high-caliber weapons in states bordering Mexico.

In this atmosphere one finds the initiative promoted in Mexico by the Alianza Cívica (Civic Alliance) organization to address a letter directed to the president of the United States with three petitions: to immediately stop the importation of assault weapons to the United States since the majority arrive as contraband in Mexico; to increase the regulatory capacity of the ATF in regions supplying contraband weapons to Mexico; and to order sellers to report sales of multiple assault weapons to a single person to the ATF.

This incursion of Mexican civil society into the battle for gun control in the United States has the enormous merit of opening the door for joint action from the societies of both countries and contributing to the major realization, here and there, of the enormous harm that the traffic of weapons is causing to Mexico.

Recognizing these merits, I find, nevertheless, two limitations: first, that they are only addressed to President Obama. The key actors in this issue, however, are advocacy groups, legislators and the media. No U.S. president — independently of whether or not he has the power to do it — takes measures on such a sensitive issue without carefully measuring the pressures and interests expressed by said actors; even less so while in the process of seeking reelection.

The second limitation is supporting, indirectly, the politics of complaint that has set the tone for President Felipe Calderón’s strategy in dialoguing with the United States. In these pages I have referred very critically to this strategy, which had very controversial expressions in a speech given to the U.S. Congress in May of 2010. This strategy carries with it at least three problems: sidelining the responsibility of the Mexican government, for example, in improving controls at customs checkpoints through which weapons cross; stiffening anti-Mexican sentiment recurring in many sectors of American society; and above all, perpetuating the tendency of the Mexican political class to ignore the complexities of the American political system while formulating demands in such a way that, almost inevitably, they will go unanswered.

Despite these reservations, I share the spirit of those who have decided to actively participate in this battle against firearms. It is an encouraging start to a major involvement by the citizenry in a matter that gravely affects the life of the nation.