North American Regional Security: A Trilateral Framework? 9781626370081

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North American Regional Security

North American Regional Security A Trilateral Framework? Richard J. Kilroy, Jr. Abelardo Rodríguez Sumano Todd S. Hataley

b o u l d e r l o n d o n

Published in the United States of America in 2013 by Lynne Rienner Publishers, Inc. 1800 30th Street, Boulder, Colorado 80301 www.rienner.com and in the United Kingdom by Lynne Rienner Publishers, Inc. 3 Henrietta Street, Covent Garden, London WC2E 8LU © 2013 by Lynne Rienner Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Kilroy, Richard James. North American regional security : a trilateral framework? / Richard J. Kilroy, Jr., Abelardo Rodríguez Sumano, and Todd S. Hataley. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-1-58826-854-9 (hc : alk. paper) 1. Security, International—North America. I. Rodríguez Sumano, Abelardo, 1971– II. Hataley, Todd S. (Todd Steven), 1963– III. Title. JZ6009.N67K56 2013 355'.031097—dc23 2012018806 British Cataloguing in Publication Data A Cataloguing in Publication record for this book is available from the British Library.

Printed and bound in the United States of America The paper used in this publication meets the requirements of the American National Standard for Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials Z39.48-1992. 5

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Contents

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Preface 1

A Trilateral Security Framework?

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2

Understanding Regional Security

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A Brief History of Security Relations in the Americas

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New Global Security and Regional Cooperation

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September 11, Regional Responses, and the Global War on Terror

103

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New Momentum in Security Cooperation

125

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Contradictions and Tensions in Regional Security

167

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Future Prospects: Convergence or Divergence?

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219 239 255

Bibliography Index About the Book

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Preface

In developing this project on security in North America, it would have been relatively easy for us to have written three chapters, each arguing our own country’s perspective on continent-wide security cooperation, and then wrapped it up with some compare-and-contrast arguments at the end. If that were the case, this book would have been completed years ago. Instead, we chose to take the path less traveled and produce a more complex study of security relationships in North America through both a theoretical and a practical lens. To do that effectively required a new approach—one that would bring all three country perspectives together in each chapter, looking at the complexity of security cooperation through both endogenous and exogenous factors that affect security policy outcomes. The theoretical framework, provided primarily through the pioneering work of Barry Buzan and Ole Waever on regional security complex theory, was applied to the question of how states go about “operationalizing” security. The application of their sectoral analysis to the context of North American security integration appeared particularly prescient, given the geopolitical changes of the contemporary security environment and the new threats posed to state security after September 11, 2001. We soon discovered that we needed a new set of variables to clarify the complexity of security relations among the United States, Canada, and Mexico; we chose institutions, identity, and interests. These variables provided a more nuanced view of how security cultures have influenced relationships in the hemisphere and how they will continue to do so in the future.

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Four years of work on this project made it more than just an exercise in academic collaboration via long distance. In the process of researching and writing this book, we traveled together to Mexico City; Guadalajara; Ciudad Juárez; El Paso; Washington, DC; San Antonio; and Kingston, Ontario. We organized conferences in all three countries, bringing together academics; practitioners; government officials from the military, police, health services, Congress, and Parliament; and foreign service officers. We visited each other’s homes and met each other’s families. We worked through significant personal trials, including health issues, family crises, and job changes. In some respects, the effort to produce the book might have provided even more interesting reading (our next project may be titled “The Agony and Ecstasy of Academic Collaboration”). We wish to thank Jessica Gribble at Lynne Rienner Publishers for not giving up on us, despite the constant setbacks and delays. We thank the colleagues in our respective academic circles, as well as the professional contacts who supported our efforts by helping us to organize conferences on these topics and providing the necessary grant money. In particular, we thank David Biette and Andrew Selee of the Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholars for their support in hosting our conference in Washington, DC, in March 2010. We are grateful to the following individuals at the University of Guadalajara: Dagoberto Amparo Tello, Arturo Santa Cruz Santana, Roberto Hernández Hernández, Maria Fernanda Rivera Evans, Jorge Gregorio Casillas García, Luisa Fernanda Cervantes Macías, Belén Plasencia Fregoso, and Lorena Salazar Vizcarra. We also thank Raúl Benitez Manuat, Carlos Hernández Herrera, José Luis Calderón Arózqueta, César Olivares, Sigrid Arzt Colunga, Robert Donnelly, and the National Council on Science and Technology in Mexico (CONACYT). We acknowledge Jeffrey Ayres and an anonymous reviewer for their helpful insights and comments, which made this book a much better product. We also thank Craig Deare and Richard Downie at the National Defense University and Steve Kelly at Duke University for their reviews of the manuscript. We appreciate the support of Christie Loredo, Natalie Rowe, and Amanda Lanzillo in editing, translating, and assembling portions of the book. Last but not least, we wish to thank our families, who have stuck with us throughout this project. Without their support and encouragement these past four years, it is likely this book would not have been completed.

1 A Trilateral Security Framework?

On New Year’s Eve 1999, an Algerian Canadian named Ahmed Ressam was arrested while trying to cross from Canada to the United States with explosives. In the aftermath of deconstructing this event, it became clear that Ressam was intent on carrying out a terrorist attack on a US target.1 On September 11, 2001, three related yet separate terrorist attacks on US soil set the course for what would become the largest reorganization of US security bureaucracy in history, which would also have a regional and global security policy impact. In August and September 2005, Hurricanes Katrina and Rita caused widespread devastation along the US Gulf Coast, notably New Orleans and the immediate surrounding area. As US emergency response crews scrambled to bring relief and humanitarian assistance to the Gulf region, they were joined by emergency assistance crews from Canada and Mexico.2 Finally, on Christmas Day 2009, an attempt by an al-Qaeda extremist to down an inbound Detroit flight was foiled by vigilant passengers and crew. The fallout from that attempt has dictated new security measures for regional and global air travel.3 The common thread running through all of the above incidents, other than the fact that they represent some type of security problem, is their impact on regional politics in North America. The attempted smuggling of bombing material by Ressam and the attacks on the twin towers in New York on 9/11 resulted in, among other things, new border policies regulating the flow of goods and people within the North American region. 4 Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, by contrast, showed that regional support in time of disasters could be and 1

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was efficiently dispersed from regional neighbors to provide support and disaster relief. The Christmas Day 2009 attempt to bring down a Detroit-bound airliner on final approach further illustrates how threats that emanate from outside the region can have severe regional consequences. The increased security for inbound US flights caused havoc at airports in Canada and Mexico (these two countries make up over half of all tourist travel to the United States, which includes a large percentage of air travel).5 In short, security threats to the North American region have raised the question of how to best approach security concerns emanating from both outside and within the North American continent. Barry Buzan and Ole Waever, along with David Lake and Patrick Morgan (and a few others), have suggested that an appropriate level for analyzing security interaction is to begin at the regional level.6 The regional level, they argue, may provide a more accurate picture of the security atmosphere since most threats travel over shorter distances and, therefore, insecurities that states feel are frequently a result of the neighborhood. The extension to this security approach, of course, is to consider security threats to the neighborhood as threats to those states (and by extension the citizens of those states) within the neighborhood. In our view regional security has two related, yet conceptually different components: the impact of security threats that emanate within the region; and the impact of those that enter from outside the region. Although conceptually different, logic states that if a threat can move into the region from outside, it can certainly move within the region once established in the neighborhood.7 The integrated nature of the North American marketplace, a result of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), has substantially increased the amount of cross-border interaction between member countries, facilitating not only the transborder movement of legitimate goods, people, and services, but also those goods, people, and services that could be considered illegitimate and security threats.8 We speak here, of course, about such things as drugs, terrorists, weapons, organized crime, pandemics, and natural disasters, to name a few. The idea that Canada, the United States, and Mexico should enter into some type of regional security agreement has received increasing attention in the past decade for a number of reasons. Certainly, the events of 9/11 had some security commentators, especially those in the United States, suggesting the need for some type of

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perimeter security framework, designed essentially to secure the approaches to the North American continent.9 Critics of this approach suggested this was simply a way for the United States to extend its influence and push its borders beyond its geographic limits.10 More recently, violence from the Mexican drug wars has, in limited degrees, found its way north, spilling over the US-Mexico border into US border communities and, some suggest, into Canadian cities as well.11 The idea of a regional security agreement has not gone without political action. In March 2005, President George W. Bush, Prime Minister Paul Martin, and President Vicente Fox announced the establishment of the North American Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP). Although no longer in existence, the SPP did attempt to establish a framework for trilateral security cooperation in North America. The events of 9/11, drug violence, and the SPP aside, the idea that North America should form or does form some type of security complex has received only limited analysis. What does exist has largely focused on tactical and strategic arguments for structuring a regional security arrangement. These analyses have, in many cases, argued why or why not a regional security arrangement is critical to homeland security. Less prevalent, but still evident, have been the few arguments as to the viability of a regional security complex.12 Absent from much of these analyses is a defined starting point to explain what matters in a regional security arrangement. The purpose of this book is to examine what is essential to the establishment of a regional security complex. Our argument is that regional security complexes will either stand or fall based on the existence of certain variables. Our purpose, therefore, is to identify those variables, or to highlight what matters in the establishment and maintenance of regional security complexes. We employ this argument in the case of a North American security complex, encompassing Canada, the United States, and Mexico; apply those variables to this specific case; and make some suggestions as to the viability and direction of a North American security complex. In this book, we look at the evolution from bilateral security relations prior to 9/11 to the unilateral approach on the new perimeter and security relations in North America to the creation of a trilateral regional security framework involving the United States, Canada, and Mexico. We further examine threat perspectives during the evolution of several historical events such as World War II, the Cold

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War, the Global War on Terror, and, most recently, natural disasters and transnational organized crime. The thesis we offer is that, while security relationships between the three countries have appeared to suggest the existence of a North American security complex, there remain significant obstacles, derived from different threat perceptions based on identities, institutions, and interests that will impede further integration and cooperation. Chapter 2 provides a theoretical overview of approaches to regional security analysis: Lake and Morgan’s regional orders approach and Buzan and Waever’s regional security complex theory (RSCT). Although we briefly examine both approaches, the emphasis is on the latter of the two as our central theoretical framework. In this chapter, we define what is meant by security and region. We also expand on the argument as to why a regional security approach and, specifically, regional security complex theory are useful tools for analyzing the North American region. We provide additional details regarding regional security complex theory, specifically with the purpose of understanding how to operationalize the theory. Finally, we introduce readers to a blended analytical approach that incorporates different theoretical lenses within the identity-institutions-interests (I-I-I)13 framework as a key analytical intersection with regional security complex theory.14 Chapter 3 provides a contextual overview of the United States, Canada, and Mexico and the development of security relationships in North America through a historical lens. In this chapter, we briefly examine the key historical events that have impacted their interactions and the conflicts that have been shaped by each nation’s unique identity, interests, and institutions, which have contributed to insecurities as well as cooperation. Interaction between these countries before and after World War II provides an important understanding of how the concept of perimeter defense, which was developed at the time, has come back into vogue in light of the post-9/11 security environment. In Chapter 4, we look at the concepts of convergence and divergence of regional security cooperation in North America in light of events since the end of World War II and the focus on broader hemispheric security initiatives such as the Summit of the Americas and the Defense Ministerial of the Americas. However, the key event that came to identify the concept of regional cooperation was not based on security but rather economics. The formation of NAFTA in 1994 placed

A Trilateral Security Framework?

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Canada, Mexico, and the United States in a new trade union relationship that was to have broader security dimensions as each nation now had increased connectivity and vulnerability, although the institutional processes of NAFTA left many of the security interests unresolved. Chapter 5 deals with the security environment produced by the terrorist attacks of 9/11 and how these significantly altered relations between Mexico, Canada, and the United States as each nation began to respond to the new global threat to their identities, institutions, and interests. In order to prevent another attack on the homeland, the US government aimed to strengthen its defenses through domestic and foreign policy initiatives that redefine security relationships in North America. Regionally, the idea was to expand on preexisting security structures to form a new defense perimeter, with the newly created US institutions—such as US Northern Command (USNORTHCOM) and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS)—in the epicenter, serving as the backbone to the overreaching security complex. However, in light of the ensuing US-led Global War on Terror, Canada and Mexico did not see eye-to-eye with the United States in sharing the same threat perception and thus found themselves at odds over security policies. The focus on terrorism and defining the nature of the threat also produced significant internal debates within Canada and Mexico, in particular on what an appropriate national security strategy should be in order to determine each nation’s identity in the new regional security complex. In Chapter 6, we look at the nature of the trilateral relationship subsequent to the US invasion of Iraq and attempts made by the George W. Bush administration to create new instruments for security cooperation in North America through the Security and Prosperity Partnership. Ironically, the efforts of the leaders of the three powerful nations were not as influential as those of Mother Nature in her destructiveness as Hurricanes Katrina and Rita wreaked havoc in the Gulf Coast region. The new threat of a catastrophic natural disaster exposed considerable vulnerabilities, both economically and physically, as threats to security took on an “all hazards” perspective for all three countries. To add to these developments, the rise of transnational criminal gangs and drug trafficking took on new levels of violence and concern for the three countries as new security policies took shape under the Mérida Initiative and other mechanisms. In Chapter 7, we provide an analysis of how, despite the appearance of increased cooperation and shared threat perceptions, there

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still remain a number of contradictions and tensions in regional security issues that challenge the notion of whether new institutions could foster shared interests and overcome individual national identity in creating a regional security complex in North America. In this chapter, we further explore some of the traditional problems associated with borders between states and how new threats, such as transnational regional crime networks, challenge the state’s ability to provide both internal and external security against threats that do not recognize the borders, sovereignty, or even legitimacy of state actors. In Chapter 8, we look to the future and whether security cooperation in North America will converge or diverge given the significant challenges ahead as all three states face unique domestic political issues and upcoming electoral changes. We examine the nature of defining security cultures in North America, which can create cooperative institutions, share interests, and respect identity, in the context of a trilateral relationship. We conclude the chapter where this study starts—by reexamining the concept of regional security complex theory and its applicability to the contemporary security challenges that states face in forming policy outcomes to deal with real threats. Despite each of us coming into this project with our own unique national identities, shaped by our individual academic studies and our professional experiences working in the security communities we examine here, we have attempted to do our best to remain objective in our analysis. We do not pretend to have solved the problems that have inhibited increased security cooperation between Canada, Mexico, and the United States. However, we do believe that, by conducting this study through our collective lenses, we have been able to shed some unique insights into the challenges that our three countries face collectively in forging a new security relationship in the years to come.

Notes 1. For more details of Ressam’s plan as well as links to al-Qaeda, see Hall Bernton, Mike Carter, David Heath, and James Neff, “The Terrorist Within,” Seattle Times, June 23–July 7, 2002, http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/news /nation-world/terroristwithin/, accessed January 12, 2010. 2. This was the first time that the Mexican military had been on US soil since 1846. As part of the relief effort, the Mexican military provided water

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treatment plants and mobile kitchens. See “Mexican Troops Aid Katrina Efforts,” Fox News, September 8, 2005, www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933 ,168778,00.html, accessed January 12, 2010. 3. Increased security checks for US-bound flights resulted in wait times in excess of three hours, delays, and cancellations. See Laura Stone, “Delays, Cancellations Continue at Canadian Airports,” National Post, December 28, 2009, www.nationalpost.com/m/story.html?id=2385834, accessed January 12, 2010. 4. The Smart Border Accord—one signed between Mexico and the United States and one between Canada and the United States—is the best example of the larger change in border policies within the region. See Veronica Kitchen, “Smarter Cooperation in Canada-US Relations,” International Journal 59 (2003–2004): 693–710; Peter Andreas, “Politics on the Edge: Managing the US-Mexico Border,” Current History (February 2006): 64–68. 5. International Trade Administration Monthly Tourism statistics, 2010, http://tinet.ita.doc.gov/view/m-2010-I-001/table1.html, accessed July 11, 2011. While overall outbound flights from the United States were down 11 percent in total and down in every region of the world, air traffic actually increased by 6–8 percent to Mexico and Canada; http://tinet.ita.doc.gov /tinews/archive/tinews2011/20110630_US_Intrenational_Outbound.html, June 30, 2011. 6. Barry Buzan and Ole Waever, Regions and Powers: The Structure of International Security (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004); David Lake and Patrick Morgan, ed., Regional Orders: Building Security in a New World (University Park: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997). 7. This was certainly the case in early January 2010 with regard to an estimated twenty Yemeni-trained al-Qaeda terrorists who, according to Canadian intelligence officials, were trying to gain access to North America by entering through Canada. The intelligence reports suggested that their target was not Canada but ultimately the United States. See “Security Warnings Prompted Airline Security Alert: Baird,” CTV News, January 12, 2010, http://toronto.ctv.ca /servlet/an/local/CTVNews/20100112/airport_security_100112/20100112?hub =TorontoNewHome, accessed January 14, 2010. 8. Lee Hudson Teslik, “NAFTA’s Economic Impact,” Council on Foreign Relations, July 7, 2009, www.cfr.org/economics/naftas-economicimpact/p15790, accessed July 11, 2010; Clyde Gary Hufbauer and Jeffrey J. Schott, NAFTA Revisited: Achievements and Challenges (Washington, DC: Pearson Institute for International Economics, 2005). 9. Richard J. Kilroy, Jr., Abelardo Rodríguez, and Todd Hataley, “Toward a New Trilateral Strategic Security Relationship: United States, Canada, and Mexico,” Journal of Strategic Security 3, no. 2 (February 2010): 51–63. 10. See Laura Carlson, “Armoring NAFTA: The Battleground for Mexico’s Future,” North American Congress on Latin America, August 27, 2008, https://nacla.org/node/4958, accessed July 11, 2011.

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11. Carol Cratty, “Mexican Drug Cartels Extend Reach into US,” CNN, March 26, 2010, http://articles.cnn.com/2010-03-26/us/drug.trends_1_drug -cartels-mexican-border-drug-violence?_s=PM:US, accessed July 11, 2011. 12. Rafael Fernandez de Castro makes the case that Mexico, in particular, should see the value in supporting US needs for regional security and a security perimeter in North America. “NAFTA at 10: Progress, Potential, and Precedents” (Washington, DC: Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, December 9–10, 2002), 11, www.wilsoncenter.org/article/nafta -10-progress-potential-and-precedents. 13. Lewis Griffith and David Hamm, Drivers of Political Behavior (Montgomery, AL: Air University Press, 2006). 14. Buzan and Waever, Regions and Powers.

2 Understanding Regional Security

The end of the Cold War brought an end to the bipolar era. For scholars of international relations, and subfields such as peace and security studies, this marked a period of change for theorizing and understanding the security dynamics of the international community. The explanatory power of the systems and state-level approaches that dominated international relations theory was increasingly challenged in the post–Cold War world, as new approaches to understanding the global security dynamic gained more traction among scholars. In the absence of a bipolar world, academics began to emphasize the explanatory power of other variables such as culture1 and social understanding.2 At the same time security threats previously defined by superpower conflict and global nuclear war rapidly became more localized, including such things as failed states, intrastate conflict, and regional conflicts. Whereas the issues of war and peace had previously defined the field of international security, asymmetrical and nontraditional threats such as terrorism and transnational criminal activity have gained a foothold in the field. 3 Certainly in the West, the post–September 11 period placed further emphasis on regional and local security as the United States, Canada, and Mexico as well as a host of other countries put greater emphasis on homeland security, by tightening up their respective boundaries,4 adding more resources to local security actors, and by “fighting the away game” in order to keep the homeland secure. The idea that regions may be important policy drivers for states is nothing new. The old axiom of “good fences make good neigh9

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bors” speaks to the importance of keeping a watchful, if not defensive, eye on other members of the neighborhood. In the past twentyfive years, however, the end of the Cold War and the deepening regional integration in various parts of the globe have seriously challenged the accuracy of systems and state-level analysis. The rise of the European Union (EU) and the Common Market of the South (Mercosur) are examples of regional trading blocs that have expanded beyond simply shared economic concerns to broader regional issues, including shared conceptions of security. Barry Buzan and Ole Waever5 and David Lake and Patrick M. Morgan6 have proposed less conventional approaches to security analysis. They have suggested that an alternative level of analysis exists at the regional level. The authors noted above suggest theoretical approaches for understanding and analyzing regional dynamics. Buzan and Waever’s regional security complex theory concentrates its focus on security considerations that drive the development of what they call regional security complexes. Lake and Morgan’s approach, by contrast, considers security to be simply one of the important variables that drives the development of regional clusters, but certainly not the only one. Both approaches are instructive on understanding contemporary regional concerns. This chapter borrows from both in developing what we consider to be a critical approach for understanding a North American regional security complex, as theorized by Buzan, or whether a new model is needed to understand emerging security threats. First, we briefly introduce readers who may not be familiar with conceptual approaches to regional security to two existing approaches: Lake and Morgan’s regional orders approach and Buzan and Waever’s RSCT. Our emphasis, however, is on the latter of the two. We also clearly define what is meant by security and region. Next, we expand on the argument as to why a regional security approach and specifically RSCT are useful tools for analyzing the North American region. Then, we examine RSCT in more detail, specifically with the purpose of understanding how to operationalize the theory. More specifically, we introduce readers to a blended analytical approach that incorporates different theoretical lenses within a framework known as identity-institutions-interests (I-I-I). 7 Finally, we identify the critical questions that this book is attempting to answer through our analysis of North American regional security and the corresponding RSCT.

Understanding Regional Security

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Defining Security

In this book, we use a regional security framework and the accompanying RSCT to examine North America and the concept of perimeter defense.8 When we speak about North America as a regional security complex, we mean specifically the countries of Canada, the United States, and Mexico.9 Since we are primarily concerned with regions and security, it is incumbent that these are adequately defined. Moreover, since we are primarily concerned with regional security, it makes sense that the term region should be defined in that context. More importantly, if one were to try and define the term without some qualifier, it would be largely a futile task.10 Buzan and Waever define a regional security complex as “a set of units whose major processes of securitization, desecuritization, or both are so interlinked that their security problems cannot reasonably be analyzed or resolved apart from one another.”11 The two central terms in this definition are the terms security and securitization. Alex J. Bellamy defines security as a discourse that is used to identify and justify solutions to various problems.12 Inherent in this definition of security are certain norms, values, interests, and identities that have a determining effect on what is understood, or not, as a security issue. Bellamy’s definition of security is composed of four primary components: identify who or what is going to be secured; authoritatively identify the threat; identify the most effective agent for dealing with the threat; and determine the appropriate action for dealing with the threat.13 There are two critical components that make this definition of security important for this study. First, Bellamy does not center or rely on the state as the definer of security.14 Whereas more traditional definitions consider security in the context of the state, which makes the state not only the focus of security but also the agent that defines what security means (this is especially true in traditional realist approaches), Bellamy’s definition opens up the possibility for a much wider definition of security as well as the possibility that security can be defined by regions and regional actors such as multilateral organizations. This poses a challenge to the claim made by Buzan and Waever that regions do not have actor quality. 15 In making the claim that regions cannot have an actor quality, they admit that the EU may be an exception to this. Indeed, a definition incorporating Bellamy’s approach would offer some explanatory

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power for this problem. Defining security in this manner provides for an outlet, thus allowing regions to have an agent quality and to define security in the context of regional considerations. Secondly, this definition of security suggests that security is a social construct; threats are identified, plans are made, and action takes place. What is important here is the issue of identification. Identifying threats is based on a set of values or norms, which have traditionally been defined by the state, but need not necessarily be so. As Alexander Wendt has so skillfully articulated, structure is dynamic and change occurs when actors, responding to a stimulus (broadly defined as the social collective) redefine their reality.16 This definition of security, therefore, further allows for the development or evolution of regional security complexes based on changing security considerations. This dynamic process has two effects. Regional security complexes are temporally bound. In other words, a security complex will change over time. And those issues that become securitized can also change over time.17 The other important consideration that needs to be given to security as a social construct is that security will vary between groups, frequently (although not exclusively) defined within a set of cultural, political, or social understandings. The issue of undocumented immigration along the US-Mexico border is useful as an example. Undocumented immigration along the US-Mexico border has been a political issue at the state and the federal level in the United States. At the root of the issue is a sense among the public that undocumented immigrants represent a threat to the stability of their communities, from a public safety and an economic point of view. At the same time, undocumented immigrants making the trip across the US-Mexico border do so in an effort to secure better economic opportunities and to escape the poverty and associated dangers in their own respective homelands. The point is that security is, at the least, a two-way street, where security needs to be defined within a context of not only what is being securitized but also who is securitizing. Security, therefore, has a number of important attributes that are critical to understanding regional security complexes and how they develop and change. First, the state does not hold a monopoly on defining security. We admit that the state most frequently takes action on security issues, but those issues may be defined and articulated in any number of forums. For this reason, the state can shift its primary security concerns from global nuclear war, to international terrorism, to transnational organized crime, to global warming, all as a response

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to the social collective that not only defines or politicizes security issues but also defines the state. Moreover, security issues do not need to be homogeneous between states within a security complex. In other words, because those issues that become politicized to the degree of becoming securitized are socially constructed, they need not be the same between states. For example, drug violence spilling across the southwest border of the United States represents a real security threat for US citizens, particularly those living in that specific region. On the other hand, Mexican citizens living on the other side of the border are concerned about the violence facilitated by weapons that enter from the United States. Second, regions can have an actor quality. By integrating security interests, developing regional security institutions, and shifting identities from a state- to a regionally based identity, regions or regional actors can securitize issues.

Security and Sector Analysis

With an expanded understanding of the term security, those sectors that can be incorporated within security analysis increase significantly. Although this provides, in our view, a fuller and more accurate image, it creates the problem of trying to understand an entire security picture that is determined or composed by input from any number of sectors. In earlier work, Barry Buzan, Ole Waever, and Jaap de Wilde proposed an approach to security analysis that broke down the whole into separate sectors for the ease of analysis.18 Buzan, Waever, and de Wilde suggest five sectors that could be used for security analysis: the military sector; the environmental sector; the economic sector; the societal sector; and the political sector. The value of a sector approach to security analysis, according to those authors, is that it creates more manageable portions. At the same time, they point out that what is broken down into components must be reassembled in order to build an accurate security picture. Briefly, here is how the different sectors are defined by Buzan, Waever, and de Wilde and how we propose to incorporate each of those sectors in our regional security complex analysis using the I-I-I approach. Military Sector

For Buzan, Waever, and de Wilde the military sector is defined in terms of the capacity of governments to “maintain themselves against

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internal and external military threats, but can also involve the use of military power to defend states or governments against nonmilitary threats.”19 In our view, maintaining the legitimacy of the state is not the sole responsibility of the military. We prefer to think of the military sector in terms of public security, where the military becomes one component of a larger security picture. In many democratic states, Canada being an example, the military does not have a domestic mandate outside of disaster relief and assistance to civilian power. The role of the military is restricted not only by institutional arrangements but also by a tacit cultural understanding of what role the military plays within a democratic society. Maintaining a secure and stable domestic society is largely the responsibility of policing agencies. Similarly, in the United States, the domestic role of the military is restricted. In the United States, there is a long history of public aversion to the domestic use of the military. Title 10 of the US Code has been interpreted in various judicial rulings to prohibit the military from being used for domestic law enforcement roles. The Posse Comitatus Act of 1878 further upheld these domestic law enforcement restrictions on the active duty US military. The National Guard, however, being under the authority of the state, has been used routinely for dealing with domestic disturbances.20 In contrast, the Mexican military has primarily had an internal security role, focusing on threats to the state by internal actors. These different roles, institutional and cultural, of militaries (or any security agency) within different states raises some interesting questions with regard to regional security complexes and the capacity of militaries to cooperate on a regional level. Here the I-I-I approach is instructive because it allows the security analyst to draw comparisons across multiple theoretical frames, creating a picture of the role of the military within each country in terms of interests (power), institutional arrangements (formalized rules and expectations), and identity (culture). The value is being able to compare and analyze the military sector on multiple levels between states, and to draw conclusions on the capacity for greater regional integration in the military sector based on these comparisons. Environmental Sector

In the context of a North American regional security complex, the environment, as a security sector, plays an important role. Buzan,

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Waever, and de Wilde suggest that environmental security is largely a systems-level issue such that most environmental issues are looked at on a global scale.21 Certainly issues of global resource depletion and climate change fit with that description, as they also do within the regional context. More importantly, however, within the North American context environmental issues are part of the regional political agenda and, if not related directly to the security agenda, they do represent an area of shared interests and regional institution building. For example, a brief examination of the border between Canada and the United States and the border between the United States and Mexico illustrates the importance of shared watersheds and shared water resources. For Canada and the United States, this shared resource along the border has long been managed by an institutionalized agreement called the International Boundary Waters Treaty Act signed in 1909.22 The agreement created the International Joint Commission and guidelines and rules for managing the shared resource. In the contemporary context, environmental security has taken on new importance with the increased trade in agricultural products and the development of biosecurity programs. Biosecurity-related issues have been forefront on the political agenda in the past decade, prompted by global outbreaks of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), avian influenza (bird flu), and, most recently, H1N1 (swine flu). All of these events can be examined on the global level but given regional trade patterns, especially in a region such as North America that is dominated by a regional trade agreement, examining these issues on a regional level would be the most accurate approach. Economic Sector

For many states, economic security and physical security cannot be separated. Certainly, some realist scholars make the claim that without an economic capacity there can be no military capacity.23 In a more liberal context, a strong economy is essential for the state to provide public goods, which include such things as public safety. Economic security has traditionally been based in the liberal principles of a regulated international trade regime. A more recent development has been the creation of regional trading blocs, in places such as Europe, North and South America, and Southeast Asia. These large institutionalized trade arrangements highlight important considerations in the regional security framework.

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Regional economic arrangements, such as NAFTA, create a greater interdependence between states, by partially regulating markets through institutional arrangements. When entering into trade agreements, states also frequently enter into an agreement for conflict resolution in the event of trade disputes. These arrangements become rules for resolving conflict, with an understanding that arbitration is undertaken in the interest of the regional arrangement and not the interest of the individual state. Certainly in any conflict there will be a winner and a loser, but those positions become acceptable within the context of adhering to the agreement in fairness to all participants. Self-interest, or the interest of the state, is put aside in the interest of the regional arrangement. Regional economic arrangements can also be seen as a source of insecurity. Opening state borders to increased trade with neighboring states sets the stage for the growth of transnational criminal activity. As more goods, services, and people cross the international boundaries, the potential for weapons, drugs, criminals, and terrorists to cross as part of that flow equally increases. The result is that trading partners within the regional trade zone become a threat. This is certainly the case with US claims about terrorists entering the country across the US-Canada border, Mexican concerns about US weapons fueling the bloodshed associated with the drug cartels, and the US concerns about drugs and undocumented migrants flowing across the US-Mexico border. The economic sector is actually a two-sided coin. On the one hand, regional economic agreements produce institutionalized arrangements for conflict resolution that, when adhered to, provide a framework for resolving economic disputes. On the other hand, trade liberalization also opens the borders of each respective state to transnational threats, making partner countries a source of insecurity. Societal Sector

According to Buzan, Waever, and de Wilde the societal sector is about identity on a substate level.24 This idea plays out on a regional level in the form of identity-based politics having a regional security impact. Security arises out of identity-based politics when specific groups within a society feel threatened, by unfair treatment or even fears about their continued existence. The actions of these threatened groups can play out on a state, regional, or international level. Secu-

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rity threats can develop from the sharing of ideas, regional alliances, and violent and nonviolent cross-border activity. In North America, there is a continuing history of identity politics having regional security impacts. Perhaps this was most evident in the state of California, where in 1994 Proposition 187 sought to limit access to public health care, education, and other public services to undocumented migrants. The War on Terror has given rise to new issues of security and identity politics. Some diaspora communities, living within the North American region, have conspired to provide resource support, most frequently in the form of money but also as material aid, to known terrorist organizations. Terror cells are also known to operate across borders, with members living throughout the region or planning operations in one state to be carried out in a neighboring state. Political Sector

The political sector, according to Buzan, Waever, and de Wilde, is framed by threats against the organizational stability of the state. 25 In objective terms, the political sector is defined by threats to the legitimacy of the state, either through internal or external actions. Threats to the legitimacy of the state can come from such groups as tribes, minorities, or clans; transnational organizations such as businesses or social movements; or emerging regional governance structures. In a regional context, if any organization threatens the legitimacy of a governing partner, the issue de facto becomes regional. In the North American context, the challenge being made by drug cartels in Mexico to the ruling government provides a clear illustration. In parts of Mexico, the drug cartels have the capacity to challenge the functioning government by providing some public goods that have traditionally been provided by the government. This challenge to the Mexican government has a regional aspect, in that the legitimate government is becoming less capable of containing this threat within its own borders. As a result, the impacts of the cartels in social costs and violence can also be felt in the United States and Canada. Similarly, in Canada the French Canadian sovereignty movement has challenged the legitimacy of federal government powers in the province of Quebec. Although the Quebec separatist movement has been largely peaceful in the past thirty-five years, the potential for political violence that could have a spillover effect into the region does exist.

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Sectored Approach

The choice of a sectored approach to analyzing security was developed by Buzan, Waever, and de Wilde in order to better comprehend how and why certain things become securitized while others do not.26 At the state level, the interplay of the securitization process is generally restricted to state actors. Things become securitized because of actors operating within the state. In the regional context, however, a new dynamic is introduced: the interaction between a restricted number of states (neighbors). The regional securitization dynamic is no longer restricted to an intrastate process, but is now also influenced by an interstate process. Although the inter- and intrastate securitization processes share much in common, the interstate (or regional) approach does not share the homogeneity of the intrastate approach, which therefore introduces a whole new dynamic of identity, institutions, and interests that must be incorporated into a regional security analysis. We concur with Buzan, Waever, and de Wilde that the use of sectors for security analysis simplifies the job of the analyst. We propose that the five sectors suggested by Buzan will be incorporated in our analysis using the I-I-I framework. The value of using sectors in a regional security analysis is that it has the added benefit of providing a baseline starting point for analysis that does not privilege the security perspective of one state over another. In regional security analysis, part of the problem is determining a starting point. What is an important security issue for one state may not be for another state. In other words, although the military sector may dominate the US security picture, the Canadian security picture is determined by the economic sector and the Mexican picture is framed largely by the political sector. The sectored approach, as arbitrary as it may appear, creates a point of departure and an organizational framework, which as a whole creates a fuller security picture.

Regional Security Complexes

The discussion on security aside still leaves us with the task of clarifying the attributes of a regional security complex. This is an important task since the status of Canada, the United States, and Mexico as a regional security complex is one of the questions that we are try-

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ing to answer in this book. As noted above, regional security complexes are broadly defined as “a set of units whose major processes of securitization, desecuritization or both are so interlinked that their security problems cannot reasonably be analyzed or resolved apart from one another.”27 In general terms this provides a starting point for understanding what a regional security complex is; however, it does not articulate the nature of security threats, the structure of a regional security complex, the roles and relationships of member states, or how security complexes develop and change. There are two issues at play with regard to the nature of security threats. First, a regional security complex can in fact be defined by threats internal to the region. This is the argument that is made by Buzan and Waever.28 Threats travel most easily over short distances and, therefore, regionally based clusters are the most accurate way to frame security analysis. In other words, the insecurity that is felt by a state actor is the result of regional relationships. The traditional security dilemma (excluding nuclear or ballistic missile threats) would be an example of insecurities at the state level caused by regional tensions. Tuva Kahrs argues that the region of Northeast Asia, specifically the region encompassing the People’s Republic of China and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, is such an example where the concerns internal to the region require the action of those states sharing the region.29 The second issue at play is that a regional security complex can also be defined by threats external to the region. In this instance, threats emanate from outside the region and are defined as security threats to all the actors within that region. Solutions to security problems are found through collective action of all the partners involved. When we say collective action, this by no means suggests equal or shared action but rather simply that all the actors have agreed, tacitly or otherwise, to a particular regional response to a security issue. The structure of regional security complexes is a point of debate between Buzan and Waever and Lake and Morgan. There are two important distinctions on this point. First, Lake and Morgan argue that the definition of regional security complexes needs to include the possibility that members are not located within the regional cluster of states.30 This, they argue, accounts for the role of superpowers in regions not in geographic proximity, but still within the sphere of influence and interest. In the case of the United States, for example, which has global interest and global reach, membership in regional security

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complexes outside of North America seems reasonable. Buzan and Waever do not so much disagree with Lake and Morgan, but rather define this relationship in different terms. For Buzan and Waever, superpowers can influence regional security complexes of which they are not members through a concept they refer to as “penetration.” They maintain that penetration occurs when outside powers make alliances or provide security assistance to states within a regional security complex.31 Although this should not be an issue when examining the North American regional security complex, it does allow for and explain US membership and influence in other regional security complexes. The second issue with reference to structure is whether or not membership in a regional security complex is exclusive. We tend to favor the position of Lake and Morgan, who maintain that regional security complexes are not exclusive. 32 Buzan and Waever, by contrast, argue that regions are clearly delineated.33 Our reasoning for favoring Lake and Morgan’s position goes back to the definition of security above, which argues that security and the process of securitization are social constructs that will have different meanings to different social collectives. What states or other collectives choose to securitize will determine the cluster of states or regions to which the problem applies. The spillover effect of drug violence in the southwest US border region has little or no impact on Canada but, rather, does extend the regional security complex to include South American drug production zones, overland smuggling routes through Central America, and even coastal smuggling routes through the Caribbean. The definition of regional security complexes provided by Buzan and Waever is also silent on the issue of the relationship between actors within the complex. In their defense, Buzan and Waever maintain that their approach is constructed around security and it is incumbent on the analyst to understand the respective actors’ responses within the complex.34 That said, however, security is very much a social construct. The issue with this approach is that it rests on a number of assumptions about the nature of security. First, it takes for granted that an issue that has been securitized in one member state will also be securitized in other member states. This plays out in two ways: externally and internally. The issue of Cuba may be instructive in this instance. Within the North American regional security complex, both Canada and Mexico have trade and diplomatic relations with Cuba. By contrast, for the United States, Cuba has traditionally been considered a security problem (albeit one that is heavily influ-

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enced by a strong domestic Cuban American constituency). This example, however minor, speaks to the issue of securitization within a regional context, in that external threats to one member state may be seen as economic partners in another member state. A similar case can be made for security issues internally. Whereas undocumented immigration along the US southwest border may be securitized within the United States (and it certainly has been, given that it was raised as an election issue), it is not similarly viewed in Mexico.35 The assumption that member states are willing to construct their problems first as security issues and second in the context of regionalism, articulate their security problems in regional terms, and seek solutions through regional action is somewhat problematic, especially when we consider the anarchic nature of the state system. No baseline exists for determining the existence or not of a security issue, particularly between clusters of states. In order for a security issue to be salient within a region of states, each with their own respective security lens, there needs to be a regional driver. The regional driver, which can best be ascertained through analysis of specific regional security complexes, could be as simple as a common understanding of security, a formalized regional institution defining security for member states, common security interests, or a hegemonic state that controls the security discourse. In summary, Buzan and Waever maintain that a number of conditions must be met in order for a group of states or other entities to form a regional security complex.36 Fundamentally, they claim that a regional security complex exists where a group of states possesses “a degree of security independence sufficient both to establish them as a linked set and to differentiate them from surrounding security regions.”37 They go on to claim that a regional security complex must possess four distinct variables: 1. A boundary dividing regional neighbors. 2. Anarchic structure of two or more autonomous units. 3. Polarity defining the distribution of power among units. 4. A socially constructed understanding of amity and enmity among the units.38 We concur with Buzan and Waever insofar as these variables allow security analysts to clearly define regions, providing a starting point for a regional security analysis. We are less convinced, how-

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ever, in the static nature of regional security complexes, and suggest that these complexes are far more fluid than RSCT allows. In this sense, the boundaries of regional security complexes are formed not only by geography and ideas, but also by interests and institutions.

Why a Regional Security Approach?

In this section, we describe the logic for and benefits of using a regional approach to understanding and analyzing contemporary security issues. More specifically, we explain why a regional security complex lens is a useful tool for analyzing the North American region. The study of regions has taken on a larger profile in the post–Cold War period. Lake and Morgan provide four reasons as to why the study of security in a regional context is more significant than in the past. 1. Regions are now more important features of international relations. The end of superpower rivalry has also signaled a decrease in the interest of the last remaining superpower to become involved in regional conflict. Although the United States maintains the capacity to be involved on a global stage, the political will and geostrategic importance for doing so has declined. As a result, regional conflicts increasingly evolve along their own paths, free of superpower influence, making the study of security in a regional context more significant. 2. The end of the Cold War, and the subsequent decrease in superpower influence throughout a number of regions around the globe, created the capacity and responsibility for these regions to develop their own regional character free of superpower influence. 3. Regions behave differently than the international system; thus, new approaches and new theories are necessary to fully understand regional security dynamics. 4. Regions provide a new dynamic for great powers and, therefore, traditional foreign policy approaches to regional conflicts may no longer be appropriate. Great-power foreign policy must be designed to suit the region.39 Buzan and Waever make the argument that studying security at the regional level provides the most useful level of analysis for

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understanding conflict and security. At the most basic level, they argue that security threats travel more easily over shorter distances than longer distances and, as a result, security interdependence is normally patterned in regionally based clusters. In addition, they maintain that, at the state level, the analysis of security issues is relatively meaningless. They posit that, since security is largely a relational term, the security of an individual state can be understood only in the context of other actor(s), generally another state. In other words, “it takes two to fight.” They also suggest that, at the global level, analyzing security is too vast for most states, with the exception of superpowers that have the capacity to act on a global scale. Therefore, the subsystem level (or regional level) offers a more realistic and accurate approach toward analyzing security.40 The North American security region presents a number of issues that challenge some of the general claims made by both Buzan and Waever and Lake and Morgan. First, North America is the only security region that is dominated by the last remaining superpower. This, of course, has serious implications for understanding the dynamic of regional security. It may be true that the end of the Cold War witnessed the demise of superpower rivalry and influence in various regions around the globe but, given the fact that North America is home to the last remaining superpower, its influence (if not hegemonic position) is a given. Second, contrary to the idea that regions are now able to develop free of superpower influence, we argue this is not an accurate depiction of the North American security region. We suggest that the focus on homeland security in the post-9/11 United States has resulted in a greater effort on the part of the United States to control the regional security agenda than ever before. That said, given the long history of cooperation in matters of defense, security, and economics between Canada and the United States, the relationship between the two countries does not fit into traditional models of power relationships.41 At the same time, however, the idea of a North American security complex is driven largely by US territorial concerns and the belief that threats, such as terrorists or criminal organizations, could emanate from other countries within the security region and threaten US territory. Therefore those countries need to be incorporated within a US security umbrella. Moreover, the fact that the United States has the capacity to act on a global scale plays into the security considerations of other members within the security region. Nowhere was this more evident than during the Iraq War, when

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Canada was told by the United States that, if it did not participate in the military coalition in Iraq, Canada and Canadian businesses would be shut out of any rebuilding contracts offered by the US government once the rebuilding process began.42 In the case of the North American security region, it seems unlikely, if not impossible, to have a region isolated from the global interests of the United States. In short, the purpose of the regional security complex is to provide a more accurate method of examining security dynamics in the international community. As means of measuring and describing regional security, Buzan and Waever developed a theoretical approach to studying regional security using RSCT.43 Thus, unlike the global scale, which is far too large and complex to accurately measure security interactions, Buzan and Waever suggest that the regional level can be analyzed to the degree that it allows for some predictive capacity. In other words, the subsystem approach is large enough to give meaning to state security actions while, at the same time, small enough to isolate and measure identifiable variables, with results significant enough to have a predictive capacity for regional security.

Operationalizing Regional Security Complex Theory

Buzan and Waever operationalize RSCT first through identification of regions of security interdependence.44 These regions are defined by their close proximity to one another and by the existence of security interdependence that is more intense than with surrounding regions. We find this approach to approximating or constructing regional security complexes somewhat subjective, especially when put in the context that regional security complexes are considered by Buzan and Waever to be mutually exclusive and without overlap. In addition to the idea of intense security interdependence, other important factors of RSCT include the presence of borders, an anarchic structure, a system of polarity among member states, and a pattern of amity and enmity. In the approach to understanding regional security complexes, the dependent variable (security regions) is reliant on the independent variables (boundaries, anarchy, polarity, and patterns of amity and enmity). Briefly, we will look at each of these independent variables and appraise the possible impacts each could have on the analysis of a regional security complex. Following this, we will suggest an alternative framework for examining regional security complexes, building on the process set out by Buzan and Waever.

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Boundaries

The term boundaries for Buzan and Waever does not mean the boundary of the state, although that does play into the overall understanding. In RSCT, a boundary differentiates the regional security complex from neighboring states and other security complexes. For states, boundaries are legally defined entities that delineate the territorial limits of the state and its legitimate political control. In RSCT boundaries are much more arbitrary, determined largely by regional security relationships. In this sense it seems that boundaries must have a fluid context, given that the security concerns of the state change. It can be generally agreed that Canada’s regional security interests are dominated largely by its relationship with the United States. At the same time, however, Canada is a circumpolar nation, bordering in the north on Russia and a number of Scandinavian nations. In recent years, challenges to the Canadian claim of territorial sovereignty over the north have come from other circumpolar nations.45 In this example, it could be argued that the regional security complex to which Canada belongs is composed of polar nations and not the traditional focus to the south. Indeed, the absence of security concerns between Canada and the United States might well detract from defining Canada as part of a North American security complex.46 We argue that boundaries are a very useful tool for delineating or identifying a physical region known as a regional security complex. To state the obvious, in the absence of regional boundaries, security analysis takes place on a global level. We also maintain, however, that regional boundaries are dynamic and frequently vary according to the security issue and the actor(s) involved in defining security. This last point, who defines security, is critical and we will return to it in the subsection on polarity. Anarchy

For Buzan and Waever, anarchy simply means that any regional security complex is composed of at least two autonomous units. 47 As stated earlier, analyzing security outside of at least two actors is relatively meaningless since security is a relational process. For Buzan and Waever, autonomous units mean states. Certainly, in the traditional realist sense, it is states that make up the anarchic structure of the global community. We, however, favor a more inclusive arrangement. We agree that states are the final arbiter when it comes to security-

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related issues, especially the use of violence. However, state action is frequently moderated by the existence of other entities, many of which are transnational in nature. We suggest that such entities as transnational corporations, nongovernmental organizations, and international institutional structures frequently determine the course of state action, even to the degree that the final course of action may not be in the selfinterest of the state. The softwood dispute between Canada and the United States is instructive in this instance. The solution to this trade-related dispute was determined by a multinational NAFTA tribunal, acting in the interest of regional trade and not the interest of one single state. The final decision saw the United States agreeing to repay duty previously collected on softwood lumber imports from Canada.48 The important point is that the state does not act in a vacuum: rather, state decisions, even those pertaining uniquely to security, are tempered by other entities—some regional in composition. To exclude other actors, in our view, distorts the security policymaking process. Polarity

For Buzan and Waever the term polarity refers to the distribution of power within any given regional security complex. They identify four main forms, the first two of which center on a unipolar condition, where the main power is a superpower. In this instance, the global level is considered dominant over the regional level and regional units will not have sway over the dominant power, as is the case in North America with Canada and Mexico. Related to this situation is the case where a superpower projects influence into another region but is not part of that region. This is the case of the United States, whose security interests span the globe and frequently play a role in other regional security complexes. The third case is represented by a multipolar situation where, within the regional security complex, power is distributed between a number of centers. This, for example, might be considered the case in South America, where no one state dominates regional security but rather power is distributed asymmetrically across a number of different countries (despite the fact that Brazil sees itself in a regional leadership role in the hemisphere). The fourth case is a region that is integrated by institutions, where state decisions are increasingly surrendered to a larger multistate institutional body but the anarchic order of the state system has not yet been replaced.49

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The question of polarity in the case of Canada, the United States, and Mexico is so significant that it is almost not an issue whatsoever. The power of the United States makes the North American security complex a unipolar system centered not only on US security concerns in the region but also on US security concerns globally. This condition, in fact, plays a significant role in what issues become securitized in both Canada and Mexico and what the ensuing policy response will be. More interestingly, however, is that it is not a given that a policy response to a securitized issue will be the same between Canada and Mexico. The Global War on Terror is a good example of a securitized issue with different policy responses from the three states in the region. Amity and Enmity

The final set of variables suggested by Buzan and Waever are patterns of amity and enmity. These variables are suggested as a more accurate alternative to the distribution of power.50 We agree with Buzan and Waever that these variables, understood within a constructivist framework, are critical to understanding interaction between states within reason. Similarly, we agree that these variables can be best understood in the context of history, culture, geography, and religion, for example, and that these long-term relationships need to be examined in order to establish a pattern or baseline of past relationships. We disagree, however, on the value of one single role—be that friend or enemy. By contrast, interaction between states is frequently much more nuanced than that of a single role; indeed, multiple roles may determine a policy response, including a security response, which is what would be expected particularly in democratic states where policy options are openly debated as part of the political culture. Further related to this point is the fact that neither security nor threats can be treated as homogenous terms but rather they exist on various levels and have meaning that will vary between situations, dependent on the dominant view of the social collective. Once again the Canada–United States relationship is instructive on this point. As noted above, Canada and the United States have one of the longest and most stable security relationships in the world. However, in the immediate aftermath of the terrorist attacks of 9/11, that friendly relationship did not stop the United States from framing Canada as a source of potential threats to US security.51

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The other important question regarding amity and enmity is how these terms are measured. At best, tracking historical patterns of hatred and friendship and looking for triggers to conflict give us a subjective, and certainly temporally bound, picture of regional security relations. A more accurate view, we suggest, would come not only from looking at historic patterns but also from mapping contemporary mechanisms for keeping open lines of communication, mechanisms for resolving conflict, cross-border interaction (including, e.g., defense treaties, security cooperation, trade, and social exchange), and shared values and culture, among others. We concede that our approach expands significantly on the amity/enmity framework, but it also serves to provide a more accurate picture of interstate relationships.

Identity, Institutions, and Interests

Our method of analyzing the North American regional security complex is to use a blended approach, incorporating the sectors Buzan and Waever articulate in their work on security with a more generalized approach developed by Lewis Griffith and David Hamm known as the identity-institutions-interests framework.52 The blended approach that we are suggesting incorporates the I-I-I model along with Buzan and Waever’s sectors as a framework for analyzing regional security complexes. Our approach is much less about replacing Buzan and Waever’s methodology than about incorporating the sectors within the I-I-I framework in order to provide what we believe is a more accurate picture of the dynamics of security complexes. The I-I-I framework allows for the incorporation of entities in such a way that is critical to understanding not only the potential for regional conflict but also the potential for the mitigation, resolution, or elimination of conflict between regional actors and to assessing change within the regional security dynamic. Identity

Identity-based variables become important when discussing shared understandings of concepts such as democracy, rule of law, and citizenship. They are most closely approximated to the amity/enmity variable articulated by Buzan and Waever, but in our estimation are

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more inclusive.53 Identity-based variables, which we maintain are based largely on a constructivist framework, place an emphasis on the role of individuals, nongovernmental agencies (at both the national and international levels), and other nontraditional players in international politics. Identity takes on a particularly important role at the domestic and international levels with regard to national and international perception—how individual leaders and nations view themselves and how they are viewed by others. Constructivism asserts that not only are identities and interests socially constructed but they also interact with a host of other ideational factors that originate within human capacity and will. According to Vendulka Kubalkova, Nicholas Onuf, and Paul Kowert, social constructivism holds that people make society and society makes people in a continuous two-way process.54 Furthermore, social reality is what people construct or constitute as social reality. The ideas that are deemed most important by a social group, such as the state, security, and even regional identities, become political by definition. Constructivism, therefore, defines social reality as an interactive process in which people forming a social group or unit (at any level, substate, state, or regional) continually construct in their individual and collective mind the reality that forms the basis for, and is shaped by, decisions made. One of the basic principles of social constructivist theory states that people act toward objects, including other actors, according to the meaning that the objects hold for them.55 Individuals and social units act differently toward enemies than they do toward friends because enemies are associated with a threatening behavior while friends are not. In the same way, security defined within a regional context will vary dependent on the dominant images held of the concepts of security and the region, which in turn are associated with a multitude of other ideas. The understanding that individuals or social groups associate with any given object determines the limits for behavior. It is only through a change in the associated understanding of a given object that the limits for determining behavior are altered. Once an individual or social unit decides that a particular object or social group is no longer an enemy, for example, the social understanding associated with that enemy is altered. If we think of regional security along similar lines, once a social group has altered its view of security to extend beyond the state to a regional level (for any number of reasons: threat, cooperation, or enhancing security), the

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social understanding of security and/or regionalism is altered. In turn, the behaviors that were previously applicable no longer apply. The new understanding begets new behaviors, which may better be articulated as new policies, and changes in the application of public goods (material and manpower resources). According to Wendt, it is collective meanings that constitute the structure.56 The identities that define actors are understood as being relatively stable, being role specific, and capable of organizing their action, understandings, and expectations of themselves.57 The identities are acquired through participation in collective meanings. Individuals have many identities linked to institutional roles such as brother, citizen, and employee. Similarly, a regional security complex can have differing identities. Those identities can be inclusive or exclusive of some social units (including states) or similarly can view some social units as friends and others as enemies. The degree of commitment to any particular identity may vary but each identity is a social definition, grounded in the belief that actors hold about themselves, each other, and objects of analysis (e.g., security) that compose the structure of the social world.58 Collective identity creates what constructivists term social facts. The acceptance by the collective consciousness of a norm or behavior creates meaning at the simplest level and a constitutive role at a higher level. The mutual recognition within a specific geographic zone of shared security concerns sets the context for the development of a regional security complex. The intentional acceptance of this regional security complex across the region (i.e., it needs to exist across borders) sets in place a set of accepted norms and behaviors (institutions) and also a shared understanding and language, which act to clarify and to some degree stabilize current and future situations. Institutions

The identities that individual or social units possess define the interests that will be held as important for that individual or social unit. Wendt maintains that actors do not have a portfolio of interests that exist independently of social context but rather their interests are defined in the process of defining situations.59 For the most part, situations have a routine quality in which meaning is determined through an institutionally assigned role. Kubalkova, Onuf, and Kowert maintain that institutions are a stable, but not fixed, pattern of

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rules and related practices that makes people into agents who in turn conduct themselves within the context of the institution, maintaining some degree for human choice.60 From time to time, situations are unique; therefore, meaning has to be constructed through the use of analogy or metaphor, or must simply be invented. The lack of an institutionally assigned role tends to lead to confusion and the need to redefine the interests of the actor or group of actors. Institutions play an important role in defining social reality. Wendt defines institutions as a relatively stable set or structure of identities and interests, and claims that they are often codified as formal rules and norms61 and, as Kubalkova, Onuf, and Kowert assert, give society structure.62 Despite this, institutions have no motivational force except by virtue of the actors’ participation in collective knowledge. Wendt further argues that institutions are primarily cognitive entities that do not exist apart from actors’ ideas about how the world works.63 James G. March and Johan P. Olsen claim that the rules and practices of institutions are embedded in structures of meaning and schemes of interpretation that explain and legitimize particular identities and practices associated with them. These same practices and rules are also embedded in resources and the principles of their allocations, setting up the possibility of socialization and individual role behavior.64 The fact that the existence of institutions is linked directly to the will of collective identity does not detract from the power of institutions to affect the behavior patterns of individuals or social groups. As Wendt explains, as a collective knowledge, institutions have an existence over and above the individuals who happen to embody them at the moment.65 In this way, institutions have a persuasive character that directs and bounds individual and collective behavior and, to some degree, choice. The term institutions has some association with amity and enmity, in that institutions often reflect some degree of amity or enmity since in most cases states enter into these institutional arrangements voluntarily. More importantly, institutions frequently set the context in which policy decisions are made. Although institutions themselves may not make decisions as independent actors, they do constrain some behaviors while, at the same time inducing others, they act as filters for political decisionmakers and set the context in which decisions are made.66 Paul Pierson notes that the development of institutions encourages or generates an increased investment in

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resources and skills, deepening the social commitment to the institution. At the same time, the institutional constraints imposed by the institution on social behavior are reinforced.67 In our view, institutions not only tell us something about state-tostate relationships that exist within a given regional security complex, but understanding their function and role is fundamental to understanding the context in which security decisions are made. Moreover, understanding how institutions develop and change adds an additional piece to the puzzle of understanding how regional security complexes evolve. Interests

Interests are most frequently defined in the context of the state. This conforms to realist theory, which sees states as the dominant actors competing for power in an anarchic international system. Although realist theory comes in many variants, there are a number of common key assumptions: (1) states are the key actors in international relations; (2) the international system is conflictual and competitive and states compete for power in an anarchic system; (3) states exist in a system of legal sovereignty but nonetheless vary in capability; (4) states are unitary actors and domestic policy can be separated from foreign policy; (5) states make rational choices based on national interest; and (6) power is the key concept to predicting state behavior.68 Evaluating state interests in the regional context poses a number of distinct challenges, especially when put in the context of state security. State interests, however they are created (through new ideas or institutional constraints), define state action whether we examine the actions of the state within the international system or as part of a regional cluster. This is particularly true in the security realm, where concepts such as national security and state power frequently dominate the political discourse. Although we concur that states most frequently act in their own interest and that interest is largely defined in terms of physical and economic security, the idea that states pursue those goals in an international system that is entirely competitive or conflictual is not necessarily accurate. By entering into bilateral or multilateral agreements, states are attempting to manage or limit, to at least some degree, the anarchical nature of the international system. 69 There are a number of examples where states have successfully added a layer of rules to the international system through the

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use of international agreements and the existence of international norms. Within the Canada–United States–Mexico relationship, agreements such as NAFTA have served, in some sectors, as power multipliers for Canada and Mexico and, to a lesser degree, also for the United States. We agree that the state remains the final arbiter in the international community, but there is evidence to suggest that sometimes the state defers to international agreements even at the expense of the state. The issue of power and security is probably more pronounced in a North American regional security complex, simply because of the dominant global position of the United States as the only superpower remaining in the post–Cold War period and the fact that US interests and influence span the globe. In a regional security complex that encompasses Canada, the United States, and Mexico, the two smaller partners are influenced by US global interests, simply by association and geography. Thus, for Canada and Mexico, there is a need for the United States to recognize each nation’s sovereignty as an issue of important national interest, even more so in the case of Mexico. The whole idea of a North American security complex has been viewed by some as an attempt by the United States to make the homeland more secure by extending its boundaries beyond its geographic limits.70 We maintain that the hegemonic position of the United States both regionally and globally is critical to understanding the regional security dynamic in North America, but it is not the only factor. Interests correspond largely with state-level security goals. This lens would conform closest with Buzan and Waever’s anarchy variable as both seek to determine state-level actions. Our use of the term interests, however, provides a more accurate view since, unlike the term anarchy, we do not reduce interests to a zero-sum game and necessarily rational action. This approach allows for the possibility of states deferring to regional interests over and above state-centric interests. Before continuing any further it is important to address the issue of sector analysis, an approach to security analysis used by Buzan, Waever, and de Wilde. 71 They suggest an expanded approach to understanding security and posit the five sectors that could be separated from the whole and still be analytically significant, enough so that the analysis process is significantly simplified. We agree that the parts of the whole cannot actually exist outside of the interaction of the whole. However, it is true that for analytical purposes breaking

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down the whole does simplify the process. That said, we suggest that the five sectors identified by Buzan, Waever, and de Wilde can be incorporated into the I-I-I framework in a more parsimonious manner. This approach, we argue, provides a more accurate regional security picture and also allows for the tracking of changes to the security picture over time, by evaluating changes in institutional development, interests, and even identity politics. Thus, rather than dismiss Buzan, Waever, and de Wilde’s sector approach, we feel that these not only can be adequately accommodated within the I-I-I framework but, through this framework, a more accurate depiction of regional security can be gleaned. In sum, we concur with Buzan and Waever that regional security complexes need to be clearly defined in order to qualify as a complex and that the framework they suggested—borders, anarchy, polarity, and amity/enmity—is appropriate. In contrast, we believe that analysis of regional security complexes is much more nuanced and open to more substantial analysis through an expanded approach. To that end, we have suggested an approach that also includes the I-I-I framework, which will incorporate the analytical arguments proposed by Buzan and Waever. Together, these variables allow for a more accurate analysis of regional security dynamics, therefore giving more depth to the final security picture.

Guiding Questions

The starting point for this book is regional security complex theory. It forms the base on which we build in order to understand regional security dynamics. We are convinced that RSCT provides valuable insight into regional security dynamics but, at the same time, we also believe that it is silent on a number of key issues. The following are some of the questions that we believe need to be answered more fully in an effort to strengthen this approach: 1. When does a regional security complex exist? 2. How do security policies, such as perimeter defense, contribute to regional security complex development? 3. What drives change in a regional security complex? 4. How have the events of 9/11 in particular impacted the development of a new security relationship between Canada, Mexico, and the United States?

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5. Has the emergence of new transnational threats, such as terrorists, drug cartels, and natural disasters, changed the dynamics and dialogue that define the security complexes in North America? 6. What are the future implications for relations between the United States, Canada, and Mexico in a highly securitized world?

Conclusion

The end of the Cold War, the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and the Global War on Terror have left in their wake new challenges to security analysis. Buzan and others, such as Lake and Morgan, have suggested that a more accurate manner in which to observe and analyze security phenomena is through a regional lens. Our analysis of Buzan’s regional security complex theory suggests that there is a good deal of value in using a regional approach, but a more accurate picture of a regional security complex would also include an additional analysis using an identity-institutions-interests framework. We argue that, as a theoretical model, it is possible to operationalize RSCT to better understand and estimate the potential for the emergence of regional security cooperation, including the degree to which cooperation, coordination, and integration will occur within a given region. The focus of this book is North America, specifically Canada, the United States, and Mexico, where we maintain there is more than ample evidence to demonstrate the regional nature of security threats and the need for a regional security response.

Notes 1. See, for example, Peter Katzenstein, ed., Culture of National Security: Norms and Identity in World Politics (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996); Alastair Iain Johnston, “Thinking About Culture,” International Security 19, no. 4 (1995): 32–64; Michael Desch, “Culture Clash: Assessing the Importance of Ideas in Security Studies,” International Security 23, no. 1 (1998): 141–170. 2. See, for example, Roy Koslowski and Friedrich Kratochwil, “Understanding Change in International Politics: The Soviet Empire’s Demise and the International System,” International Organization 48, no. 2 (1994): 215–247; Vendulka Kubalkova, Nicholas Onuf, and Paul Kowert, ed., International Relations in a Constructed World (New York: M. E. Sharpe, 1998); Alexander Wendt, Social Theory of International Relations (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999); John Ruggie, “What Makes the World

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Hang Together? Neo-utilitarianism and the Social Constructivist Challenge,” International Organization 52, no. 4 (1998): 855–885. 3. See Richard K. Betts, Conflict After the Cold War: Arguments on Causes of War and Peace (Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 1994), especially part 7. 4. See, for example, Peter Andreas, “Redrawing the Line: Borders and Security in the Twenty-first Century,” International Security 28, no. 2 (2003): 78–111; Peter Andreas and Thomas J. Biersteker, ed., The Rebordering of North America: Integration and Exclusion in a New Security Context (New York: Routledge, 2003). 5. Barry Buzan and Ole Waever, Regions and Powers: The Structure of International Security (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004). 6. David Lake and Patrick M. Morgan, ed., Regional Orders: Building Security in a New World (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997). 7. Lewis Griffith and David Hamm, Drivers of Political Behavior (Montgomery, AL: Air University Press, 2006). The identity-institutionsinterests blended approach is discussed later in this chapter. 8. The concept of “perimeter defense” in the Americas emerged during World War II and the US development of the American Theater of Operations (1942–1945), which included both North and South America. The intent by US military planners was to expand continental defense outward by developing security arrangements with countries in the hemisphere for basing rights and security outposts. See J. Lloyd Mecham, The United States and Inter-American Security (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1961); John Child, Unequal Alliance: The Inter-American Military System, 1938–1978 (Boulder: Westview, 1980). 9. On regional security in the North American context, see Joel Sokolsky and Philippe Legasse, “Suspenders and a Belt: Perimeter and Border Security in Canada-US Relations,” Canadian Foreign Policy 2, no. 13 (2006): 15–29; Jordi Diez, “North America’s Security Perimeter,” Security and Defense Studies Review 7, no. 1 (Summer 2007): 1–14; Mónica Serrano, “Integration and Security in North America,” International Journal 61 (2006): 611–632. 10. Morgan maintains that, according to his review of the literature, the term “region” has multiple definitions and “cannot be resolved to everyone’s satisfaction.” See Patrick M. Morgan, “Regional Security Complexes and Regional Order,” in David Lake and Patrick M. Morgan, ed., Regional Orders: Building Security in a New World (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997), 25. See also Bjorn Hettne and Fredrik Soderbaum, “Theorizing the Rise of Regionness,” New Political Economy 4, no. 3 (2006): 457–472. 11. Buzan and Waever, Regions and Powers, 44. 12. Alex J. Bellamy, Security Communities and Their Neighbours: Regional Fortresses or Global Integrators? (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004), 47–48. 13. Ibid., 48. 14. For example, realists and neorealists advance the argument of states as key actors in an inherently anarchical world; their security and insecurity

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are the result of power relations in the international community. See Terry Terriff, Stuart Croft, Lucy James, and Patrick M. Morgan, Security Studies Today (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1999), 38–39. 15. Buzan and Waever, Regions and Powers, 23. 16. Wendt, Social Theory of International Relations. 17. Buzan, Waever, and de Wilde define the term “securitization” as the process by which a public issue moves from being politicized (defined as being in the normal course of governing and policymaking) to being securitized (a threat significant enough to require emergency actions outside of normal public policy). See Barry Buzan, Ole Waever, and Jaap de Wilde, Security: A New Framework for Analysis (Boulder: Lynne Rienner, 1998), 23–25. 18. Buzan, Waever, and de Wilde, Security, 8. 19. Ibid., 50. 20. “Posse Comitatus Act of 1878,” US Department of Justice, June 18, 1878, www.dojgov.net/posse_comitatus_act.htm, accessed October 29, 2010. 21. Buzan, Waever, and de Wilde, Security, 84. 22. The International Joint Commission is responsible for the management of all boundary waters between Canada and the United States. See www.ijc.org/rel/agree/water.html, accessed October 29, 2010. 23. See Robert Gilpin, War and Change in World Politics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981). 24. Buzan, Waever, and de Wilde, Security, 119. 25. Ibid., 142. 26. Ibid., 119. 27. Buzan and Waever, Regions and Powers, 44. 28. Ibid. 29. Tuva Kahrs, “Regional Security Complex Theory and Chinese Policy Towards North Korea,” East Asia: An International Quarterly 21, no. 4 (2004): 64–82. 30. Lake and Morgan, Regional Orders, 29. 31. Buzan and Waever, Regions and Powers, 46. 32. Lake and Morgan, Regional Orders, 30. 33. Buzan and Waever, Regions and Powers, 48–49. 34. Ibid., 48. 35. In fact, former Mexican president Vicente Fox called those Mexicans who traveled to the United States as undocumented workers “heroes.” Timothy Roberts, “Former Mexican President Decries US Immigration Policies,” San Jose Business Journal, October 27, 2007, www.bizjournals.com /sanjose/stories/2007/10/22/daily75.html, accessed July 29, 2011. 36. The italics are added. Although Buzan and Waever maintain that security complexes are made up of states, they do use the term “other entities,” suggesting that perhaps states are not the only actors who can securitize issues (Regions and Powers, 47). This would be consistent with our position that other actors, such as transnational corporations, transnational criminal organizations, and even issue-oriented organizations such as Greenpeace, can securitize issues on a regional level.

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37. Buzan and Waever, Regions and Powers, 47–48. 38. Ibid., 53. 39. Lake and Morgan, Regional Orders, 6–7. 40. Buzan and Waever, Regions and Powers, 43. 41. Keohane and Nye have explained the Canada–United States relationship using their theory of complex interdependence. See Robert Keohane and Joseph Nye, Power and Interdependence (New York: Longman, 1989). 42. “Bush Sticks with Iraqi Contract Ban,” Associated Press, December 11, 2003, www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3676000/, accessed August 11, 2009. 43. Buzan and Waever, Regions and Powers. 44. Ibid. 45. Bruce Campion-Smith, “Geopolitics of the Far North,” Toronto Star, August 9, 2009, www.thestar.com/news/world/article/678473, accessed August 11, 2009. 46. Canada and the United States have long been considered one of the world’s oldest and most stable security communities, which is defined by an understanding that problems within the community can be resolved by peaceful means. See Emanuel Adler and Michael Barnett, ed., Security Communities (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998). 47. Buzan and Waever, Regions and Powers. 48. “Canada Wins NAFTA Softwood Ruling,” Canadian Broadcasting Company, April 29, 2004, www.cbc.ca/money/story/2004/04/29/softwood 040429.html, accessed August 11, 2009. 49. Buzan and Waever, Regions and Powers, 53–60. 50. Ibid., 50. 51. “Canadian Security Threat Real, Says Celluci,” CTV News, October 21, 2004, www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/print/CTVNews/20041021 /canada_terror041020/20041021/?hub=TopStories&subhub=PrintStory, accessed August 11, 2009. 52. Griffith and Hamm, Drivers of Political Behavior. 53. Buzan and Waever, Regions and Powers. 54. Vendulka Kubalkova, Nicholas Onuf, and Paul Kowert, ed., International Relations in a Constructed World (New York: M. E. Sharpe, 1998), 59. 55. Alexander Wendt, “Anarchy Is What States Make of It: The Social Construction of Power Politics,” International Organization 46, no. 2 (1996): 397. 56. Ibid. 57. Ibid. 58. Ibid., 397–398. 59. Ibid., 398. 60. Kubalkova, Onuf, and Kowert, International Relations, 61. 61. Wendt, “Anarchy Is What States Make of It,” 398. 62. Kubalkova, Onuf, and Kowert, International Relations, 61. 63. Wendt, “Anarchy Is What States Make of It,” 398. 64. James G. March and Johan P. Olsen, “The Institutional Dynamics of International Political Orders,” International Organization 52, no. 4 (Autumn 1998): 948.

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65. Wendt, “Anarchy Is What States Make of It,” 298. 66. Ellen M. Immergut, “Theoretical Core of the New Institutionalism,” Politics and Society 26, no. 1 (1998): 26. 67. Paul Pierson, Politics in Time: History, Institutions and Social Analysis (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2004), 34–35. 68. James E. Dougherty and Robert L. Pfaltzgraff, Jr., Contending Theories of International Relations: A Comprehensive Survey (New York: Longman, 2001), 63–64; Ole Holsti, “Theories of International Relations and Foreign Policy: Realism and Its Challengers,” in Charles W. Kegley, ed., Controversies in International Relations Theory: Realism and the Neoliberal Challenge (New York: St. Martin’s, 1995). 69. Hedley Bull, The Anarchical Society: A Study of Order in World Politics (New York: Columbia University Press, 1977). 70. See Richard J. Kilroy, Jr., “Perimeter Defense and Regional Security Cooperation,” and Abelardo Rodríguez, “Mexico’s Insecurity in North America,” Homeland Security Affairs, Supplement No. 1 (2007). 71. Buzan, Waever, and de Wilde, Security.

3 A Brief History of Security Relations in the Americas

The terrorist attacks on September 11 in the United States provide an opportunity to critically examine regional security complex theory in North America. Furthermore, it is relevant to point out that through these new lenses, regional security concerns develop new dimensions in explanation and understanding, fostered by history and perceptions that go beyond dogmas and taboos.1 Concurrently, our main argument in this chapter relies on a reconceptualization of threats since identities and interests evolve systematically over time, particularly under critical junctures. This theoretical reexamination of historical events allows an understanding of the continuity and change of policies and institutions. It argues a new knowledge on the limits and possibilities of US hegemony and Canadian and Mexican sovereignties under an asymmetric interdependence among the North American neighbors climaxed by World War II, visà-vis Germany and Japan.

Regional Security Issues in North America

From the 1790s to the outbreak of World War I, US national security had two main concerns: safety of its northern and southern borders and preservation of the Union of States.2 Indeed, the birth of a country with universalistic ideals and policies had direct implications for its neighbors, Canada and Mexico.3 Throughout this historical period, it would be a stretch to define North America as a security complex where “a set of units whose major processes of securitiza41

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tion, desecuritization or both are so interlinked that their security problems cannot reasonably be analyzed or resolved apart from one another.”4 Regional security complexes are temporally bound together as security concerns evolve. Mexico, Canada, and the United States are not the exception. For example, Great Britain was the threat for the American colonies during their revolutionary period, whereas the British Crown was vital to the very existence of the Canadian colonies. Subsequently, the universalistic ideals and policies held by the United States threatened first Canada (1776 and 1812) and then Mexico (1836 and 1848), when the latter lost more than half of its territory to the United States. External threats to Canada and Mexico also came from other colonial powers, such as France and Spain, as well as from the United States. In this historic context, one can see how the United States sought to spread its influence in trying to shape Mexican and Canadian identities, political institutions, and security interests based on the region’s colonial history, perceptions, and wars. Additionally, regions are defined by their close proximity to one another and the existence of security interdependence more intense than with surrounding regions. In North America, this security and economic interdependence was possible after Canadian independence (1867) and a more intense economic relationship between the United States and Mexico’s Porfirio Díaz military regime.5 In fact, it was clearer after the 1880s that an intensification of economic and trade relations between the United States and Canada and between Mexico and the United States was linked to geographic proximity, market needs, and political interests.6 Certainly, this convergence toward a deepening economic integration was possible only after the outcome of the War of 1812 between the United States and Great Britain, the US-Mexican War (1846– 1847), and the American Civil War (1861–1865) when the United States decided to not acquire more territory immediately north and south of its borders and when territorial boundaries were finally established.7 This does not mean that the United States stopped its expansionist march; it continued into the Caribbean and to the Pacific and East Asia but not to its immediate neighbors.8 Although Mexico was able to establish an unwritten agreement with the United States to not extend the border or intervene directly in its political affairs after 1928, Canada established a more formal relationship with the United States after the Treaty of Westminster in 1931 that granted Canada

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independent control over all its foreign relations. Nonetheless, during World War II, the countries of North America shared a similar threat perception in the formation of a regional security complex; however, it was a relationship where the countries were expected to cooperate in a regional context under bilateral US-led institutions, not in a trilateral dimension. Therefore, a brief examination of the historical record of relations between the three countries is necessary in understanding the evolution of identity, creation of institutions, and both the divergence and convergence of interests with regard to common threat perceptions and misperceptions.

Security Cultures: Identity, Institutions, and Interests

The Declaration of Independence (1776) is one of the most important documents in the foundation of the United States. Its stated principles were a prelude to the outbreak of war with Great Britain, the emergence of a revolutionary movement, and the rise of a deeply patriotic citizenry. Paradoxically, from the American Revolution emerged a counterrevolutionary movement that increased Canadian affiliation with the British Crown. The arrival into British Canada of some 45,000 British loyalists from the thirteen American colonies, following the outbreak of the American Revolution, was one of the events that influenced the developing Canadian political culture. Just as the newly independent United States saw its neighbor to the north as a potential enemy, so too did the British Canadians who prepared for war with the newly independent nation.9 It was clear that, for the United States, British forces in British North America were considered a threat. During the seven-year period between the attempted invasion of Canada in 1775 and the Treaty of Paris in 1783, the thirty-nine land battles fought along the frontier between British and American forces served to reinforce the resentment between the two belligerents.10 For British Canadians, the idea was simple: avoid annexation by the new American republic to the south. 11 In these two extremes, the United States and Canada laid the basis for the development of different identities, institutions, and security interests. Yet the United States and Canada have something in common: their dominant Anglo-Saxon Protestant cultural heritage and a common language (the exception here being, of course, French Canada). On the other hand, Mexico and most Latin American countries inher-

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ited from the Spanish monarchy an Iberian Catholic heritage and political institutions and identity quite different from their northern neighbors. For a variety of reasons, Mexico was unable to gain consensus during the nineteenth century on the type of government necessary to achieve an institutional order, security, and progress for its people such as the ones undertaken by the United States and Canada. Contrary to Mexico’s founders, the US founding fathers had the ingenuity to shape a great national consensus through the deliberation of how to form “a more perfect union.”12 The constitutional convention made possible a new agreement and a new form of federal representation through representative institutional structures. The following quote from a letter from the Federal Convention president, George Washington, to the president of Congress on September 17, 1787, subscribes a foundational argument key to understanding the values and identity that have impacted the formation of a US national security culture. In all our deliberations on this subject we kept steadily in our view, that which appears to us the greatest interest of every true American, the consolidation of our Union, in which is involved our prosperity, felicity, safety, perhaps our national existence. This important consideration, seriously and deeply impressed on our minds, led each state in the Convention to be less rigid on points of inferior magnitude, than might have been otherwise expected; and thus the Constitution, which we now present.13

In this letter, Washington expressed the role of a federal government to secure all rights and liberties of its peoples, the consolidation of the Union, the nation’s existence regulated by the Constitution, and the preservation of freedom and happiness led by an elected civilian president. The Constitutional Convention of 1787 conceived of a constitutional presidency that is, in a sense, the office’s “genetic code.”14 According to this constitutional body, the presidency is a one-person office and the president, who is elected, incarnates the powers of a national government with an equally distinct and independent Congress.15 For David Rothkopf, a key distinction from those earlier years of the nation’s existence was Washington’s idea of erecting a presidential office, not a man, which was fundamental to the construction of a constitutional republican democracy as a pillar of national security and foreign policy.16

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In the beginning, the Constitutional Convention was not clear about the power of the president as commander in chief of the nation’s military. The Committee of Detail, however, included a military role for the president supported by each branch of government, giving the Congress the power to declare war and the executive branch the authority to make war. 17 Delegates argued that the Congress would not be able to act quickly enough on military matters if the use of military force was necessary. As for control of the various state militias, the Constitutional Convention approved without discussion that “the president shall be commander in chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the militia of the Several States, when called into the actual service of the United States.”18 The organization of the executive branch provided for five departments: domestic affairs, commerce and finance, foreign affairs, war, and navy. The conception of these departments was to assist the president in conducting domestic and foreign affairs. Each individual department secretary would be a person appointed by the president and approved by the Senate. The debate on the executive power was a permanent trend regarding the president as the leading figure of the government and the public administration.19 In this perspective, antifederalists were preoccupied about the excess of the presidential office,20 although the necessity of a strong executive to provide for the “common defense” of the nation was made clear during and after the War of 1812 with Great Britain.21 Once British Canada declined to endorse the Declaration of Independence, arguing loyalty to the king of England or indifference to the American cause, “Congress sponsored several unsuccessful invasions of Canada.”22 From this fact, Canada took a distinct historical transformation from the United States, repeated during the War of 1812. For example, intrinsic to the Declaration of Independence and the Revolutionary War, there emerged a new country incarnating a new identity, political institutions, and conception of popular sovereignty. In his first inaugural address in 1789, Washington communicated that the United States embodied the expression of all peoples everywhere for freedom and liberty and the singular purpose of spreading these new universal values. 23 As the new president-elect in 1801, Thomas Jefferson, who had been one of the most prominent drafters of the Declaration, also declared that the “Empire of Liberty” and the territorial expansion must be consistent with the principles of the Declaration of Independence.24 The Louisiana Purchase and the

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acquisition of Spanish Florida were further examples in this direction, embodying the intersection between ideals and security policies. Consequently, internal and external factors impacting the new US government propelled the idea of a further concentration of power, territorial expansion, and a systematic redefinition of boundaries and strategies to defend the homeland and extend the nation’s boundaries to British Canada or Spanish Florida and eventually to Mexico.25 The War of 1812

Jefferson’s and James Madison’s policies on trade (the Embargo Act) with France and England made the war inevitable to the extremists. More succinctly, the War Hawks (led by Henry Clay of Kentucky, John C. Calhoun of South Carolina, Felix Grundy of Tennessee, and Peter B. Porter of western New York in the House of Representatives) helped to reshape US limits on the neutrality policy and expand the need for a strong central government led by the presidency. Additionally, the midterm election of 1810 meant a significant shift in foreign policy because the War Hawks represented an important expansionist faction in the United States that sought to acquire territory from British Canada and Spanish Florida. However, the emerging nation did not have a national military capable of conducting a war with England. In other words, the War Hawks were more preoccupied on implementing war than on planning it. President Madison’s message of June 1, 1812, which urged Congress to declare war against Britain, was the first such message by a US president. The United States was not prepared for war because of a series of different deficiencies: fiscal problems to collect taxes; lack of cooperation between states; a diplomatic tradition instead of a military one with Great Britain and France; lack of a national and well-organized army; a divided government (Congress was pro-war, the presidency was weak and moderate); opposition to a national debt; a divided cabinet; factionalist powers; and primitive transportation. At the time, the British navy was still the most powerful military force on the earth. Meanwhile, the navy and army of the United States included only a few thousand men and were largely led by inexperienced junior officers or aging Revolutionary War veterans.26 Nevertheless, as long as the British were preoccupied with the war against Napoleon, they were unwilling to divert units to North America. But in 1814, Napoleon was at last defeated. Subsequently,

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the British forces were free to concentrate on the war in the United States, devising a coordinated strategy to invade the United States in the northern, central, and southern parts of the country. Their main army headed south from Montreal but was checked when Captain Thomas McDonough destroyed the British fleet on Lake Champlain in New York. In that process, a smaller British force landed in Maryland, marched on Washington, DC, and burned the Capitol and the White House. After the US failure in Baltimore, New Orleans was the next British target for attack. General Andrew Jackson emerged as the hero who defeated the British in the battle of New Orleans in January 1815. Prior to this, Jackson had defeated the Red Stick Creek Indians but, “not satisfied with defeating the Creeks, Jackson had invaded Spanish Florida contrary to his orders and occupied Pensacola and Mobile, solidifying American control of all West Florida, over which the United States now assumed jurisdiction.”27 Although the United States did not acquire Canada and annexed only part of Florida, no territorial losses were incurred by the US forces. However, the US attempt to annex Canada during the war contributed to the development of a unique Canadian nationalism, standing in contrast to the emerging US exceptionalism. In the end, Jackson’s leadership helped to ratify US independence, to expand the US identity, and to help the United States emerge as a powerful republic in the international concert of nations. In addition, the War of 1812 meant the second US independence from England and solidified its independent status.28 The Monroe Doctrine, 1823

President James Monroe’s (1817–1825) conservative agenda fit perfectly with the War Hawks such as Secretary of the Treasury William H. Crawford and Secretary of War John C. Calhoun. As a result of the War of 1812, the United States was in a much stronger position, regionally and internationally, to pursue an expansionist agenda as developed by Monroe’s secretary of state, John Quincy Adams (son of president John Adams), to enhance the young republic’s security through a continental vision. John Quincy Adams wanted to promote expansion to the Pacific, an extraordinary route to establish commerce with East Asia. Even before Mexican independence was consummated, Adams wanted Texas as well. 29 The defeat of England

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and expansion into Spanish territory redefined US commercial relations with the European powers, establishing new boundaries and the expansion to the south and the Pacific. There could not have been a better confluence of time and place to define the new US preeminence in the continent than the announcement on December 2, 1823, of the Monroe Doctrine included in the president’s State of the Union message to Congress: The occasion has been judged proper for asserting, as a principle in which the rights and interests of the United States are involved, that the American continents, by the free and independent condition which they have assumed and maintain, are henceforth not to be considered as subjects for future colonization by any European powers. . . . We should consider any attempt on their part to extend their system to any portion of this hemisphere as dangerous to our peace and safety. With the existing colonies or dependencies of any European power we have not interfered and shall not interfere.30

Interestingly enough, President Monroe extended virtually the entire Western Hemisphere as an entity under US regional strategic security interests, identifying European powers as the potential threat to itself and its neighbors north and south of its borders. Mexico had been an independent country for only two years and was still unclear about its nascent structures of government, doctrines, and values. Meanwhile, Canada was still a British colony. Yet the US government wanted to be sure of a zone free of European interests. As further stated in the Monroe Doctrine: “In the war between those new Governments and Spain we declared our neutrality at the time of their recognition, and to this we have adhered, and shall continue to adhere, provided no change shall occur which, in the judgment of the competent authorities of this Government, shall make a corresponding change on the part of the United States indispensable to their security.”31 Certainly, the United States intervened politically and monetarily in the wars for independence in Mexico, Argentina, and Venezuela.32 Additionally, Latin American independence was in the United States’ interest as long as it consolidated the region’s political systems around democratic principles and regimes. Since the consolidation of many Latin American nations in the 1820s, the extension of “democratic” values and foreign trade became an urgent necessity to the US political system. “It is impossible that the allied powers should

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extend their political system to any portion of either continent without endangering our peace and happiness; nor can anyone believe that our southern brethren, if left to themselves, would adopt it of their own accord. It is equally impossible, therefore, that we should behold such interposition in any form with indifference.”33 Although the Monroe Doctrine was never formally enacted as law, it has been a fundamental document reflecting US foreign policy and security interests. Additionally, the document is consistent with the principles raised by the delegates to the Constitutional Convention, Washington’s and Jefferson’s presidencies, and with the principles and origins of the republic’s foundation. Thus, “like the Declaration of Independence, The Monroe Doctrine codified the aspirations of the American people.”34 Moreover, for the historian W. P. Cresson, “it was a sincere expression of the belief in the superiority of American institutions and ideals, and the right of self-preservation, grounded in the conviction that the extension on European principles was dangerous to the peace and safety of the American system.”35 The context of the issuance of the Monroe Doctrine was almost perfect for US interests at the time. In 1815 the United States had already defeated England, which in 1814 had simultaneously defeated France, which in 1808 had invaded and humiliated Spain. The momentum of territorial expansion was remarkable given the purchase of Louisiana from France (1803) and the acquisition of Florida from Spain (1819). These land acquisitions added millions of acres to US territory, but also afforded greater influence to those institutions that previously stood outside the regular channels of political power. Furthermore, the US Army and US Navy as well as the central power of the presidency were expanded and better organized. And by definition, regional security and defense interests took on greater significance for the United States by expanding the legal boundaries of US territory. So formally, with the Monroe Doctrine, the United States would now defend ideals, institutions, and territory in the region, and informally keep a watchful eye on the entire Western Hemisphere. The United States also communicated a vision and consistency of thought, linking the universalistic principles of liberty conceived in the Declaration of Independence ultimately to the concept of Manifest Destiny. These national, hemispheric, and global ideals and interests espoused by the United States were quite different from those of its northern and southern neighbors. In fact, these ideals and

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policies posed a threat to Canada (1776 and 1812) and Mexico (1836 and 1848) when the latter lost more than half of its territory to the United States. In this historical context, one can see how the United States sought to spread its influence by trying to shape Mexican and Canadian identities, political institutions, and security interests based on the region’s colonial history. Manifest Destiny

The concept of Manifest Destiny has been one of the most outstanding examples of US exceptionalism.36 Moreover, it was a remarkable principle, consistent with the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, the presidency, and the construction of US democracy. Additionally, Manifest Destiny was an expansion of the Monroe Doctrine on a truly global scale. From the signing of the Declaration of Independence to the inauguration of the presidency, the emerging nation conceived of an intertwined mix of religious and political ideas that added a “moral superiority” to the conception of its institutions and form of government, making it ready to expand its values and interests universally. As James West Davidson et al. note, “Since most Canadians were also French, they had little sympathy for the struggle for ‘British Liberties.’ When Canadians declared either loyalty to the king or indifference to the American cause, Congress sponsored several unsuccessful invasions of Canada, approving the first almost immediately after it created the ‘Continental Army.’”37 Thus, US exceptionalism can be traced back to the nation’s foundation and is incarnated consistently over time after critical junctures such as Washington’s Inaugural Address (1789);38 Jefferson’s “Empire of Liberty” (1801); the War of 1812; the US-Mexican War; the Spanish-American War (1898); World War II; and after 9/11. Sometimes there has been a virtual or territorial expansive trend, although this powerful energy was catapulted to the acceptance of the Manifest Destiny linked to providence and to some extent to national security.39 John L. O’Sullivan, a US journalist, was the intellectual force behind the principle of Manifest Destiny, whose writings best conceptualized the role of the United States in the world in 1839. This principle of Manifest Destiny clearly portrays the United States as a rising global power. The founders of the United States, such as Thomas Paine, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Alexan-

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der Hamilton, claimed that they created a nation meant to be a “city on a hill,” and provide a moral example for the world.40 The United States had become a potent and emblematic masterpiece evoking this vision: The far-reaching, the boundless future will be the era of American greatness. In its magnificent domain of space and time, the nation of many nations is destined to manifest to mankind the excellence of divine principles; to establish on earth the noblest temple ever dedicated to the worship of the Most High—the Sacred and the True. Its floor shall be a hemisphere—its roof the firmament of the starstudded heavens, and its congregation a Union of many Republics, comprising hundreds of happy millions, calling, owning no man master, but governed by God’s natural and moral law of equality, the law of brotherhood—of peace and good will amongst men.41

These ideas, which formed a critical part of the United States’ early identity, also shaped institutions and interests and profoundly transformed boundaries and political systems in North America and abroad. The US-Mexican War

Manifest Destiny, as a sacred creed and design, is perhaps the main source of controversies, discrepancies, and confrontation for the United States with the rest of the world. This is most vividly demonstrated with the justification of the US-Mexican War (1846–1848). From the US standpoint, expansion was the country’s natural development. From the Mexican perspective, the war was unjustified. It is important to point out that as a result of the war, the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo certified the annexation of Texas; confirmed the acquisition of California, New Mexico, and Arizona; and caused Mexico to lose more than half of its territory. This was simply the point of departure for a global expansive enterprise already defined by the United States in the principle of Manifest Destiny. The annexation of Texas by the United States on March 1, 1845, was the prelude for the war. 42 The expansionist enterprise found a great opportunity for the extension of US values, territory, and a slavery system after the independence of Texas. The annexation as part of the expansionist trend was the popular force in the presidential election of James Polk in 1845. President Polk sought a pretense for expanding the United States. It was possible when Mexican forces crossed the Rio Grande to attack General Zachary Taylor’s

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troops and killed eleven US soldiers. Consequently, on May 9, 1846, Polk sent Congress a mandate for war. Mexico’s refusal to negotiate the boundary lines between the two countries was the underlying reason for the aggression by the United States toward Mexico.43 From the US perspective, Polk’s leadership of the US-Mexican War established a fundamental difference from the War of 1812 with England. In fact, Polk acted as an outstanding commander in chief, who determined the general strategy, of military and naval operations; he chose commanding officers; he gave personal attention to supply problems; he organized so as he could the General Staff; he controlled the military and naval estimates, and he used the Cabinet as a major coordinating agency for the conduct of the campaign. He told the Secretaries of War and Navy to give their personal attention to all matters, even of detail, and to advise him promptly of every important step that was to be taken. The president was the center on which all else depended; Hamilton’s doctrine of the unity of the executive power was seldom more truly exemplified.44

In contrast to the War of 1812, the war with Mexico also provided the US military the opportunity to practice campaign planning and conduct a war against an enemy that was militarily inferior to that of Britain. The US military had also learned its lessons from its mistakes during the War of 1812. In any event, US domestic disputes made it impossible for the absorption of all of Mexico into US territory.45 The war ended with the signing of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, a treaty that established the current boundaries between Mexico and the United States since 1848.46 In the two decades following the signing of the treaty, the expansionist trend toward Mexico did not stop. Rather than territorial conquest, it was expressed in terms of the type of government that the United States would support in Mexico. The Plan of Iguala in 1821 had declared Mexico a constitutional monarchy; however, it was not until 1857 that Mexico had a liberal democratic constitution that defined Mexico as a federal republic. In other words, the aftermath of the US-Mexican War redirected the conception of the Mexican constitutional monarchy of 1821 to a liberal democratic republic in 1857, more compatible with the US political system and institutions that would develop in the following century. Paradoxically, despite any concerns of renewed US efforts to annex its northern neighbor, Canada avoided the construction of governing institutions identical

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to those of the United States and opted instead for a parliamentary system. This decision was in large part due to the retention of British values in the colony and the need to draw into the nation-building process French Canadians and those provinces on the east and west coasts of the country. The US-Mexican War is the most significant external event impacting Mexico’s development in the second half of the nineteenth century as well as the entire twentieth century. The terrorist attacks of 9/11 and the discussion of a new security perimeter in North America reopened many old wounds from this period in Mexico’s history. From a Mexican point of view, this is crucial to underline due to the current existence and limits of its national territory as well as a sense of insecurity and inferiority that has been difficult to overcome in the nation’s history. Although it can be argued that the United States was certain about its ideals and institutions in the nineteenth century and the war with Mexico furthered the nation’s goals where “they more than doubled the nation’s territory by 1848,” on the other hand Mexico developed a reactive and defensive policy in external affairs focused on internal security.47 As a result of the USMexican War, the United States continued to be viewed as a potential threat to Mexico, although there was not always a consensus among the nation’s political and economic actors.48 Furthermore, Raúl Benítez argues that the US-Mexican War provided two main doctrinal trends for the Mexican armed forces and foreign policy: on the one hand, it exacerbated nationalism and, on the other, it contributed to building up a reactive national security toward the United States. 49 Porfirio Díaz, the Mexican Revolution, and the United States

After Mexican independence from Spain in 1821, no civilian leader or military president was able to achieve internal peace and political stability. This occurred because political and military elites never found political consensus on the type of government, the means of representation, and the legal and institutional instruments necessary to resolve political disputes. As mentioned above, during the nineteenth century Mexico lost more than half of its territory to the United States. Additionally, in the second half of the nineteenth century, Spain wanted to conquer Mexico again, Great Britain threatened several times with intervention, and Mexico went to war with France. 50 Ultimately, no

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leader achieved the command of power and control of Mexico until the emergence of General Porfirio Díaz in 1876. With Díaz’s rise to power, Mexico, for the first time in its history, experienced internal peace and political stability. Although the cost was high in human losses and controversial in political development, Mexico had never before developed an identity as an independent nation-state. Additionally Díaz’s government endorsed the liberal principles of the 1857 Constitution such as separation of powers, democratic representation, and a party system. Despite his democratic aspirations, in practice Díaz’s regime was still a military dictatorship. The institutional strength of the Porfiriato regime and the strong interdependent economic relationship with the United States provided Díaz with the support he needed to maintain control of the Mexican state.51 Nevertheless, things began to change at the beginning of the twentieth century when serious discontent and a concentration of wealth gave rise to a growing dissatisfaction within sectors of Mexican society after the seventh reelection of Díaz. There also emerged a strong anti-US movement, opposed to US support of the dictatorship. In addition, Díaz was losing control of the northern border where, since the beginning of the twentieth century, Mexican revolutionaries and bandits had been using the open border with the United States as a safe haven to avoid pursuit by the Mexican military. Indeed, interdependence and closeness with the United States was a double-edged sword: a rapid and accessible source for guns and money but a volatile space for fomenting conspiracy and revolution. Hence, the loss of real political representation throughout the municipalities in the entire nation and particularly in northern Mexico was decisive for the Revolution.52 Some of the major leaders belonged to that region, from Francisco Madero and Venustiano Carranza (Coahuila) to Francisco “Pancho” Villa and Felipe Ángeles (Chihuahua) to Álvaro Obregón, Plutarco Elías Calles, and Abelardo L. Rodríguez (Sonora). Furthermore, the loss of land for almost 90 percent of the population in a rural and mainly peasant nation made possible the existence of Emiliano Zapata, the most serious voice for land reform, without concessions to Díaz, Madero, or Carranza during the revolution.53 Security Doctrines and the United States

Under the Treaty of Juárez (May 21, 1911), Díaz resigned from the presidency. Foreign Secretary Francisco de la Barra was designated interim president pending general elections in October. Francisco

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Madero was elected overwhelmingly and he was inaugurated on November 6, 1911. However, according to Charles Cumberland, “on no single day was the Country at full peace under him.”54 One of the worst implications of the election of the Maderista government was the preservation of the Federal Army because it ultimately brought about his assassination. The coup d’état commanded by General Adolfo de la Huerta over Madero was followed by an endorsement of the old regime. For the Federal Army both under Madero and De la Huerta, the threat was the revolutionary forces on the internal front. On the external front, Madero was killed under the complicity of the William Howard Taft administration in the United States, which felt threatened by the weak Mexican leader. Then with a change of power in the United States, De la Huerta confronted the Woodrow Wilson administration, which was upset with his dictatorship. Wilson, a Democratic president, is best remembered in Latin America for his comment, “I am going to teach the South American Republics to elect a good man.”55 As William L. Sherman and Richard E. Greenleaf point out, “If Huerta’s main concern at home was pacification, his international preoccupation was recognition by the United States.”56 Consequently, De la Huerta confronted those two major forces. On the one hand, Venustiano Carranza, the governor of Coahuila founded the Constitutional Army, the base of the actual Mexican armed forces in March 1913. 57 On the other hand, the US president was De la Huerta’s major obstacle. In the end, De la Huerta was unable to govern for those major reasons. The peasant and labor forces were soon incorporated into the Constitutional Army, leading to the overthrow of the dictator De la Huerta. Similarly important, Carranza had the sympathies of President Wilson and access to guns and money in the United States for his cause. Nevertheless, the overthrow of De la Huerta brought no settlement of the civil war in Mexico, which continued to threaten US business interests, and Wilson’s recognition of the Carranza government did not end the problem. The raids of the guerrilla leader Pancho Villa into US territory in March 1916 led Wilson to authorize a punitive expedition under General John J. Pershing. The Mexican Revolution plagued Wilson to the end of his administration. In fact, the conflict coincided with Wilson’s reelection campaign in 1916. It gave strength to the argument that he had vindicated the rights of the country successfully and had kept the United States out of war. However, with the appearance of the Zimmermann Telegram from Germany everything changed. In a proposal

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to the Mexican government to declare war against the United States, the German foreign secretary made the following offer: We intend to begin on the first of February unrestricted submarine warfare. We shall endeavor in spite of this to keep the United States of America neutral. In the event of this not succeeding, we make Mexico a proposal or alliance on the following basis: make war together, make peace together, generous financial support and an understanding on our part that Mexico is to reconquest the lost territory in Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona. The settlement in detail is left to you.58

Based on the Zimmermann Telegram, the United States implemented a pact with Carranza and took part in World War I. This situation changed the dynamics of US military intervention in Mexico in the future because the US government had to give full attention to the European conflict and to be careful about its southern flank with Mexico.59 So the United States had to seriously rethink its relationships with its neighborhood, particularly with Mexico because it meant its own shared security. On the domestic front, Carranza’s legacy relied on the inauguration of a new constitution inspired by the principles of 1857, the organization of the army, and the principles of the foreign policy and defense still alive in Mexico. On November 1, 1918, the Carranza Doctrine was passed, which upheld equality between the states and condemned all intervention in the internal affairs of other nations.60 As president, Carranza securely guarded national interests and called for internal change in the Mexican government. He intended this change to be carried out by Ignacio Bonillas, his handpicked successor, but he failed. Carranza wanted to finish the era of militarism and to erect the preeminence of a civilian order. Mexico was not ready for those changes. Five more generals—Álvaro Obregon (1921–1924), Plutarco Elías Calles (1924–1928), Abelardo L. Rodríguez (1932–1934), Lázaro Cárdenas (1934–1940), and Manuel Ávila Camacho (1940–1946)— had to govern Mexico to make Carranza’s aspirations a reality. Thus, in Mexico, the political architecture was authoritarian in nature and not democratic. In addition, at the base of the regime were the armed forces. Mexico’s internal transformation was about to be challenged, however, by a global war and the nation’s principles, interests, and security doctrines and decisions would need to be redefined.

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World War II: Security Cooperation and Its Limits

The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, was the turning point for an open and aggressive US involvement in World War II. It was a historic opportunity that tested and adjusted an intense relationship of interdependence, geography, and collaboration between the United States, Canada, and Mexico not seen before in the face of a common external threat: Japan and Germany. Each nation was advancing a reaffirmation of its identity, institutions, and interests that shaped its foreign policy, doctrine, war plans, and national security structures. For the nations of North America, Germany and Japan proved to be threats not only to the United States but also to Canada and Mexico.61 Consistent with its history, the United States had anticipated a continental defense and security relationship with Canada and Mexico before its full entry into World War II. The radius of operation of this vital defense focused on the regional level; thus, cooperation with Canada and Mexico was vital to secure US borders, air space, sea-lanes, and territory. Thus, the development of a continental theater of operations that included a comprehensive vision of hemispheric defense was key to US security strategy. Furthermore, the recent lessons of the Great Depression demonstrated the vulnerability of the United States and the importance of obtaining hemispheric allies after a period of US military intervention. Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Good Neighbor Policy set the stage for increased security cooperation before and during World War II. These initiatives were consistent with the basic policy represented in the Monroe Doctrine: to prioritize the strategic interests of the United States throughout the Western Hemisphere and keep threats to its economic, political, and military security out of the region. The intensity in processing and maturation of North American security relations was forced to some degree by external circumstances created by World War II and the recognition of external threats to each nation’s security. This had not happened before the war. However, wartime cooperation at the highest level allowed the convergence of dialogue, interests, and instruments of cooperation through institution building to occur throughout the war. Mexico, like Canada, developed a binational defense policy with the US War Department. However, the level of cooperation of Mexico with the United States was less intense than that of Canada, which opened the

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possibility of a long-range binational security relationship that would last well into the second half of the twentieth century. The truth is that participation among the three nations in the global, regional, and bilateral levels had powerful implications for refining their strategies on national security, defense, and foreign policy. Perimeter Defense During World War II

In one sense, the concept of a perimeter defense of the Western Hemisphere that emerged during World War II was not anything new. The United States had been committed, in principle, to the proposition that no foreign (meaning European) power be allowed to extend its influence over the Americas since the Monroe Doctrine. German intrigue and Mexican responses during World War I demonstrated that the concern was not unfounded. With the buildup of Nazi Germany’s military prowess in the 1930s and its ability to project military power and influence, the United States reiterated its intention to prevent a foreign military presence in the region.62 During World War II, the United States was concerned that the Axis powers could open up a third theater of operations in the Western Hemisphere. Thus, perimeter defense at this time was viewed as continental defense of the Americas, extending from Canada to Argentina. Prior to its entry into the war, the United States had begun to negotiate basing rights with a number of Latin American countries, which would allow the United States to project military power throughout the hemisphere to protect its Latin American neighbors. The US conception of continental defense also included Canada since Canada’s entry into the war in 1939, and its commitment of military forces to Great Britain, left the nation exposed to a foreign attack.63 Yet continental defense did not infer a sharing of security interests by states in the Western Hemisphere. There was no agreed upon “perimeter” that required defending. In fact, many Latin American nations, with military regimes, were skeptical of US interests in the region, with some leaders leaning toward fascism and pro-German sentiments.64 Even in Mexico, there was a small, neo-Nazi movement, called the “Gold Shirts,” founded by a Mexican Army general Nicolás Rodríguez.65 Suffice it to say that, “all of the measures planned and taken in the name of hemisphere defense, including those taken during 1941 for the salvation of Great Britain and the British lifeline across the North Atlantic, had the fundamental objective of promoting the security of the United States itself.”66

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The terrorist attacks of 9/11 brought about a dusting off of these wartime collaborations and discussions promoted by the United States, harkening back to the idea of the development of a new continental security defense perimeter in North America. However, just as the delineation and context of the security perimeter proved elusive during World War II, it again proved difficult to establish in the contemporary security environment given differing perceptions of the threat and each nation’s own security interests and identity, making formal institutional mechanisms difficult to establish. US-Mexico Security Cooperation

The Franklin D. Roosevelt administration cautiously enacted the Good Neighbor Policy in the Americas. Indeed, policymakers sought to reshape Theodore Roosevelt’s Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine in place by the end of the Spanish-American War of 1898, where the United States developed an interventionist and tutelage policy toward Latin American nations.67 World War I evinced two major differences for the United States between the wars against Mexico (1846–1848) and Spain (1898) vis-à-vis Germany and Italy: (1) a global conflict overseas meant several internal risks; and (2) the volatile dynamic of an anarchic international system incarnated by imperial disputes directly challenged the US homeland. Hence, the Good Neighbor Policy had the implicit purpose of strengthening a continental defense led by US interests in the Western Hemisphere through a more sophisticated policy in the region that would attract cooperation, rather than coerce it. An example in this direction was Mexican president Lázaro Cárdenas’s decision to expropriate all foreign oil industry holdings in 1938, where the United States responded by not intervening in Mexico and thus preserved a noninterventionist policy. The Frankin D. Roosevelt administration’s response to Mexico’s actions was viewed positively by other Latin American nations and thus contributed to security cooperation in the light of World War II. Mexico was a key component in the new hemispheric approach since it was the southern flank of the United States, the “soft underbelly” that Roosevelt feared if Germany sought a third front in the war. Accordingly, the Roosevelt administration pointed out at the Seventh Pan-American Conference that “no state has the right to intervene in the international or external affairs of another,” despite the fact that military intervention was requested by some US business sectors after the oil expropriation in Mexico.68

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In fact, the US government’s respect of the Cárdenas administration’s policies allowed Mexico to reaffirm its sovereignty, nationalism, and foreign policy of nonintervention—indispensable ingredients in the institutionalization of the Mexican presidency and the armed forces. Paradoxically, all these factors helped in the creation of a Mexican national security system on the one hand. On the other, it was the natural evolution toward institutionalization of Mexico’s political structure inaugurated since the 1920s. Once the United States began to take part in World War II, both countries already had an agreement of understanding and cooperation. Furthermore, President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Lend-Lease policy brought direct military assistance to Mexico, whereby the United States provided weapons, ammunition, and other equipment to countries involved in the conflict. Concurrently, the Mexican Army, Air Force, and Navy received light weapons, armored vehicles, trucks, light artillery, aircraft, transmission equipment, and diverse material from the United States, which enabled the Mexican armed forces to modernize their “obsolete military equipment.”69 The Mexican military’s institutional response to World War II was the creation of three new commands: the General Command from the Pacific Region, led by General Lázaro Cárdenas, with its headquarters at Mazatlán, Sinaloa; the Command of the Gulf Region, led by General Abelardo L. Rodríguez with headquarters at Veracruz, Veracruz; and the Command from the Tehuantepec Isthmus, with headquarters at Ciudad Ixtepec, Oaxaca, led by Mayor General Joaquín Amaro. The commanders were two former presidents of the republic and the leading figure of the Mexican Army’s educational reformation, Joaquín Amaro. During the war, US troops crossed the border to enhance “collaboration” in Baja California Norte, Mexico. This became a delicate and sensitive event because it represented the most sensitive factor regarding cooperation and Mexican sovereignty—the presence of US military on Mexican soil, which had not occurred except during the war of 1846–1848 and the 1914 and 1916 interventions. General Cárdenas (then minister of defense), supported by a leading strategist and thinker, Coronel Luis Alamillo Flores, responded to the situation. Major Arturo Dávila Caballero was the officer responsible for identifying US troops on Mexican soil and General Cárdenas implemented negotiations with General John L. de Witte, commander from the US Fourth Army, for the swift extradition of the service members back to the United States, without incident.

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As far as Mexico’s direct involvement in World War II, General Cárdenas initiated the restructuring of the military, including the shift in January 28, 1942, of the former Military Technical Direction to a Technical Commission subordinated in administrative terms to the minister of defense and to the joint chief of staff in technical matters. Previously, on January 12, 1942, President General Manuel Ávila Camacho had reformed the Organic Laws of Army and Navy (1926) respectively to modify the role of the joint chief of staff. On April 15, 1942, the Mexican presidency, in a clear commitment of Mexico’s engagement with the Allied effort during World War II, expanded the role of the joint chief to serve as a special assistant to the president in preparation of the military, economic, and legal organization of Mexico’s war effort. It is vital to note that with the end of the war the joint chief of staff (estado mayor presidencial) reassumed its original technical support to the president of Mexico.70 Mexico’s entry into World War II brought a significant transformation of the role of the armed forces, including the incorporation of new equipment and doctrine. It meant a significant change for the Mexican Air Force and a new school of aviation in Monterrey, Nuevo León. A similar transformation occurred for the Mexican Army, with infantry units that supported the Regional Guard, now being tasked with support of keeping public peace in all the country. As Mexico prepared its military to support an external war, the Ministry of Defense issued a general provision for all inhabitants of the republic and established a General Defense Plan in order to solve two basic problems: “A. Defense of the homeland against possible aggression, with its own resources, and B. Cooperation between its Armed Forces and those of other nations, if necessary, to defend the American Continent.” 71 Based on these new security responsibilities, the military was being fully incorporated with the civil component of the entire nation in order to provide technical support in transmissions and communications in order to better link the regional headquarters with central Mexico. Certainly, the turning point in the bilateral cooperation with the United States was the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, which impacted the reorganization of Mexican regional commands in Ensenada, Baja California, Mazatlán, the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, and the Gulf of Mexico, whose main objective was to anticipate a Japanese attack in the Pacific or from Germany in the Gulf of Mexico. It also meant a complete reorganization of the Mexican military, including the air force, navy, and army, led by General Cárdenas. As a matter

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of fact, World War II pressed Mexican strategists to introduce the concept of continental defense and develop interoperability capabilities not widely developed in their doctrines such as providing the Mexican president the information necessary for defense decisionmaking through the joint chief of staff. The war also opened an equation even more complex for the Mexican Navy as it inevitably forced the Mexican government to undertake the matter of defense coordination with the US government, granting it the status of a nonbelligerent force with all nations participating as partners with the United States and emphasizing the coming diplomatic rupture with Japan, Germany, and Italy and their allies. These changes paved the way for Mexico’s entry into World War II. The key moment for the formalization of common defense policies between Mexico and the United States was the rise of war in the Atlantic in 1942. On May 13, 1942, the Mexican merchant ship, El Potrero del Llano, was torpedoed and sunk by Germany, with fifteen Mexican casualties. The Mexican Foreign Ministry petitioned Germany, Italy, and Japan to pay compensation for the damages and thus preserve the country’s national honor. However, Germany refused to receive the note and Italy and Japan did not respond. On May 20, 1942, La Faja de Oro was sunk near Key West, Florida, killing eight Mexican crewmembers. Accordingly, a proposal from the minister of foreign relations that Mexico declare a state of war since May 22, was submitted to Congress on May 28. Two days later, Congress endorsed the declaration of war and on June 1, a decree was published abolishing individual rights provided in the Mexican Constitution, as Mexico entered into a state of war with the Axis powers.72 Institutionalization of Mexico’s political process and the establishment of effective political leadership in Mexico under the party system established by former president Plutarco Calles was a positive development for the United States. During World War II the United States was anxious to establish practical coordination at the highest level with its partner through the Joint US-Mexico Defense Commission, which was to aid the United States in solidifying the concept of continental defense to include reshaping the air, sea, and land spaces of Mexico. Consequently, the Ávila Camacho administration was forced to respond and collaborate effectively with the United States in a concept of common defense and continental security with Canada and other Latin American countries in order to repel a possible invasion from Japan, Germany, or Italy in the Western Hemisphere.

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This meant a revolution for Mexican war doctrine, released the following year by General Luis Alamillo Flores, Mexico’s leading defense strategist. In 1943, the Mexican Doctrine of War was published, delineating not only doctrinal, institutional, and legal foundations for the Mexican armed forces in an external conflict but also internal security and the broader concept of national security embodied by the presidential institution and the new role of the joint chief of staff. General Luis Alamillo wrote in the Mexican Doctrine of War that the Mexican armed forces were loyal to the presidential institution headed by President Ávila Camacho and sculpted by the leadership, vision, and ability to build consensus by General Cárdenas. This doctrine stated that the Mexican defense primarily remains in the field of internal security and that only in extreme circumstances, such as when independence or national sovereignty are at risk, the armed forces would participate in an act of war abroad. At that moment, during World War II, Japan and Germany were identified as threats to the integrity of national sovereignty. Similarly, it was noted that Mexico should not pursue a war with the United States, taking into account the war of 1846–1848. It also endorsed the principles of self-determination and sovereignty as essential to contain the United States in order to prevent it from intervening on Mexican soil under the guise of continental defense or hemispheric security. For example, members of the US military, if allowed to operate in Mexico during the war, would not be allowed to wear their respective service uniforms. 73 This was a sensitive issue for Mexico, mainly because the United States was interested in extending the security perimeter into Mexican air space and establishing a continental defense structure from Canada to Mexico and farther into Central and South America. In this regard, the United States sought to be consistent with the concept and practice of hemispheric defense and justified the extension of a common security zone in the Americas so that it could simultaneously support its wartime activity in both Europe and Asia more fully. Direct wartime cooperation between the militaries of the United States and Mexico was limited due to President Ávila Camacho’s effort to outlaw direct Mexican military participation in the war; however, in July 1943, Mexican foreign secretary Padilla and US ambassador George Messersmith began discussions over the involvement of a Mexican air unit in combat operations in the Pacific. The subject was brought up by General Cárdenas at the Joint Mexican-US Defense Commission (JMUSDC) meeting in September 1943. In

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June 1944, a Mexican combat aviation squadron traveled to the United States for training. In April 1945, Escuadrón de Pelea 201 of the Mexican Expeditionary Air Force arrived at Clark Air Force Base in the Philippines, armed with twenty-five Republic P-47 Thunderboldts. Thirty-two Mexican pilots flew over 700 combat missions in the Pacific theater, suffering seven casualties.74 US-Canada Security Relationship

Canada’s involvement in World War II was very different from that followed by Mexico because it took part alongside Great Britain from the outset of the war, fully two years before the United States. However, in 1940, the Department of Foreign Affairs urged the leadership to anticipate the eventual US entry into World War II and plan for a broader coordination of joint continental security: “Therefore, Canada’s best chance of maintaining her national existence is the frank admission from the beginning that her defense must be worked out in cooperation with the United States, on the basis of a single continental defense policy. The emphasis must therefore be on continental effort rather than on national effort.” 75 Continental defense arrangements were formalized during a meeting in Ogdensburg, New York, on August 18, 1940, between President Franklin D. Roosevelt and Prime Minister Mackenzie King. During this meeting, Roosevelt and King formalized what has become known as the Ogdensburg Agreement. This agreement, according to Canadian historian Donald Creighton, “effectively bound Canada to a continental system and largely determined Canadian foreign and defense policy for the next thirty years.”76 This involved a tacit agreement of cooperation from the United States in not only providing weapons and resources required by Canada to participate more effectively in the war but sharing in weapons production between the two nations. The agreement, which created the Permanent Joint Board of Defense, did raise some concerns in London. Winston Churchill himself was concerned about a Commonwealth nation making an agreement for hemispheric defense without the participation of Great Britain.77 The effect of the agreement, which had no official documentation outside of a press release, marked the beginning of a US-Canada defense agreement, which would form the basis of the longest lasting and strongest security community in the world.78 World War II institutionalized a closer collaboration between the United States and Canada on a number of fronts related to support of

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the war effort, for example, the construction of the Alaska-Canadian (ALCAN) Highway; shared production of military hardware, equipment, joint operations, and training; and the beginning of interoperability between the two militaries. For its part, the First Special Service Force formed a binational structure for joint action, including shared training, tactics, and uniforms of both countries in the war with joint combat action in Italy.79 Additional joint and combined experience was incorporated by naval and air components with the participation of the British in the North Atlantic in the defense of Canada. Similarly, the Royal Canadian Air Force participated in joint attacks against Japan and in the assault on Kiska Island. Collaborative training peaked as the Canadian military sought to integrate US technology and military equipment into the Canadian armed forces. This technological collaboration also intensified economic interdependence driven by the wartime civilian sector that would give greater dynamism to the bilateral relationship in the context of continental defense. US-Canadian wartime cooperation was taken a step further with the Hyde Park Agreement in 1941. This agreement set in place the principle that “each country should provide the other with defense articles which it is best able to produce, and above all, produce quickly, and that production programs should be coordinated to this end.”80 It marked the beginning of a defense manufacturing agreement between Canada and the United States that had set the course since 1941 for a coordinated and shared defense industrial program, which ensured a high degree of cooperation and interoperability between US and Canadian military forces. The attack on Pearl Harbor accelerated the agreements established by the joint defense plan, which provided for the exchange of staffs. In March 1942, Canadian General Pope was sent to Washington, DC, as Canada’s main contact with the Combined Chiefs of Staff organization. His main purpose was to maintain contact with US Allied forces and to garnish as much information as possible. This informal arrangement did provide Canada with some degree of access, but the ad hoc nature of the entire arrangement did not guarantee Canadian influence in US military decisionmaking: “Since responsibility for the coordination of the war effort in the North American area had been assumed by the Canadian and United States Chiefs of Staff, the establishment of the Canadian Joint Staff in Washington, DC, made it possible to relegate the Permanent Joint Board on Defense to the role for which it had apparently been intended, the

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preparation and revision of long-range defense plans and projects.”81 In the prelude to the end of the war, the Permanent Joint Board on Defense began to consider peacetime cooperation between the two nations. The joint participation in the war had brought about a special relationship between the United States and Canada where the maturation of the binational nature of the security relationship created a mutual understanding and the need to build a long-term commitment that was based on common threats from abroad but which respected the integrity and sovereignty of each other.

Conclusion

It is important to identify the profound changes in ideas and actions in US security policy ranging from isolationism to internationalism that occurred since 1933.82 The Good Neighbor Policy was intended to help construct a hemispheric defense relationship with countries in the region before the United States entered into World War II. If Germany had defeated Britain and France and then threatened the Americas, the United States had a clear purpose and objective: Before it entered World War II, the United States had committed itself to defend or help defend the entire land area of the Western Hemisphere against military attack from the Old World. In the course of planning for this purpose, the United States Government had defined the hemisphere as including the land masses of North and South America plus Greenland, Bermuda, and the Falklands (but not Iceland or the Azores) in the Atlantic area, and all islands east of the 180th meridian and all of the Aleutians in the Pacific.83

Accordingly, as a result of the Axis threat during World War II, the United States adjusted its views on isolationism and interventionism, due to its perceived sense of vulnerability and insecurity in the air and maritime spaces of the Atlantic and Pacific. Therefore, from 1942 onward, the United States decided to promote bilateral relations at the highest level with both Canada and Mexico and the nations in the rest of the hemisphere on the way to forming a common continental defense structure. The United States desired that Canada and Mexico adopt a similar perception of vulnerability and insecurity to their respective maritime areas and air and land spaces due to their common geographic area and threat perception. Thus, during World War II, and as a theoretical matter for this book, the countries of

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North America shared a similar threat perception in the formation of a regional security complex; however, it was a relationship where the countries were expected to cooperate in a regional context under bilateral US-led institutions, not in a trilateral dimension. Consequently, the United States was able to redefine its ideals and principles of the Monroe Doctrine and hemispheric defense during World War II and, as such, the United States reaffirmed its security primacy in the Western Hemisphere. US relations with Mexico and Canada followed different paths of cooperation and interdependence during the war and after. Canada was able to move forward with a formal binational security relationship with the United States in defense of North America. Mexico, however, did not participate in the large impulses of hemispheric defense. For the new postwar president, Miguel Alemán Valdés (the first civilian in years, conferred in 1946), the central mission for the armed forces was internal security and defense of Mexican sovereignty. Another main concern was the civil-military pact between the armed forces and the civilian order, crucial in the years to come, to keep stability within the Mexican political system itself.84

Notes 1. In Mexico, there is academic and political resistance to examining sovereignty beyond internal and state considerations. New knowledge in the field is challenging this narrow approach and extending the scope to a more comprehensive view led by RSCT. 2. Ernest R. Moy, “National Security in American History,” in Graham Allison and Gregory F. Treverton, ed., Rethinking America’s Security: Beyond Cold War to New World Order (New York: W. W. Norton, 1992), 94–95. 3. See Eliot A. Cohen, Conquered into Liberty: Two Centuries of Battles Along the Great Warpath That Made the American Way of War (New York: Free Press, 2011). 4. Barry Buzan and Ole Waever, Regions and Powers: The Structure of International Security (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 44. 5. Robert Maryse, Negotiating NAFTA: Explaining the Outcome in Culture, Textiles, Autos, and Pharmaceuticals (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2000), 25–26. 6. Lorenzo Meyer, La Segunda Muerte de la Revolución Mexicana (Mexico City: Cal y Arena, 1992), 259. 7. Josefina Zoraida Vázquez and Lorenzo Meyer, México frente a Estados Unidos: un ensayo histórico 1776–1988 (Mexico City: Fondo de Cultura Económica, 1989), 9.

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8. The United States acquired Alaska from the Russian Empire, not Canada or Great Britain, in 1867. 9. J. L. Finlay and D. N. Sprague, The Structure of Canadian History, 2nd edition (Scarborough, Ontario: Prentice-Hall Canada, 1984), 74–76. 10. See Edwin P. Hoyt, America’s Wars and Military Excursions (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1987); Jerry K. Sweeney, A Handbook of American Military History: From the Revolutionary War to the Present (Boulder: Westview, 1996). 11. Patrick Malcolmson and Richard Myers, The Canadian Regime: An Introduction to Parliamentary Government in Canada (Toronto: Broadview, 2005), 19. 12. Matthew Spalding, ed., The Founder’s Almanac: A Practical Guide to the Notable Events, Greatest Leaders and Most Eloquent Words of the American Founding (Washington, DC: Heritage Foundation, 2002), 234. 13. “Letter from the Federal Convention President to the President of Congress, Transmitting the Constitution,” September 17, 1787, www.constitutionfacts.com/content/constitution/files/Transmittal_Letter.pdf, accessed December 22, 2010. 14. Sidney M. Milkis and Michael Nelson, The American Presidency: Origins and Transformations, 1776–2002 (Washington, DC: CQ Press, 2003), 1. 15. Ibid., 3. 16. David Rothkopf, Running the World: The Inside Story of the National Security Council and the Architects of American Power (New York: Public Affairs, 2004), 26; Saul Landau, The Dangerous Doctrine: National Security and US Foreign Policy (Boulder: Westview, 1988), 13. 17. Max Farrand, ed., The Records of the Federal Convention of 1787, vol. 2 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1911). 18. Milkis and Nelson, The American Presidency, 43. 19. Ibid., 3. 20. See Jackson Turner Main, The Antifederalists: Critics of the Constitution, 1781–1788 (Chicago: Quadrangle, 1961). 21. “1812–1814 UK-US War,” War of 1812 website, www.warof1812.ca/, accessed November 26, 2010. 22. James West Davidson et al., Nation of Nations: A Narrative History of the American Republic, 5th edition (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1990), 195. 23. “George Washington’s First Inaugural Address, April 30, 1789,” www.archives.gov, accessed November 26, 2010. 24. See Bernard W. Sheehan, “Jefferson’s ‘Empire for Liberty,’” Indiana Magazine of History 100, no. 4 (December 2004): 346–363. 25. This was probably the earliest embodiment of the concept of perimeter defense in North America. 26. Davidson et al., Nation of Nations, 329. 27. Ibid., 328. 28. Ibid., 329. 29. Timothy J. Henderson, A Glorious Defeat: Mexico and Its War with the United States (New York: Hill and Wang, 2007), 73. 30. “The Monroe Doctrine,” http://bartleby.com/43/29.html, accessed November 26, 2010.

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31. Ibid. 32. See Peter H. Smith, Talons of the Eagle: Dynamics of US–Latin American Relations (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996). 33. “The Monroe Doctrine.” 34. Quoted in Milkis and Nelson, The American Presidency, 113. 35. Ibid. 36. See Seymour Martin Lipset, American Exceptionalism: A Doubleedged Sword (New York: W. W. Norton, 1997). 37. Davidson, et al., Nation of Nations, 195. 38. “George Washington 1789 Inaugural Address,” April 30, 1789, www.american-presidents.com/george-washington/1789-inaugural-address, accessed November 26, 2010. 39. See John L. O’Sullivan, “The Great Nation of Futurity,” United States Democratic Review 6, no. 23 (November 1839): 426–430, www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/osulliva.htm, accessed December 23, 2010. 40. “John Winthrop’s City upon a Hill, 1630,” www.mtholyoke.edu /acad/intrel/winthrop.htm, accessed December 23, 2010. 41. O’Sullivan, “The Great Nation of Futurity.” 42. “The US-Mexican War,” Public Broadcasting System, n.d., www.pbs .org/kpbs/theborder/history/timeline/5.html, accessed November 26, 2010. 43. “Mexican-American War,” http://dmoz.org/Society/History/By _Time_Period/Nineteenth_Century/Wars_and_Conflicts/Mexican-American _War/, accessed November 26, 2010. 44. Quoted in Milkis and Nelson, The American Presidency, 139. 45. Henderson, A Glorious Defeat, 133–179. 46. In November 1993, the ratification of NAFTA by the House of Representatives was considered in Washington, DC, as the second most important historic event between both nations since the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. Sidney Weintraub and Julius L. Katz, NAFTA at Three: A Progress Report (Washington, DC: Center for Strategic and International Studies, 1997); “Treaty with Mexico (February 2, 1848),” www.mexica.net/guadhida.php, accessed June 26, 2012. 47. George C. Herring, From Colony to Superpower: US Foreign Relations Since 1776 (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008), 176. 48. The Mexican military, however, continued to view the United States as its principal threat, leading to a strong nationalistic identity, particularly in the army, that avoided any formal security alliance or relationship with the United States for decades. Even as late as the 1990s, when the United States was fighting in the Gulf War, the Mexican Army continued to conduct training exercises and staff drills in its senior military schools focused on the threat of a US invasion. 49. Raúl Benítez, “Sovereignity, Foreign Policy and National Security in Mexico, 1821–1989,” in H. P. Klepak, ed., Natural Allies? Canadian and Mexican Perspectives on International Security (Ottawa: Carleton University Press, 1996), 57–87. 50. Smith, Talons of the Eagle, 23. 51. The Porfiriato was the name given to Díaz’s regime, which lasted from 1876 to 1911, the start of the Mexican Revolution.

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52. There is a consensus among historians and political scientists about the social roots of the Mexican Revolution and its impact on northern Mexico. For Katz, the Mexican Revolution is unique in Latin America because the people from northern Mexico benefited from the economic growth linked to the US economy during the Porfiriato. Friedrich Katz, The Secret War in Mexico: Europe, the United States and the Mexican Revolution (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1981), 4. 53. Adolfo Gilly, La Revolución Mexicana (Mexico City: Ediciones el Caballito, 1980), 34. 54. Charles Cumberland, The Mexican Revolution: Genesis Under Madero (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1952), 248. 55. Burton J. Hendrick, Life and Letters of Walter H. Page (New York: Doubleday, Page, 1922), 204–205. 56. William L. Sherman and Richard E. Greenleaf, Victoriano Huerta a Reappraisal (Mexico City: Centro de Estudios Mexicanos, 1960), 123. 57. El Ejército Mexicano (Mexico City: Secretaría de la Defensa Nacional, 1979), 361. 58. “Teaching with Documents: The Zimmermann Telegram,” coded telegram, National Archives, www.archives.gov/education/lessons/zimmermann, accessed June 26, 2012. 59. An extraordinary account of documents about the episode can be seen in Edward Buehring, Woodrow Wilson and the Balance of Power (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1955). 60. Cancilleres de México, Tomo 2 (Mexico City: Secretaría de Relaciones Exteriores, 1992), 213. 61. It is important to note that Canada entered the war on September 10, 1939, one week after Great Britain. Canadian involvement in the war was in large part in support of ties to the British Crown. A formalized military alliance with the United States took place in 1940 with the signing of the Ogdensburg Agreement. 62. Stetson Conn, Rose C. Engleman, and Byron Fairchild, Guarding the United States and Its Outposts (Washington, DC: Center for Military History, 2000), 3. 63. Ibid., 7. 64. Argentina, Brazil, and Chile all had military regimes in power at the start of World War II, which initially leaned toward supporting Germany or remaining neutral but eventually sided with the Allies after the US entry into the war and Germany’s changing fortunes. Gregory Weeks, US and Latin American Relations (New York: Pearson Longman, 2008), 95. 65. Edwin Lieuwen, Arms and Politics in Latin America (New York: Praeger, 1960), 119. 66. Conn, Engleman, and Fairchild, Guarding the United States, 4. 67. The Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine, articulated by President Theodore Roosevelt in 1904, advocated a more muscular US foreign policy in Latin America, where the United States would intervene militarily when necessary to promote its interests and provide stability in chronically unstable countries such as Nicaragua. The occupation of Nicaragua by

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the US Marine Corps from 1912 to 1933 embodied Roosevelt’s ideals. Robert H. Holden and Eric Zolov, Latin America and the United States: A Documentary Record (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000), 103–106. 68. Lorenzo Meyer, “La Construcción histórica de la Soberanía y del Nacionalismo Mexicanos,” in Ilán Bizberg, ed., México ante el fin de la Guerra Fría (Mexico City: El Colegio de México Press, 1998), 698. 69. Author’s translation from El Ejército Mexicano, 490–494. 70. El Estado Mayor Presidencial, Cumplir con Institucionalidad (Mexico City: Edición Estado Mayor Presidencial, 2006), 15–16. 71. Luis Garfias Magaña, El Ejército y Fuerza Aérea Mexicanos, Tomo 2 (Mexico City: Secretaría de la Defensa Nacional, 1979), 444. 72. El Aspecto Naval de la Segunda Guerra Mundial (Mexico City: Secretaría de Marina, n.d.); Capítulo 9, “La Participación de México en la Segunda Guerra Mundial,” 177–179; Vicealmirante IMN Mario Lavalle Argudín, La Armada en el México Independiente (Mexico City: Instituto Nacional de Estudios Históricos de la Revolución Mexicana, Secretaría de Marina, Centro de Estudios Superiores Navales de México, 1985), 261–263. 73. In fact, US Army Air Corps personnel working in Mexico during the war at Mexican Air Force bases were required to wear Pan American Airways uniforms. Raymond Estep, United States Military Aid to Latin America (Montgomery, AL: Air University Press, September 1966), 209. 74. Adrian J. English, Armed Forces of Latin America (London: Jane’s, 1984), 318. 75. Stetson Conn and Byron Fairchild, United States Army in World War II, the Western Hemisphere: Framework of Hemisphere Defense (Washington, DC: Center of Military History, 1989), 368. 76. Cited in Finlay and Sprague, The Structure of Canadian History, 383. 77. C. P. Stacey, Canada and the Age of Conflict: Volume 2, 1921–1948 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1981), 311. 78. See Emanuel Adler and Michael Barnett, ed., Security Communities (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998). 79. Properly designated as the 1st Special Service Force, the Devil’s Brigade was a joint World War II US-Canadian commando unit trained at Fort Harrison near Helena, Montana. 80. Conn and Fairchild, United States Army in World War II, 408. 81. Ibid., 407–408. 82. Jeffrey W. Legro, “Whence American Internationalism,” International Organization 54, no. 2 (Spring 2000): 261. 83. Conn and Fairchild, United States Army in World War II, 410. 84. Raúl Benítez Manaut, “Introduction,” in Ernesto Ledesma Arronte, Gustavo E. Castro Soto, and Tedford Lewis, ed., Always Near, Always Far: The Armed Forces in Mexico (San Francisco: Global Exchange, 2000), xv–xxviii.

4 New Global Security and Regional Cooperation

Following World War II, there began a movement away from a strictly state-centric view of national interest to a more global view toward the growth of international institutions as the means to best provide security in the Cold War era. This new orientation toward security came about as a result of the shift from the threat of the Axis powers to the new threat of Soviet communism. Politicians within the United States were divided on whether to follow a “universalist” approach or a “regionalist” approach in promoting new collective security regimes against the new threat. The universalists in the Harry Truman administration, led by Secretary of State Edward Stettinius, advocated for the formation of the United Nations as the principal means of providing for a post–World War II security arrangement for managing conflict, both globally and regionally, through collective security. The regionalists were headed by the undersecretary of state for Latin America, Nelson Rockefeller, who advocated for a new security regime for the Western Hemisphere (but still under US leadership) where states within the region could deal with their particular security concerns and not be subjected to powers outside the region.1 What was clear from the dialogue and discussion within the Truman administration was that the United States would not return to an isolationist foreign policy of disengagement from international affairs as it did following World War I. Neither would it repeat the mistakes of the failure of the League of Nations, by not supporting the new United Nations initiative and providing it with the necessary support to truly act as an international body capable of supporting 73

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collective security policies. The United States would now take a lead role in determining security relations globally, which would have an impact regionally as well. For Canada, this meant a further convergence of its national security interests with the United States in forming new bilateral and multilateral security institutions. For Mexico, this meant a divergence of security interests away from North America and the United States, and closer to other Latin American nations as they sought more autonomy from US influence.

Post–World War II Security Relations

For Mexico, and other Latin American states, the end of World War II signaled a change in the international security environment that would have a significant impact on the region as a whole. Recognizing a need to be proactive in trying to influence the structure of the new emerging security relationships, particularly with regard to the United States, a conference was held in Mexico City in 1945. The Chapultepec Conference (as it was called) was an attempt by the Latin American nations to influence the United States toward recognizing the need for maintaining a separate security arrangement for the hemisphere and not putting all hopes in the newly formed UN. The conference further provided a forum for states throughout Latin America to present their views to the United States and each other on a wide range of topics, from security to economic development and modernization. Then Mexican foreign minister Ezequiel Padilla emphasized the need for the Chapultepec Conference to not just address security issues but rather to focus on economic issues as paramount to regional concerns. He saw this as critical in order to deal with the semicolonial relationships that had formed in the region. In the post–World War II era, Padilla was further looking for more concrete forms of economic assistance from the United States to address these concerns of perceived unfair trade practices and US economic hegemony over the region.2 In the end, the conference produced the framework for regional security cooperation, which was formalized three years later with the formation of the Organization of American States (OAS).3 For the Truman administration, the post–World War II security environment, with its focus on containment policies and the rebuilding of Europe under the Marshall Plan, demanded a large-scale eco-

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nomic, political, and military commitment outside of the hemisphere, leaving few resources to commit to Latin American nations. Mexico, Brazil, and other nations in the region, which had supported the Allies during the war, expected some recognition and reward for their support from the United States along the lines of a Marshall Plan for the hemisphere. 4 While they had not experienced the physical devastation during the war that Europe had experienced, they were reeling economically due to the war’s repercussions on the international economy. To these demands, Truman is credited as saying essentially that the Monroe Doctrine, with its history of US “investment and support” in Latin America, had been the region’s Marshall Plan and thus there was no need for any large infusion of US economic aid to Latin America after World War II.5 New Hemispheric Security Institutions

The foundations for a hemispheric security relationship that were begun in Mexico City in 1945 were expanded on in Rio de Janeiro in 1947 with the signing of the Inter-American Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance (Rio Treaty). The United States achieved its goal of uniting the nations in the region under the umbrella of a collective security agreement that did not challenge the newly forming United Nations structure but rather operated in accord with Article 51 of the UN Charter, which allowed for the principle of self-defense.6 Mexico was a signatory to the Rio Treaty but later did not sign the follow-on 1952 Inter-American Reciprocal Aid Treaty, which sought to formalize the Rio Treaty in a military assistance pact between the nations in the region and the United States.7 Mexico did not want to be tied to any formal defense treaty with the United States that required the commitment of Mexico’s armed forces to any mission other than its own self-defense, or one that would allow the United States the ability to intervene militarily in Mexico.8 This formula allowed the Mexican government the ability to protect its sovereignty and allow its military the freedom to pursue its main mission of internal defense. In 1948, Mexico did join with nineteen other Latin American nations and the United States in supporting the formation of the Organization of American States, with the signing of the OAS Charter in Bogotá, Colombia. Mexico, and the other Latin American states, saw the OAS as a means to counter US influence in the region and provide a political forum for decisionmaking and conflict reso-

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lution apart from the collective defense structure of the Rio Treaty. The OAS provided the institutional means for political discourse and the expansion of hemispheric cooperation on a number of issues, including economic, social, and cultural development. Mexico viewed its participation in the OAS as more in line with its interests rather than those of the United States. Throughout the Cold War, Mexico was not afraid to openly oppose US positions within the OAS (and the United Nations), including US policies related to Cuba and voting against the US invasion of the Dominican Republic in 1965.9 Although, in private, Mexico’s leaders could agree with the United States on matters of security and foreign policy.10 During the Cold War period, the OAS was a forum for discussion of regional issues among member states, including security. Most of the security dialogue was shaped by the broader Cold War context and implications for the region such as the Central American wars in the 1980s. The overthrow of the US-supported general Anastasio Somoza Debayle in Nicaragua in 1979 brought the Marxist Sandinista Front for National Liberation (FLSN, or Sandinistas) to power. With Cuban and Soviet backing, the Sandinistas sought to spread revolution to other countries in the Central American region, including El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala. The United States, under President Ronald Reagan, sought to “roll back” the Sandinista revolution by fighting a proxy war in Central America, providing military support and training to friendly military regimes in the region.11 The main US effort was centered on El Salvador, where the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (FMLN), with Sandinista support, threatened to take over the country. The US government supported the Salvadoran military with direct aid, providing US military advisers on the ground as well as material and logistical support for combat operations. At the same time, it indirectly aided the counterrevolutionary movement (Contras) in Nicaragua in their efforts to overthrow the Sandinista regime. 12 Most of the US military support in the region was provided through the establishment of a temporary operational base at Soto Cano Air Base in Honduras, co-located with the Honduran Air Force Academy in Palmerola. That base still exists today, housing the 600 members of the US Joint Task Force Bravo (JTF-B), under the control of the US Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) based in Miami.13 Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, Mexican presidents, such as Luis Echeverría Álvarez and José López Portillo, viewed US inter-

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ventions in Latin America with concern. Along with the Mexican military, Mexico’s leftist political leaders saw the revolutions occurring in neighboring states, such as Guatemala and Nicaragua, as of national concern to Mexico. The Guatemalan military frequently crossed into Mexican territory in pursuit of rebel groups, violating Mexican sovereignty. As a result of US policy to support military regimes, such as those in Guatemala during the Cold War, the Mexican armed forces (particularly the army) sought to reexamine Mexico’s national security doctrine toward the United States.14 When the OAS could not reach a consensus on how to respond to the growing crisis in Central America, nations within the region took it upon themselves to generate new response mechanisms, rather than seek to form new institutions. Mexico took a lead role in forming the Contadora Group. The group was named after an island off of Panama, where the leaders of Mexico, Colombia, Panama, and Venezuela first met in 1983 to discuss the growing security problems of Central America. Working outside of the OAS structure allowed the Contadora Group members greater freedom of action apart from US influence and a venue where their efforts were viewed by other nations in the region and in the larger international community as being impartial. This effort gave rise to other ad hoc groupings of Latin American nations where issues could be taken outside of the OAS when they felt impotent to deal with conflict within the organization and wanted to tackle issues outside of direct US influence.15 After World War II, Canada made a choice to opt for an internationalist position at the expense of regionalist responses, putting its efforts toward helping to ensure the success of the United Nations to accomplish what the League of Nations could not—guaranteeing peace and international security. For this reason, joining the OAS was viewed as a contradictory foreign policy by Canada’s secretary of foreign affairs, Lester B. Pearson.16 Pearson also saw the US influence within the OAS as overshadowing any security discussions in the region, acting only to provide a rubber stamp to a US regional agenda. The failure of the OAS to condemn US involvement in a military coup in Guatemala in 1954 and its later expulsion of Cuba in 1962 vindicated Pearson’s views of the organization. His belief that it was basically just an instrument of enforcing US foreign policy and actions that supported US containment policies in the region ended any further discussion on whether Canada should or should not join the OAS.17

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NATO and NORAD

While the United States maintained bilateral relations with Mexico, it tended to view Mexico in the broader context of regional security cooperation institutions like the OAS. On the other hand, the United States entered into a number of multilateral and bilateral security relationships directly with Canada, which were not focused on North America or the Western Hemisphere per se. The most comprehensive security agreements between the two countries began with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in 1949, further solidifying their mutual security relationship in light of the post–World War II threat of Soviet communism. Canada’s participation in the military command structure of NATO placed the nation’s armed forces alongside US military forces in the continental defense of Europe. As an example, Canada’s 4th Mechanized Brigade Group was embedded in the US 1st Armored Division in Germany, which required its military forces to train, operate, and live together with US military forces throughout the Cold War.18 Due to the NATO relationship and a shared language and cultural identity, Canadian Forces were also part of the “FiveEyes” security agreements, which were an outgrowth of the 1943 British–United States Agreement (BRUSA) during World War II. These agreements allowed for the sharing of classified intelligence and operational information between the militaries of the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom.19 It was not until 1958 that Canada and the United States focused specifically on North American security concerns through the formation of the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD). The focus of NORAD at the time was to provide for the territorial defense of North America from Soviet ballistic missiles and other airborne threats to both nations. NORAD was not focused on land- or water-based threats to the hemisphere—these continued to fall within the purview of the respective countries’ armed forces. The headquarters for this binational command was located at Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado Springs, with the operational command post located in nearby Cheyenne Mountain. It is still there today and remains a combined command with a fully integrated staff of Canadian and US military personnel. Prior to 9/11 and the formation of the US Northern Command (USNORTHCOM), NORAD was embedded in the US Space Command (USSPACECOM), with the four-star commander of USSPACECOM and NORAD being dual-hatted. A Canadian lieutenant general has served as the deputy commander of

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NORAD. Canadians were not, however, part of the USSPACECOM staff. After 9/11, most of the functions of USSPACECOM were moved to Omaha, Nebraska, and placed under the US Strategic Command. The NORAD infrastructure remains in Colorado, co-located with the headquarters of USNORTHCOM, which is now occupying most of the former USSPACECOM buildings. As a result of the close security cooperation between the United States and Canada throughout the Cold War period in organizations such as NATO and NORAD, the two nations’ militaries remain strong allies. Many US and Canadian officers and enlisted personnel have served together in operational units overseas or in North America, or have worked with each other through military schooling or on training exercises. Even when their respective governments disagree on specific policies, such as the Iraq War, the Canadian and US militaries continue to work together on a daily basis throughout the world.20 That close defense cooperation continues today, where Canada and the United States are party to “over 80 treaty-level defence agreements, more than 250 memoranda of understanding between the two defence departments, and approximately 145 bilateral forums in which defence matters are discussed.”21 Examples of formal bilateral security agreements include the Permanent Joint Board on Defense, the Military Cooperation Committee, the Canada–United States Test and Evaluation Program, the Technology Research and Development Projects Memorandum of Understanding, and the Mutual Support and Integrated Lines of Communications Memorandums of Understanding.22 The Missing Trilateral Relationship

While Mexico and the United States cooperated in the formation of the Rio Treaty of 1947, Canada did not participate and has never been a signatory to this hemispheric security agreement. In fact, Canada did not join the OAS until 1989. Neither did it join the InterAmerican Defense Board (IADB), which was formed in 1942, until 2002. A World War II relic, the IADB did not do much in terms of military cooperation, other than to host an occasional cocktail party in Washington, DC. So, Canada’s membership in that organization was more symbolic than anything else and did not signal any significant military engagement in the region or change in its security relationship with the United States or Mexico, in particular. Therefore, while there had been precedent for a number of bilateral security

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agreements between the United States and Mexico and the United States and Canada, there was little historical precedent for North American regional security cooperation between all three nations from the end of World War II until the end of the Cold War. When the Soviet Union imploded in 1989, most international relations scholars considered that the Cold War had ended.23 The breakup of Eastern Europe and eventual collapse of the Soviet Union itself ushered in a change in international politics from a bipolar to a unipolar world. The United States emerged as the sole superpower, possessing an ability to act unilaterally without fear of a Soviet response. However, the United States was conflicted over its newfound victory, not quite sure how to respond to this “New World Order.”24 Instead of a new peace, the United States found itself committing military forces to new wars in places such as Panama with Operation Just Cause. The Mexican representative to the OAS at the time, Antonio de Icaza, was quoted as saying, “The fight against international crime is not sufficient reason to intervene in a sovereign nation. There are no reasons that can justify an intervention.”25 Only Canada came to the defense of the US invasion, with its OAS representative, Richard Gorham, expressing his government’s position that it “regretted the use of force” but added that “we must nonetheless again highlight the extraordinary circumstances which have caused the United States to act as it has, and to support its objective of restoring constitutional, democratic government to the republic of Panama.”26 The US-led invasion of Kuwait in 1991 provided another clear example of the differences between Mexico and Canada with regard to their responses to the United States in the post–Cold War world. As a nonpermanent member of the Security Council in 1990, Canada supported UN Security Council Resolution 678, authorizing military force to remove Iraq from Kuwait. Mexico was not a Security Council member and did not vote on the resolution; however, its government response was to officially remain neutral during the Gulf War. Within Mexico, there was some initial support expressed by President Carlos Salinas de Gortari that Mexico would in fact participate in the coalition; however, the Mexican military challenged the president and the ruling party in a rare show of its political power. Mexican military officers went so far as to condemn the US invasion, arguing that the United States was acting as a hegemonic power over the Middle East as it had over Latin America.27 Reexamining the theoretical underpinnings of this discussion, it is clear that the institution-building process of regional security com-

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plex theory during the second half of the twentieth century remained a bilateral relationship with the United States in the center and Mexico and Canada joining with the United States at uneven levels of engagement. While Canada joined the United States in formal security structures and alliances, Mexico did not. The Cold War did much to shape those relationships when the amity that the United States enjoyed with Canada appeared equally matched with the enmity that it experienced with Mexico. Thus, the process of securitization discussed in Barry Buzan and Ole Waever’s RSCT was clearly lacking in the North American context.28 However, this situation was about to change when the three countries turned their attention toward economic policies and a merging of a collective interest in the formation of the North American Free Trade Agreement.

NAFTA and Economic Integration

The signing of NAFTA in 1992 brought the United States, Canada, and Mexico together into a new relationship to promote shared economic interests. It also created a new identity, particularly for Mexico, as a “North American” nation (although many Mexicans remain divided about this today). Mexico’s identity prior to NAFTA had been as part of the corporate identity of Latin America as a region, typically juxtaposed to US interests. Now, as part of the trilateral trade regime that NAFTA created, Mexico’s status in the hemisphere changed gradually, as it was viewed by other Latin American nations as part of “them” versus “us” when it came to some broader regional issues. Also, as a result of accession to NAFTA, Mexico continued to undergo a profound internal political change as the forces of democratization and openness that the new economic relations created began to have an accelerating effect on the domestic political landscape. With regard to regional integration, amity and enmity were evident where two factions emerged: one compelled to move closer toward the United States and Canada, and the other took a more traditional stance in favor of resistance and nationalism. North American Economic Cooperation

Mexico’s economic transformation began in the 1980s, primarily under the regime of Miguel de la Madrid Hurtado (1982–1988) and his successor, Carlos Salinas de Gortari (1988–1994). As a result of

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Mexico’s financial crisis in 1982, when the country could no longer meet its foreign debt obligations, the nation faced a severe loss of foreign investment and capital.29 The de la Madrid and later Salinas governments sought to restructure Mexico’s economy, privatizing many inefficient state-run industries and implementing a series of austerity measures required to shore up the nation’s future creditworthiness. The result was not just an economic restructuring of the state but also a political opening that eventually supported increased participation and access for old and new political parties in Mexico’s traditional one-party system.30 Throughout 1990–1993, there was little internal debate in Mexico, as occurred in the United States over NAFTA where it was a divisive issue in the 1992 presidential elections. 31 The Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) held political power over the Mexican Congress, as well as the presidency, and as good as controlled the agenda with regard to North American economic integration. Outside voices in Mexico opposed to the new treaty with the United States, over the apparent loss of sovereignty, had little impact in shaping the debate or influencing its outcome.32 As a result, one of the most marginalized groups in Mexico took it upon itself to violently protest the formation of NAFTA, raising concern in the United States over the internal security situation in Mexico. When NAFTA went into effect on January 1, 1994, Mexico experienced an internal uprising. The Zapatista National Liberation Army (EZLN) revolution in the state of Chiapas in southern Mexico was a short-lived insurrection, which involved mostly indigenous peoples under the leadership of Subcomandante Marcos, an educated, middleclass mestizo.33 While the movement was not directly a response to NAFTA, the implementation date provided a justification for the beginning of the Zapatistas’ armed struggle against the Mexican government. Marcos used NAFTA and the threat of the Mexican government seizing communal lands in Chiapas to encourage foreign investment and free trade as an argument for his political struggle on behalf of the oppressed indigenous peoples of Mexico.34 After a brief armed struggle against the Mexican military, the Zapatista movement went mainstream, using the Internet and media to garner international recognition and financial support for its cause as well as to launch a political movement. Nevertheless, the Zapatistas did represent a historic revolutionary movement, not seen in the country since the Mexican Revolution in

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the early 1900s.35 Marcos and the other Zapatista leaders were able to cultivate a collective imagination in Mexico where many disenfranchised and marginalized groups elevated Mexico’s internal problems of poverty, injustice, identity, and exclusion to the world—a very different face than that portrayed by President Salinas and the PRI with the implementation of NAFTA. Moreover, the Zapatista movement challenged Mexico’s political elite since its demands rocked the country by addressing Mexico’s historic inequality, opening a national debate on indigenous rights and exclusion. The Zapatista uprising further pointed to the paradox of Mexico’s desire to be considered a first world nation economically but to continue to exist as an authoritarian state politically. These internal fissures further played out in the country with the assassination of the leading PRI candidate for the presidency, Luis Donaldo Colosio Murrieta, in March 1994. The Zapatista uprising also presented the Mexican military with the challenge of facing an internal threat of an armed group operating inside the country. Although the Cold War had ended and the threat of the Zapatistas gaining external military support from either Cuba or a former Soviet bloc country was marginal, it raised a concern about the Mexican military’s ability to defeat real internal as well as external threats to the nation.36 Nonetheless, the Zapatista uprising and the unexpected strength of the movement presented a moral challenge to the Mexican state more than anything else. While never posing a serious threat to Mexico’s security, the Zapatista uprising concerned the United States because it demonstrated that revolutionary movements were not just isolated to small, Central American nations but were now closer to the border. The United States provided the Mexican military with aid to combat the EZLN. Although Mexico did not consider the Zapatistas an existential threat to the nation, the Mexican armed forces did take advantage of the situation to increase their capabilities by seeking advanced technology and equipment from the United States such as AH-64 Apache helicopter gunships.37 The United States, however, provided primarily logistical support (e.g., transport helicopters, night vision goggles, and Humvees) and training at US military bases for Mexico’s air mobile troops.38 Mexico would not accept any direct US military support, such as military advisers, or any additional US military presence in the country.39 Although, as a result of a new openness on the part of the Mexican Army to US military assistance, the structure of the Military Liaison Office in the US embassy in Mexico City changed sig-

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nificantly, transitioning from a small three-person US Air Force delegation to a twelve-person US Army-led operation.40 Mexico’s championing of NAFTA and push for its passage in the US Congress had a surprisingly positive reaction in Canada, even though Canada already had a bilateral trade relationship with the United States—the US-Canada Free Trade Agreement, which was concluded in 1989. The United States was already Canada’s primary trading partner, with 80 percent of its export earnings coming from trade with the United States.41 However, Canada realized it had much to gain from being part of the world’s largest regional trading bloc and part of a trilateral economic relationship with Mexico. A further reduction in trade barriers and loosening of the terms of trade between the two countries were likely to increase the flow of goods and services across the US-Canada border; however, Canada also saw a whole new market opening up with Mexico, which previously had high tariff barriers and restrictions on Canadian imports.42 The irony in the free trade debate is that, at some point in the relationship, each country had feared a loss of sovereignty and identity over the signing of a free trade agreement, despite the shared economic interests and perceived benefits from such a trilateral agreement. During the free trade agreement debates in Canada in 1988, there was a great outpouring of nationalist sentiment against the trade agreement, fearing a loss of Canadian identity to the United States. During the NAFTA debates from 1990 to 1993, a similar reaction occurred in the United States, where nationalistic sentiments were raised over a loss of US identity to Mexico. In 2002 the original signatories to NAFTA, Prime Minister Brian Mulroney, President George H. W. Bush, and President Carlos Salinas de Gortari, met in Washington, DC, to commemorate the tenth anniversary of their historic venture and assess the impact of NAFTA on their respective countries. Each former leader praised the agreement and the positive results. Salinas went so far as to call it a “revolutionary event” that led to a paradigm shift in North American relations.43 Rather than a loss of identity, the former presidents saw it as the beginning of a new North American identity and the forging of a new community through the convergence of interests and institutions.44 Nonetheless, Mexico remained divided with respect to this vision of a shared community emerging in North America as a result of NAFTA. Jorge G. Castañeda’s early analysis proved correct about Mexico’s insertion in NAFTA: “Mexican stability and the United States succeeding in one

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of the oldest and most persistent aspirations—Mexico’s full incorporation into American economic sphere and the subsequent political and international alignment of Mexico with Washington.”45 Challenges to NAFTA

In 2008 with the global economic downturn having its impact on all three economies, both leading Democratic candidates for the US presidency advocated for a reassessment of NAFTA and its impact on US workers and jobs, which caused a vocal reaction from both Canada and Mexico. The leaders of Canada and Mexico feared a rise in US nationalism and protectionism.46 After the elections and once in office, President Barack Obama was quick to distance himself from his earlier campaign rhetoric on NAFTA and hints of US protectionism, instead offering reassurances to both Canada and Mexico that the United States valued its membership in the trade agreement and in fact sought ways to strengthen those ties. 47 Making visits to both Mexico City and Ottawa early in his term in 2009, President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton offered praise for the NAFTA relationship between the three countries and its larger implication for regional cooperation on a number of other issues.48 While the economic impact of NAFTA on all three countries has been a hotly debated issue, the political impact has earned less attention. Yet it is this process of formulating and implementing a trilateral mechanism to resolve trade issues that has contributed to the securitization of the North American region in ways previously not seen, except in the bilateral relationships discussed above. The integration of economies had impacts on issues directly related to security, such as border transparency and commercial access to shipping, which also then influenced transit policies, credentialing, and licensing of commercial and human traffic. Prior to 9/11, significant progress was being made on North American integration as well as promising a further expansion of the NAFTA model into the rest of the Western Hemisphere. This was the vision of US president William J. Clinton when he convened the first meeting of the heads of states throughout the hemisphere to not only expand NAFTA into a broader Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) but also to share a larger vision of a region populated entirely by liberal democracies, practicing free trade, and sharing in a mutual security vision against the threats of drug trafficking and terrorism.

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Yet as Robert Pastor notes, the NAFTA model had its shortcomings when considering its broader hemispheric applications. A number of unresolved issues remained to impact North American regional integration: First NAFTA was silent on the development gap separating Mexico from its two northern neighbors, and that gap has widened. Second, NAFTA did not plan for its success; and inadequate roads and infrastructure cannot cope with increased traffic. The resulting delays have raised the transitions costs of regional trade more than elimination of tariffs has reduced them. Third NAFTA did not address immigration, and the number of undocumented workers in the US jumped. Fourth, NAFTA did not address energy issues, and eastern Canada and northeastern US suffered a catastrophic power black-out in August 2003, even while Mexico imports natural gas from the United States. Fifth, NAFTA made no attempt to coordinate macro-economic policy, leaving the region with no way to prevent market catastrophes such as the Mexican peso crisis.49

Pastor further notes that, since NAFTA did not address specific security concerns, events that unfolded after 9/11 could possibly “cripple the North America integration process by placing new and formidable barriers in the path of trade and movement of people.”50 Despite these setbacks, Pastor remains convinced that a “genetic code” exists in North America and continues to push the three states to greater cooperation and integration.51

The Summit of the Americas and Democratization

The end of the Cold War, which came about with the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the subsequent collapse of the Soviet Union, brought profound changes in US security policies directed toward the Western Hemisphere as a whole, including Mexico and Canada. The focus on containment of the Soviet communist threat and its influence in the region had created much conflict between the United States and Latin American nations, particularly along political lines, with the United States favoring regimes in the region that supported hard-line anticommunist policies. Military governments, which were prevalent throughout the region in the 1970s and 1980s, began to wane as domestic pressure mounted for political change and increased democratization. Seeking to capitalize on these profound

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political changes in the region, the Clinton administration decided to host a historic meeting of heads of states throughout the hemisphere, which took place in Miami in December 1994. (Subsequent meetings have taken place in Santiago, Chile, in 1998; Quebec City, Canada, in 2001; Mar del Plata, Argentina, in 2005; and Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, in 2009. Colombia is scheduled to host the sixth Summit of the Americas in 2013). 52 While the goal of these summit meetings was to further regional cooperation on a number of substantive issues, such as trade, democratization, and development and education issues, the result has actually produced more bilateral agreements between the United States and individual countries (particularly on trade), rather than a comprehensive regional agreement. The Summit of the Americas was the first meeting of the democratically elected heads of thirty-four nations in the region, including the United States, Canada, and Mexico. This was the first gathering of heads of state in the hemisphere since the Punta del Este Conference in Uruguay in 1967. In fact, the only state not invited to participate was Cuba, considered a Cold War relic clinging to communism and a military dictatorship under Fidel Castro. One of the goals the United States sought through the summit process was to bring collective political and economic pressure on Cuba to force a regime change by seeking to isolate the nation even further. Mexico and Canada, however, sought to maintain their own identity in regional politics by not succumbing to US demands and continuing to trade openly with Cuba as well as maintaining diplomatic relations with the Castro government. Seventeen years after the first summit meeting, Cuba remains isolated from the United States politically and a nonparticipant in the summit process, despite calls by other nations in the region to include Cuba, to end the embargo, and to readmit Cuba to the OAS.53 The principal goal of the summit process was to provide a forum for the heads of state of democracies in Latin America to meet on a regular basis and discuss regional issues of importance. With the end of the Cold War and the absence of an ideological threat to US interests globally, the Clinton administration sought to foster stronger regional ties and a new hemispheric identity for the nations in the Americas through the promotion of democracy and trade. The “day of the dictator” in the region was over and the United States sought to communicate to its neighbors that it would no longer support military regimes at the expense of democracy. 54 The United States also

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sought to encourage further democratization in the region by promoting transparency in government institutions, including open elections, increased political participation, and effective governance. This meant the United States would use its foreign policy toward the region to promote those political goals through increased trade and investment.55 Thus, one of the more ambitious goals of the summit process was the formation of an FTAA by 2005, building on the NAFTA model, as a means to further unite democratic nations throughout the Americas and discourage a return to authoritarian regimes. Mexico’s Response

For Mexico, the message was clear: the United States wanted Mexico to continue to democratize and open up its economic and political institutions to further increase transparency and accountability. After Salinas’s questionable electoral victory in 1988, the next challenge occurred in July 1994 when Salinas’s PRI successor, Ernesto Zedillo Ponce de León, won the presidential election with just over 50 percent of the vote, thus maintaining the ruling party in office for another six years. Zedillo was inaugurated in December 1994, allowing him to attend the summit in Miami as the new president of Mexico. Zedillo continued to pursue many of the reforms initiated by Salinas to allow more diverse political expression in Mexico, including the recognition of electoral victories by opposition parties occurring at the state and local levels. By the next presidential election in 2000, Mexico was prepared to take the next step and accept an opposition candidate winning the presidency, ending the PRI’s seventyone-year hold on power in Mexico. Vicente Fox’s National Action Party (PAN) presidential victory in July 2000 ushered in a new era of democracy (and uncertainty) in Mexico as the nation faced the prospects of a split government, with the PRI controlling both houses of Congress and the PAN controlling the presidency. Canada’s Reaction

For Canada, the summit process further solidified views in Ottawa that Canada needed a new regional identity in order to be more engaged in the Western Hemisphere, moving beyond just the NAFTA relationship with its North American neighbors. Canada had been an

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active partner in the trans-Atlantic relationship with Europe and the United States, supporting traditional east-west relationships during the Cold War. The end of the Cold War brought a new interest in directing Canada’s foreign policy to look at developing regions of the world along a north-south orientation. Expanding relationships in the Western Hemisphere, particularly in the Caribbean and farther south, supported Canada’s involvement in the OAS. Canada also took an active role in supporting UN Security Council Resolution 975, which led to the restoration of democracy to Haiti in 1994, by participating with the US-led Multinational Force in ousting General Raoul Cédras and returning President Jean-Bertrand Aristide to power. Canada later provided military and police forces to the United Nations Mission in Haiti peacekeeping effort.56 The summits have continued every three to five years, attempting to institutionalize the process of regional gatherings of elected heads of state in the Americas. These meetings were not meant to negate the need for smaller subregional meetings or bilateral engagement. Rather, the summit process continued to reflect recognition by the nations in the region that there was a need for regular multinational engagement by the heads of state to address issues of significance to the Western Hemisphere. Its purpose was also to further strengthen the relevancy of the OAS as the secretariat for the summit process and the means by which regular contact can occur at the diplomatic level between foreign secretaries and ambassadors between summit meetings. The summit was not intended to replace the OAS or other formal mechanisms for regional engagement but rather to elevate the dialogue to the presidential level to ensure that the United States, in particular, would need to occasionally look south and north in the hemisphere and not just east and west in its foreign policy focus.

The Defense Ministerial Process

With the formation of NAFTA and the prospect of developing a broader Free Trade Area of the Americas, coupled with the transition to democracy occurring throughout the Americas, former US secretary of defense William Perry suggested that what was missing in the broadening political and economic relationships between nations in the region was the “third leg” of the stool: increased security cooperation.57 To this end, Perry proposed a meeting of secretaries and

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ministers of defense from all thirty-four democratic nations in the hemisphere to continue the “Spirit of Miami” by joining in a Defense Ministerial of the Americas. Later gatherings came to be called the Conference of Defense Ministers of the Americas (CDMA). Perry intended the CDMA to offer a structure to discuss means to enhance security relationships that would reinforce the expanding political and economic ties that were occurring in the region. He also sought to solidify the new regional identity that President Clinton espoused in Miami by redefining security relations between nations in the hemisphere. The first CDMA was held in Williamsburg, Virginia, in June 1995. (There have been eight subsequent meetings: San Carlos de Bariloche, Argentina, 1996; Cartagena, Colombia, 1998; Manaus, Brazil, 2000; Santiago, Chile, 2002; Quito, Ecuador, 2004; Managua, Nicaragua, 2006; Banff, Canada, 2008; and Santa Cruz, Bolivia, 2010.)58 It produced a document called the Williamsburg Principles, where attendees committed themselves to “defending democracy, broadening civilian control over the military, increasing transparency in defense matters, and enhancing confidence-building among nations.”59 The CDMA Agenda

Mexico did not officially attend the first CDMA in 1995, citing its long-standing policy of avoiding any appearance of participating in a formal military alliance with the United States or other nations in the region. Instead, Mexico sent its ambassador to the United States, Silva Herzog, and his defense attaché in an “observer” status. Mexico still did not officially attend the eighth CDMA in Banff, Canada, in 2008; however, it was a more active observer in the process than it had been at previous events.60 Nevertheless, the CDMA process presented Mexico with the principle of a strategic alignment with the United States after the turbulent internal political and economic events of the 1990s. The CDMA movement also signaled the Mexican military’s isolation from the United States and the obstacles preventing cooperation between Mexico and the United States on matters of security and defense with regard to concerns over identity and sovereignty, particularly with regard to defense procurement issues. The CDMA process established a biennial mechanism for routine meetings between defense ministers throughout Latin America. It also fostered discussions on topics ranging from commitments to

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fight environmental disasters to ones to fight narcoterrorism. While specific agreements and programs were often missing, what occurred was a cultural shift in many Latin American military institutions, which recognized that a key democratic principle being invoked by the United States was military subordination to civilian authority. It was not enough that all nations participating in the CDMA had democratically elected heads of state. The United States was also promoting the notion that civilian control should go much further and include civilian heads of the Ministries of Defense.61 This idea was solidified by the formation of the Center for Hemispheric Defense Studies (CHDS) in Washington, DC, after the first CDMA meeting. The CHDS actively promotes the process of “civilianizing” Ministries of Defense by offering courses designed to develop Latin American civilian defense workers by educating them on defense planning, programming, and budgeting issues.62 The CDMA process was successful in this regard in converting Latin American militaries to the US model with one civilian minister (or secretary) of defense overseeing the individual armed services. By the time the fourth CDMA occurred, all Latin American countries, except Mexico, had a minister of defense (or equivalent) and all but six were civilian. 63 By the time of the fifth CDMA in 2002, Mexico continued to be the lone holdout, preserving its own security identity by maintaining separate cabinet-level military organizations, with the military officer–run secretary of defense and secretary of the navy reporting directly to the president, instead of one civilian minister of defense over all branches of the armed forces. For this reason, Mexico’s participation in the CDMA process has been limited to symbolic gestures or behind-the-scenes bilateral discussions, with no official proclamations of support for broader hemispheric security cooperation through strictly military organizations. Rather, Mexico has chosen to pursue discussions on regional security cooperation through other established venues such as the OAS Conference on Hemispheric Security or its military advisery component of the IADB. The CDMA process continues to foster a commitment to the broad goals and objectives of hemispheric security cooperation originally envisioned by Secretary Perry in 1995. However, it has failed to establish the institutional structures of a NATO-like security organization with all nations in the region equally committed to the same concepts of security, among other reasons, because the dimensions

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and conceptions about security are quite distinct and it is practically impossible to share a single vision of security regionally in the Americas. Interestingly, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld’s opening comments at the fifth CDMA in Chile in 2002 came immediately before his departure for Prague and participation in the NATO summit. Rumsfeld noted similarities between the processes that both NATO and the CDMA faced: “consolidate the democratic progress of the region; set military priorities in our democratic societies; identify the new threats of the 21st century; and transform our capabilities to meet those emerging threats.”64 However, that is where similarities ended. While NATO created a formidable military alliance that is credited with maintaining peace and stability in Europe throughout the Cold War, the CDMA has produced no such equivalent security agreement in the Americas. Impact on North American Security Cooperation

For the United States, Mexico, and Canada, security relationships throughout the previous century have remained primarily bilateral relationships, either between the United States and Mexico or between the United States and Canada. NATO provided a further structure whereby the United States and Canada operationalized military doctrine, tactics, and equipment through a number of Standardization Agreements (STANAGs) as well as through training and exercises. This relationship, etched in combat, has additionally grown through military cooperation in places like Bosnia, Kosovo, and most recently in Afghanistan with NATO’s commitment to Operation Enduring Freedom. The CDMA has not replaced any of the bilateral security relations that are ongoing between the United States and Canada or the United States and Mexico. For example, the formation of Mexico’s war doctrine in 1942 established that only in conditions in which independence and sovereignty of the nation are at risk would Mexico approve any combined international activity of its armed forces with other nations’ militaries at home or abroad.65 Both Canada and the United States have hosted meetings of the CDMA while Mexico has not. One of the sticking points for Mexico’s participation in the CDMA continues to be its defense structure, with its separate Secretariat of Defense (army) and Secretariat of the Navy. Both are cabinet-level positions that are held by active-duty military officers. In Mexico, there continues to be no civilian US

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Department of Defense or Canadian Ministry of Defense equivalent with oversight over all branches of the armed forces. Although Mexico actively participates in the CHDS by sending military officers and civilian governmental officials (e.g., key members of the Defense Committees in the Mexican Congress) to the courses offered at the National Defense University in Washington, DC, it has not succumbed to the CDMA pressure to create a single cabinet-level defense model with a civilian head. Recently, senior Mexican Navy officials have admitted that Mexico’s lack of full participation in the CDMA process has been frustrating due to their bifurcated defense structure. This situation has raised the broader issue in Mexico about civil-military relations in general and the possibility of Mexico moving toward an integrated or joint service defense model in the future. However, there are no immediate plans to do so.66

Conclusion

From the end of World War II until the events of 9/11, the nature of the trilateral relationship between the United States, Mexico, and Canada had primarily been defined within the context of a shared economic interdependence based on individual state interests. While the United States and Canada did enter into new formal security relationships through institutional mechanisms (NATO and NORAD), Mexico did not. The Summit of the Americas process brought a new regional focus on the challenges posed by transitions to democracy in the region and away from Cold War authoritarian regimes (with the exception of Cuba). However, security discussions, through the CDMA, IADB, OAS, summit process, or other institutional mechanisms, remain on the outside of the relationship. NAFTA brought the three countries together based on economic interests, despite the often expressed concern over identity, but it did not produce a regional security complex in North America as defined by Buzan and Waever. Their RSCT is based on the belief that the formation of a security complex occurs at the subsystem level, created by security interdependence, since “most threats travel over short distances, rather than longer ones.”67 As previously discussed, NAFTA failed to address a number of issues related to threat identification, thus limiting the integration and formation of a North American regional security complex.

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Nor did the Summit of the Americas or CDMA processes foster a broader regional security identity in the Americas, despite US efforts to expand the NAFTA economic model beyond North America into an FTAA through such venues. The Clinton administration sought to build on each of the “three legs of the stool.”68 However, with the end of the Cold War, security discussions became much more diffused, with vastly differing perspectives of the threat. 69 Political transitions away from authoritarian models toward democracy were also taking place outside of US influence. Political change in the region has primarily been through the rise of neopopulist leaders and new indigenous movements to empower voters and increase political participation. Economic expansion, mostly due to the geographic diversity of the hemisphere, took on a more regional perspective, as the FTAA was challenged by the rise of the Common Market of the South and the newfound political and economic autonomy of countries like Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay, and Uruguay.70 The Mercosur members initially sought to leverage their collective power to increase trade opportunities with Europe and Asia, rather than only with the United States, thus frustrating attempts by the United States to create a regional trade regime under its leadership. The United States has instead pursued a series of separate bilateral free trade agreements (Chile, Panama, Peru, Colombia) as well as another subregional trade agreement, the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA), which includes Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and one Caribbean country—the Dominican Republic. (Thus, it is officially called CAFTA-DR.)71 CAFTA-DR was ratified by the US Congress in July 2005. The free trade agreement with Chile took effect in 2004 and Peru in 2009; those with Colombia and Panama were finally passed in 2011.72 Yet none of these trade agreements has sought to expand NAFTA or change the North American identity of the relationship by integrating new countries into the existing trade regime. It is clear by the end of the twentieth century that the United States, Canada, and Mexico lacked a shared physical security interest that would compel each nation to take a new look at their individual and collective perimeter. Each nation did, however, have shared economic interests in expanding trade and shared political interests in expanding democracy. The United States and Canada have made the most progress toward institutionalizing their security interests

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through formal security commitments through the Cold War and after, and with their involvement in NATO and NORAD. Mexico has remained outside of the bilateral security relationship, engaging the United States and Canada peripherally through the Summit of the Americas or the CDMA process. Nevertheless, the key equation in the relationship between Mexico and the United States from 1928 to 1994 was that Mexico maintained the basis of political and economic stability, which prevented the United States from intervening in Mexico, a case much different than Canada. The events of 1994, including the Zapatista uprising, the assassination of formal presidential candidate Luis Donaldo Colosio, and the devaluation of the Mexican peso, all contributed to a new sense of concern in the United States over Mexico’s internal stability. The visit to Mexico by Secretary Perry in 1995, to solicit Mexico’s participation in the Defense Ministerial Process, could be construed to communicate US concern, particularly in light of the subsequent arrest of Mexico’s drug czar, General Jesús Gutiérrez Rebollo, on drug trafficking charges. 73 As a result of these developments, in 1996, the Clinton administration established the Bi-lateral High Level Contact Group for Drug Control as a means to monitor the drug trafficking situation in Mexico. The US Congress, in particular, was concerned over the complicity of the long-standing ruling party (the PRI) about Mexico’s drug cartels. This concern was abated in 2000 with the election of the PAN candidate Vicente Fox, followed by the election of another PAN candidate Felipe Calderón in 2006. It was only through the terrorist attacks of 9/11 that relations between Canada, Mexico, and the United States were transformed by the new security challenges of global terrorism and the subsequent need to address an “all-hazards” security perspective. They then realized that their futures—politically, economically, and physically— were indelibly linked by this new reality since an attack on the infrastructure of the United States would have significant repercussions throughout North America.74 This required a shift in US regional security concerns away from looking for consensus with Latin American nations within the Western Hemisphere as a whole toward a more narrow focus on the immediate region of North America, particularly with Mexico and Canada. Nevertheless, the dimensions and instruments of each of the three countries vary notably, including North American security concerns now at risk in a form much more evident after 9/11 than in years past.

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Notes 1. Mark T. Gilderhus, The Second Century: US–Latin American Relations Since 1889 (Wilmington, DE: Scholarly Resources, 2000), 115–116. 2. Ibid., 117. 3. Barry Carr, “Chapultepec Conference (21 February–8 March 1945),” ABC-CLIO, www.historyandtheheadlines.abc-clio.com/ContentPages/ContentPage.aspx?entryId=1161964¤tSection=1130228&productid=4, accessed July 25, 2011. 4. Milton Eisenhower, The Wine Is Bitter: The United States and Latin America (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1963), xi–xiii. 5. Gilderhus, The Second Century. The Monroe Doctrine has been in existence since 1823. It signaled the rise of the United States as regional power, seeking to influence the Western Hemisphere by keeping foreign (European) interests out. What precipitated President James Monroe’s proclamation was the concern that, with the collapse of Spain’s colonial empire and the rise of independence movements among Latin American nations, the British in particular would seek to take advantage of these changes to expand their influence over the former Spanish colonies. While the United States did not possess the physical means to enforce the Monroe Doctrine, it still was a strong political statement of US interest in and support of nations in the hemisphere and their desire to break free from colonialism as the US had done the previous decade. Robert H. Holden and Eric Zolov, Latin America and the United States: A Documentary Record (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000), 11–14. 6. Gregory Weeks, US and Latin American Relations (New York: Pearson Longman, 2008), 100. 7. Howard Handelman, Mexican Politics: The Dynamics of Change (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1997), 150. 8. Mexico’s foreign policy has always maintained a strong sense of nationalism and concern over any nation interfering in its domestic affairs. Thus, a key principle Mexico advocates in its foreign relations is that of nonintervention, meaning that no nation has the right to intervene in any other state’s internal affairs. William P. Tucker, The Mexican Government Today (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1957), 188. 9. Ibid. 10. Jefferson Morley, Our Man in Mexico: Winston Scott and the Hidden History of the CIA (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2008), 15; Sergio Aguayo, El Panteón de los Mitos, Estados Unidos y el nacionalismo mexicano (Mexico City: Grijalbo, 1998), 73. 11. See William M. LeoGrande, “Rollback or Containment? The United States, Nicaragua, and the Search for Peace in Central America,” International Security 11, no. 2 (Autumn 1986): 89–120. 12. See Walter LaFeber, Inevitable Revolutions: The United States in Central America (New York: W. W. Norton, 1984). 13. JTF-B is comprised of US military personnel from all services. During the 1980s, it was a covert military base providing logistical support to

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the Contras. After the Central American wars, the base provided logistical support for counternarcotics operations, humanitarian assistance, disaster relief, and other military training to Latin American militaries. With the closure of US military facilities in Panama in 1999, it remains the largest US military forward presence in Latin America. 14. See Raúl Benítez Manaut and Ricardo Córdova, México en Centroamérica: Expediente de documentos fundamentals (1979–1986) (Mexico City: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, 1989). 15. Brian J. R. Stevenson, Canada, Latin America and the New Internationalism: A Foreign Policy Analysis, 1968–1990 (Montreal: McGillQueen’s University Press, 2000), 159–160. 16. Ibid., 171. 17. Ibid. 18. Author’s personal experiences serving in the US 1st Armored Division in Germany from 1985 to 1988 and working with the Canadian armed forces. 19. Will Kaufman and Heidi Slettedahl Macpherson, Britain and the Americas: Culture, Politics, and History (Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2005), 459. There also existed differing tiers of security relationships between NATO countries such that the United States shared intelligence within the NATO structure in a compartmented fashion. 20. For example, when the Canadian government refused to join the US “coalition of the willing” in 2003 for Operation Iraqi Freedom, Canadian officers attending a US military school in Virginia intimated their personal disappointment not to be able to join their US colleagues in combat operations in Iraq. 21. Canada–United States Defence Relations, BG-03.009, National Defence and Canadian Forces, www.forces.gc.ca/site/Newsroom/view _news_e.asp?id=836, accessed October 1, 2004. 22. “Canada–United States Military-to-Military Relationship,” National Defence and Canadian Forces, January 24, 2012, www.forces.gc.ca/site /mobil/news-nouvelles-eng.asp?id=4073, accessed July 7, 2012. 23. John Mueller, “When Did the Cold War End?” paper presented at the meeting of the American Political Science Association, Boston, July 26, 2002. 24. The term “New World Order” was used by the George H. W. Bush administration to describe the new geopolitical context after the fall of the Soviet Union; however, H. G. Wells coined the term with his book The New World Order (New York: A. A. Knopf, 1940). A number of conspiracy theory books sprung up in the 1990s using the same title such as A. Ralph Epperson, The New World Order (New York: Publius, 1990); and Pat Robertson, The New World Order (Boston: G. K. Hall, 1992). The best academic treatment of the subject is probably Anne-Marie Slaughter, A New World Order (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2005). Although Slaughter’s book focuses on events since 9/11, her analysis looks at the geopolitical context that developed at the end of the Cold War, which gave rise to the threat of international terrorism today.

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25. “Latin Allies Blast US; Will OAS Do the Same?” Deseret News, December 21, 1989, www.deseretnews.com/article/77862/latin-allies-blast -us-will-oas-do-the-same.html, accessed March 16, 2011. 26. Ibid. 27. Author’s personal insights from serving as an exchange officer to the Mexican military during the Gulf War. See Richard J. Kilroy, Jr., “Between the Eagle and the Serpent: A New Look at Civil-Military Relations in Mexico,” Journal of Low Intensity Conflict and Law Enforcement 1, no. 2 (Autumn 1992): 152–162. 28. Barry Buzan and Ole Waever, Regions and Powers: The Structure of International Security (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004). 29. Handelman, Mexican Politics, 45. 30. Sheila Melvin, “The Rebirth of Mexico,” The Freeman 42, no. 5 (May 1992), www.thefreemanonline.org/columns/the-rebirth-of-mexico, accessed September 21, 2009. This political opening in Mexico was in keeping with the electoral reforms of 1977. José Woldenberg, La Construcción de la Democracia (Mexico City: Plaza y Janés, 2002), 23. 31. H. Ross Perot won 19 percent of the popular vote for president in 1992, as a third-party candidate, running mostly on an anti-NAFTA platform. David Sirota, “Was Ross Perot Right?” Creators.com, 2007, www.creators .com/opinion/david-sirota/was-ross-perot-right.html, accessed June 27, 2012. 32. Mexican opposition leaders included Cuahtémoc Cárdenas and Porfirio Muñoz Ledo, of the leftist Democratic Revolutionary Party (PRD). Within the United States, those opposed to the passage of NAFTA included H. Ross Perot who, during his presidential debate with George H. W. Bush and William J. Clinton, coined the famous saying that NAFTA was “the giant sucking sound” that would drain US jobs south of the border. “Looks Like Ross Perot Was Right About the ‘Giant Sucking Sound,’” Business Insider, February 11, 2011, www.businessinsider.com/looks-like-ross-perot -was-right-about-the-giant-sucking-sound-2011-2#ixzz1GsYgHy7q, accessed March 11, 2011. 33. Mestizo is the dominant race in Mexico and Central American nations of mixed Spanish and indigenous peoples. 34. Gideon Baker, Civil Society and Democratic Theory: Alternative Voices (New York: Routledge, 2002), 130–131. 35. See John Tutino, “Globalizaciones, autonomías revoluciones: Poder y participación popular en la historia de México,” and Alan Knight, “Tres crisis de fin de siglo en México,” in Leticia Reina and Elisa Servin, ed., Crisis, Reforma, y Revolucion. México: Historias de fin de siglo (Mexico City: Taurus-Conaculta, 2002). 36. For further insights on Cuba’s ideological distancing from the Zapatista movement, see “Louis Proyect: The Unrepentant Marxist—Update on NACLA Attack on Cuba,” October 29, 2005, http://louisproyect.word press.com/2005/10/29/update-on-nacla-attack-on-cuba/, accessed June 14, 2011. 37. A sophisticated analysis of the complexities and challenges to Mexico’s national security during the Zapatista uprising can be seen in Alejandro

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Alvaro-Brenner, “La politica de seguridad nacional del presidente Carlos Salinas de Gortari frente al conflicto indigena en Chiapas en 1993,” PhD dissertation, University of Miami, 2003. 38. Author’s personal experiences serving as the Mexican desk officer at SOUTHCOM in Panama in 1994. 39. US military presence in Mexico was limited to those officers and noncommissioned officers assigned to the US embassy in Mexico City, attending Mexican military schools, or supporting the Peace Aztec program that provided Mexico with F-4E fighter jets in the 1980s. 40. Ibid. 41. T. A. MacDonald, “Canada, the FTA and NAFTA: A View from the Negotiating Table,” London Journal of Canadian Studies 14 (1998/1999). 42. Ibid. 43. NAFTA at 10, vol. 1, conference proceedings (Washington, DC: Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, 2005), xiv. 44. Ibid., xv. 45. Jorge Castañeda, The Mexican Shock: Its Meaning for the United States (New York: New Press, 1995), 67. 46. Jeff Mason, “Obama Targets NAFTA but Says Supports Free Trade,” Reuters, February 5, 2008, www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSN 2414727720080225, accessed September 15, 2009. 47. Ewan MacAskill, “Obama Raises NAFTA Renegotiation During His First Official Visit to Canada,” The Guardian, February 19, 2009, www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/feb/19/barack-obama-stephen-harper -canada-visit, accessed September 16, 2009. 48. Todd J. Gilman, “Obama Talks of ‘Upgrade’ to NAFTA with Mexico’s Calderon,” DallasNews.com, January 13, 2009, www.dallasnews.com /sharedcontent/dws/news/world/mexico/stories/DN-obamacalderon _13nat.ART0.State.Edition2.4b829d0.html, accessed September 16, 2009. 49. Robert A. Pastor, “North America: Three Nations, a Partnership, or a Community?” paper presented at the conference “European Union and Regional Integration: A Comparative Perspective and Lessons for the Americas,” Miami, April 8, 2005. 50. Ibid. 51. Robert A. Pastor, The North American Idea: A Vision of a Continental Future (New York: Oxford University Press, 2011), 56. 52. “Colombia Will Host Sixth Summit of the Americas,” Semana.com International, June 4, 2009, www.semana.com/noticias-headlines/colombia -will-host-the-sixth-summit-of-the-americas/124736.aspx, accessed September 21, 2009. 53. Cuba’s membership in the OAS was suspended in 1962 after Fidel Castro came to power. In 2009 Cuba’s suspension was revoked, despite US opposition due to Cuba’s lack of democratic progress. As of this writing, Cuba has not rejoined. 54. This is a reference to Latin America’s authoritarian political culture and history. See Paul H. Lewis, Authoritarian Regimes in Latin America: Dictators, Despots, and Tyrants (Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 2005).

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55. See Gordon Mace and Hugo Loiseu, “Cooperative Hegemony and Summitry in the Americas,” Latin American Politics and Society 47, no. 4 (December 2005): 107–134. 56. See John R. Ballard, Upholding Democracy: The United States Military Campaign in Haiti, 1994–1997 (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1998). 57. Author’s personal insights working with the secretary of defense’s staff on the first Conference of Defense Ministers of the Americas (CDMA) in 1995. 58. At the time of this writing, the next CDMA was scheduled for some time in 2012 in Uruguay. See www.cdmamericas.org/PublicPages/Montevideo _Confe_eng.aspx, accessed February 14, 2012. 59. Ray Walser, “The Eighth Defense Ministerial of the Americas: End of the Line?” Heritage Institute Web Memo No. 2044, September 3, 2008, www.heritage.org/Research/LatinAmerica/wm2044.cfm, accessed September 21, 2009. 60. Author’s personal conversations with CDMA attendees. 61. The procedural mechanics of this process were fostered at the first CDMA by the configuration of the main meeting room where there was one seat at the table for the chief of delegation, with two seats behind that person, and then four seats in the third row. This was problematic for nations like Brazil, which did not have a civilian minister of defense but rather three chiefs of the armed services, all cabinet-level officials. If Mexico had participated, it would have faced the same dilemma since the secretary of defense and secretary of the navy are both cabinet-level officials and military officers (author’s personal observations of the first CDMA in Williamsburg, Virginia, in 1995). 62. John T. Fishel, “The Organizational Component of Civil-Military Relations in Latin America: The Role of the Ministry of Defense,” paper presented at the meeting of the Latin American Studies Association, Miami, November 16–18, 2000. The CHDS was initially housed in the US Coast Guard headquarters building adjacent to Fort McNair, eventually moving to its permanent structure within the National Defense University complex in 2008. 63. The six countries that still had military ministers of defense in 2000 were the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Mexico, Peru, and Venezuela. Fishel, “The Organizational Component of Civil-Military Relations in Latin America.” 64. Donald Rumsfeld, “Defense Ministerial of the Americas: Opening Remarks,” Santiago, Chile, November 19, 2002, www.defenselink.mil /speeches/2002/s20021119-secdef.html, accessed October 5, 2004. 65. Today, the Mérida Initiative is becoming the new regional security agreement of bilateral cooperation between Mexico and the United States. 66. Author’s personal discussions with Mexican Navy vice admiral Jose H. Pastor Gómez, chief of staff, Kingston, Ontario, June 12, 2009. 67. Buzan and Waever, Regions and Powers, 11. 68. Author’s personal observations from working in the office of the secretary of defense at the Pentagon in preparation for the second CDMA in Bariloche, Argentina, in October 1996.

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69. As one Caribbean delegate to the first CDMA in Williamsburg, Virginia, noted, “if we are not going to talk about bananas, I am not coming,” a reference to his interest in economic security as the main issue that needed to be discussed (author’s personal observations and conversations with CDMA attendees). 70. Mercosur was founded in 1991 and expanded in 1994; however, the original founding members remain Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, and Uruguay. “Profile: Mercosur—Common Market of the South,” BBC News, September 18, 2008, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/5195834.stm, accessed September 21, 2009. 71. “US-CAFTA-DR Free Trade Agreement: How US Companies Can Benefit,” Export.gov, n.d., www.export.gov/FTA/cafta-dr/index.asp, accessed September 22, 2009. 72. Ibid. 73. General Rebollo was convicted of collusion with the Juárez cartel and accepting bribes. This was particularly disturbing to the United States since General Barry McCaffrey, the incoming drug czar in the Clinton administration, had accompanied Secretary Perry on his trip to Mexico and made a statement to the press that General Rebollo was someone of “unquestionable character” with whom he could work to combat drug trafficking. George W. Grayson, Mexico: Narco-violence and a Failed State? (New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction, 2010), 50. 74. Canadian lieutenant general Rick Findley, deputy NORAD commander, used the analogy of a fire where your house may survive while your neighbor’s house is destroyed. You may survive but you have no water, no power, and so forth. You can choose to wait until after the disaster and then help your neighbor recover. But it would have been better to have helped your neighbor prevent the fire in the first place or, at least, assist in putting it out since your home is also at risk. It is also interesting to note that on September 11, Findley was the acting commanding officer in NORAD’s Cheyenne Mountain Operations Center, “commanding” the aerospace defense of the United States. He commented that, except for the Canadian and US flags on each other’s uniforms, no one could tell the difference in command and control relationships between the two countries as they worked together to defend North America. (Comments offered at the USNORTHCOM-sponsored 2004 Homeland Defense Symposium, Colorado Springs, Colorado, October 14, 2004.)

5 September 11, Regional Responses, and the Global War on Terror

The terrorist attacks on the United States on September 11, 2001, occurred on the same day that the foreign ministers from countries throughout Latin America were meeting in Lima, Peru, to sign the Inter-American Democratic Charter. This Organization of American States–sponsored event was precipitated by the undemocratic practices of former Peruvian president Alberto Fujimori and his usurping constitutional procedures to maintain himself in office. The Lima meeting also occurred shortly after a military coup in Ecuador to overthrow a democratically elected leader. The goals of the September meeting were therefore to gain a commitment from the nations throughout the Western Hemisphere to support continued democratic governance and to work together to put pressure on regimes that seek to undermine these principles. On that day in Lima, the threat to democracy in the region was not international terrorism. In this chapter, we look at the security environment in North America and relations between Mexico, Canada, and the United States, which developed after 9/11. We evaluate the five sectors (political, economic, environmental, military, and societal) offered by Barry Buzan, Ole Waever, and Jaap de Wilde1 to analyze security in light of their relationship to the identity, institutions, and interests of these three nations that emerged as a result of 9/11 and the US efforts to conduct a Global War on Terror.2

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The Post-9/11 Security Environment

After 9/11, the United States reshaped its security strategy and institutional structures in order to respond to the new threat of international terrorism specifically targeted against US interests at home and abroad. This fundamental shift in US policy directly impacted its security relations with nations around the globe, primarily with regard to the war in Afghanistan and what has been called a preemptive military action in Iraq.3 While many nations echoed support for US and coalition forces’ actions in Afghanistan, specifically targeted against the Taliban regime and known terrorist bases in that country, they did not weigh in with US efforts against Saddam Hussein and the Iraq War. In fact, two Latin American nations, Mexico and Chile (both Security Council members at that time), did not support the US-sponsored action in the United Nations to gain an international sanction for military action.4 Even Canada, a staunch Cold War ally, refused to support US military action in Iraq, instead limiting its military support to the Global War on Terror to coalition actions in Afghanistan. While the Canadian and Mexican governments took public stands against the United States on Iraq, behind the scenes both countries were moving forward in accommodating the United States’ new view of the threat of terrorism to North America. On the military side, both Canada and Mexico began to take on new security relationships with their US counterparts, even challenging some old taboos. Looking at the five sectors of Barry Buzan, Ole Waever, and Jaap de Wilde across the identity, institutions, and interests framework, we find varying degrees of amity and enmity at play, which are framed by the historical context offered in the previous chapters.5 We also see the importance of boundaries heightened after 9/11 by all three countries as the United States, in particular, felt a sense of insecurity that it had not experienced since the end of the Cold War. While polarity was still at play in the hemisphere, US vulnerability to the emerging terrorist threats contributed to its need to create new institutions as well as articulate its security interests with Canada and Mexico in a way that would seek to create a new identity among these North American neighbors. The United States was the last remaining superpower but it was a wounded superpower in search of a community of nations in North America, where the terms of secu-

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rity cooperation were shared rather than directed. In an anarchic international system, where the traditional elements of national power (military and economic) appeared to have little impact over these new asymmetric threats, a convergence of identity, institutions, and interests in North America offered some glimmer of hope at a time of confusion and uncertainty over what would happen next.

The US Northern Command

After 9/11, the United States established a new military command to coordinate the homeland defense role of the Department of Defense in support of homeland security.6 USNORTHCOM was carved out of the existing US Space Command structure located at Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado Springs, which also housed the North American Aerospace Defense Command. USNORTHCOM became operational on October 1, 2002. Its first commander, Air Force general Ralph “Ed” Eberhart, took off his USSPACECOM hat one day and put on his USNORTHCOM hat that very same day. However, he never relinquished his NORAD hat in the process. Canada continued to provide personnel to NORAD even as the new US command group established the USNORTHCOM structure, with its focus on supporting the US government’s new focus on homeland security. Defense planners in the Pentagon also considered sending overtures to Mexico, based on the new Unified Command Plan architecture that assigned Mexico and Canada to the Area of Operational Responsibility (AOR) of USNORTHCOM commander.7 In the past, Mexico opposed any efforts by the Department of Defense to assign it to any US military organization. In fact the Mexican secretary of defense (an army general) traditionally preferred to work with all US and Mexican Army contacts directly through the US Army chief of staff, who was a uniformed officer, rather than the civilian secretary of defense. But with the formation of USNORTHCOM, Mexico’s then secretary of defense, General Clemente Vega, privately indicated a willingness to open channels of communication to this new command structure and not be constrained by past relationships. In public, however, he remained reluctant to such collaboration.8 Canada’s political leadership did not initially respond to the urgency of US actions to secure the North American continent. However, as Bernard Stancati notes, Canada soon “understood that if it

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were to continue its long-established role in hemispheric defense, it would have to become a more active player in this newly crafted defense and security paradigm.”9 Thus, Canada eventually followed the US lead on February 1, 2006, by creating its own military command responsible for the homeland defense mission of Canada and North America. Like its US counterpart, Canada Command has the mandate to serve as a single point of contact “for Canadian civil authorities seeking Canadian Forces support; a single military command for domestic and continental operations; and a focus on Canada as a single theatre of operations.”10 In the case of Canada, it not only was the events of 9/11 that prompted this institutional change but also the events of 2005 when the Canadian military provided support to rescue and relief operations in the United States following Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in the Gulf of Mexico. The Canadian military recognized the need for a unified command to coordinate the joint efforts of its military services within the hemisphere whereas, previously under the NORAD structure, the air force was the only service fully integrated with its US counterparts. Canadian military personnel from all branches of service had worked with their US counterparts through the NATO command structure in Europe; however, the terrorist attacks of 2001 and the natural disasters of 2005 prompted an institutional change required for the new roles and missions of the Canadian armed forces in North America. Mexico, on the other hand, did not follow suit. There was no restructuring of the Mexican armed forces after 2001 to respond to terrorist threats in the hemisphere, although the Mexican military did respond to Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. The Mexican military’s command structure was already focused on homeland defense, by virtue of its regional commands throughout the country. Since the Mexican Revolution, Mexico has viewed the threat as internal and the focus has been on domestic security concerns, rather than a larger national security focus.11 However, as a result of 9/11 and US fears over additional terrorist attacks that could emanate from either Mexico or Canada, the Mexican military was concerned that the United States would take a proactive stance toward Mexico that would threaten its sovereignty, including unilateral actions against perceived threats. This concern in Mexico was heightened by the new USNORTHCOM emblem, which showed the entire continent of North America covered by the bald eagle, which is the US national symbol.12 It was primarily Mexican Army officials who voiced these concerns. On the

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other hand, the Mexican Navy cautiously welcomed the opportunity for closer cooperation with its US counterparts. The two navies had been participating in counterdrug operations in the Pacific Ocean, Gulf of Mexico, and Caribbean Sea. Thus, when USNORTHCOM offered Mexico an opportunity to send liaison officers to Colorado Springs, the navy accepted while the army initially did not.13 In the end, the problem for Mexico lies in the lack of a unified defense policy for external affairs, mainly with the United States. Within the US Department of Defense itself, there were additional impediments to an expanded US-Mexico security relationship through the USNORTHCOM structure. The Office of the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Western Hemisphere Affairs at the Pentagon traditionally served as the conduit for US-Mexico defense relationships since Mexico had been unassigned with regard to a combatant commander’s AOR. Although the US Southern Command (USSOUTHCOM) had made overtures to that office to change the Unified Command Plan and place Mexico under its AOR, the deputy assistant secretary’s office balked at placing Mexico under any combatant commander at that time.14 However, with the establishment of USNORTHCOM, both Mexico and Canada were added to USNORTHCOM’s AOR, despite earlier objections by the deputy assistant secretary’s office to assigning Mexico to any US military AOR. For USNORTHCOM and NORAD officials seeking to accomplish their assigned mission of providing for the homeland defense of the continental United States and Canada, the prospect of expanding the perimeter of defense out beyond the borders of these two nations to include Mexico was problematic. Overtures continued to be made to Mexican defense officials through low-level contacts, or through established working relationships such as the US Fifth Army–sponsored Border Commanders Conferences. However, the prospects of an expanded security relationship that would bring Mexico into either the current NORAD structure or the proposed expanded NORAD agreements proved to be elusive.15

Internal Debates and Institutional Changes

After 9/11, the United States also undertook a significant restructuring of its governmental institutions in order to address the new domestic threats posed by terrorism. The Homeland Security Act of 2002 pro-

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duced the largest restructuring of the US government since 1947 when the National Security Act created the Department of Defense, Department of the Air Force, and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).16 The Department of Homeland Security (DHS), a new executive department of the federal government, was crafted from twenty-two existing federal agencies with over 170,000 employees.17 It became operational on March 1, 2003.18 DHS also included new institutional structures, such as the Transportation Security Administration, and a restructuring of existing agencies, such as the US Border Patrol, the US Customs Service, and US Immigration and Naturalization Service into new organizational relationships.19 The bipartisan National Commission on Terrorist Attacks upon the United States (9/11 Commission), chartered by the US Congress to consider the reasons why the US government failed to anticipate the terrorist attacks, looked particularly at the intelligence and law enforcement communities. While the 9/11 Commission did not recommend changing the institutional structures of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) or the CIA, or placing them under the new DHS, it did suggest the need for better information sharing and integration of the country’s intelligence architecture. The solution offered was the formation of the director of national intelligence as the single entity for oversight over the Intelligence Community organizations, effectively removing the director of the CIA from this role.20 Mexico’s Dilemma

In Mexico, there were changes politically with regard to its view toward security and relations with the United States. Prior to 9/11, Mexico appeared to be moving in the direction of recommending that the Inter-American Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance (Rio Treaty of 1947) and the Inter-American Defense Board be revoked in their entirety since these structures lacked validity due to the fundamental change in the security relationships between nations in the hemisphere. 21 Yet after 9/11, Mexican president Vicente Fox took the complete opposite position, citing the need for a second Chapultepec Conference in Mexico City in 2003 to discuss hemispheric security issues. Although he was careful not to allude to the formation of any new formal military alliances and insisted that the real threat to the hemisphere remained poverty, Fox was clearly falling more in line

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with US interests and desires to expand the security relationship in North America. Within Mexico, the 9/11 terrorist attacks in the United States demonstrated the necessity for the country to develop a policy of prevention to protect its national infrastructure and establish a better system to coordinate within its own structures of government and with the United States. Additionally, institutional contradictions, the absence of a national security project by the Fox administration, and the compounding problems presented by the diverse personal interests of other cabinet ministers made it even more evident that a national strategy would not be forthcoming. In fact, national security coordination was dismantled and the national security adviser was sent to the United Nations, exacerbating the contradictions in Mexican foreign policy. This vacuum created by the loss of a major actor in national security decision planning led to several problems. First, Mexico lost a golden opportunity to develop a democratic national security agenda. Second, the government did not take advantage of its chance to conceptualize a national strategy. Third, the lack of an institutionalized, conceptually coherent strategy, combined with national security law, revealed Mexico’s vulnerabilities. Consequently, the Mexican government experienced a political, conceptual, and institutional vacuum and was unable to coordinate, plan, and administer the resources of the state in order to cooperate effectively with the United States. Moreover, between January 2002 and March 2003, it was unclear who was in charge of coordinating national security in Mexico. According to Mexico’s Constitution, the president and the minister of the interior are responsible and, after the departure of Adolfo Aguilar Zínser to the United Nations, the Fox administration neglected to clearly define new roles within his government. Some general ideas were announced in April 2003, but no strategy was defined. 22 After 9/11, the contradictions within the Fox administration were exposed when the national security adviser was sent to the United Nations without coming to an agreement on a new strategy within his own cabinet. Equally important, Aguilar Zínser was not supported by his former political ally and friend, the minister of foreign relations, Jorge Castañeda. In fact, Castañeda was against his appointment. 23 Subsequently, they became political enemies with very different

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positions on several issues. Castañeda was in support of the War on Terror; Aguilar Zínser was against the war and in favor of UN participation regarding the Iraq War. These major differences exacerbated the position of the Mexican government and created tension in the bilateral relationship with the United States. They also further demonstrated that Fox did not have a plan. The 2012–2016 Department of Homeland Security Strategic Plan has reshaped perceptions in Mexico regarding the United States. In general terms, the Iraq War was not supported by the Mexican government and Mexican public opinion. As a result, Castañeda left his position as minister of foreign relations due to the lack of US support for his migratory reform and his impasse with the Mexican ambassador to the United Nations, Aguilar Zínser.24 In addition, bilateral relations changed when the former governor of Pennsylvania, Tom Ridge, was appointed as the new US cabinet-level official in charge of homeland security. Mexico was unable to develop a national security strategy before or after 9/11. The contradictions and constraints in Mexico’s relationship with the United States have become more tangible due to Mexican opposition to the US unilateral national security strategy, which continues to generate negative reactions instead of cordial coordination and support. For practical purposes, the US strategy to defeat terrorism and transnational crime exacerbated an already fragmented Mexican state, despite the fact of a bilateral relationship in progress. In sum, while the United States developed a national, regional, and global security strategy to deal with the threat of terrorism after 9/11, Mexico’s response was reactive and short-sighted. This is due in large part to Mexico’s history, size, geographic position, and plurality of views. For instance, this lack of a coordinated response is creating obstacles to maximizing Mexico’s cooperation in North America. There is not a single unified strategy for addressing the types of security challenges that Mexico faces internally and abroad or for the types of policies Mexico needs to implement regarding organized crime and drug trafficking, as well as terrorism. Canada’s Support

On the other hand, immediately after 9/11, Canada and the United States made significant progress in the realignment of their security relationships. In December 2002, the Bi-National Planning Group

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(BPG) was created after the exchange of formal diplomatic notes and terms of reference through diplomatic channels (Department of State and Ministry of Foreign Affairs). The BPG had an ambitious agenda, seeking to expand the current NORAD agreement to include maritime- and land-based approaches to North America. Other topics addressed at these early meetings included enhanced intelligence and information sharing, interagency cooperation, better situational awareness, and border security. The BPG completed its preliminary recommendations in 2005 and a renewed NORAD agreement, including a maritime component, was signed in August 2006. Canada also formed new political institutions, in response to the 9/11 terrorist attacks in the United States and the newly created DHS. Public Safety Canada (PSC) was established in 2003 to serve as a single government agency “to ensure coordination across all federal departments and agencies responsible for national security and the safety of Canadians.”25 PSC includes both intelligence (Canadian Security Intelligence Service) and law enforcement (Royal Canadian Mounted Police) agencies under its umbrella. PSC also includes the Canada Border Services Agency, the Correctional Service of Canada, and the National Parole Board. Given the size of these agencies and their roles and missions in providing for the safety and security of the nation, it made operational sense to include them all under the new governmental structure. More importantly, for maintaining ministeriallevel contact with the United States, mirroring the structure of DHS made perfect sense for two countries with such deeply integrated security arrangements.

Conflicting Interests in Security Responses

After Mexico’s initial show of support for US security concerns after 9/11, reality set in, with a retrenchment of Mexican nationalism and public concern over Mexico’s involvement in any new formal military alliances. The Mexican press ran a number of articles condemning the formation of the new USNORTHCOM in 2002 and the assigning of Mexico to its AOR, arguing that Mexico would soon be “occupied” by the US military. 26 Secretary of Defense Vega also made public comments condemning US actions, insisting that the Mexican military would not be subordinated to such a new regional security system. He was adamant that he would not work through a

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US regional combatant commander, insisting that his relationship with the US military would remain directly with the secretary of defense (whom he considered to be his equivalent cabinet-level officer) or the chief of staff of the army.27 On the political side, there were additional obstacles in furthering security cooperation between the United States and Mexico. The State Department, reeling over Mexico’s failure to back the United States in the UN Security Council to authorize force in Iraq, insisted on playing hardball with the Mexican Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The State Department also blocked the Defense Department’s request to increase its Foreign Military Financing Program (FMFP) budget for Mexico to $57 million in FY 2005/06, instead reducing it to a meager $2.4 million. The Mexican military had traditionally shunned Foreign Military Sales programs with the United States that used FMFP credit, preferring instead to purchase any weapons systems or military equipment from Direct Commercial Sales to avoid the logistics of being tied directly to the US government for support. In spite of this, the US Defense Department saw the symbolic significance of expanding FMFP money to Mexico as a regional partner in the homeland defense mission.28 Mexico received $11 million in FMFP funds in FY 2006/07.29 Canada also faced challenges to its national interests after 9/11 due to the pressure from the United States for Canadian support of the Global War on Terror, including the expansion of military operations beyond Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan into the new theater of operations in Iraq. Canada did not connect the USsponsored Iraq War (Operation Iraqi Freedom) with the War on Terror and thus did not see its interests at stake with this new war effort in 2003. After the decisive combat operations ended, Canada’s economic interests were at stake because the United States sought to withhold $13 billion in reconstruction funds to countries that did not support the war effort. Then prime minister Paul Martin found the US policy “difficult to fathom,” particularly given that some of that reconstruction money ($225 million) had been pledged by the Canadian government.30 Excluding Canadian companies from bidding on the contracts did not seem right for a country that had supported the United States in so many ways after 9/11. Neither did it reflect the spirit of cooperation and shared security interests that the United States wished to foster with its North American neighbors after the terror attacks. After 9/11, economic interests also created some enmity with regard to boundaries (i.e., the administration of border security mea-

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sures by the United States), particularly with regard to the USCanada border. Canadian trade with the United States has always represented a critical component of the economic security of the country. With over 80 percent of Canadian trade moving across a small number of border crossings, ensuring an efficient and timely flow has been foremost in the interests of the Canadian government and business groups. Infrastructure at border crossings, however, remains an Achilles’ heel for the Canadian government. When it comes to the US-Canada border, geography does matter. The tunnels and bridges that form the critical trade links between the two countries could also be significant targets for any terror organization wishing to disrupt the trade flow between the two largest trading partners in the world. Starting in the late 1980s, the US-Canada Free Trade Agreement and the subsequent NAFTA in 1994 resulted in substantial increases in cross-border trade and placed increased pressure on border infrastructure. The results of the cooperative efforts to resolve some of these border- and trade-related issues were the Canada–United States Accord on Our Shared Border signed in February 1995 and the follow-up 1999 agreement, the Canada–United States Partnership Forum. However, post-9/11, the issue of the US-Canada border became increasingly securitized. In December 2001, the two governments signed the Smart Border Accord, which focused predominately on resolving a security-trade dilemma that had developed after 9/11. The importance of maintaining open border crossings along with an infrastructure that could adequately handle the heavy flow of traffic was evident in the post-9/11 security climate. Immediately following the 9/11 attacks, trucks with US-bound cargo were lined up for days on the Canadian side waiting to cross the border. Later, an upgraded security alert during the 2003–2004 holiday season caused border backups in some cities up to 10 kilometers in length, playing havoc with deliveries in time for Christmas.31 Indeed, such delays at the border led the president of the Ontario Trucking Association to claim that the border is the largest economic issue facing Canada. 32 This position was echoed by the Coalition for Secure and TradeEfficient Borders, an organization formed by Canadian businesses to help the government deal with border issues.33 More recently, a report by the Ontario Chamber of Commerce has claimed that delays at the border due to issues of limited infrastructure and border management are a major drain on the economies of both countries.34

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Given the heavy reliance on Canadian trade with the United States, the dependence on a relatively few border crossings to carry this trade, and the vulnerable nature of the infrastructure at border crossings, a shutdown of even one of these crossings would have a significant impact on the Canadian economy, on the US states that depend a great deal on trade with Canada, and on the industries that are highly dependent on timely cross-border deliveries. Unfortunately, balancing the need to facilitate rapid transborder movement of products has resulted in low inspection rates: about 4.5 percent for the Canada Border Services Agency.35 Furthermore, programs developed to facilitate faster customs clearance, such as Free and Secure Trade (FAST), NEXUS, and the Customs Trade Partnership Against Terrorism (C-TPAT), are based on models of self-compliance and risk management that offer no security guarantee against an evolving terrorist threat.36 With a large percentage of the Canadian and US economies being interdependent on trade between the two countries, border infrastructure, like bridges and tunnels, represents a real target to groups wanting to inflict damage on the economies of Canada and the United States. For Canada an attack that would impede the movement of even a small percentage of goods traveling south could be catastrophic to the Canadian economy.

Borders and the New Perimeter

The United States and Canada have proudly boasted to have the longest undefended border in the world.37 The societal and environmental implications have been immense with communities on both sides of the border sharing a sense of identity and security characterized more by amity than enmity. That perception significantly changed after 9/11, when the United States took measures to increase security along its northern border. The US-Mexico border, however, has been contentious given the large number of undocumented immigrants who have entered the United States, which is estimated to be at least 11 million.38 For the United States prior to 9/11, the uncontrolled migration of undocumented aliens (primarily from Mexico and Central America) was considered a threat to the nation’s identity, as demographic and cultural factors redefined many communities in border states and large metropolitan areas. The societal implications were significant as many anti-immigration groups pushed for the construction of a security

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fence, tougher immigration laws, English language–only laws, and denial of benefits to undocumented immigrants.39 For Mexico, however, emigration is considered a right of movement by the government, which gives Mexican nationals living in the United States identification and protection as Mexican citizens. They do not give up their citizenship even if they become naturalized US citizens.40 In fact, many Mexicans consider parts of the southwestern United States still to be Mexican territory that was illegally annexed by the United States in 1848.41 These cultural and identity issues had created enmity between the United States and Mexico over immigration issues well before 9/11, particularly for residents of border states in the southwest. This was only heightened as a result of the new threat of terrorism. In his study of the US-Mexico border, sociology professor Robert Lee Maril provides an example. He describes the role of the US Border Patrol as “patrolling chaos” along the US-Mexico border in south Texas. After two years of extensive research on the border after 9/11, Maril determined that the anarchic situation created a profound sense of insecurity for the United States as a whole as well as a great deal of frustration and helplessness on the part of the agency responsible for securing the border.42 If the 9/11 terrorists could enter the United States legally and conduct the coordinated attacks witnessed in Washington, DC, and New York City, then what could terrorists who enter the country illegally accomplish? The potential for terrorists to take advantage of a porous border, to integrate with other undocumented migrants, or, even worse, to exploit criminal and drug trafficking networks created profound fear on the part of US officials. This also created serious concern on the part of Mexican and Canadian officials who worried that the United States would take extreme measures to close the border even to legal border crossers. Whether or not Mexico, Canada, and the United States are more vulnerable to transnational threats originating in one of the three countries, the post-9/11 security climate has substantially impacted the political will to act on potential transnational threats, especially those external to the geographic boundaries of the respective state. In this scenario a hardening of the border would result from a political decision to make transiting the border between Canada and Mexico into the United States more difficult. This process is perhaps already in motion, given the increases in material and manpower resources allocated to border security and the adoption, on the US side of the bor-

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der, of a forward deployment strategy.43 The worst-case scenario, however, would be a move on the part of the United States to severely tighten the border to the degree that trade between it and the two countries would be compromised—an outcome that could result from either Canada or Mexico being viewed by the United States as a liability to homeland security.44 Central to US identity and concerns about Canadian security has been the Canadian immigration and refugee system. Following 9/11, former US attorney general John Ashcroft was clear on the need for increased security in light of potential terrorist threats when he commented that “we are working on plans to help provide greater security for our northern border, which has become a transit point for several individuals involved in terrorism.”45 Of course, even before the attacks of 9/11, Canadian and US officials were aware of security problems along the US-Canada border. In 1988, US customs officials arrested three members of a Syrian terrorist group linked to al-Qaeda who attempted to enter the United States with explosives. Some of the bombers of the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center entered the United States from Canada and planned to use Canada as a possible escape route. In December 1999, Ahmed Ressam was arrested crossing into the United States in possession of bomb-making materials and plans to carry out a terrorist attack.46 In the post-9/11 period, Canada has continued to raise security concerns in the United States. US security officials believe that Canada not only is home to terrorist sleeper cells waiting for a chance to cross the border and attack the United States but also that crossing from Canada has become a favored route for undocumented immigrants, drug smugglers, and potential terrorists.47 Canada’s security image among US policymakers is not lost on Canadian officials. In December 1999, the Mackenzie Institute warned publicly that Canadian trade with the United States could be damaged if Canada did not do something about the Canadian immigration and refugee system and did not take action against the known terrorist organizations operating within Canadian territory.48 In the same month, the Canadian Security and Intelligence Service (CSIS) confirmed not only that Canada’s immigration and refugee policies were attractive to terrorist organizations but that a number of terrorist organizations had already taken advantage of the rules to establish a presence in Canada.49 Following the 9/11 attacks, Stewart Bell of the National Post reiterated the claims made by CSIS and added that,

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given Canada’s proximity to the United States and the openness of the border, Canada had become “a logical staging point for attacks against Americans.”50 While both Canada and the United States have made increased efforts to tighten security along the border, illegal transnational movement continues to be a problem in both directions. The border is breached on a regular basis. Whether it is smugglers moving highpotency marijuana from Canada to the US market or cigarette smugglers bringing less-expensive, tax-exempt cigarettes into Canada, illegal transnational movement is a regular occurrence. As the former inspector general of DHS, Clark Ervin, makes clear, the border between Canada and the United States continues to be a point of weakness not only because of geography but also because of limitations inherent in border security programs.51

Redefining the Threat After 9/11

After 9/11, if the United States, Canada, and Mexico were to form a new security relationship in North America, given the large number of impediments previously discussed, another approach would be necessary. In other words, it became evident that it was necessary to readdress the security concerns of each nation in a post-9/11 world by reexamining the nature of the threat that it perceived and the context of the perimeter with regard to its security concerns. For the United States, the threat of global terrorism, primarily from fundamentalist Islamic groups, was the main concern. The US State Department listed forty-four Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTOs), of which twenty-nine were Islamic groups.52 Some of these groups (e.g., Hezbollah and Hamas) have been known to operate in Latin America but, other than Hezbollah’s implication in an attack on the Israeli embassy in Argentina in 1992, they have not directly targeted Latin American, US, or Canadian citizens.53 Some terrorist groups, such as the Irish Republican Army, were identified as operating in Colombia with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), possibly providing demolitions training. But again, there is no evidence of any of these identified FTOs specifically targeting US interests in the region. After 9/11, the United States continued to consider illegal drugs a threat; however, it would be difficult to say that the country contin-

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ued to fight a “war” on drugs (particularly given its policy in Afghanistan after the overthrow of the Taliban). 54 In Latin America (primarily Colombia), US policy under the George W. Bush administration shifted after 9/11, allowing the United States to help fund counterterrorism as well as counternarcotics efforts of the Colombian military and the National Police. In October 2004, the United States further increased the numbers of military personnel and contractors authorized to operate in Colombia to 1,600 (800 each). The link between narcotics trafficking and terrorists groups such as the FARC is documented and the US Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) made a number of public service announcements reinforcing the connection between drug trafficking and terrorism. ONDCP also noted that Mexico remained the major transit zone for cocaine entering the United States, approximately 70 percent coming over land routes, rather than via air or maritime routes.55 For Mexico, immediately after 9/11, the threat was not terrorism but rather organized crime and economic underdevelopment. Mexican president Fox and his successor, Calderón, realized that Mexico would face increased instability due to the growing power of drug cartels and political violence if economic hardship were to escalate and the pressure valve of the US border were to be closed off over US fears of undocumented immigrants and terrorists crossing the border. If the United States were to close the border, the impact on each nation’s economy would be enormous, especially for Mexico, which had seen its trade with the United States grow exponentially in the past ten years under NAFTA (estimated at $350 billion in 2002).56 The economic impact on Mexico also would be staggering if the United States attempted to limit the amount of foreign remittances sent back to Mexico from Mexicans without a legal status working in the United States (estimated at $9 billion annually, second only to oil, as Mexico’s main source of export income).57 Viewed in this light, Mexico could not withstand another terrorist attack on the United States, particularly if it appeared that the terrorists used Mexico as the infiltration route into the United States. For Canada after 9/11, the threat of a loss of sovereignty and identity with the United States appeared to be the greatest stumbling block to increased security cooperation. Under Prime Minister Jean Chrétien, Canada refused to support the United States in the Iraq War. This was exacerbated under Prime Minister Paul Martin, who further refused Canada’s support of the US National Missile Defense system, which sought to include Canada in its security umbrella.58

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Canadian citizens also had concerns about the direction in which the United States was headed after 9/11, given the Iraq War and President George W. Bush’s belligerent tone (e.g., “either you are with us or with the terrorists”).59 In fact, in an Innovative Research Group public opinion poll in 2006 five years after 9/11, over a third of Canadians thought Bush was a greater threat to Canada than Osama bin Laden.60

Conclusion

The eminent Cold War historian, John Lewis Gaddis, reflecting on the events of 9/11, observes that “we act in the present with a view of shaping the future only on the basis of what we know from the past.”61 For the United States, the threat of terrorism required a global response, taking the fight to the enemy instead of waiting for the enemy to strike again against the homeland. The United States viewed the passive reaction to terrorist incidents in the past as serving to embolden al-Qaeda, leading to the deadliest single attack on US soil from an outside enemy in the history of the nation. 62 In order to prevent another deadly terrorist attack on the US homeland, the United States undertook a series of initiatives, which involved both foreign and domestic policies aimed at shoring up its defenses. Within North America, those defenses were intended to redefine the security relationship between the United States, Canada, and Mexico, by expanding on preexisting security structures (e.g., NORAD and NATO) to form a new defense perimeter. For the United States, new institutional structures (e.g., USNORTHCOM and DHS) would provide the mechanisms by which regional security cooperation would be transformed from previous relationships into more dynamic and robust security relationships. In this new threat environment, the interests and identities of all three countries would be so interconnected that historical contentions would have less salience, amity would trump enmity, and even boundaries would need to be expanded rather than contracted behind borders and fences. For Canada and Mexico, however, there was not a shared threat perception that necessitated a major restructuring of security relationships in the hemisphere. Canada conceded to US insecurity by building on existing relationships (e.g., NORAD) and even allowing some reorganization to mirror US political and military institutional changes. However, Canada refused to allow its identity to be so transfigured in the process that its interests would become subsumed

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under US hegemonic influences. Mexico, under Fox, looked at the situation differently, seeing US vulnerability as a historic opportunity to push for open borders and increased access for Mexican emigrants into the United States as the price for security cooperation.63 He failed to take into consideration the reaction of the US public after 9/11 to the prospect of an open border when the threat of terrorists crossing into the United States from Mexico was a very real concern. The main issue in the 2004 US presidential election remained the War on Terror. George W. Bush ran on a reelection platform that claimed his administration’s policies to deter another terrorist attack on the US homeland were working. Even the Iraq War had yet to become an electoral concern, despite the failure to find weapons of mass destruction or the revelations of prisoner abuse by US service members at Abu Ghraib prison. Notwithstanding some concerns over civil liberties and the impact of the USA PATRIOT Act (Patriot Act) on domestic policy, the majority of citizens continued to place a heightened value on security and looked to their neighbors to the north and south to share these same concerns. Mexican and Canadian citizens did not. In fact, prior to 2005, there were indicators that relationships between the three countries were becoming more strained. It was evident that the threat of terrorism alone was not sufficient for forging a new regional security complex in North America. Rather, a different kind of threat and unique response would provide a breakthrough in security relationships to foster a new security partnership in the hemisphere.

Notes 1. Barry Buzan, Ole Waever, and Jaap de Wilde, Security: A New Framework for Analysis (Boulder: Lynne Rienner, 1998). 2. The term “Global War on Terror” was coined by the George W. Bush administration. The term was dropped by President Barack Obama in favor of a new term, “Overseas Contingency Operation.” 3. Andrew Bacevich, “Requiem for the Bush Doctrine,” Current History (December 2005): 411–417. 4. Frederic L. Kirgis, “Security Council Resolution 1441 on Iraq’s Final Opportunity to Comply with Disarmament Obligations,” American Society of International Law Insights (November 2002), www.asil.org/insigh92.cfm, accessed August 28, 2010. 5. Buzan, Waever, and de Wilde, Security. 6. The Department of Defense distinguishes between homeland defense (what the military does to protect against attacks against the United States ema-

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nating from outside the territorial boundaries) and homeland security (what all other federal government agencies do to protect the United States). In other words, military forces used for domestic homeland security–related roles and missions will be in support of lead federal agencies performing their homeland security roles. The exception is the use of the National Guard, which the state governors can activate to meet specific security-related functions that they deem necessary. Recent examples have been in line with traditional National Guard missions such as disaster relief and consequence management (sealing off public access to Ground Zero in New York City was one such example). 7. The Unified Command Plan is the document that lays out geographic and operational boundaries for each of the Unified Commands. Prior to USNORTHCOM, both Canada and Mexico were “unassigned” to a regional Combatant Command for political reasons. Security assistance programs for Mexico were administered through USSOUTHCOM, which had moved its headquarters from Panama to Miami commensurate with the turnover of the Panama Canal in 1999. Canada as part of NATO was essentially part of the US European Command’s “Area of Responsibility” for all intents and purposes, with the exception of Canada’s involvement in NORAD, which came under USSPACECOM and was a functional rather than a geographic Combatant Command. 8. Author’s personal discussions with US Department of Defense officials, Colorado Springs, October 12, 2004. 9. Bernard Stancati, “The Future of Canada’s Role in Hemispheric Defense,” Parameters (August 2006): 109. 10. Canada Command website, www.canadacom.forces.gc.ca/site/mis-mis -eng.asp, accessed September 8, 2010. 11. El ejército mexicano (Mexico City: Secretaría de la Defensa Nacional, 1979), 341. 12. Sergio Aguayo Quezada, a leading academic on national security affairs from El Colegio de México, wrote that the emblem of USNORTHCOM including Mexico in its AOR is “offensive” for a real spirit of cooperation. “Plan México,” Reforma, August 29, 2007, www.sergioaguayo.org/articulos /2007/ART07-08-29.pdf, accessed May 29, 2009. 13. “At First Glance,” Ágora 2, no. 1 (2009): 5. As of 2011, both Mexican Navy and Army officers are represented at USNORTHCOM headquarters in Colorado Springs. 14. In 1996, General Wesley Clark, commander of SOUTHCOM, attempted to make the case for Mexico’s integration into the SOUTHCOM AOR but was rebuffed by the secretary of defense, at the urging of the Office of the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Western Hemisphere Affairs. The irony is that the SOUTHCOM emblem shows Mexico as part of the command’s AOR to this day. 15. As one member of the B-National Planning Group commented in personal discussion with the author in 2005, “We expect an agreement with Canada in the next year. For Mexico, it may take 10 years, if at all.” 16. Richard White, ed., Department of Homeland Security (New York: Pearson Learning Solutions, 2005), 98.

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17. Richard J. Kilroy, Jr., ed., Threats to Homeland Security: An All Hazards Perspective (Hoboken, NJ: Wiley, 2007), 27. 18. White, Department of Homeland Security, 124. 19. Two new organizational structures that formed after the establishment of DHS were US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and US Customs and Border Protection (CBP). 20. See The 9/11 Commission Report (New York: W. W. Norton, 2004). The Intelligence Community is comprised of seventeen agencies with intelligence functions, many of which reside within the Department of Defense. The intelligence agencies within DHS belong to the US Coast Guard and the DHS Intelligence and Analysis Division. See www.intelligence.gov/about-the -intelligence-community/, accessed September 8, 2011. 21. Juan Pablo Soriano, “El 11 de septiembre y la redefinición de la seguridad interamericana,” Observatori de la Política Exterior Europea Working Paper No. 24 (Barcelona: Institut Universitari d’Estudis Europeus, 2002). 22. Santiago Creel Miranda, “La migración y la seguridad entre México y Estados Unidos,” Foreign Affairs en Español ITAM 4, no. 2 (2004): 6. 23. Author’s interview with a former adviser to the William J. Clinton administration, Washington, DC, January 2002. 24. Delgado Alvarado, “Historia de un desencanto,” Proceso, no. 1367 (January 12, 2003): 12–16. 25. Public Safety Canada website, www.publicsafety.gc.ca/abt/index -eng.aspx, accessed January 8, 2011. 26. “El Pentágono quiere a México en su Comando Norte,” Proceso, February 24, 2002; Gustavo Iruegas, “Y se acabo por llorar,” La Jornada, March 23, 1995; Nydia Egremy, “Comando Norte Engulle a México,” VoltaireNet.org, January 20, 2007, www.voltairenet.org/article144607.html, accessed January 8, 2011. 27. Author’s personal discussions with Department of Defense officials, Colorado Springs, October 12, 2004. 28. Ibid. 29. US Department of State, Summary and Highlights: International Affairs Function 150, 2007, www.fas.org/asmp/resources/110th/Function 150.pdf, accessed September 14, 2010. 30. “Bush Sticks with Iraqi Contract Ban,” Associated Press, December 11, 2003, www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3676000/, accessed September 14, 2010. 31. Kevin McGran, “Windsor Suffers Border Woes,” Toronto Star, January 13, 2004, A4. 32. Ibid. 33. See Coalition for Secure and Trade-Efficient Borders, “Rethinking Our Borders: A Plan for Action,” December 3, 2001, www.canambta.org /Documents/Plan_For_Action.pdf, accessed January 8, 2011. 34. Ontario Chamber of Commerce, “Easing the Chokepoints: A Plan for an Efficient Canada-US Border,” August 30, 2007, http://occ.on.ca/Policy /Reports/340, accessed January 8, 2011. 35. Canada Customs and Revenue Agency, “CCRA Performance Report Annual Report to Parliament,” 2001–2002, 1–71, www.ccra-adrc.gc.ca/agency

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/annual/2001-2002/performance-e/mainpoints_customs-e.pdf, accessed January 10, 2011. 36. NEXUS is a joint program between the Canada Border Services Agency and CBP, which allows low-risk, preapproved travelers easier access in border-crossing procedures. C-TPAT is a program to expedite shipping for companies outside of the United States. “NEXUS Program Description,” CBP, June 5, 2009, www.cbp.gov/xp/cgov/travel/trusted_traveler/nexus _prog/nexus.xml, accessed August 1, 2011. 37. The US-Canada border is 8,893 kilometers long—the longest shared border between two countries and also the longest undefended border in the world. The Longest List of Stuff website, 2010, http://thelongestlistofthe longeststuffatthelongestdomainnameatlonglast.com/long263.html, accessed September 15, 2010. 38. Hope Yen, “Number of Illegal Immigrants in the US Declining,” Associated Press, September 10, 2010, www.msnbc.msn.com/id/38961638/, accessed September 15, 2010. 39. For example, see www.weneedafence.com/ and www.minuteman project.com/. 40. David Fitzgerald, “State and Emigration: A Century of Policy in Mexico,” Working Paper No. 123 (San Diego: Center for Comparative Immigration Studies, University of California at San Diego, September 2005). 41. Author’s discussion and personal observations working with the Mexican military. 42. See Robert Lee Maril, Patrolling Chaos: The US Border Patrol in Deep South Texas (Lubbock: Texas Tech University Press, 2004). 43. US Department of Justice, “Follow-up Report on the Border Patrol Efforts to Improve Northern Border Security,” Report no. I-2002-004 (Washington, DC: Department of Justice, 2002). 44. See, for example, US Government Accountability Office, “Border Security: Security Vulnerabilities at Unmanned and Unmonitored US Border Locations,” September 2007, www.gao.gov/new.items/d07884t.pdf; Peter Andreas, “A Tale of Two Borders: The US-Canada and US-Mexico Lines After 9-11,” in Peter Andreas and Thomas J. Biersteker, ed., The Rebordering of North America: Integration and Exclusion in a New Security Context (New York: Routledge, 2003), 8. 45. Linda Diebel, “US Seeks Tighter Security Border,” Toronto Star, September 26, 2001, A1. 46. Christopher Sands, “Canada and the War on Terrorism: The US Challenge on the North American Front,” Canada Focus 2, no. 3 (October 2001), www.csis.org/americas/canada/focus/Forcu0110.htm, accessed January 10, 2011. 47. Jerry Seper, “Terrorist Cells Too Close for Comfort,” Washington Times, December 8, 2003, www.washingtontimes.com, accessed October 23, 2010. 48. Lesley Wroughton, “Canada’s US Trade Could Be Hurt by Security Worries,” Reuters, December 24, 1999. 49. Canadian Security and Intelligence Service, “Trends in Terrorism,” Per-

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spectives, December 18, 1999, www.csis.gc.ca/eng/miscdocs/200001_e/html, accessed January 10, 2011. 50. Stewart Bell, “Infiltrating Canada,” National Post, September 17, 2001, A10. 51. Clark Kent Ervin, Open Target: Where America Is Vulnerable to Attack (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006), 37–77. 52. US Department of State, Country Reports on Terrorism 2009 (Washington, DC: Office of Counterterrorism, August 2010), www.state.gov/s/ct/rls /crt/2009/index.htm, accessed October 23, 2010. 53. Hezbollah was indicted by the Argentine Supreme Court in September 1992 and an arrest warrant was issued for its leader, Imad Mughniyah, by the Argentine authorities. Angel Rabasa, Beyond Al-Qaeda: The Outer Rings of the Terrorist Universe (Santa Monica, CA: RAND, 2006), 12. 54. For example, see Gretchen Peters, Seeds of Terror: How Heroin Is Bankrolling the Taliban and al Qaeda (New York: Picador, 2009). 55. US Office of National Drug Control Policy, Source Countries and Drug Transit Zones: Mexico, 2004, www.whitehousedrugpolicy.gov /international/mexico.html, accessed October 29, 2010. 56. NAFTA at 10: Progress, Potential, and Precedents (Washington, DC: Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, Conference Proceedings, 2005), 68. 57. Ibid., xv. 58. Michael O’Hanlon, “Don’t Blame Canada for Missile Defense Snub,” Brookings Institution, March 3, 2005, www.brookings.edu/opinions/2005/0303 defensestrategy_ohanlon.aspx, accessed October 30, 2010. 59. George W. Bush, “Address to Congress,” September 20, 2001, http://yc2.net/speech.htm, accessed November 1, 2010. 60. Terry Vanderheyden, “38% of Canadians Believe President Bush More Dangerous Than Osama Bin Laden. 32% Also Dislike Americans,” Lifesitenews.com, Ottawa, Canada, November 14, 2005, www.myforumabout.com /city/vancouver/38-of-canadians-believe-president-bush-more-dangerous-than -osamabin-laden-32-also-dislike-americans-20537, accessed June 28, 2012. 61. John Lewis Gaddis, Surprise, Security, and the American Experience (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2004), 5. 62. The Battle of Antietam witnessed the single bloodiest day of the American Civil War, with 23,000 casualties. “Antietam: Casualties of Battle, National Park Service,” National Park Service, n.d., www.nps.gov/anti/history culture/casualties.htm, accessed November 9, 2011. 63. President Fox pushed for immigration reform before 9/11. He envisioned Mexico having an open border with the United States similar to what the United States had with Canada. Vicente Fox interview with Jim Lehrer, NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, September 7, 2001, www.pbs.org/newshour/bb /latin_america/july-dec01/fox_9-7.html, accessed November 11, 2010.

6 New Momentum in Security Cooperation

After both Canada and Mexico did not support the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq, the United States began to look at other means of furthering security cooperation in North America with its two neighbors. Neither Canada nor Mexico shared the threat perception of the United States with regard to terrorism, which required a commitment to a Global War on Terror. However, they did share common interests with regard to furthering trade, economic cooperation, and regional integration. Thus, the concept of shared threat perceptions, which impacts such a dialogue on these broader issues, had to go beyond terrorism toward a redefinition of security along the lines of an “all-hazards approach” that includes threats from natural disasters, pandemic diseases, and trafficking in illegal goods.1 The instrument that provides the structure for such dialogue to occur is called the Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP). In this chapter, we examine the formation and development of the SPP as it evolved under different leaders in all three countries since its founding in March 2005 and the subsequent actions that have occurred under the SPP umbrella: the responses to Hurricanes Katrina and Rita and the Mérida Initiative. The focusing events of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in the fall of 2005 provided further momentum to foster increased security cooperation in North America, putting the United States in the rare situation of receiving assistance from its neighbors during a humanitarian crisis instead of giving it. The 2008 Mérida Initiative provided a new mechanism by which security assistance (primarily military assistance) could be accepted by Mexico from the United States in supporting the war on 125

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drugs and targeting organized criminal gangs. Furthermore, this initiative openly acknowledged the co-responsibility of the United States in Mexico’s drug dilemma as the largest consumer of illegal drugs from Mexico and main supplier of illegal firearms to Mexico. Another facet of security cooperation under the SPP umbrella was the threat of pandemic flu. The possibility of such an outbreak occurring in North America had been recognized and work had been proceeding to address a pandemic avian influenza threat. For example, in September 2007, USNORTHCOM hosted a conference on pandemic influenza, which brought together public health, military, and government officials from the United States, Canada, and Mexico to discuss cross-border cooperation in the event that such a pandemic should occur.2 The fact is that many border towns had already established linkages and begun to plan for pandemic flu–related events such as the communities of Laredo, Texas, and Nuevo Laredo, Mexico.3 This relationship was tested, however, when in May 2009 a swine flu outbreak in Mexico threatened to become a real pandemic, with cases spreading to the United States and around the world. Mexico moved quickly to control the disease by shutting down the country for a week—closing schools, restaurants, and even suspending Cinco de Mayo celebration gatherings. Although some members of Congress called for a closing of the border, the Barack Obama administration refrained from taking any extraordinary measures to halt travel or commerce between the countries. The State Department refused to issue an official travel warning, instead deferring to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) travel advisory against all nonessential travel, which mainly impacted US government travelers to Mexico.4 The relationships that had developed since 2005 furthered the communication and coordination required to address the swine flu outbreak in 2009, such that it did not proliferate into the global crisis anticipated. For that reason, a discussion of this event and its application to the thesis we develop here will not be further addressed in this chapter. In this chapter we present two analytical cases based on the theory of security complexes around two threats that emerged in the 2005–2011 time frame: natural disasters and illegal trafficking. The significance of this work is the notion of a different understanding of US hegemony, as a superpower having to find instruments for collaboration and cooperation with Canada and Mexico for the mitigation

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of external and internal threats to North America. The efforts to strengthen cooperation through the SPP were reduced by the nature of US hegemony and the new mission to protect the homeland, which on the one side required the protection of US borders with Canada and Mexico. On the other side, this mission rested in the aftermath of insecurity due to the neglect of the Mexican state to provide stability and control at the common border with the United States by the end of the administration of Vicente Fox. Another of our aims in this chapter is to specifically analyze the impact of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita five months into the SPP and the changes in Canadian and Mexican perceptions on collaboration, which reached unprecedented levels in terms of military relations and security assistance to the US populace. This participation led to new insights into diplomatic and military cooperation on natural disasters as well as the idea that, from a coordinated manner, cooperation could be possible with regard to other threats (aside from terrorism) in the hemisphere. Furthermore, it demonstrated the differences between Canada and Mexico in support of their neighbor and illustrated the new interconnected phases of North American security cooperation. The United States continued to subordinate this collaboration under its overall agenda of the Global War on Terror and domestic security. Canada had created new institutions that responded to the Department of Homeland Security and the USNORTHCOM, redefining its national and defense security strategies. By the end of the Fox administration in 2006, Mexico still had not strategically defined its role in North America, leading to greater insecurity for its continental neighbors and an expansion of its national and hemispheric vulnerability. What the examination of these two cases (Hurricanes Katrina and Rita and the Mérida Initiative) demonstrates is that the insecurity of one state—implicitly or explicitly—is the insecurity of another, even though it may not necessarily be shared in the goals and perceptions of its neighbors. Our analysis in this chapter is made from the framework of identity, institutions, and interests and it indicates the advances and dilemmas of the interdependent and asymmetric cooperation between the United States, Canada, and Mexico. As we demonstrate, threats have no respect for hegemony and sovereignty; rather, the key is human and institutional capacity to address shared challenges for the region.

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The Security and Prosperity Partnership

After 9/11, for Canada, the threat of a loss of sovereignty to the United States appeared to be the greatest stumbling block to increased security cooperation. Previous Liberal Party administrations, specifically those of Jean Chrétien and Paul Martin, were timid on rapprochement with the United States with regard to its security agenda. Conservative Party prime minister Stephen Harper (elected in 2006) attempted to draw Canada closer to the United States on security cooperation and undo some of the hostility encountered during the previous administrations such as by supporting Canada’s involvement in the Security and Prosperity Partnership. The SPP was viewed skeptically by Canadian and US citizens alike, who believed it was a cover for ushering in a North American Union under a shroud of secrecy.5 Ironically, Canada viewed it as a loss of sovereignty to the United States, the United States viewed it as a loss of sovereignty to Mexico, and Mexico viewed it as a loss of sovereignty to both Canada and the United States.6 The SPP was launched by President George W. Bush in Waco, Texas, on March 23, 2005, in a joint statement with Mexican president Fox and Canadian prime minister Martin. The stated purpose of the SPP was to increase regional cooperation and information sharing so that the three countries could develop initiatives to “support continuous and prosperous trade . . . while ensuring that each nation— and the continent as a whole—remains secure against external threats and criminal activity.”7 The five major policy initiatives proposed under the SPP included: 1. Creation of a North American Competitiveness Council 2. Advancing cooperation on avian and pandemic influenza 3. North American Energy Security Initiative 4. North American emergency management 5. Smart, secure borders8 While these policy initiatives reflected a broader agenda for enhanced regional cooperation, the heart of the SPP (from the US perspective) was oriented toward confronting international terrorism as the main threat to North America. The SPP sought to protect, prevent, and respond to external and internal threats to North America and to improve the border crossings of the three partners as follows:

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• Implement common border security and bioprotection strategies; • Enhance critical infrastructure protection, and implement a common approach to emergency response; • Implement improvements in aviation and maritime security, combat transnational threats, and enhance intelligence partnerships; and • Implement a border facilitation strategy to build capacity and improve the legitimate flow of people and cargo at our shared borders.9 While Canada and Mexico were more motivated to support the “prosperity” over the “security” aspects of the SPP, each country’s leaders recognized that to get the prosperity incentives, they would have to be in favor of creating favorable conditions for US security. In the end, all three states got something that they were looking for. For example, in the area of competitiveness and improving the quality of life for the people, the following elements were implemented: Improve productivity through regulatory cooperation to generate growth, while maintaining high standards for health and safety; promote sectoral collaboration in energy, transportation, financial services, technology, and other areas to facilitate business; reduce the costs of trade through the efficient movement of goods and people; and enhance the stewardship of the environment, create a safer and more reliable food supply while facilitating agricultural trade, and protect the people from disease.10

To support the goal of shaping the most dynamic economic region in the world, nine working groups were created to deal with issues of prosperity such as transportation, the movement of goods, food, agriculture, energy, health, financial services, and the environment. Likewise, ten working groups undertook the security aspect, which entailed traveler and cargo security, law enforcement, border facilitation, aviation and maritime security, intelligence cooperation, bioprotection, emergency management, and science and technology. These working groups were conducted at the ministerial levels of all three governments, where senior leaders led roundtable discussions with relevant parties and held meetings and provided briefings to business groups in order to carry out a series of recommendations to improve competitiveness and security in North America. This was to offer the highest level of protection in critical infrastructure in the

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region from terrorists and other criminals as well as from common natural disasters.11 With respect to prosperity, a more efficient movement of people who were crossing the common borders was sought, emphasizing the removal of barriers to trade, investment, research, and education. Put another way, “Increased economic integration and security cooperation will further a unique and strong North American relationship that meets your state goals while preserving our political and cultural identities.”12 Nonetheless, the security and prosperity working groups were dissimilar, diverse, and difficult to articulate, despite the need of having to link security with prosperity. Since it was an initiative created and led by the George W. Bush administration in the United States with the focus on security, prosperity was diluted to the extent that Mexico presented more problems along its border and Canada concentrated on the focus of its interests with the United States. Furthermore, traditional civil society opponents expressed skepticism about the SPP due to the absence of extensive information about the outcomes of its negotiations. Criticism centered heavily on the secretive and exclusionary nature of discussions and the apparent privileging of business interests through the creation of the North America Competitiveness Council.13 Even supporters expressed concerns over the decisionmaking model that had been adopted by the SPP. Chris Sands declares that the “SPP represented a much needed reform or update of the framework for economic integration” in North America. Nonetheless, he adds that “the SPP has been a failure in two important respects: its limited transparency has fueled conspiracy theories that hold the SPP is a plot to reduce national sovereignty in each country; and it has failed to allay public concerns, mainly in the US, that NAFTA has hurt US prosperity more than it has helped—despite the ample economic data which provides evidence to the contrary.”14 Nonetheless, the formation of the SPP was a major effort of the North American neighbors to find solutions to common problems after 9/11. The initiatives that it created, however, lacked strong endorsement by the Mexican and US Congresses and the Canadian Parliament. Still, the SPP provided a basis for increased integration of North America into a regional security complex, which sought to respond as much to the new institutions that the United States had formed since 9/11 as to the extension of the security perimeter. In retrospect, in the formulation of the SPP initiative, Mexico had left out important interests

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such as immigration and drug trafficking.15 In fact, Mexico did not articulate specific interests that clearly identified its role in North America. Instead, it responded more openly to the interests of the United States, expecting that the George W. Bush administration would be able to promote an effective migration reform policy under the guise of the SPP; however, that did not happen. For its part, Canada upheld a more interdependent security and defense posture toward the United States, which put Canada in its best position. The United States, on the other hand, was committed to con-

Figure 6.1 Institutional Diagram of North American SPP Integration Leaders President Vicente Fox President George W. Bush Prime Minister Paul Martin Coordination Group

Presidencia de la República (Public Policy Office)

The White House (National Security Council)

Privy Council Office (Foreign Policy Advisor)

Facilitation and Coordination Group

Security • SEGOB (Mexico) • Homeland Security (United States) • Emergency Preparedness (Canada)

Linking Policy • SRE (Mexico) • State Department (United States) • Foreign Affairs (Canada)

Prosperity and Life Quality • Secretaría de Economía (Mexico) • DoC (United States) • Privy Council Office (Canada)

Trilateral Security Groups

Thematic Action Plans

Trilateral Groups of Prosperity and Life Quality

Source: Joint Statement by President George W. Bush, President Vicente Fox, and Prime Minister Paul Martin (March 2005), Sistema Internet de la Presidencia: http://aspan.fox.presidencia.gob .mx/archives/53/Declaracion%20de%20WACO%20_ingles_.pdf, accessed October 10, 2010. Notes: SEGOB: Secretaría de Gobernación (Secretariat of the Interior); SRE: Secretaría de Relaciones Exteriores (Ministry of Foreign Affairs); DoC: Department of Commerce.

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ducting a Global War on Terror, a policy that was prompted through its ongoing wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. US security, however, could not depend on what Mexico and Canada did or failed to do. In any case, US leaders continued their efforts to step up surveillance along the border with Mexico, fearing terrorists might use its porosity as a means of infiltration, neglecting the possibility of another route from the north.16 As is shown in Figure 6.1, the defense dimension to the SPP was mentioned in 2005; however, it was not envisioned as part of a new military-security relationship between the three countries—still deemed a bridge too far for reasons previously developed here. As a result, when natural disasters struck the US Gulf states later in the year, the underlining rapid response mechanisms to disasters and transnational threats had not been sufficiently developed through the SPP’s institutional processes to cope with the onslaught of one of the most destructive threats to the hemisphere in decades.

Hurricanes Katrina and Rita

The destructive power of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in August and September 2005 in the Gulf of Mexico (particularly impacting New Orleans) became an important test of regional security cooperation. While the systems and institutional mechanisms put in place after 9/11 were established anticipating the next terrorist attack, they were unprepared to respond to the threat from a major natural disaster of “apocalyptical” proportions as referred to by then commander of USNORTHCOM, Admiral Timothy Keating.17 The US government’s response to the hurricanes evinced a blurring of individual agency responsibilities, such as that of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), part of the Department of Homeland Security, created after September 11, 2001. The system was prepared “for the worst case scenario such as the dropping of atomic bombs,”18 but not for the calamity of nature. Therefore, coordination among local, state, federal, civil, and military officials was lacking. Hurricanes Katrina and Rita exposed a critical gap in the US security system and showed how highly vulnerable the United States was to unanticipated threats like natural disasters, which were neglected in the post-9/11 National Security Strategy as well as the National Strategy for Homeland Security. Consequently, when these hurricanes hit the Gulf Coast, this absence of policy direction led to criticism of the George W. Bush administration’s singular focus on the Global War on Terror since 9/11.19

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As a result of this lack of preparedness, and given the destructiveness of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, the United States welcomed assistance from other states and from its immediate neighbors, Canada and Mexico. To that end, the three countries already had begun to formulate mechanisms of response and cooperation under the SPP five months before Katrina and Rita. It is important to note that these mechanisms formed new tools for collaboration that the SPP had opened at that time. Nevertheless, institutional collaboration did not include defense relations. It was from the perspective of disaster assistance in the wake of Katrina and Rita that the governments of Canada and Mexico deepened their military-to-military relationship as well. It also cleared the way for Mexico to launch a military approach toward collaboration with the United States that was not in the Mexican agenda. Although Plan DN-III and Plan Marina had already been used elsewhere and at other times, never had these plans been activated in the case of a humanitarian disaster in the United States.20 At this point, it is important to focus on the implications of the environmental sector from the point of view of security. As Barry Buzan, Ole Waever, and Jaap de Wilde assert, this sector involves a disruption of ecosystems, climate change, biodiversity loss, the risk of losing levels of civilization among other things that strike equally all sectors of society and its ramifications may well impact on other sectors such as political, economic, and civil-military.21 In short, environmental security “concerns the maintenance of the local and the planetary biosphere as the essential support system on which all other human enterprises depend.”22 In this light, an environmental disaster on the destructive scale of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita clearly had an impact on the economy and security of the United States, which directly impacted its neighbors. The sense of urgency and destruction of this non-man-made threat is considered one of the most costly in US history. Estimates of the direct damage caused by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita run into the billions. The city of New Orleans alone, of which upward of 80 percent was underwater at some point, suffered a significant humanitarian crisis, with over 1,800 casualties and $110 billion in damage. 23 As a result of this destruction and vulnerability the United States experienced a unique occurrence that had not happened since the US-Mexican War of 1846–1847: Mexican troops crossing the US border. This time, Mexico was prepared to provide humanitarian support to the American people in coordination with US authorities.

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Thus, natural disasters were able to unite the three governments of North America on the basis of a common threat that created a humanitarian crisis. Both Mexico and Canada had faced their own environmental disasters in other years and in other places, with the support of the United States. However, each country was now in a position to lend support of their armed forces to the civil authorities of the United States. In these circumstances, Hurricanes Katrina and Rita provide an example in the applicability of regional security complex theory in North America. As Barry Buzan notes, “A security complex is defined as a set of states whose major security perceptions and concerns are so interlinked that their national security problems cannot reasonably be analyzed or resolved apart from one another.”24 The United States in Crisis

What was demonstrated with the carnage of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita was a failure in coordination at multiple levels of government interaction within the United States. A major shortcoming had to do with the lack of coordination of effort and information sharing between government agencies; for example, responses at all levels did not serve the data collection system necessary to effectively evacuate the hospitals, shelters, and schools that were overwhelmed by the hurricanes. The communication systems involved in signaling and evacuation did not function appropriately. The bottom line is that the reaction of the Gulf states’ governors was insufficient to protect the lives of millions of people. US federal agency efforts were not coordinated with state governors and, in the case of the governor of Louisiana, Katherine Blanco, President George W. Bush’s help was sought too late, after Hurricane Katrina had already done most of its damage. Once federal agencies were involved, such as FEMA, communication between state governors and federal agencies continued to be lacking. There also was a disconnected disaster response between the governors and local government officials such as Mayor Ray Nagin of New Orleans.25 The US response to Hurricanes Katrina and Rita was very much a victim of the nation’s homeland security policy, which placed the focus of the federal government’s effort on the threat of terrorism and had a limited focus on the prevention of or response to natural disasters. The Homeland Security Act of 2002 had created the largest institutional restructuring of the US government since the end of World

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War II in order to address the threat of global terrorism. Hurricanes Katrina and Rita demonstrated that this structure was highly vulnerable and flawed. Coordination failures; inability to accurately define threats; inadequate leadership to guide institutions; and communication lags between municipalities, states, and the federal government all created a major political crisis for the United States. In sum, the federal system of government and the new institutional mechanisms put in place after 9/11 to address the threat of terrorism were not sufficient to respond to the threat posed by a natural disaster on the scale of the Gulf Coast hurricanes of 2005. As a result of these circumstances, the United States accepted support from both Canada and Mexico that was based on shared interests to address a humanitarian and economic crisis in North America. Before 2005, the New Orleans tourist industry totaled $7 billion. It was considered a strategic location as well because 12 percent of the US oil refining capacity is concentrated in this region of the Gulf of Mexico. Furthermore Hurricanes Katrina and Rita struck a part of the country that provided $130 billion toward the overall gross domestic product of the United States.26 As a result of the damage done by these two hurricanes, there was an increase in gas and oil prices due to reduced supply of fuel, something that unquestionably had an impact on Mexico and Canada. Therefore, both countries had economic as well as humanitarian interests in coming to the aid of the United States. What was unique about their response was the degree to which each country’s military played a significant role in lending assistance to the residents of the Gulf states. Canada’s Assistance

The military collaboration between the United States and Canada, which traced back to World War II, had evolved as one of the strongest relationships in the world. As argued previously in this book, it was reinforced during the Cold War by Canada’s participation in NATO and the formation of the North American Aerospace Defense Command, whose deputy commander is a Canadian officer. Additionally, of course, the two countries share deeply interdependent economy, society, and energy sectors. Indeed, cooperation on security and defense on the air space domain between the United States and Canada provided an already developed institutional platform to increase cooperation between the

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two countries after September 11, 2001. Unlike Mexico, Canada participated from the very first moment in the conceptualization and institutionalization of the national and public security systems and defense in an interdependent trend with the United States. It therefore was able to develop a major institutional initiative that was advanced in favor of its national interest by the time of the formation of the SPP and the impact of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005. In the case of Hurricane Katrina relief, the Canadian government’s response was coordinated by Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness Canada (inaugurated in December 2003 and later renamed Public Safety Canada) in order to deploy a strategic response from the federal government and the provinces. It was the civilian body that orchestrated coordination with the armed forces, Public Health Canada, the Department of National Defense, Foreign Affairs Canada, the Canadian Red Cross, transport companies, security organizations, and nongovernmental organizations.27 Indeed, the Canadian headquarters that were set up after Katrina struck was a hub of information and response. It allowed for coordination among various Canadian agencies, linked to the rest of the world, and the US government, taking advantage of decades of experience working in a comprehensive and coordinated manner. This strengthened the ties of solidarity, not only between governments but between societies.28 The Canadian response was swift and it was coordinated between DHS and FEMA. The response to the request of the US Department of Health and Human Services came within twenty-four hours by Public Health Canada, and it provided everything that might be needed in a hospital, from stretchers to medicines. The support of Canadian society was favorable because it contributed to the rescue through the Canadian Red Cross, whose strategy was guided on the following elements: (1) information management (in conjunction with the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade); (2) the care of people in shelters; and (3) provision of food in conjunction with the American Red Cross.29 Canadian assistance was not limited to humanitarian assistance and rescue efforts but also “in response to the International Energy Agency’s (IEA) call for member countries to support its emergency response system, Canada contributed its share of oil to the global market to help ease supply disruptions in the United States. Canada’s share of the IEA demand was 4.6 percent, or 91,000 barrels of crude oil per day, which was met from existing supply.”30

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This collaboration speaks to the profound interdependence and the progress of US and Canadian systems and societies in their integration, as opposed to those of Mexico and the United States. On the military level, the Canadian chief of the Defense Staff, General Rick Hiller, established a direct dialogue with the chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff General Richard Meyers. The commander of USNORTHCOM, Admiral Keating, and Vice Admiral Mark Fitzgerald of the 2nd Fleet provided support to the Canadian Forces, in coordination with Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness Canada, DHS, and FEMA. It is important to note that this helped in the early formation of the Canada Command (February 1, 2006) as the central partner of USNORTHCOM and NORAD in the face of natural and human disasters in the shared North American area. The US government accepted the assistance offered, and the Canadian Forces deployed three navy vessels and helicopters plus three shipping vessels. This quick response was Operation UNISON, which included more than 1,000 members of the Canadian armed forces. This task, as in World War II, required effective coordination in the domain of interoperability of air, land, and sea forces around a shared threat. The Canadian assistance left Halifax, Nova Scotia, for Operation UNISON on September 6, 2005. HMCS Athabaskan (a destroyer), HMCS Ville de Québec (a frigate), and HMCS Toronto (a frigate) arrived on September 12 at Pensacola, Florida, where they dropped essential items including: 6,000 packages of diapers in various sizes; 6,000 hygiene kits; 5,000 blankets; 4,000 large bottles of Pedialyte; 2,000 first aid kits; enough modular tents to house 1,800 people; 375 cots; and sunscreen and insect repellent.31 The Canadian Coast Guard ship, Sir William Alexander, arrived in Gulfport, Mississippi, on September 15. The assistance included in Operation UNISON was not limited to material. Canada also sent a team of thirty-five divers and engineers from Halifax and other Canadian cities. The work of the divers was to identify and remove obstacles to navigation and inspect levees. The cost of Operation UNISON was estimated at $20 million. It was a short operation and the Canadian ships remained in US territory until September 18, although the divers were deployed until October 1.32 In support of search and rescue operations, the Canadian Air Force sent two CH-146 Griffon helicopters to assist the US Coast Guard in identifying victims of the hurricanes, many of whom were

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stranded on rooftops as floodwaters continued to rise. The government of Canada considered it a humanitarian as well as a national security issue to attend the distress of its immediate North American neighbor, which is also its main trading partner. This collaboration allowed the establishment of a full coordination among all the actors involved in case of a natural disaster: diplomatic channels, public security, maritime and aviation security, port shipments, and radio and satellite communications. Hurricanes Katrina and Rita tested Canada’s resolve in three main areas: (1) humanitarian assistance; (2) support to the US government; and (3) supply of oil and fuel.33 It is important to differentiate with respect to Mexico because that country pledged its support primarily in reference to the displaced population groups within the United States. Mexico’s Participation

In Mexico, the Estrada Doctrine sets in motion the plans to support civil society abroad. Either through a government order from outside or by initiative of the Presidency of the Republic, Mexico provides humanitarian support to other nations based on the concepts of humanity, neutrality, and impartiality as well as full respect of sovereignty, territorial integrity, and national unity. Under Plan DN-III, the army and navy have deployed specialized medical care, construction materials, material to boost communications and utilities, and food and medicines to several countries in the Americas and Asia.34 In the event of emergency, the Mexican president directs that the secretary of foreign affairs coordinate the immediate forms of assistance needed by the population, while the navy and army gather teams of doctors, engineers, and specialists to carry out the support operation, in accordance with the amount of cargo to move in fortyeight to ninety-six hours. This was the case in the response to the US humanitarian crisis in 2005. Yet collaboration was not easy. It was, however, permeated with symbolism implicit in Mexican history and nationalism; the support mission was to occur in territory that Mexico had lost to the United States in the second half of the nineteenth century. This fact was not lost on the contingents of the Mexican armed forces tasked with supporting this mission. It required that unit commanders ensure their personnel developed a more expeditious, professional, and efficient response since it would occur on US soil. In some ways it provided

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an opportunity for the armed forces to claim a right of reoccupation of previously lost lands in this moment of crisis and further demonstrate their ability to act in support of the affected population (including Mexicans living in the southern United States) in the disaster area. Within Mexico, it is worth noting that humanitarian assistance is an area in which civil and military authorities have developed professionalized relationships and have worked efficiently in responding to natural disasters, domestically and abroad. In essence, the Civil Prevention System in Mexico states that it is the responsibility of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to coordinate the tasks assigned to the armed forces when deployed abroad. After some coordination problems the US government, through FEMA, decided to accept the humanitarian assistance that the Mexican government had offered. Mexico’s assistance to the United States during Hurricanes Katrina and Rita consisted not of armed soldiers but rather of uniformed support personnel providing assistance to the civilian population.35 The Mexican Army contingent that arrived at the former Kelly Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas, on September 8 consisted of 45 vehicles as well as specialized military personnel such as engineers, doctors, and nurses. It also included food preparation equipment capable of processing 162.27 tons of food. Furthermore, water and medicine were distributed among the affected populations and two field kitchens capable of providing 7,000 meals daily were set up.36 The secretary of the navy sent the warship Papaloapan, which sailed September 5 from the port of Tampico to transport eight rural 6 × 6 all-terrain vehicles, seven APC-70 amphibious cargo and rescue vehicles, an ambulance with a mobile surgical team, two MI-17 helicopters to provide search and rescue and heavy lift capacity, as well as several aid stations and marine personnel.37 The navy was responsible for debris removal work and reconstruction of public places, supplying medical equipment, and providing support for reopening signals at sea and an air sweep for aids to navigation. The marines also carried drinking water and food to the victims, as they have done in other parts of the world experiencing a humanitarian crisis.38 Although Mexican military medical personnel were ready to provide assistance and food to US citizens, they experienced some problems in gaining permission from the US government’s health care and food inspection systems, due to concerns over medical licensure issues and differences in food preparation and sanitation

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requirements. However, it was possible for Mexican authorities to work more efficiently in emergency management responses through the Department of Civil Protection, in coordination with FEMA, in order to make proposals and provide alternative solutions to improve the conditions of the affected US population.39 In the perspective of President Fox it was apparent that the necessity to help the United States went beyond the common interests between states and that “these humanitarian missions reflect the Mexican people’s feelings of solidarity with the US population.”40

The Mérida Initiative in the Trilateral Perspective

One of the principles of the study of security complexes is the identification of threats as well as the intensity of their movement and the accumulation of vulnerabilities that might facilitate their impact. At the same time, one must ask another question: What’s the source of a threat and how did it originate? We do not intend to solve this complex issue here. However, we can at least approximate the problem and illustrate its extraordinary elasticity in the context of this chapter. The Mérida Initiative provides an example of where, in the context of RSCT used throughout this book, the nature of shared threats and threat recognition is more a matter of overcoming problems of identity in accepting the challenges to state sovereignty and vulnerability. Geography, social and economic interdependence, and the proliferation of commercial transport routes throughout North America have enabled drug and weapons traffickers. This forms the context in which we need to understand the threats and national security challenges to Mexico. The impact of the drug trade destabilizes Mexico because illicit money and arms flow out of the United States and Canada from the drug trade, leading to a weaker rule of law in Mexico. Of course, even a brief reference to this threat demonstrates its complexity. It has many facets and elements, it is not static, and it is not confined to a specific state or time period as an earthquake or hurricane might be. It is a permanent and global problem that does not respect geographic boundaries.41 The consumption of drugs is one of the drivers of the illicit narcotrafficking market, which has become even more complicated by the illegal sales of US weapons in Mexico.42 To this extent, Mexico’s vulnerability has become a threat to the security of the United States

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(a problem that is indirectly fomented by the countries’ shared space) and, as such, is also a threat to Canada. In that sense, it is necessary to formulate a series of questions that do not directly confront the central question of this work but instead add substance to our understanding of it: How can the United States realistically reduce the demand side of the illegal drug market? And to what extent can it modify its prohibitionist model? To what extent can Mexico reverse the drug trafficking, corruption, and legal impunity that encourage the proliferation of cartels and energize organized crime? Moreover, what results arise from the Mérida Initiative and is this the best strategy to combat the source of drug trafficking and reduce regional vulnerability in the security perimeter that includes Canada? These questions are as much about changing national identities and cultures as they are about creating policy choices and outcomes. The Calderón Administration’s Narcotrafficking Strategy

Having contextualized the object of our study, it is worth stopping to examine some of the ideas that Mexico has brought to the debate at the national and regional arena. President Felipe Calderón opened a Pandora’s box caused by decades of institutional neglect and reached new records for the country in terms of the violence that has unfolded as Mexico has attempted to fight drug trafficking and organized crime since January 1, 2006. It is difficult to quantify this effort’s impact internationally or domestically. This radical change of strategy was initiated amid a complicated political moment: after the 2006 presidential election, the political class became much more confrontational. The left-wing opposition even saw Calderón’s electoral victory as an unknown. It is fair to say that this political confrontation caused parallels in state and local governments and the business sector, with high demands for security and justice from important members of society. However, as of December 1, 2006, Calderón elevated the fight against public insecurity to his government’s top priority and ten days later the deployment of the joint operations forces began in his home state of Michoacán.43 With these measures, the federal government defined narcotrafficking as the main security threat, as explained through the National Plan of Development as well the Security Strategy and the Combat of Organized Crime. There are five key points underlying this strategy:

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1. To recover territory and strengthen local government. 2. To reorganize security agencies and build a resolute system of rule of law at the state and municipal levels. 3. To commence land deployment of joint operations, mainly conducted by the armed forces. 4. To unite society against organized crime. 5. To enhance international cooperation.44 The first four points are designed to recover territory and reestablish authority in order to address national and public security and, afterward, to use this authority to legitimize the justice system through reform. The last point addresses the rise of the Mérida Initiative. Despite the courage signaled by the design of this strategy, which aimed to “break the pact” of negotiation between the federal government and the cartels, the reality is that the administrations of justice, intelligence, public security, and defense were not prepared to implement a national strategy to combat narcotrafficking.45 Similarly, there was no political consensus among the 32 state governments and more than 2,440 municipalities, or among the legislative branch and the Supreme Court. Additionally, the Mexican state had not yet defined its role in the security perimeter of North America. The response of organized crime to its confrontation with the government forces has led to a loss of life for innocent people, drug dealers, police, military, judges, and politicians; as of 2011, it has caused more than 40,000 mortalities.46 Additionally, the killings have included attacks against US officials. Mexican academics have created a method of calculating the level of threat posed to the state by the drug trade. Important findings included the following figures: in the first eighteen months that the Calderón administration combated narcotrafficking, 6 percent of money was seized in the war on drugs and 1.4 percent of arms were seized. These figures reveal much about the vulnerability of Mexico’s institutional structures to the fight since 94 percent of money and 98 percent of weapons are unaccounted for and it is assumed that many are in the hands of organized crime. 47 This overwhelming vulnerability explains the context in which the army, air force, attorney general, National Security and Investigation Center, Secretariat of Public Security, and president sought negotiations with the US government, acknowledging the need for help to confront this threat: particularly the source of illegal arms that fuels the drug trafficking violence in Mexico.

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The Mexican Idea

An understanding of the transnational dimension of drug trafficking means recognizing the path of production, distribution, and demand that travels from Central and South America to the United States. This idea informs the knowledge that Mexico brought to the negotiations of the Mérida Initiative between Presidents Calderón and George W. Bush in March 2007.48 The Mérida Initiative was created as a binational effort between the United States and Mexico to confront a shared threat, which allowed binational collaboration at the highest level.49 However, ideas and proposals for such an initiative were already being presented near the end of the Fox administration in Mexico, and they also belong to this historic and international process.50 For example, prior to the initiative, a number of bilateral treaties existed between Mexico and the United States already focused on drug trafficking. These included the Agreement on Mexico-US Cooperation in Combating Drug Trafficking and Drug Dependence (1989) and the High Level Contact Group for Drug Control on USMexico Relations (1997).51 The proposal of the Mérida Initiative was a natural consequence of the redefinition of Mexico’s presidential priorities in the war against drug trafficking. This recognized transnational and global interdependence (with the United States, Central America, and South America) and reformed the basis for the relationship with the United States based on the statement, “All of the efforts in this area are based on the principle of joint responsibility, in which each participant must assume full accountability for the common task and provide resources according to their abilities. Reciprocity is the central rule in this effort.”52 The dialogue that followed the March 2007 Mérida summit between Presidents George W. Bush and Calderón incorporated a series of Mexican ideas that have opened a strong public policy debate in the United States about drug abuse, money laundering, and illicit arms transfers. In an announcement on October 22, 2007, Carlos Rico, former undersecretary for North America in the Ministry of Foreign Relations, articulated the need for the incorporation of shared responsibility in order to ensure that it was one of the central factors of the negotiation process leading up to the Mérida Initiative. 53 The significance of this point is that the United States accepted its co-responsibility for drug violence in Mexico. However, on the one hand, this recognition came too late and, on the other

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hand, it occurred during the beginning of the Calderón administration when the new Mexican government found itself facing severe legitimacy and identity problems. In other words, the new security paradigm began badly. The US Perception of the Problem

Unlike Mexico, in the United States the global drug trade has been considered a threat to national security since the 1980s and, post9/11, it has been linked to financing of terrorist groups and guerrilla activity. In this sense, the National Drug Control Strategy complements the National Security Strategy in several points: • Focus US action in areas where the illicit drug trade has converged or may converge with other transnational threats with severe implications for US national security. • Deny drug traffickers, narcoterrorists, and their criminal associates their illicit profits and access to the US and international banking systems. • Disrupt the flow of drugs to the United States and through other strategic areas by building new and stronger bilateral and multilateral partnerships.54 According to the logic of the United States, an intersection exists between the two threats of terrorism and narcotrafficking in the form of narcoterrorism. This equation has been one of the primary concerns to the United States since 2001. Since 9/11, US international drug control and related national security goals have focused on reducing the flow of illicit drugs into the United States; disrupting and dismantling major drug trafficking organizations; strengthening the democratic and law enforcement institutions of partner nations threatened by illegal drugs; and reducing the underlying financial and other support that drug trafficking provides to international terrorist organizations.55 However, this national security strategy pays little attention to the internal source of the problem, which is the demand side of illicit drug trafficking that identifies the United States as the epicenter of an industry estimated at $150 billion per year.56 In Mexico, the illicit market is estimated at $20 million per year.57

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Financing and Assumptions About the Mérida Initiative

In order for the Mérida Initiative to thrive in both the negotiation and subsequent implementation stages, the US government asked Congress for a $500 million installment in 2008, as part of a total of $1.4 billion over three years to be allocated under funding for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.58 This is to say, the war on narcotrafficking is considered to be part of the Global War on Terror. As a consequence, funding of the Mérida Initiative has become tied to that of the Global War on Terror. Despite the allocation of resources from the US government for the war against Mexican narcotrafficking, the effect on illicit money that moves between the United States and Mexico has been limited, as explained above. The figures that follow represent the amount of money provided to Mexico from the United States under the Mérida Initiative: $400 million (2008), $720 million (2009), and $385.25 million (2010), totaling $1,505.25 billion.59 In 2011, the US Congress approved another $250 million in funding for fiscal year 2012 to continue the bilateral cooperation under the Mérida Initiative. 60 Funding for the Mérida Initiative equals only 1 percent of the amount of money generated by illegal drug sales. This raises the question: In what way does the Mérida Initiative benefit Mexico? The drug war in Mexico has been consistent with the US-led Global War on Terror and the links between preventative war doctrine and internal security. However, for Mexico, this strategy has been extremely restrictive as to where Mérida Initiative funding can be applied. While the United States has established clear intersections between the global objectives of national security and the objectives of internal security and has linked the work of DHS with USNORTHCOM, these links had not been fully accepted by the Vicente Fox administration. This has prevented Mexico from developing full cooperation with the United States in the Global War on Terror. The US Congress and the Mérida Initiative

Once the bilateral understanding was announced by the leaders of both states, the Mexican security apparatus did not understand or anticipate the amount of conditions placed on the resources and equipment by the US Congress. 61 These conditions came from the

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directive of the US Congress and were particularly strict with regard to corruption and violation of human rights in Mexico. As Robert Pastor and Fernández de Castro point out, “Mexico was the only major country in Latin America that was wary of the seductive invitation of President John Kennedy for a share of Alliance for Progress funds. The Mexicans understood a simple lesson that the rest of Latin America would forget and then relearn: if a country accepts aid from the United States, it also has to accept questions, exhortations, and conditions from the US Congress.”62 The reality is that Mexico did not learn from this precedent and, in supporting the Mérida Initiative, it had to accept conditions placed by the United States on equipment and economic aid provided by the US Congress.63 The Mexican Congress also participated in the Mérida Initiative; however, it insisted that the federal government make information about the project public and eliminated any conditions that might violate Mexican sovereignty.64 In any case, the Mérida Initiative caused a deep rethinking of Mexican identity with regard to its security and defense policies toward the United States, although in practice Mexico had not anticipated substantial pressure on its own insecurity from the US Congress as well as the State Department, DHS, CIA, and Department of Defense. When President Calderón realized that the Mérida Initiative in itself was insufficient and that the possibilities for success were reliant on effective shared responsibility, he called for more effective action from the United States regarding drug consumption, money laundering, and arms sales. Finding “Common Ground”

Consistent with the reorganization of priorities at the federal level, the Calderón administration decided to increase the security and defense budgets by 24 percent ($2.5 million) to create greater operational capacity for security and defense apparatuses. 65 The promoters in both countries of the Mérida Initiative sought to differentiate it from Plan Colombia, which involved placing US military forces on Colombian soil. Consequentially, the cooperation focused on the following themes: • Transfer of equipment • Technical resources • Training programs and the exchange of experts

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• No military deployment to Mexico • Respect for legal systems • Respect for national sovereignty66 The shared responsibility would be developed further through the decisionmaking process of the National Security Council of the White House. The contours of such a program also include Central America and the Caribbean since, as a part of the National Security Strategies of the George W. Bush and Obama administrations, they are part of the homeland security issue. For these reasons, the shared border is a central priority for the United States. Hence, in the process of intensifying the collaboration between US and Mexican security agencies and political systems through the Mérida Initiative, resources committed by the US Congress face greater scrutiny on how those resources are utilized. As part of the second meeting of high-level officials to discuss the continuance of the Mérida Initiative program, a renewed effort between the Obama and Calderón administrations defined the following four strategic points: 1. Disruption of capacities of criminal organizations in both countries through the systemic weakening of their structures, networks, and financial and operational logistic capacities. 2. Mutual support for the continued sustainability of the security and justice framework and the strengthening of the public institutions in each country that combat organized crime. This includes promoting full observance of human rights and active participation in civil society. 3. Development of a secure border in order to secure global competitiveness in the twenty-first century. This is based on a bilateral and comprehensive approach that will strengthen the global competitiveness of both countries by facilitating the legitimate flow of goods and people while protecting the safety of people and eradication of the flow of illegal drugs, weapons, cash, and other goods. 4. Strengthening of the social cohesion of communities in both countries and promotion of the integral development of individuals. This includes supporting efforts to address the root causes of crime and violence, promotion of a culture of legality, reduction of illegal drug use, promotion of awareness of the connection between drug use and violent crime, and promotion of legal and constructive alternatives for young people.67

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However, as of this writing the Obama administration has presented minimal results from the co-responsibility initiative. Because of this, the Calderón administration has become increasingly irritated with the United States and the violence unleashed throughout Mexico.68 Difficulties in Policy Coordination of the Mérida Initiative

The coordination of bilateral efforts is carried out in Mexico by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and in the United States by the Department of State. The truth is that in both sets of negotiations, initial information lacked precise doctrines, budgets, and commitments. For example, the scope of the commitment from the US Congress was not stipulated by some government officials in Mexico, as had happened during the negotiations of NAFTA and the SPP. Currently, both countries are undertaking the most important military and security collaboration since World War II, which needs to be understood in terms of identity and historical context. Mexico’s geostrategic location in North America places it in a situation that is at once influential, privileged, and highly sensitive. It is influential because Mexico has coastlines on both of the largest oceans, the Pacific and the Atlantic, a fact that permits cultural and commercial interaction with Europe and Asia, along with the increasing exchange with the United States, Canada, and Central American countries. Mexico is privileged, due to the extension of its territory and coastlines, its coastal infrastructure, and its invaluable land and maritime potential as well as its proximity to the United States. It is sensitive because it abuts the United States, a situation that places Mexico within the US security perimeter and, at the same time, means that threats (e.g., terrorism and the illegal trafficking of people, weapons, and drugs) have a relevant impact among Canada, the United States, and Mexico.69 Certainly, since 9/11 the perimeter, as defined by the United States, has dramatically changed the parameters of the regional security complex and perimeter defense in North America due to the threats of terrorism, natural disasters, and drug trafficking. Indeed, drug-producing countries, especially producers of cocaine, use Mexico’s territorial space as a bridge to ship drugs to the United States and to target its territory as a growing drug market. Furthermore, the risks presented by Mexico’s geostrategic location are compounded by an incomplete reform of the civilian and military structures

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responsible for developing comprehensive national security reforms that take into account the extraordinary pressure from the United States and the challenge of confronting transnational threats within Mexican territory. In fact, the changes in the international system after 9/11—the focus on geographic proximity, the creation of new institutions, and the coupling of drug trafficking with terrorism as threats to both Mexico and the United States—have allowed a regional convergence toward collaboration and cooperation beyond terrorism and natural disasters. The SPP created the possibility for this collaboration and cooperation, and Hurricanes Katrina and Rita showed the importance of interdependence. The Mérida Initiative was yet another step in the process of building Mexico’s confidence that identity and sovereignty could be maintained within this cooperative atmosphere, despite the fact that resistance to coming under the US security umbrella (i.e., a unified command) still existed at the highest levels of government. For example, the United States put several strategies in place to engage Mexico. In 2005, former USNORTHCOM commander Keating, through the US embassy in Mexico City, invited the Mexican Committee on Marine Affairs and National Defense to Colorado Springs to share their infrastructure and open a dialogue about Mexico’s integration into NORAD.70 However, as US Air Force major Lawrence Spinetta wrote in 2005, the Mexican Ministry of Defense (which consequently controls the Mexican Air Force) is unlikely to join NORAD.71 Actually, Major Spinetta notes that the United States’ real interest at the time in broaching this subject was the potential of gaining information from the Mexican secretary of telecommunications and transportation—information that can be useful to the United States because it can facilitate the exchange of passenger lists, aviation movements within Mexican air space, and transit routes of airplanes flying from Mexico to the United States. With this type of information, the United States can better anticipate possible risks to its national territory. Therefore, it is evident that at least some US-Mexico collaboration on this subject existed in 2005.72 However, the former minister of defense, General Clemente Vega was opposed to engaging with the Pentagon openly in academic forums such as those sponsored by the Center for Strategic and International Studies or other academic institutions. With the election of Calderón in 2006, there emerged a new opportunity for cooperation

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between Mexico, the United States, and Canada on security issues. “For the Pentagon, it’s an opportunity to work with Mexico’s armed forces as they start a gradual transition toward an external defense,” points out Stephen Johnson, former deputy assistant of defense for Western Hemisphere affairs.73 There is no doubt that the Mérida Initiative negotiation became more pressing with the explosions of gas pipeline facilities in Mexico that were allegedly caused by guerrilla groups in July and September 2007.74 Indeed, General Victor Renuart, former commander of NORAD and USNORTHCOM, points out two areas of common concern with regard to military-to-military relations with Mexico: During the recent North American Leaders’ summit in Montebello, Canada, on August 20–21, President Bush emphasized that the US and Mexico share joint responsibilities for dealing with the common objective of having less violence on both sides of the border in the fight against transnational organized crime and narcotics trafficking. Mexican President Felipe Calderón has identified the activities of the narco cartels as a threat to Mexico’s development and national security.75

Consequently, Mexican officials have moved closer to accepting the identification of the three main threats defined by the Department of Defense after 9/11: terrorism, natural disasters, and drug trafficking. Furthermore, there is clear evidence of a “common ground”76 emerging between both governments as set forth by the George W. Bush and Calderón administrations to deepen cooperation on defense matters on a bilateral basis on the one hand. On the other, there is the US-Canada relationship. In the end, Mexico and Canada have also developed civil-military talks since 2004 vis-à-vis the United States in a bilateral, trilateral, and international context, which will be explained in more detail below. Calderón’s negotiations fit nicely with US interests regarding Foreign Military Sales to Mexico and security cooperation to patrol the Mexican border against drug trafficking. The Mexican military had historically avoided using that purchasing system with the United States out of concern over too much control by the US military on how Mexico uses the equipment. Instead, the Mexican military preferred Direct Commercial Sales with US vendors, bypassing the military-tomilitary linkages required in the Foreign Military Sales process.77 In this new venture, the Department of Defense and USNORTHCOM responded positively to most Mexican requests for assistance, as Gen-

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eral Renuart notes, “given that President Calderón has directed his military to assist civilian law enforcement in cracking down on the cartels.”78 In the case of the attacks on natural gas pipelines in central Mexico, General Renuart further notes that the US military was ready to assist because if such attacks are “occurring on a much broader scale, a force like the drug cartels or terrorists can try to hold a nation hostage because of that, then it has clearly a strategic impact. . . . So we try to build exchanges, training opportunities, cooperation, discussion forums, to allow us to share ideas with the Mexican military and reach a common ground, a common understanding and a common view of how we can work together.”79 USNORTHCOM has always had in mind an intersection between terrorism and drug trafficking while Mexico has focused on the latter. The other area of exploration has to do with more traditional “theater security” cooperation, where the general adds that “Mexicans are looking at ways to modernize their naval components, their air and surface defense of key infrastructure elements—the way they do force protection around critical infrastructure within the country. So there is potential for traditional foreign military sales, foreign military funding, education, training, theater security cooperation here.”80 General Renuart identifies a significant concern in that the natural gas pipeline attacks proved that the intelligence services in Mexico—civil and military—were overwhelmed by hostile actions in 2007. Their failure in preventing these attacks reflects a much more strategic, regional threat to North America if Mexican services are penetrated by organized crime or terrorists in an attempt to attack the United States through Mexico. Adding to this current internal situation and the security priorities of Calderón’s government, it has been clear that a more homogeneous security vision within the cabinet is taking shape. The Mexican government is looking for improvement and more resources for their services from the Mexican Chamber of Deputies and the US government: a development, at least in terms of Mexico’s approach to the United States on military matters not seen since the establishment of the Joint US-Mexico Commission of 1942 (when Mexico was a military ally during World War II). Responding to the new threats, the secretary of defense in his speech before the Mexican Chamber of Deputies declared that the equipment of the army and the air force is outdated and they need to change their radar system because they “only operate three hours a day” and the rest of the day do not know what really happens in Mex-

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ican skies.81 In fact, he added that the Mérida Initiative negotiated with the United States was “insufficient” for their needs.82 For its part, the Ministry of the Navy argued almost simultaneously that new ships, helicopters, aircraft, radar, and marine vehicles were needed to fulfill a new national and regional security role.83 Meanwhile, the Department of Justice has also declared that the aircraft system used in the war on drugs is “old and outdated.”84 For practical purposes, and in order to close the cycle of this transition, the National Security Research Center has demonstrated the structural setbacks in policy prevention and preparation after the three explosions in central Mexico.85 Military-to-Military Relations

The Mérida Initiative opened a decisive relationship between USNORTHCOM and the Mexican Army, Air Force, and Navy as well as with the other elements of the state security apparatus in Mexico. Accordingly, USNORTHCOM became a crucial promoter of funds in the US Congress aimed at developing a stronger relationship with the Mexican armed forces. In his testimony before Congress in 2009, General Renuart stated, “Your support of the Mérida Initiative and DOD Counternarcotics Programs is helping to build the Mexican military’s ability to counter threats to our mutual security. We especially thank Congress for approving our request for critically needed equipment under fiscal year 2008 Section 1206 authority. This enabled us to coordinate the first US military equipment support to Mexico since the Command was activated in 2002.”86 General Renuart recognized that Mexico had opened a historic platform for increased collaboration with the United States on defense issues and was contributing to the development of its own operational capacity, as both nations had done during World War II. As one essential element of the US approach toward Mexico, which emphasizes broader cooperation between government agencies, Renuart notes, USNORTHCOM’s most significant contribution is in strengthening the operational capacity of the Mexican Army, Air Force, and Navy. Our engagement goes beyond providing hardware and the associated training; it also focuses on developing the ability to analyze and share the information that will allow the Mexican military to conduct operations against the drug trafficking organizations to systematically dismantle them. We are committed to a long-term military partnership with Mexico that is beneficial to both nations.87

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As the United States has defined a broad new security strategy for North America, Mexico’s national security strategy remained ambiguous, although its policy was moving toward linking Mexico’s national security to US national security, through the USNORTHCOM structure and beyond. Compared to the Mexican Army and Air Force (secretary of national defense), the Mexican Navy (secretary of the navy) is much more open to collaborative efforts with the United States military; however, both are undertaking an important militaryto-military approach toward the United States. For example, the North America Maritime Security Initiative (NAMSI) has developed the standardization of processes for military operation between Mexico and the United States to improve the coordination and efficiency of maritime protection operations and the implementation of the law of the seas, leading to the signing of a Letter of Intent for Operational Procedures and Communications Plan. One of the major benefits of the increasing cooperation has been the sharing of intelligence information, promoted by the Naval Intelligence Unit, created in 2008. This new agency has obtained transcendental cooperation agreements. Among these is the Security of Military Information General Agreement, in which the parties involved are committed to provide the appropriate security status to classified information of the counterpart. The Memorandum of Understanding between the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency and the Mexican Navy Department allows these agencies the sharing of geospatial information.88

These agreements have resulted in important joint operations and the interdiction of drugs and semisubmersibles in the context of the Mérida Initiative agreements and beyond.89 Members of the National Defense Commission in the Mexican Congress, the Mexican Military Academy, the Mexican Air Force, and the minister of defense Guillermo Galvan Galvan have visited USNORTHCOM and the Pentagon to continue with the bilateral cooperation throughout the Mérida Initiative and the war on drugs. As such, General Renuart pointed out at a forum in Washington, DC, in 2010, “The United States and Mexico are experiencing the closest military-to-military cooperation in their relationship’s history as a result of the Mérida Initiative, which confronts the shared problems of drug trafficking and organized crime.”90 However, the Mexican armed forces and the minister of foreign relations have not yet defined Mexico’s national security strategy and national interests within the new security perimeter defined by the United States. The

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situation is more delicate for Mexico due to the lack of control along the US-Mexico border. The spike in drug-related violence along the US-Mexico border, which began in 2007, as a result of President Calderón’s declared war on drug trafficking after assuming office in December 2006, has also caused serious concern for the United States and Canada. The levels of violence have increased exponentially, such that in March 2008 Mexico sent 5,000 soldiers and federal judicial police to Ciudad Juárez, across from El Paso, Texas, to help the beleaguered municipal police combat the drug cartels and stem the criminal violence. Despite this presence, homicides reached a record of 1,600 in the city by December 2008.91 Another 5,000 troops were sent to Ciudad Juárez in March 2009, taking control of all law enforcement and government operations there. On May 14, 2009, President Calderón visited Ciudad Juárez, meeting with military and state and local government officials. Calling it the “epicenter” of Mexico’s war on drugs, President Calderón’s decision to militarize the conflict in the state of Chihuahua has caused some Mexican government officials to worry about the strategy, warning that if they do not succeed in controlling the violence in Ciudad Juárez then other cities and states throughout the country will also fail.92 Furthermore, Ciudad Juárez has become one of the most insecure cities of the world, and now there is a clamor in Mexico against the current strategy, calling for a radical change and the suspension of the Mérida Initiative.93 The climate of insecurity in Mexico is already touching one of the most sensitive issues between both countries: US homeland security and the possibility of deepening US intervention in Mexico. Current events are rapidly exacerbating this friction, so it is urgent that Mexico develop its own national security strategy as part of a North American regional strategy. Canada’s Evolving Security Role in North America

The Canada-Mexico relationship dates back to 1944 with diplomatic, political, and commercial relations. NAFTA brought both nations economically closer and deepened mutual knowledge. However, greater collaboration between Mexico and Canada on security and defense came in the wake of September 11, 2001, by sharing the neighborhood with the United States and the impact on regional trade and regional security. Canada was able to adapt its institutions to pro-

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mote cooperation, trade, and exchange of intelligence with the United States to face terrorism, natural disasters, and transnational organized crime. The focus of these changes is the shared national interests with the United States and the limit of sovereignty in national security and defense. This trend can be traced back to World War I and II, NATO, and NORAD. In 2006, the Canada Command was created, making a key distinction from Mexico in its willingness to operate with USNORTHCOM. Like USNORTHCOM, Canada Command took on a homeland defense mission, while NORAD shares aerospace and maritime surveillance with the United States. A senior Canadian military officer notes that although NORAD and Canada Command have separate commanders and are separated geographically, they are working with USNORTHCOM in examining future cooperation that will respect national sovereignty and strengthen Canada’s and its allies’ military capabilities.94 For these reasons, the security relationship between Canada and the United States has advanced as one of the most developed in the world. There has been a general consistency in Canadian foreign policy, public security, and defense with the United States. As of recently, Canada has been putting effort into developing a relationship with Mexico in the bilateral sense (such as the civil-military talks since 2004) as well as in the context of North American integration in issues of national security and defense. The commander of Canada Command mentions, Indeed, being a strong and reliable partner in the defence of North America is another one of the fundamental roles of the Canadian Forces and of Canada Command. As Commander of Canada Command, that means that two of my key focus areas which define what we do and how we do it are: Broadening and deepening the Tri-Command relationship between Canada Command, the North American Aerospace Defence Command and US Northern Command; and Bringing together activities with Mexico in an integrated and unified manner for the Canadian Forces.95

These relationships will ensure that, in the twenty-first century, Canada will be well postured to promote trade and solidify cooperation with the United States based on its national interests. Processes that have meant a revolution in doctrine in proportions not seen since World War II highlight a radical difference between Canada and Mex-

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ico in their approach toward accommodating US security concerns since the latter has not adapted its national security doctrine and defense establishment to a post-9/11 era. Instead, Mexico presented itself to the SPP and the Mérida Initiative in a disjointed manner, without a strategic perspective and without the institutions needed to address new threats as well as binational and trinational cooperation. Strategic Implications of the Mérida Initiative for Mexico

During the Fox administration, the consensus to establish a new security relationship with the United States in the post-9/11 era did not exist. Furthermore, the national security, defense, and justice systems had not been fully restored, and the national and external policies had not yet been integrated in a way that redefined the role of national interest in the international context. The Mérida Initiative allowed the limited participation of US security forces in Mexico as part of US national and territorial security, and even allowed for the establishment of an administrative office for the Mérida Initiative in Mexico City.96 However, by 2011, there was little sign of change in the consumption of drugs in the United States or the trafficking of weapons or movement of illicit money across the border. If there were any operational results, they were in such areas as customs, ports, shipping, airports, public security systems, as well as in the shared responsibility and the imperative of cooperation and bilateral relations at the highest political level. Despite this, the Mérida Initiative has not fought the root causes of narcotrafficking. Meanwhile, the drug war has illustrated the deep vulnerability of Mexico in its interdependence with the United States as well as drawing increased levels of attention in Canada.

Conclusion

After the terrorist attacks of 9/11 and the natural disasters of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in August–September 2005, the process of integration of North America experienced severe problems due to the conflicting agendas in economic cooperation and security: each trend gravitates in opposite dynamics. The first deals more with open borders and the second with the task of generating greater controls and restrictions on the flow of goods and services.

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For the United States the highest priority was that of security, which concentrated on the Global War on Terror. Mexico and Canada did not share the same US threat perception with regard to the regime of Saddam Hussein and al-Qaeda. Perhaps that is one reason that the SPP initiative did not initially enhance North American security cooperation because both Mexican and Canadian governments and their legislatures were not truly supportive of the Global War on Terror. Certainly, the United States took steps to adjust its North American identity, which were consistent with its interests, and sought to create new institutions that challenged the very process of integration following the implementation of NAFTA in the 1990s. However, even after the events of 9/11, its impulses remained unilateral and not very respectful of the sovereignty of Mexico and Canada, although that is changing over time. After 9/11, Canada’s response was proactive; it was able to work within the constraints of its identity and interests to accede to US pressure, create new institutions, and safeguard its vital interests in the face of transnational threats. For its part, until 2005 Mexico remained divided, and although it collaborated with the new US institutions and actors, it remained a reluctant partner, even through the initial phases of SPP implementation with Canada. However, Mexico was not able to redefine its own security role in North America in the post-9/11 era, nor reform or create institutions that would support its interests and the society it represented. On the contrary, it immersed itself in the struggle for power at the end of Fox’s presidential term, exacerbating Mexico’s division and deepening its institutional vulnerabilities at its borders, territory, and air and maritime spaces, in addition to its strategic natural resources. In relation to the United States and Canada, Mexico’s efforts to protect its identity left out key aspects of its primary interests in the US security agenda, which in the six years that followed became almost unmanageable in the key areas of drug trafficking and immigration reform. The result of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita was to reinvigorate the SPP process for a while and provide new momentum in security cooperation in North America. The United States, feeling its own vulnerability to this new threat, realized that it needed the support of its neighbors and could not continue to dictate the terms of those relationships solely on the grounds of cooperation in the War on Terror. Mexico also changed its perspective toward the United States, particularly regarding security relationships whereby the Mexican

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armed forces would not be constrained in its direct dealings with their North American counterparts, choosing a humanitarian assistance role rather than a warfighting, counterterrorist role. Canada’s role as an arbiter and security partner in the hemisphere also increased and it recognized that, when a neighbor’s house is on fire, one can watch it burn and hope it doesn’t spread to their property, or grab a hose and help put it out.97 Certainly, the Mérida Initiative has provided resources to help Mexico “put out the fire” of drug trafficking and criminal violence that threatens to spread across borders into both Canada and the United States and its effective possibilities are deeply limited. However, the bilateral instrument did not address the main source of the threat. The new sense of urgency of this problem permeated the fifth summit meeting of the three North American leaders in Guadalajara, Mexico, in August 2009. The three key policy areas addressed in the meeting were the following: 1. Common prosperity: increase trade not restrict it, legal migration, clean energy 2. Common safety and security: H1N1 cooperation, defeat drug cartels, control flow of arms 3. Common values: peace, democracy, human rights.98 Despite the willingness to seek trilateral solutions to common problems, it was evident at the meeting that one of the key sticking points (regulatory differences impacting trade and commerce) would lead to the breakup of one of the SPP’s key institutional mechanisms (the North American Competitiveness Council), which effectively signaled the death knell to the George W. Bush administration’s SPP.99 While there was some positive momentum coming from the Leadership Summit in Mexico, the sixth meeting, scheduled to occur in Canada, did not happen in 2010 and was further postponed. However, President Obama and Prime Minister Harper met in February 2011 and issued a bilateral statement emphasizing the concept of “perimeter security” and the need to address security issues “beyond the border” collectively, as a means to ensure a shared vision of economic competitiveness and security.100 This statement confirmed that rather than moving more toward a trilateral, North American approach toward security cooperation envisioned in the original SPP process, the United States and Canada were now moving back to a

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more traditional bilateral approach, neglecting Mexico. The study of regional threats fosters an understanding that there are no limits to their man-made or natural power because they do not respect identities, institutions, or interests of states and even defy their permanence. Thus, it depends on their power and destructive capacity since states are at greater risk when they share geography, borders, economies, or societies. Furthermore, the impact of these new allhazards risks also depends on the nature of a threat and the vulnerability of the state, the spread of insecurity and the line between hegemony and sovereignty, and shared geography. While Canada, Mexico, and the United States have developed their own unique political institutions, shaped by their individual identities and responding to their own interests, there is a growing sense of vulnerability that has led each state to respond to their perceived inadequacies to deal with these new threats that do not respect borders. While Canada and Mexico have not shared in the security policy choices that the United States has pursued after 9/11, each state recognizes that these actions have a direct impact on their individual and collective ability to respond to future security challenges. In sum, regional security cooperation is a central matter to each North American neighbor in both the short and long term.

Notes 1. The all-hazards approach toward multiple threats comes from the emergency management discipline, where the focus on emergency response shifts from one based completely on terrorism (a man-made threat) to also include threats posed by natural disasters and other sources. Michael K. Lindell, Carla Prater, and Ronald W. Perry, Introduction to Emergency Management (Hoboken, NJ: Wiley, 2007), 263. 2. USNORTHCOM, “US Northern Command Hosts Canada, Mexico at Pandemic Influenza Conference,” September 6, 2007, www.northcom.mil /News/2007/090607.html, accessed September 28, 2007. 3. Comments made at the conference “Preparing for Disasters in North America,” organized by the University of Texas, San Antonio, East Carolina University, and USNORTHCOM, San Antonio, November 6–7, 2006. 4. For example, the US embassy in Mexico, following the CDC warning, refused to grant country clearance for Department of Defense travelers to Mexico. Author’s interviews, Mexico City, May 13, 2009. 5. Laura Carlson, “Extending NAFTA’s Reach,” WorldPress.org, August 26, 2007, http://worldpress.org/Americas/2910.cfm, accessed September 28, 2007.

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6. “Security and Prosperity Partnership: Myths and Facts,” 2007, Security and Prosperity Partnership, www.spp.gov/myths_vs_facts.asp, accessed September 28, 2007. 7. “Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America,” Government of Canada, Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America, May 13, 2009, http://spp-psp.gc.ca/eic/site/spp-psp.nsf/eng/h_00003.html, accessed June 9, 2011. 8. “Security and Prosperity Partnership,” Sourcewatch, August 11, 2008, www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Security_and_Prosperity_Partnership _of_North_America, accessed June 9, 2011. 9. “Leaders’ Statement: Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America Established,” Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America, March 23, 2005, www.spp-psp.gc.ca/eic/site/spp-psp.nsf/eng/00057.html, accessed June 24, 2011. 10. Ibid. 11. Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America Overview, “Report to Leaders,” Department of Homeland Security, June 2005, www.dhs.gov/xlibrary/assets/Press_SecurityProsperityPartnershipOverview _June05.pdf, accessed June 24, 2011. 12. Ibid. 13. “North America Competitiveness Council,” Council of the Americas, http://coa.counciloftheamericas.org/group.php?id=10, accessed February 12, 2012. 14. Christopher Sands, “A Vote for Change and US Strategy for North American Integration,” Portal for North America, North American Policy Brief No. 1 (Washington, DC: Hudson Institute, October 2008), www.hudson.org/files/publications/PNA_NA_Policy_Brief_1_-_A_Vote_for _Change.pdf, accessed June 24, 2011. 15. Susana Chacón, “México y el escenario de América del Norte: 2000–2006,” in Humberto Garza Elizondo, Jorge Schiavon, and Rafael Velázquez, ed., Paradigmas y Paradojas de la Política Exterior de México: 2002–2006 (Mexico City: COLMEX, 2010), 257–282. 16. Edwin Mora, “Canadian Border Bigger Terror Threat Than Mexican Border, Says Border Patrol Chief,” CBS News, May 18, 2011, www.cnsnews .com/news/article/us-canada-border-bigger-terror-threat-sa, accessed June 16, 2011. 17. Statement argued by Admiral Timothy Keating at the Homeland Defense Symposium “Building Homeland Coalition,” co-organized with USNORTHCOM and NORAD, Colorado Springs, October 24–27, 2005. 18. Ibid. 19. “9/11 Commissioners Blast Katrina Response,” CNN, September 14, 2005, http://articles.cnn.com/2005-09-14/politics/katrina.9.11.commission_1 _first-responders-frequencies-final-report?_s=PM:POLITICS, accessed June 29, 2011. 20. Plan DN-III-E, Secretaría de la Defensa Nacional, www.sedena.gob.mx /index.php/actividades/plan-dn-iii-e, accessed June 24, 2011; Plan Marina, Secretaría de Marina, www.semar.gob.mx/Plan_Marina.pdf, accessed June 24, 2011.

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21. Barry Buzan, Ole Waever, and Jaap de Wilde, Security: A New Framework for Analysis (Boulder: Lynne Rienner, 1998). 22. Ibid., 76. 23. “Hurricane Katrina Relief FAQs,” HurricaneKatrinaRelief.com, www.hurricanekatrinarelief.com/index.html, accessed June 16, 2011. 24. Buzan, Waever, and de Wilde, Security, 201. 25. See James F. Miskel, Disaster Response and Homeland Security: What Works and What Doesn’t (New York: Praeger Security International, 2006). 26. Jay Carney, “September 19, 2005: System Failure—An Investigation into What Went So Wrong in New Orleans. An American Tragedy,” Time Magazine Special Report, September 2005, 82. 27. “News Conference Regarding Canada’s Response to Hurricane Katrina,” National Defence and the Canadian Forces, September 4, 2005, www.forces.gc.ca/site/mobil/news-nouvelles-eng.asp?id=1740, accessed July 7, 2012. 28. In an interview with the author, a Canadian naval officer commented that the Canadian Navy actually began deployment even before official approval from the Canadian government. The reason, he stated, was that if it had been Canada that experienced such a disaster, they knew the United States would be there to help them. 29. John McKay, “The Canadian Response to Hurricane Katrina: A Demonstration of Friendship,” Parliamentary Report, vol. 11, no. 5, January 1, 2005, www.johnmckaymp.on.ca/newsshow.asp?int_id=80290, accessed February 23, 2011. 30. Ibid. 31. “Canadian Forces Support to Relief Efforts in Southern United States,” National Defence and the Canadian Forces, September 16, 2005, www.forces.gc.ca/site/mobil/news-nouvelles-eng.asp?id=1739, accessed July 7, 2012. 32. David Rubin, “Operation UNISON: Canada’s Help with Katrina, 2005,” Commercial Law League of America 24, no. 6 (November 2009). 33. “Canadian Forces Support to Relief Efforts.” 34. “Apoyo a la población civil en casos y zonas de desastre en México,” Secretaría de Marina, June 8, 2009. 35. J. B. Martí, “México: Presidencia de la República–Actividades,” Presidencia de la República, September 6, 2005, http://fox.presidencia.gob .mx/actividades/orden/?contenido=20620, accessed February 1, 2011. 36. Secretaría de Relaciones Exteriores, “Huracán Katrina,” resumen de acciones del gobierno de México en torno a la devastación ocasionada por el huracán Katrina, September 14, 2005, www.sre.gob.mx/eventos/informacion .htm, accessed December 10, 2010. 37. Martí, “México.” 38. Secretaría de Relaciones Exteriores, “Huracán Katrina.” 39. Ibid. 40. “President Fox Sends New Message About Disaster Caused by Hurricane Katrina,” Presidency of the Republic, September 5, 2005, http://fox .presidencia.gob.mx/en/activities/speeches/?contenido=20654&pagina=1, accessed July 14, 2011.

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41. Drug trafficking has been augmented by privatization, movement of stock markets, financial systems, new technologies, organized crime, human trafficking, extortion, kidnapping, terrorism, and migration. It embodies many different facets of one problem. A. Celis Sánchez, La Historia del Crimen Organizado: Los Mafiosos y Narcotraficantes más Conocidos (Madrid: Libsa, 2009); L. De la Corte and A. Giménez-Salinas, Crimen.org: Evolución y claves de la delincuencia organizada (Barcelona: Editorial Ariel, 2010); John Bailey and Roy Godson, Crimen Organizado y Gobernabilidad Democrática: México y la Franja Fronteriza (Mexico: Grijalbo, 2000). 42. US Government Accountability Office, Firearms Trafficking: US Efforts to Combat Arms Trafficking to Mexico Face Planning and Coordination Challenges (Washington, DC: US Government Accountability Office, June 2009), 20. 43. Procuraduría General de la República, “Con acciones y resultados el gobierno federal combate al crimen organizado, 18 meses de gobierno,” May 2008. 44. Ibid. 45. Ibid. 46. “México: Estado de Terror,” El Universal, May 24, 2011, www.eluniversal.com.mx/editoriales/52945.html, accessed June 25, 2011. 47. Sergio Aguayo Quezada and Abelardo Rodríguez Sumano, “¿Quién gana la guerra contra el narco?” in Sergio Aguayo, Todo en Cifras (Mexico: Nuevo Siglo/Aguilar, 2009), 203–112. 48. Carlos Rico, “México–Estados Unidos, ¿hacia un nuevo paradigma?” Magistral Conference, CIDE A.C., Mexico City, December 12, 2008. 49. “Declaración conjunta Iniciativa Mérida: Un nuevo paradigma de cooperación en materia de seguridad,” Secretaría de Relaciones Exteriores, Mexico, October 22, 2007, www.iniciativamerida.gob.mx/pdf/declaracion _conjunta_Iniciativa_Merida_esp.pdf, accessed June 14, 2011. 50. Andrés Rozental and Peter Smith, “Los Estados Unidos y México: Construyendo una relación estratégica,” Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, Mexico Institute, 2005, www.wilsoncenter.org/topics /pubs/USMEXspa1.pdf, accessed June 14, 2011. 51. “La Iniciativa Mérida,” www.iniciativamerida.gob.mx, accessed June 14, 2011. 52. Carlos Rico, “La Iniciativa Mérida y el combate nacional al crimen,” Foreign Affairs en Español 8, no. 1 (January–March 2008). 53. Rico, “México–Estados Unidos.” 54. George W. Bush, National Drug Control Strategy (Washington, DC: White House, 2008), 12, http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news /releases/2008/03/national_drug_control_strategy_2008.pdf. 55. Ibid., 41. 56. UN Office on Drugs and Crime, The Globalization of Crime: A Transnational Organized Crime Threat Assessment (New York: UNODC, 2010), 5–6. 57. Aguayo and Rodríguez, “¿Quién gana la guerra contra el narco?” 208. 58. US Department of State, Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, Fiscal Year 2009 Program and Budget Guide, www.state.gov/documents/organization/121735.pdf, accessed June 22, 2012.

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59. Benito Andión, “Esfuerzos económicos y de seguridad en México en América del Norte,” in Abelardo Rodríguez Sumano, ed., Agendas comunes y diferencias en la seguridad de América del Norte: ¿de dónde venimos?, ¿dónde estamos? y ¿a dónde queremos ir? (México: Centro de Estudios Superiores Navales de la Armada de México and Universidad de Guadelajara, 2012). 60. “US House Approves Mérida Initiative Funds to Mexico: Another $248.5 Million,” Mexico and Gulf Region Report, December 17, 2011, http://mexicogulfreporter.blogspot.com/2011/12/us-house-approves-another -merida.html, accessed June 28, 2012. 61. “Preocupa a México condiciones de EU para Iniciativa Mérida: Mouriño,” El Universal, May 29, 2008, www.eluniversal.com.mx/notas /510779.html, accessed June 29, 2011. 62. Robert Pastor and Rafael Fernández de Castro, The Controversial Pivot: The US Congress and North America (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 1998). 63. “Mérida Initiative: The United States Has Provided Counternarcotics and Anticrime Support but Needs Better Performance Measures” (Washington, DC: Wilson Center, July 2010). 64. Alejandro Chanona, “La Iniciativa Mérida y el Congreso Méxicano,” in La Iniciativa Mérida: ¿Nuevo paradigma de cooperación entre México y Estados Unidos en seguridad? (Mexico City: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Benemérita Universidad Autónoma de Puebla y Editores e impresores profesionales Edimpro, S.A. de C.V., 2009), 56. 65. “Iniciativa Mérida: Un nuevo paradigma de cooperación para la seguridad regional,” October 22, 2007, www.iniciativamerida.gob.mx /work/models/IniciativaMerida/Resource/4/1/images/PDF/declaracion_conjunta_Iniciativa_Merida_esp.pdf, accessed June 29, 2011. 66. Ibid. 67. “Declaración Conjunta sobre Cooperación Bilateral contra la Delincuencia Organizada Transnacional,” Segunda Reunión del Grupo de Alto Nivel, Secretaría de Relaciones Exteriores, Mexico City, March 23, 2010. 68. Jorge Ramos, “Calderón demanda congruencia a EU por drogas,” El Universal, May 11, 2011, www.eluniversal.com.mx/notas/764837.html, accessed July 28, 2011. 69. “Estrategia regional y cooperación,” Secretaría de Marina Armada de México, Información no clasificada, February 2010. 70. Second author’s discussions with Mexican government officials. 71. Lawrence Spinetta, Major USAF, “Ampliación de la Defensa del Espacio Aéreo Norteamericano (NORAD), una estrategia de participación para México,” Air and Space Power Journal (Español Segundo Trimestre, June 6, 2005): 4–15. 72. Ibid., 15. 73. Stephen Johnson, “New Security Challenges in the Western Hemisphere: Remarks Before the Interamerican Dialogue,” Inter-American Dialogue, October 16, 2007, www.thedialogue.org/uploads/Andean/Johnson _IAD_Remarks_10-16-07.pdf, 3. 74. “Se adjudica EPR explosiones en instalaciones de Pemex,” El Universal, July 10, 2007, www.eluniversal.com.mx/notas/436116.html, accessed

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July 12, 2011; “EPR se adjudica atentados a Pemex,” CNN expansión, September 10, 2007, www.cnnexpansion.com/actualidad/2007/9/10/epr-se -adjudica-atentados-a-pemex, accessed July 12, 2007. 75. Martin Edwin Andersen, “Top Gun: Gene Renuart Moves Out Smartly as Senior US Domestic General; Extends Hand to Mexico,” Center for Hemispheric Defense Studies, National Defense University, www.ndu.edu/chds/doc Uploaded/RenuartTopGun.pdf, 2, accessed June 29, 2011. 76. Ibid. 77. Author’s observations of security assistance issues with the Mexican military. 78. Andersen, “Top Gun.” 79. Ibid. 80. Ibid. 81. “Equipo y materiales del Ejército, obsoletos, advierte el general Galván,” La Jornada, October 10, 2007, 3. 82. Ibid. 83. “Requiere la Armada renovar barcos, helicópteros, aviones, radares y vehículos,” La Jornada, October 12, 2007, 3–6. 84. “La flota aérea de la PGR, ‘a punto de entrar en crisis’: Romero Apis,” La Jornada, October 18, 2007, 8. 85. “Alertó el Cisen sobre amenazas a la seguridad nacional: SG al Congreso,” La Jornada, September 21, 2007, 4. 86. Statement of General Victor E. Renuart, Jr., US Air Force commander, USNORTHCOM and NORAD, before the Senate Armed Services Committee, March 17, 2009, www.armed-services.senate.gov/statemnt/2009 /March/Renuart%2003-17-09.pdf, accessed March 10, 2011. 87. Ibid., 25. 88. Second author’s discussions with Mexican government officials. 89. Ibid. This is significant for the Mexican military since such collaboration between the Mexican and US armed forces has not occurred since Word War II. 90. Trilateral Security Cooperation in North America: New Dimensions and Approaches, conference co-organized by the Virginia Military Institute, the Canada Institute, and the Mexico Institute of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, March 12, 2010. 91. Malcolm Beith, “Soldiers, Police Work Together to Reconstruct,” The News (Mexico City), May 14, 2009, 4–5. 92. Authors’ interviews with Mexican government and security officials, Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, May 14, 2009. 93. “Exige Caravana en Juárez sacar el Ejército de las calles,” Milenio, June 10, 2011, www.milenio.com/cdb/doc/noticias2011/315474553c1b630900 719a957b362b48, accessed July 12, 2011; “Sicilia exige en EU suspender la Iniciativa Mérida,” El Universal, June 11, 2011, www.eluniversal.com.mx /notas/772059.html, accessed July 12, 2011. 94. Charles Bouchard, deputy commander, NORAD, comments provided at the conference, “At Home in the Americas: Canada, the United States, and Hemispheric Security,” Kingston, Ontario, June 2009, 17.

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95. General Walter Semianiw, “Cooperacíon militar de Canadá en América del Norte,” in Abelardo Rodríguez Sumano, ed., Agendas comunes y diferencias en la seguridad de América del Norte: ¿de dónde venimos?, ¿dónde estamos? y ¿a dónde queremos ir? (México: Centro de Estudios Superiores Navales de la Armada de México and Universidad de Guadelajara, 2012). 96. “Seguridad y Fronteras, Iniciativa Mérida, Embajada de los Estados Unidos en México,” www.usembassy-mexico.gov/sborders_Merida_Initiative.html, accessed June 11, 2011. 97. This specific example was communicated by a senior Canada Command officer during the conference, “At Home in the Americas: Canada, the United States, and Hemispheric Security,” Kingston, Ontario, June 10–12, 2009. 98. “Joint Statement by North American Leaders,” Guadalajara, August 10, 2009,White House, www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/Joint-statement -by-North-American-leaders/, accessed June 17, 2011. 99. Robert A. Pastor, The North American Idea: A Vision of a Continental Future (New York: Oxford University Press, 2011), 137. 100. “Beyond the Border: A Shared Vision for Perimeter Security and Economic Competitiveness,” Government of Canada, February 4, 2011, www.borderactionplan-plandactionfrontalier.gc.ca/psec-scep/declaration -declaration.aspx?lang=eng, accessed June 17, 2011.

7 Contradictions and Tensions in Regional Security

Perimeter defense and regional security cooperation will remain a key component of the trilateral relationship between Canada, Mexico, and the United States for many years to come. Even with changes in government in each country, successors have been quick to embrace the process of dialogue and cooperation, regardless of party affiliation or domestic political agendas. The stakes are too high not to do so. A catastrophic terrorist incident at the border, pandemic flu, organized crime, and natural disasters are not isolated events that impact only one nation. They pose a series of challenges to the region as a whole and recognition that the growing interdependence, which continues to be primarily economic, has created a security dimension of its own whereby a threat to any one of the three countries has to be considered a threat to all three. Yet there remain significant hurdles to developing a broader sense of security cooperation: the most pressing is immigration. Most US citizens are opposed to open borders, with over 70 percent in favor of building a fence and increasing border security.1 Neither do they want a North American Union or merger with Canada or Mexico, along the lines of the European Union’s emergence at the expense of national sovereignty. Cultural affinity and nationalism run deep in all three countries and any proposed security agreements that imply a loss of national identity or sovereignty will not pass muster. The most successful security agreements have been those shaped by the shared threat perceptions and imminence of attack. The more distant the adversary, the less likely states are willing to cooperate. Perimeter defense implies that the threats remain outside the region, 167

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which in this case is North America, and the nations of the region agree on the need to keep those threats outside the perimeter as it is defined by policy choices. Clearly, the focus on homeland security and homeland defense in the initial Global War on Terror conveyed this point of view. However, by taking an all-hazards approach to homeland security and including the threats from both man-made and natural disasters into the equation, the concept of perimeter defense takes on the necessary internal dimension as well as an external focus. In other words, the threats that Canada, Mexico, and the United States face—now and in the future—are of such significance to economic security and domestic policy considerations that the response to threats (whether man-made or not) must also serve to contain the damage and prevent the spillover effect beyond the borders of each country and into that of its neighbor.

Bilateral Versus Trilateral Security Relations

The politics of security within and between Canada, the United States, and Mexico have gone through periods of national debate, directing and determining options for security relations. Unilateralism, bilateralism, multilateralism, and now trilateralism form a significant part of the security debate past and present for these North American states. That these debates and the policy choices that follow on their heels are political speaks not only to the changes in political leadership and power but also to the changing nature of threats and threat perception. World War II is a prime example. Canada entered the war early in support of the British Crown and emerged from the war as a staunch military ally of the United States, a relationship that continues to be built on. The United States entered the war in late 1941, preferring isolationism until the attack on Pearl Harbor limited that option. The United States emerged from the war as one of two dominant superpowers. Mexico, on the other hand, maintained its neutrality early in the war and, after a limited commitment of forces in the Pacific theater, returned to its neutral status throughout the Cold War period. The changing political and security climate has left in its wake countless ideas about what state security relations should or should not look like. Our purpose in this chapter is not to review those debates, which can be done elsewhere. Rather, we will consider the novelties of a trilateral security relationship

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(based on the concept of a North American regional security complex), the debates that surround that potential relationship, and how the politics of security in North America have not been well articulated and might change. Following the terrorist attacks on New York City and Washington, DC, on 9/11, the idea of creating a North American defense perimeter as a means of guarding the approaches to the continent was debated in political and security circles. In the United States, this approach was articulated as “pushing the border outwards.”2 Former commissioner of US Customs and Border Protection, Robert C. Bonner, characterizes the efforts to push the boundary outward as efforts to “expand our perimeter of security away from our national boundaries and toward foreign points of departure.” 3 Indeed, Section 401 of the Enhanced Border Security and Visa Reform Act of 2002 called for a feasibility study of a North American perimeter security program (articulated in the act as a North American National Security Policy), which would necessitate the harmonization of various security policies (notably, immigration and refugee policies).4 The interest in a North American perimeter policy sparked questions among politicians and policymakers in all three North American states, foremost among them was how a trilateral security relationship would differ from existing bilateral security relationships. North Americans are not new to trilateral arrangements. The signing of NAFTA, which came into effect on January 1, 1994, brought Canada, the United States, and Mexico together in a trilateral economic arrangement that, in theory at least, was to open the flow of goods within the North American trade bloc. The road to that trilateral economic arrangement, however, did not come without some roadblocks that, in many ways, were similar to the ongoing debate between bilateral and trilateral approaches to security policy. Support for NAFTA came from political leadership in all three countries and from well-organized business groups. Labor (with the exception of the official Mexican trade union movement) and environmental groups stood in opposition to NAFTA. 5 More importantly, however, the creation of a North American trade bloc was very much a reaction to the liberalization of global economics and the protectionist measures of creating regional trading zones such as the EU. Similarly, one of the important lessons of the 9/11 attacks was the globalization of terrorist violence. Recall that this was the first time that the United States suffered such an attack on its

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own soil and the reaction led to a Global War on Terror under the George W. Bush administration. The effort to create a North American security perimeter equates to the development of a regional security zone, as a means of enhancing homeland security by adding a protective regional layer. As a strategy for protecting the castle, keeping the threat on the far side of the moat makes sense. Stephen Clarkson and Matto Mildenberger similarly suggest that Canada and Mexico are contributors to the domestic security of the United States. At the same time, however, their research demonstrates that the United States has little to no dependency on its geographic neighbors for its internal security.6 This position, we argue, is consistent with our identity-institutions-interests (I-I-I) framework insofar as interest has traditionally driven state security policy but in the context of identity and institutional constraints. However logical the strategy of a North American security perimeter may sound, operationalizing such a concept has immense challenges. Applying the I-I-I framework used throughout this discussion to the bilateral or trilateral security debate illustrates some of the challenges associated with creating a North American security perimeter since 9/11. A North American Identity?

Identity, whether at the regional or state level, is a social construct based on a dominant narrative, which is continuously being reproduced.7 In North America, Canada, the United States, and Mexico all have unique narratives that define their respective national identities. Often that identity is articulated by distinguishing differences between neighbors. Certainly, this is often the case in Canada and Mexico, where Canadians and Mexicans take pride in defining themselves by how they differ from their US neighbors. When discussing security relations, there is also a question of identity. Without a doubt, all three North American states have designed a security policy that aims to ensure state sovereignty and the survival of the state itself. But beyond the rhetoric of state centrism are questions of alliance building and security cooperation. In 2004, the Canadian government published its first ever national security policy document, entitled “Securing an Open Society: Canada’s National Security Policy.”8 In that document, the government of Canada articulated a number of key national security pri-

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orities. Among those were the standard ideas of protecting Canadians and Canadian sovereignty. In addition, however, there was a priority to ensure that Canada could not be used as a base for attacks against its allies. As general as this statement may appear, it illustrates the importance of Canada’s bilateral security relationship with United States, a relationship that goes back to 1940 with the signing of the Ogdensburg Agreement and the creation of the Permanent Joint Board on Defense. It would be a misnomer to suggest that Canadian identity does not play into security relationships with the United States. For many years during the Cold War and into the post–Cold War period, Canada took a certain amount of pride in defining itself as a nation of peacekeepers. And during the Global War on Terror and the subsequent Iraq War, Canada stood its ground and refused to participate in the conflict. At the same time, however, the Canadian government was able to find a role in the Global War on Terror to ensure that the trusted and special security relationship with the United States would continue. Canada has long identified with US security goals through programs such as defense production and sharing agreements, joint planning, and even shared command in continental defense. In short, Canadians recognize that being friends with the United States has ensured a bilateral relationship that has allowed Canada to play a global role beyond what might otherwise be possible. As the only world superpower and leader in global security, the United States holds a global identity that is unique in the world and even more so within a hemispheric context. The identity as a hegemonic leader in the hemispheric context has been reflected in some of the continental security policies that the United States has undertaken. Certainly common political culture has allowed the United States to find a solid ally in Canada but more significant is the importance of Canada geostrategically to the defense of the US homeland. Extending US influence northward into Canada and closer to the Soviet enemy strengthened the defense of the continental United States during the Cold War period. Building an allied identity through a common enemy and threat perception helped to cement the trust between Canada and the United States and to lay the foundation for joint security institutions. There is no doubt that the US-Mexico relationship is fundamental to Mexico but, at the same time, Mexico has maintained a security identity independent of US concerns. Traditionally, Mexico’s security

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and defense policies have been nationalist and reactive. Mexico has stayed away from foreign intervention in clear contrast to US interventionism worldwide. Mexico’s response to the United States’ Cold War concerns in Latin America was substantially different than the relationship developed between Canada and the United States during the same period. US concern over communist developments in Latin America was not shared by Mexico, where neutrality and in some cases support for Latin American leftist groups (e.g., Guatemala in 1954, Chile in 1973, and Nicaragua in 1979) ran afoul of US priorities in the region.9 The end of the Cold War served to somewhat soften US-Mexico security relations but did little to influence Mexico’s desire to be seen as independent of US influence in security matters. Although the government of Mexico condemned the 9/11 terrorist attacks in the United States, it also was critical of US military intervention in Iraq and Afghanistan.10 Identity is central to defining membership with geospatial entities, whether they are states or regions. Our concern here is state identity in and between the states of Canada, the United States, and Mexico. The United States has been identified as a global security leader and Canada has been a strong supporter of US global leadership and security goals, creating amity and trust between the two nations. Mexico, on the other hand, has continued to maintain independence from US-led security goals, which has resulted in a more distant and less trusting relationship than exists between its two northern neighbors. Security and National Interests

Traditional realism teaches that states exist in anarchy and it is therefore incumbent on states to act in their own national interest, which can be articulated as ensuring security through the acquisition of power.11 Canada, the United States, and Mexico all have their own respective security interests, which in some cases are unique to each country alone and in others overlap with the security interests of one or the other. We will briefly examine the security interests of the three states here, highlighting in particular where these security interests overlap and how that is further manifest in state-to-state relations. Canada is a trading nation and as such has defined its national interests in a larger global context of a stable world in order to assure Canadian economic security. 12 Trade liberalization and expanding

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global markets are articulated as key goals of the Canadian government. Canadian security interests tend to return time and again to economic security and the maintenance of a stable national economy. In part, this is due to the fact that Canada has severe limitations on its capacity to act beyond its own state borders. Canada’s military is small and, outside of small peacekeeping operations and some disaster relief, it can act on a global scale only in concert with other military or security partners. As a result, Canada’s security interests have been less about ensuring territorial integrity and the safety of Canadian interests abroad and more about using the security apparatus to ensure economic interests at home. A stable global market (where it matters), trade liberalization, and above all maintaining the confidence of the United States in order to ensure open borders define the security interests of Canadians. In a new US National Security Strategy released by the Barack Obama administration in May 2010, the US government laid out its national interests in four succinct categories: security, prosperity, values, and international order.13 According to the document, “security” refers to the security of the territorial integrity of the homeland, the citizens of the United States, its allies, and partners. “Prosperity” is defined as having a strong national economy that is able to compete in an open and free global marketplace. The “values” that serve US security interests are promotion of democracy, freedom, and rule of law based on a US model. Finally, “international order” in the US national security context means an order that is built to ensure the promotion of US interests globally. In short, this means a stable global system that promotes liberal democratic values. Mexican national security interests are much more introverted than those of Canada and the United States. Mexico’s first National Security Law (2005) defined national security as the actions that contribute immediately and directly to the sovereignty, independence, integrity, stability, and permanence of the Mexican state. Narcoviolence was defined as the main threat to national security by President Felipe Calderón in the National Development Plan (2007–2012) and the new amendments in the 2008 National Security Law. In November 2009, President Calderón articulated that the objective of the National Public Security System and National Security Council was to ensure that Mexico’s internal security goals were focused on increasing coordination within and between Mexican security agencies.14 In fact, these reforms undertaken by the Calderón

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administration since 2007 and continuing to this day are driven by the war on drugs.15 Interests are an important variable in defining not only the national security goals of a country but also the relationships that it fosters or does not foster in the pursuit of those aspirations. For Canada and the United States, a shared interest in regional and global security is an important (but not the only) variable to further security integration. Similarly, Mexico and the United States share common regional goals but not the large global security objectives, which may have some explanatory power as to the limits of US-Mexico security integration. From a trilateral perspective, the regional security concerns between Mexico and the United States (drugs and migration) are not shared between Canada and the United States, making security interests a weak variable on which to build a larger trilateral arrangement. Institution Building in North America

Traditional liberal approaches to international relations suggest that institutions are created for the purpose of state-to-state cooperation in the pursuit of peace.16 Alternatively, greater security integration can be viewed in a second and third light: force multiplication and influence, where a state’s security is enhanced by leveraging the capabilities of those forces available from other states. Institution building in the North American region has focused largely on economic agreements. It would be an exaggeration to say that NAFTA has opened the borders between Canada, the United States, and Mexico. Rather, NAFTA has allowed for increased cross-border trade and greater regional production. Security, on the other hand, is a different story. In the context of North America, there has been little in the way of trilateral security institution building. It is difficult to look at Canadian and Mexican security institutions without taking into account US security institutions. Cooperation between Canadian and US security agencies—whether formal (institutionalized) or informal—has always been high, with the greatest advances taking place in during the post–World War II period and post-9/11 era. Different ideas have been postulated as to why Canada has been such a willing partner in bilateral agreements with the United States and larger multilateral agreements with other likeminded countries. There are a number of schools of thought but two

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stand out. The first is influence: the argument being that Canada is so affected by its proximity and relationship with the United States that, through bilateral agreements, Canada is able to have a seat at the security table.17 The second approach argues that Canada’s relationship with the United States has allowed Canada greater security, by being able to “free ride” on US resources and as a force multiplier for limited Canadian resources. Whatever the reason is for the development of bilateral security institutions between Canada and the United States, it is for Canada something to be coveted. As we describe later in this chapter, Canada has some fear that trilateral security relations will water down Canada’s entrenched bilateral relationship with the United States. In defense of its homeland, the United States’ bilateral relations with Canada have been driven by pragmatic geostrategic considerations. Joseph Jockel makes the argument that the development of NORAD grew out of US Cold War concerns, with the need to protect the northern approaches to the United States and therefore bring Canada into the defense equation.18 Edelgard Mahant and Graeme Mount argue that the US security relationship with Canada is so close that the United States most frequently sees Canada in domestic policy terms rather than foreign policy terms.19 Stephane Roussel takes this argument a step further, maintaining that the US-Canada relationship has evolved into a collective liberal democratic identity that values peaceful resolution to conflict management.20 Suffice to say that the United States has been no less shy than Canada on bilateral security institution building. Either for geostrategic considerations, or because Canada and the United States share one of the oldest and most stable security communities, institutions form an important component of US-Canada bilateral security relations. Bilateral security relations between Mexico and the United States are not well established, despite the fact that in the past forty years Mexico and the United States have signed seventy-four securityrelated agreements, the majority of them in the period following 9/11.21 Many Mexicans remain suspicious of the United States’ intentions with regard to Mexico and eschew US influence within their country. In addition, Mexican authorities have not shared US geostrategic goals, either during the Cold War or during the Global War on Terror. This does not take away from US influence with regard to Mexican security issues. The Mérida Initiative has linked Mexican security to a larger US-led regional initiative but that has not

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resulted in the development of formal bilateral security institutions. This is not to say that the first steps toward bilateral security institutions have not been taken. The Bilateral Implementation Office for the Mérida Initiative has established, for the first time, a mechanism for security consultations between the Mexican and US governments.22 Institutions form an important part of relationships between states. As Paul Pierson argues, institutions provide an important base for building stronger institutions in the future.23 This has certainly been the case in US-Canada bilateral security relations. Institution building, however (as argued above with identity and interests), forms only one variable, albeit one that formalizes mechanisms for dealing with issues. The lack of security institutions between Mexico and the United States creates a real disadvantage in the quest for a larger trilateral arrangement. Moreover, those security institutions developed between Canada and the United States represent geostrategic considerations relatively unique to Canada and the United States. Similarly, some strategic considerations shared between the United States and Mexico do not reverberate with any great political considerations in Canada.

Borders and Fences Within the Perimeter

One of the stark contradictions of North American security is the heightening of border security between Canada and the United States and between the United States and Mexico, especially in the post9/11 period. One might expect that a perimeter defense policy would include a greater opening of the borders between member states, similar to what has happened in the EU. By contrast, however, in North America greater resources have been assigned to border security in an effort largely to secure access points to the United States. Even though Canada has been a cooperative and willing partner in these developments, the purpose of the changes to border policy remains unchanged: the border has a security function to maintain the territorial integrity of the US homeland. Along the southern border with Mexico, the United States has strengthened the forward deployment strategy and hardened the line between the two countries. Here, we explore the contradiction of border enforcement within a security perimeter, arguing that strengthening the line can be seen in two ways: homeland security (protection from neighboring threats) and internal security (security apparatus within the perimeter).

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The foundation of US-Canada cooperative border security is the Integrated Border Enforcement Team (IBET). The first IBET was developed in 1996 in response to the transborder drug trade in the lower mainland of British Columbia. The model was developed to bring together partner agencies dealing with the specific problem of cross-border drug criminality (initially defined as trafficking) but was soon expanded to include other cross-border criminal activities such as the illegal movement of people, weapons, money, and cigarettes. Following 9/11, IBET was rapidly expanded to cover the entire US-Canada border with fifteen separate teams. The expansion of IBET in the post-9/11 period represents simply the continuation of policies initiated before 9/11. In addition to this expansion, the IBET mandate changed from transborder criminality to “national security,” defined as identifying, investigating, and interdicting persons and organizations that pose a threat to national security. The IBET structure is one composed of partner agencies operating under a joint management structure. Partner agencies are drawn from across all levels of government and international partnerships. IBET partnerships include: Canada Border Services Agency, provincial and municipal police, tribal police, and US agencies such as the Border Patrol, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Customs and Border Protection, and state and local law enforcement. At the most senior level IBET is managed by an International Joint Management Team, and at the local level by a Regional or Local Joint Management Team. Local management meetings take place on a regular basis (generally weekly). Frequent meetings allow for partner agencies to establish the necessary working relationships, determine group priorities, share information and intelligence, set priorities, and plan operations. Integration with core members of IBET is done through a close working relationship (which in many cases means working in the same office space), formal scheduled meetings, and regular informal contact. In addition, IBET maintains open lines of communication through predetermined links, interoperable communications systems, standardized mapping capability, and open lines of intelligence sharing. The joint management arrangement is critical for the working relationship of partner agencies as well as for setting objectives and priorities. Joint management provides one of the key mechanisms for joint law enforcement. The idea of joint law enforcement is important since it sets a baseline for evaluating US-Canada border enforcement. In the simplest terms, “joint enforcement” means that law enforcement units,

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from different levels of government and different governments, work together sharing information and resources for the purpose of investigating criminal organizations operating on both sides of the border. Although there is a shared enforcement mandate, the jurisdiction of the respective agencies remains relatively intact. In other words, US law enforcement officers are not operating in Canada and vice versa. In April 2009, the International Joint Management Team produced a strategic plan and future vision for IBET. The plan concluded that by 2015 all teams would be fully integrated and strategically located, have a cross-designated law enforcement capability, and operate within a standard and common model with appropriate legislation on both sides of the border.24 In short, the future of IBET is a move beyond the joint law enforcement model to a joint jurisdiction model. “Joint or shared jurisdiction” means having designated Canadian and US law enforcement agents empowered to operate on both sides of the border, under the direction and supervision of the local police of jurisdiction. The border becomes a zone in which certain agents are trained and authorized to enforce the laws of either country. This represents a totally integrated and seamless enforcement blanket that is not interrupted by the presence of an international boundary. There currently are two programs in existence that represent this kind of joint jurisdiction arrangement: Integrated Maritime Security Operations (Shiprider) and Border Enforcement Security Task Force (BEST). Shiprider is a cross-border maritime law enforcement operation conducted in shared waters and commanded by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the US Coast Guard. It involves reciprocal arrangements by which law enforcement personnel from Canada and the United States work in partnership onboard each other’s vessels in sovereign waters of both countries. The program operates under the Canada-US Framework Agreement on Integrated Cross-Border Maritime Law Enforcement Operations of 2007.25 Shiprider is implemented in Canada under Part 1, Section 7(1)(d) of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police Act.26 In the United States, it is implemented under Title 19 US Code 1401.27 Currently, Shiprider is restricted by time and geography. Operations can take place only in designated locations for designated periods of time. Shiprider projects have been conducted in Cornwall, Ontario, at the Detroit/Windsor border, during the 2010 Vancouver Olympics, and most recently during the Group of 8 and Group of 20 meetings in Toronto in June 2010.

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BEST is an ICE-led operation. Like Shiprider, it allows law enforcement agents from Canada to operate alongside ICE agents in the United States to enforce US law. BEST was initiated along the USMexico border in 2005 but has since expanded to include locations along the border with Canada at Blaine, Washington; Detroit, Michigan; and Buffalo and Massena, New York. Canadian partners working with the ICE-led BEST program include: the Canada Border Services Agency, Royal Canadian Mounted Police, and Ontario Provincial Police.28 Like IBET and Shiprider, BEST allows for an integrated enforcement strategy and the ability to conduct operations beyond the traditional restrictions imposed by international boundaries. IBET, Shiprider, and BEST represent an evolution in a comprehensive approach to border security. Cooperation between Canadian law enforcement agencies and between Canadian and US law enforcement agencies has always been high. However, these programs have pushed the institutional arrangements, developing frameworks for working together and integrating not only Canadian but also US resources. US-Mexico border enforcement cooperation is much less prevalent and certainly much less institutionalized. This is not to say that some cooperation is not taking place but it tends to be greatly overshadowed by unilateral efforts on the US side of the border. Cooperation between the United States and Mexico was boosted shortly after 9/11. Following on the heels of the US-Canada Smart Border Accord, Mexican officials signed a similar document with the United States in March 2002. The US-Mexico Border Partnership Action Plan included twenty-two points to augment security along the border while at the same time facilitating the flow of goods and people.29 Since 2006, ICE has created ten BESTs in the southwestern United States and one in Mexico City. ICE has also coordinated special investigative units in Mexico to investigate areas such as money laundering, human trafficking, and alien smuggling. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) agents have most recently set up Gunrunner Impact Teams (GRITs) working in cooperation with Mexican authorities to combat weapons smuggling into Mexico.30 Cooperative efforts aside, the Obama administration recently signed legislation authorizing an additional $600 million to strengthen US border security efforts, the majority of which is destined for the US-Mexico border. The money is intended to hire new Customs and Border Protection officers, Border Patrol officers, ICE agents, addi-

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tional ATF GRITs, and technology such as unmanned drones and cameras along the border.31 In short, while the US government appears to be committed to some degree to ad hoc cooperative arrangements with Mexican officials, little has been institutionalized and the hardening of the line along the US southern border appears to be increasing. Borders are probably one of the larger roadblocks to a regional security perimeter. Within a true perimeter, one might expect to see the protective function of a state border replaced by a regional protective border. A regional border, however, would require a common border policy for all the states involved, which would have to include common visa requirements, immigration and refugee policies, and a customs union. In North America, the international boundaries that currently separate Canada, the United States, and Mexico serve different state functions and exist at different stages of development. The security border of the United States addresses different security considerations in the southern than in the northern border, meaning the local policy responses are going to differ substantially. Canadian border policy is much less oriented toward security considerations and more directed toward facilitating economic trade. Insofar as security is important to Canadian policymakers, maintaining the confidence of the United States vis-à-vis border security is critical to keeping the borders open to the all-important southbound Canadian trade. A commitment of resources, cooperation, and institution building among border security agencies on both sides of the US-Canada border facilitates the goal of an open and secure border. In the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, the border between the United States and Mexico was the object of a number of bilateral agreements. No less than ten border-related agreements were signed by the two governments between 2001 and 2007.32 The 2010 Declaration on Border Management committed the two countries, through the establishment of a border working group, to the promotion of economic competitiveness and the enhancement of security along the border. These goals have been operationalized to some degree by the opening of three new border crossings in 2010 and a commitment by the Mexican government to modernize border infrastructure. However, the existing limited border infrastructure in Mexico, a vastly different set of security concerns than those of their US neighbors, and a culture of mistrust have resulted in the wall building along the US-Mexico border that has occurred in recent history.33 The bor-

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der with Mexico remains a serious security concern for the United States, as witnessed by forward deployment strategies along the border and substantial increases in material and manpower resources in the past decade. This is not to say, of course, that cooperation will not continue to develop. However, common border policies seem a long way off because the issues that are having to be dealt with along the southern border of the United States are so significantly different from those that are faced along the northern border.

Regional Crime Networks

In January 2009, President Obama was sworn into office. In less than three months into his new administration, he faced his first foreign policy crisis: Mexico’s mounting criminal violence. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton led a series of high-level visits to Mexico beginning in March 2009, attempting to communicate US support for President Calderón’s war on drugs as well as to assure the US public that the new administration was committed to securing the border and keeping the drug violence from spilling over it. 34 Visits by the secretaries of state and homeland security as well as the attorney general preceded President Obama’s visit to Mexico in April 2009 on his way to the sixth Summit of the Americas in Trinidad and Tobago.35 Parts of Mexico have been under siege by organized criminal networks, resulting in the death of 40,000 people since President Calderón initiated his war on drug trafficking gangs in December 2006. Over 45,000 Mexican military personnel have been deployed, along with 5,000 federal police, combating criminal gangs in eighteen of Mexico’s thirty-one states.36 Despite the US show of support and continuance of the George W. Bush–era Mérida Initiative by President Obama, Mexico’s criminal gang-related violence showed no sign of letting up and threatened to spread throughout the region, impacting both the United States and Canada. The traditional bilateral security relationships discussed above would not be sufficient to deal with the rising threat from regional crime networks, which have come to be categorized as a “criminal-capitalist-insurgency.”37 Drug trafficking organizations and the violence associated with these groups are not the only security consideration within the North American context. A 2010 report on organized crime by the Congressional Research Service notes that organized crime in the United

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States poses a threat to the economy and to national security. In addition, such threats are increasingly transnational so that they also threaten US neighbors and allies. The report continues by highlighting some of the criminal activities that dominate organized crime groups, including money laundering, cigarette smuggling, human trafficking, piracy, and counterfeit goods.38 Similarly, the 2010 report on organized crime by the Criminal Intelligence Service of Canada notes similar transnational concerns with organized crime groups operating in Canada and specifically the issue of weapons smuggling from the United States into Canada. In addition, the report emphasizes cross-border criminal activity such as smuggling of humans, cigarettes, drugs, and counterfeit goods.39 The post–World War II history of cross-border cooperation between Canada and the United States shows that the two countries have shared a commitment to cross-border cooperation, especially in the context of economic development. The Autopac Agreement in 1965 stands out as an example of a cooperative cross-border trade agreement. The US-Canada Free Trade Agreement in 1988, followed in 1994 by NAFTA, seemed to reiterate this cooperative relationship. The 1995 Canada–United States Accord on Our Shared Border committed the governments to improving the relationship and brought border security into the mix for the first time. More importantly, the 1995 agreement suggested taking law enforcement beyond the cooperative level to a shared enforcement level, with the formalization of the security relationship. An important question to consider is why the cross-border law enforcement relationship emerged with the characteristics that it did in the mid-1990s. What emerged during that time period was an organizational structure that was cooperative and that saw a particular problem (drug trafficking) as a criminal or law enforcement issue. It may seem strange to question how the problem of drug trafficking was framed but it is important to note that this issue could have just as easily been framed as a community issue, a health care issue, or even an educational issue. At the same time, the US-Canada relationship could have been marked by animosity or unilateral action rather than a cooperative approach. There are three critical points here. First, the border was developed in the context of security. Thus, the issue of drug trafficking was most easily framed in the security context, rather than in a social or educational context. Second, cooperation between Canada and the United States with regard to security

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issues has always been high, both in a formal and informal level. Therefore, that natural evolution was the development of a formalized relationship. The advantage of the formalized relationship, as opposed to maintaining the status quo, was the ability to work within the legislative parameters that define legal or criminal codes of each state. Prosecuting cross-border crime required formal and legal arrangements. Third, the timing of the creation of the first IBET corresponds with the US decision to designate the border along the Washington State–British Columbia corridor as a High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area (HIDTA). By giving the region this designation, the US government put the border between Washington State and British Columbia on par with drug trafficking corridors along the US-Mexico border, a status that threatened the movement of legitimate trade within the region.40 What can be observed is a continuation of changes that had taken place before 9/11 but in an accelerated fashion and for different reasons. While IBET, for example, was being implemented slowly at points along the Canada-US border, the Smart Border Accord immediately committed Canada and the United States to development of fifteen teams to cover the entire border for the purpose of ensuring national security (defined largely in the context of terrorism). Along with this expansion came the necessary increase in manpower and material resources, further entrenching the security mandate along the border. More significantly, however, was the commitment to a formal arrangement for joint enforcement along the border. For the first time, dedicated teams of law enforcement officials from both sides of the border shared intelligence resources and set investigational and enforcement priorities as an integrated and international unit. The comprehensive approach to border security had an official binational mandate for joint enforcement. The shift toward shared jurisdiction, which is evident in the development of Shiprider and BEST, represents simply the continuation of an institutional arrangement going back to the beginning of the post–World War II era. Although these current programs are restricted in scope, they do represent a comprehensive approach that goes beyond the traditional restrictions imposed by different levels of government, state boundaries, and sovereignty. Consequently, these programs are illustrative of the capacity for institutional arrangements to develop well beyond their initial incarnation in order to address, or respond to, changing political pressures.

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There is an interesting parallel in the US-Canadian and US-Mexican cross-border crime networks. Cooperation between the former took root in an institutionalized form as a result of drug trafficking. The most significant problem between the latter is also drug trafficking (granted on a much larger scale), but the solution has been far more unilateral, on the part of the United States, than cooperative between the two nations. President Calderón has argued that the United States has not adequately acknowledged its own part in the US consumption of drugs and the trafficking of weapons.41 Mexico remains the largest supplier and transit state for illegal narcotics to the United States, although a significant amount of highpotency marijuana and synthetic drugs are trafficked from Canada.42 It is estimated that some 90 percent of all the cocaine consumed in the United States is transited through Mexico.43 In addition, the $150 billion illegal narcotics industry in the United States produces an estimated $19 billion to $29 billion in illicit proceeds flowing from the United States to Mexico on an annual basis.44 The region is further destabilized by human trafficking, human smuggling, and weapons trafficking. Finally, the presence of Mexican drug cartels in the United States has increased over the past five years with their correspondent US counterparts. The National Drug Intelligence Center estimates that Mexican cartels have expanded their influence in the United States beyond the border regions and the western coast to now include the entire continental United States.45 There have been a number of policy responses to the problems associated with organized crime groups in Mexico. In 2007, President Calderón presented five priorities that his government would endeavor to address: joint military-police operations to support local law enforcement; justice reform; police reform; a national criminal intelligence system; and drug prevention and rehabilitation programs.46 By 2008, according to official documents, the priorities included: • Recovering territories and strengthening local governments. • Reorganizing security agencies and building a resolute system of rule of law at state and municipal levels. • Commencing land deployment of Joint Operations, mainly to be conducted by the armed forces. • Uniting society against organized crime. • Enhancing international cooperation.47

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During that same period, the United States announced a multiyear plan to assist Mexico and Central America in the fight against drug trafficking and organized crime in the region.48 The Mérida Initiative was intended as such an assistance program, designed to enhance US security interests in the region. However, it has yet to develop lasting security cooperation between Mexican and US security agencies. For its part, Mexico remains wary of US intervention in its territory, and critics frequently refer to the Mérida Initiative as Plan Mexico, in reference to Plan Colombia’s US intervention in Colombia.49 In addition, some Mexicans remain critical of the US position on drug trafficking, claiming that the United States must also ensure a reduction in demand through domestic programs.50 Furthermore, the lack of an articulated Mexican position on its role in an enhanced regional security strategy limits the institutionalization of the Mérida Initiative. There is no doubt that, within North America, there are criminal organizations that have regional influence. However, the responses to these regional criminal organizations have been less than coordinated. The fight against drugs and drug abuse is a perfect example. In Canada, drugs are most frequently viewed as social issues that are best combated with education and rehabilitation. In the United States, by contrast, drugs and drug trafficking have reached to the highest national security levels and are dealt with through law enforcement and incarceration. Mexico, by contrast, is only now beginning to deal with the drug fallout. Since 2006, the Calderón administration has developed strategies to combat not only the corruption and violence that accompany drug cartels but the social woes caused by addiction and abuse. Learning how criminal problems are constructed is important in order to develop common strategies to solve them. Equally important is the existence of institutional structures that either exist for security purposes or are flexible enough to be modified to address criminal concerns. Between Canada and the United States, these institutions are already present and therefore are more likely to be transformed for a shared issued. The United States and Mexico have started down the path to working cooperatively to combat organized crime, but the approach is currently more ad hoc than institutionalized. Finally, each country shares an interest in combating transnational or regional crime, if for no other reason than to maintain a legitimacy of governance within their respective states. But as was

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illustrated earlier, having a shared interest may not be enough to recognize a cooperative effort.

Conclusion

At the close of 2010, significant political, economic, and security challenges portended a coming change in North American relations. In the United States, the results of the November 2010 congressional elections brought a new Republican majority to the House of Representatives as well as a lessening of Democratic control over the Senate.51 The main election issues were not terrorism, crime, or drug trafficking but the economy, jobs, and taxes. The growing threat of criminal networks and drug trafficking organizations to either Mexican or US security did not emerge as a significant election issue. Even immigration reform appeared to have stalled for another two years with a congressional vote in December 2010 to kill the Dream Act legislation.52 The focus of the US electorate and their leaders was clearly on domestic politics, with a looming economic fiscal crisis that portends significant cuts in state and local government services as well as federal programs. Anticipating a future economic shock from a struggling US economy, Mexico moved forward to shore up its financial portfolio in December 2010, by asking the International Monetary Fund to extend its flexible spending account from $48 billion to $73 billion. 53 The extra credit line would provide President Calderón with a reserve to draw on for the final two years of his administration should Mexico suffer an economic crisis. These funds, however, would not extend past 2012, when both Mexico and the United States face presidential elections. Where do security and concerns over regional threats and perimeter defense fit within these emerging domestic problems? Will each nation’s individual identity, specific institutional focus, and interests render any movement toward convergence on security cooperation a moot topic, pending any significant man-made or natural disaster to threaten the region? Where will regional security concerns in North America fall within the spectrum of global concerns and challenges each nation will face in the coming years? In the next chapter, we will attempt to address these issues and offer some

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insights on what may develop in North American security cooperation after 2012, provided the world does not end by then.54

Notes 1. Polling Report on Immigration, www.pollingreport.com/immigration.htm, accessed October 1, 2007. 2. See Lisa M. Seghetti, Jennifer E. Lake, and William H. Robinson, “Border and Transportation Security: Selected Programs and Policies,” Congressional Research Service, CRS Report for Congress, March 29, 2005, www.fas.org/sgp/crs/homesec/RL32840.pdf, accessed November 10, 2010. 3. Cited in Gregory W. Bowman, “Thinking Outside the Border: Homeland Security and the Forward Deployment of the US Border,” Houston Law Review 44 (2007–2008): 192. 4. The exact wording of the act: “The President shall conduct a study of the feasibility of establishing a North American National Security Program to enhance the mutual security and safety of the United States, Canada, and Mexico.” This included the study of preclearance programs for people and goods at points of departure outside of North America. See Public Law 107–173, May 14, 2002, http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/get doc.cgi?dbname=107_cong_public_laws&docid=f:publ173.107.pdf, accessed November 10, 2010. 5. John Herd Thompson and Stephen J. Randall, Canada and the United States: Ambivalent Allies, 3rd edition (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2002), 293–296. 6. Stephen Clarkson and Matto Mildenberger, Dependent America? How Canada and Mexico Construct US Power (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2011), 247. 7. Anssi Paasi, “Region and Place: Regional Identity in Question,” Progress in Human Geography 27, no. 4 (2003): 476. 8. “Securing an Open Society: Canada’s National Security Policy,” April 2004, http://publications.gc.ca/collections/Collection/CP22-77-2004E.pdf, accessed July 7, 2012. 9. Daniel Levy and Kathleen Bruhn, Mexico: The Struggle for Democratic Development, 2nd edition (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2006), 186–187. 10. Ibid., 190. 11. Ole Holsti, “Theories of International Relations and Foreign Policy: Realism and Its Challengers,” in Charles W. Kegley, Jr., ed., Controversies in International Relations Theory: Realism and the Neoliberal Challenge (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1995), 42. 12. See Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, Priorities for 2009–2010, www.international.gc.ca/about-a_propos/priorities-priorites.aspx, accessed November 10, 2010. 13. National Security Strategy (Washington, DC: White House, May

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2010), www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/rss_viewer/national_security _strategy.pdf, accessed November 10, 2010. 14. See Mexico’s National Public Security System and Council, Presidency of the Republic, November 30, 2009, http://mexidata.info/id2480 .html, accessed November 10, 2010. 15. Felipe Calderón Hinojosa, “La Guerra al crimen organizado,” in Raúl Benítez, Abelardo Rodríguez, and Armando Rodríguez, ed., Atlas de la Seguridad y la Defensa de México (Mexico City: CASEDE, 2009), 17. 16. James E. Dougherty and Robert L. Pfaltzgraff, Jr., Contending Theories of International Relations: A Comprehensive Survey (New York: Addison Wesley Longman, 2001), 505–552. 17. Kim Richard Nossal, The Politics of Canadian Foreign Policy (Toronto: Prentice-Hall Canada, 1997), 79–84. 18. Joseph Jockel, No Boundaries Upstairs: Canada, the United States and the Origins of North American Air Defense, 1945–1958 (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1987). 19. See Edelgard Mahant and Graeme Mount, Invisible and Inaudible in Washington: American Policies Toward Canada (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1999). 20. Stephane Roussel, The North American Democratic Peace: Absence of War and Security Institution Building in Canada-US Relations, 1867–1958 (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2004). 21. Benito Andión, “Esfuerzos económicos y de seguridad en México en América del Norte,” in Abelardo Rodríguez Sumano, ed., Agendas comunes y diferencias en la seguridad de América del Norte: ¿de dónde venimos?, ¿dónde estamos? y ¿a dónde queremos ir? (México: Centro de Estudios Superiores Navales de la Armada de México and Universidad de Guadelajara, 2012). 22. “Arranca en DF oficina de Iniciativa Mérida,” El Universal, August 31, 2010, www.eluniversal.com.mx/notas/705518.html, accessed July 13, 2011. 23. See Paul Pierson, Politics in Time: History, Institutions and Social Analysis (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2004). 24. Joe Oliver, Royal Canadian Mounted Police chief superintendent, “Northern Border Security Challenges and Cross-Border Cooperation,” speech, Yale Club, New York, October 8, 2009. 25. See “Framework Agreement on Integrated Cross-Border Maritime Law Enforcement Operations Between the Government of Canada and the Government of the United States of America,” May 26, 2009, www.public safety.gc.ca/prg/le/_fl/int-cross-brdr-martime-eng.pdf, accessed July 7, 2010. 26. Section 7(1)(d) of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police Act states the following: “The Commissioner may: (d) designate any member, any supernumerary special constable appointed under this section or any temporary employee employed under subsection 10(2) as a peace officer.” See http://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/R-10/page-2.html, accessed July 7, 2010. 27. Title 19 US Code 1401 states, “The terms ‘officer of the customs’ and ‘customs officer’ mean any officer of the US Customs Service of the Treasury Department. These personnel are also referred to as the ‘Customs Service’ or any commission, warranted or petty, of the Coast Guard, or any

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agent or other persons, including foreign law enforcement officers, authorized by the law or designated by the secretary of the treasury to perform any duties of an officer of the Customs Service.” See http://vlex.com/vid/sec -miscellaneous-19194215, accessed July 7, 2010. 28. Regarding BEST, see US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, www.ice.gov/best, accessed July 7, 2012. See also “Canada-US Join Forces at Detroit/Windsor Border,” CBC News, October 28, 2009, www.cbc.ca /canada/windsor/story/2009/10/28/windsor-border-task-force-091028.html, accessed July 7, 2010. 29. “The US-Mexico Border Partnership Agreement” (Washington, DC: White House), http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/infocus/usmxborder, accessed November 10, 2010. 30. Clare Ribando Seelke, “Mexico-US Relations: Issues for Congress,” Congressional Research Service, CRS Report for Congress, June 3, 2010, http://fpc.state.gov/documents/organization/145101.pdf, accessed November 10, 2010. 31. Ibid., 19. 32. Those agreements include: the Plan of Action for Cooperation on Border Security (2001); Alliance for the US-Mexico Border (2002); Group for Law Enforcement and Cooperation Against Narcotics (2002); Working Group on Homeland Security and Border Cooperation (2003); Bi-Technical Group US-VISIT (Visitor and Immigrant Status Indicator Technology) Program (2003); Plan of Action for Border Security (2004); Memorandum of Understanding on Mexican Repatriation (2004); Association for Security and Prosperity of North America (2005); Plan of Action Against Violence and Increased Public Security at the Border (2006); Merida Initiative (2007); and Declaration on Border Management (2010). 33. Joseph Nevins and Timothy Dunn, “Barricading the Border: A History of the US/Mexico Border Fence,” CounterPunch.org, November 14–16, 2008, www.counterpunch.org/nevins11142008.html, accessed November 10, 2010. 34. Marc Lacey and Ginger Thompson, “As Clinton Visits Mexico, Strains Show in Relations,” New York Times, March 25, 2009, www.nytimes .com/2009/03/25/world/americas/25mexico.html, accessed December 20, 2010. 35. The Summit of the Americas is a meeting of heads of state from all nations in the Western Hemisphere (except Cuba). It has occurred every three to four years since the first summit took place in Miami, Florida, in 2005. See www.summit-americas.org/default_en.htm, accessed December 20, 2010. 36. Statistics are as of December 20, 2010. See the Los Angeles Times interactive map and live updates on Mexico’s drug war in a series entitled “Mexico Under Siege,” http://projects.latimes.com/mexico-drug-war/, accessed December 20, 2010. 37. See Sam Quinones, “State of War,” Foreign Policy (March–April 2009): 76–80. 38. Kristin M. Finklea, “Organized Crime in the United States: Trends and Issues for Congress,” Congressional Research Service, CRS Report for

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Congress, December 22, 2010, www.fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R40525.pdf, accessed January 7, 2011. 39. Criminal Intelligence Service of Canada, “2010 Report on Organized Crime in Canada,” 2010, www.cisc.gc.ca/annual_reports/annual_report _2010/document/report_oc_2010_e.pdf, accessed January 7, 2011. 40. Accordingly, it is not surprising that Mexico has been losing territorial control along the US-Mexico border over the past ten years. Recently, at-risk cities can be identified in several key transborder points: Tijuana–San Diego, Nogales-Arizona, Ciudad Juárez–El Paso, and Reynosa-Texas. Durango, Coahuila, and Nuevo León are also among the zones where weak local institutions have posed a serious governability problem for Mexico as well as its relationship with the United States. 41. “Felipe Calderón culpa a armerías de EU por miles de muertes en México,” Excelsior, June 12, 2011, www.excelsior.com.mx/index.php?m =nota&id_nota=744238. 42. “Anti-drug Efforts Beefed Up Along US-Canada Border,” USA Today, July 25, 2009, www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2009-07-25-border -security_N.htm, accessed January 7, 2011. 43. Colleen Cook, “Mexico’s Drug Cartels,” Congressional Research Service, CRS Report for Congress, October 16, 2007, www.fas.org/sgp/crs /row/RL34215.pdf, accessed October 15, 2010. 44. Seelke, “Mexico-US Relations,” 19; UN Office on Drugs and Crime, The Globalization of Crime: A Transnational Organized Crime Threat Assessment (New York: UNODC, 2010), 5–6. 45. See US Department of Justice, National Drug Threat Assessment 2010, www.justice.gov/ndic/pubs38/38661/index.htm#Contents, accessed January 7, 2011. 46. John Bailey, “Combating Organized Crime and Drug Trafficking in Mexico: What Are Mexican and US Strategies? Are They Working?” (Washington, DC: Wilson Center, 2010), www.wilsoncenter.org, accessed November 10, 2010. 47. Procuraduría General de la República, “Con acciones y resultados, el gobierno federal combate al crimen organizado (18 meses de gobierno),” Mexico City, May 2008. 48. Seelke, “Mexico-US Relations,” 14–16. 49. Laura Carlson, “A Primer on Plan Mexico,” Center for International Policy, Mexico City, May 5, 2008, www.cipamericas.org/archives/1474, accessed August 1, 2011. 50. Cook, “Mexico’s Drug Cartels,” 16. 51. The 112th Congress, which convened on January 3, 2011, is comprised of the Senate, with 51 Democrats, 2 Independents (caucusing with the Democrats), and 47 Republicans; and the House of Representatives is comprised of 193 Democrats and 242 Republicans. Kathy Gill, “The 2010 Congressional Election: An Overview,” USPolitics.About.com, November 10, 2010, http://uspolitics.about.com/od/elections/tp/2010_congressional_election.htm, accessed December 21, 2010. 52. The Dream Act, which was derailed by the US Senate in December

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2010, would have provided conditional legal status to undocumented alien children who came to the US before the age of sixteen years, were under the age of thirty, and have lived in the country for five consecutive years. They would also have to pass a criminal background test and have a high school diploma or equivalent. Also under this bill, “children who were brought to the country illegally who go to college or sign up for the military for two years could receive permanent residency after 10 years.” Scott Wong and Shira Toeplitz, “Dream Act Dies in Senate,” Politico.com, December 18, 2010, www.politico.com/news/stories/1210/46573.html#ixzz18ltySAAY, accessed December 21, 2010. 53. “IMF Likely to Expand Credit Line for Mexico,” Latin American Herald Tribune, December 21, 2010, http://laht.com/article.asp?ArticleId =381531&CategoryId=14091, accessed December 21, 2010. 54. The popularity of the movie 2012 brought increased interest in apocalyptic prophesies, including those accredited to the Mayan calendar, which some doomsday prophets say predicts that the world will end on December 21, 2012. See G. Jeffery MacDonald, “Does Maya Calendar Predict 2012 Apocalypse?” USA Today, March 27, 2007, www.usatoday.com/tech/science /2007-03-27-maya-2012_n.htm, accessed December 21, 2010.

8 Future Prospects: Convergence or Divergence?

Our purpose in this chapter is to assess the prospects for convergence or divergence within the North American regional security context. It is critical to consider the concepts of convergence and divergence as mutually compatible and not polar opposites. On a linear plane, convergence and divergence may exist at opposite ends. But within the realm of security, where the securitization of a given issue remains largely a social and political construct, the questions of security “for whom” and “from what” set the context for understanding divergence and convergence of security interests. In this chapter we will examine two cases, one contextualized in the institutions and interests framework and the other within the identity framework. The first case examines the US-Mexico border and the US-Canada border; particularly, it contrasts the United States–Mexico Joint Declaration Concerning Twenty-First Century Border Management with the US-Canada agreement, Beyond the Border: A Shared Vision for Perimeter Security and Economic Competitiveness. We also will look closer at law enforcement cooperation across borders, with specific reference to Operation Fast and Furious along the US-Mexico border and similar operations along the US-Canada border. The second case is an examination of Canadian, US, and Mexican strategic cultures. As an ideational concept, strategic culture will provide a fuller picture of the ideas that drive the military and security engagement of Canada, the United States, and Mexico. And at the same time, it will contribute to the assessment of the potential for a regional security complex in North America. 193

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Border Relations in North America

On May 19, 2010, the governments of the United States and Mexico signed a border agreement titled the United States–Mexico Joint Declaration Concerning Twenty-First Century Border Management.1 The purpose of the agreement was to create an Executive Steering Committee on Border Management charged with establishing and executing priority issues in order to make the US-Mexico border more secure and more compatible with economic growth. The Executive Steering Committee was provided with a twelve-month time line to complete priority obligations.2 Similarly, on February 4, 2011, US president Barack Obama and Canadian prime minister Stephen Harper signed a border agreement titled Beyond the Border: A Shared Vision for Perimeter Security and Economic Competitiveness.3 The purpose of the agreement was to create a Borders Working Group charged with pursuing “a perimeter approach to security, working together within, at, and away from the borders of our two countries to enhance our security and accelerate the legitimate flow of people, goods and services between our two countries.”4 Borders are fundamental to the study of security arrangements between neighboring states because it is at the border where any type of perimeter security arrangement will have recognizable consequences. Thus, if we can successfully analyze border policy between states in the context of what borders do, we can draw some general conclusions about the nature of, potential for, and consequences of a perimeter security arrangement. With respect to North American perimeter security, these two border agreements are significant for several reasons beyond the fact that they are current. First, how any given state interacts along the border with neighboring states provides some indication of the nature of the state-to-state relationship that exists. Second, boundaries between states provide insight into the nature of state identity. Third, boundaries are instruments of state policy and therefore are representative of the priorities and capabilities of the government.5 Fourth, these are bilateral agreements and not a single trilateral agreement, which speaks further to the interaction of the North American state governments. Given the theoretical significance of boundaries in both internal and external state politics, an examination of the two agreements, within the context of what boundaries do, will provide some indication of the barriers and the bridges to the development of a North American security perimeter.

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At the most basic level, the function of a border is to demarcate and control territory. In recent years, border scholars have argued that the functions of borders have changed substantially. 6 These arguments have been developed as a response to the end of nation-state thesis, in the context of globalization, mass migration, and the impact of cyberspace. However, as David Newman points out, the compartmentalized Westphalian world, dominated by the existence of the nation-state, remains intact. 7 The controls exercised along borders vary across the globe along a continuum: in some localities border controls are virtually nonexistent but in others fences and other security apparatuses are being augmented. This in turn translates to conditions where some borders are becoming increasingly permeable while others are becoming increasingly closed. Securitization of the Borders

A great deal has been written about the increased securitization of the US-Mexico border, including the extension of the border wall over the past years and the militarization of the border.8 This has left many observers of border politics with the impression that the US-Mexico border remains a liability, if not to the territorial integrity of the United States, then certainly to its citizens.9 At the same time, of course, NAFTA has sought to increase economic competitiveness within the North American region by making access to production and markets easier for business, although the distribution of wealth has remained systematically unequal, particularly in Mexico. The mix between creating a secure border barrier while maintaining the necessary ease of cross-border movement to facilitate competitive trade seems to define US border policy not only with Mexico but also with Canada, albeit in different proportions. The fact that over 85 percent of all US Border Patrol agents are posted along the US-Mexico border highlights the significance of that border compared to the US-Canada border as well as the material capacity for the United States to enforce border policy.10 An examination of the two border documents, United States–Mexico Joint Declaration Concerning Twenty-First Century Border Management and Beyond the Border: A Shared Vision for Perimeter Security and Economic Competitiveness, illustrates a clear distinction between how the United States views its relationship at the border with Mexico and its relationship at the border with Canada. The US-Canada document is clear in stating an intention to build on existing law

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enforcement programs, including the cross-designation of law enforcement officers and resources.11 On the contrary, the US-Mexico agreement looks toward developing strategies for coordinated border operations, suggesting that the US-Mexico security relationship at the border substantially trails the US-Canada relationship.12 More importantly, these agreements speak to the type of border sought by the hegemonic regional power, one that is fairly open and cooperative with Canada and one that is a much more closed or enforced border with Mexico. This analysis in no way suggests that US foreign relations with Mexico are adversarial or in conflict but rather that the relationships between the United States and Mexico and the United States and Canada are very different and this is reflected in the type of border that each respective country is attempting to establish. Joint resourcing between Canada and the United States represents a much higher level of cooperation and trust than the development of binational investigative strategies between Mexico and the United States. In short, the US objective for territorial integrity leads to a different strategy along its southern border than it does along the northern border.13 One explanation for the stricter and more significant border controls along the US-Mexico border is the exclusion and inclusion functions that are fundamental to the political identity of any community. 14 Malcolm Anderson states that borders are boundaries of identity that mark friend from foe, or differentiate “us” from “other.”15 The ongoing debate in the United States specifically concerning undocumented Mexican migrants speaks to the idea of inclusion and what types of control are required along the US-Mexico border in order to regulate northbound migration from Mexico and Central America. Peter Andreas notes that the migration of undocumented Mexican workers into the United States has been used as a political tool for leaders to build support by making immigration a rallying point for domestic discontent.16 This type of analysis points to the importance of domestic politics in the securitization process, specifically within the United States. We will return to this process below in our discussion of security cultures and regional security integration. Fast and Furious

In late 2009, the US Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives launched a weapons trafficking investigation named Operation Fast and Furious. The operation was aimed at tracking weapons being purchased in the United States and trafficked to drug

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cartels in Mexico.17 During the operation over 2,000 firearms were allowed by the ATF to be purchased, with its knowledge that the intent was for the weapons to be trafficked into Mexico. Although the objective of the operation was to track weapons moving from the United States to cartel members in Mexico, the operation went terribly wrong when the same weapons were found at shootings in Mexico and one of the weapons was used in the killing of a US Border Patrol agent.18 More importantly, however, particularly in the context of security cooperation, is the fact that the Mexican government was not made aware of the details or the extent of the operation. 19 This ATF operation illustrates the limited capacity with which US law enforcement agencies and Mexican law enforcement agencies are able to cooperate. As the US congressional hearings on Operation Fast and Furious demonstrated, the ATF had to receive approval from the highest level in order to run such an operation, suggesting that cooperation is not only a problem at the operational level but also at the highest administrative levels. The problem therefore is systemic. In interviews we conducted along the US-Mexico border, the lack of trust between US and Mexican border enforcement officers was often cited as a limiting factor to greater cross-border cooperation.20 The limited cooperation between Mexican and US law enforcement officers is in contrast to the cooperation that exists between Canadian and US law enforcement officers. In 2010, a cross-border weapons smuggling ring was dismantled through cooperation between US and Canadian law enforcement officers. 21 In 2009, police in British Columbia and Washington State dismantled a drug smuggling ring that was using helicopters to move drugs across the border. This type of investigation would be possible only through coordinated law enforcement investigations.22 Our point is not to create a laundry list of examples of cross-border cooperation but to illustrate the significant differences in cooperation between USMexico law enforcement and US-Canada law enforcement. Bilateral institutions, such as IBET and BEST, as well as a shared interest in rule of law (consistent with the principles of liberal democracy), are not a determinant for cooperation; however, they do provide a different set of options for policymakers when faced with a regional security problem. Thus, while security may well have a regional component in that, as Barry Buzan and Ole Waever note, threats travel most easily over short distances, limits are set on the capacity for state-tostate security cooperation by international boundaries, sovereignty, and state capacity.23

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Security Cultures and Regional Security Integration

The role of institutions is critical for understanding change. Recall that institutions play both a stabilizing function as well as a destabilizing function. Institutions have the role of reproducing behavior as well as inducing behavioral change and serve as a landmark against which change will be measured. If, for example, the state did not exist, then there would be no need for a revolution in which control of the state was the final goal. Institutions are not necessarily eliminated during change; rather, they can simply be altered or modified to provide a new benchmark against which further change is defined. Certainly, the ongoing existence of NATO even after the end of the Cold War is testimony to the retooling of institutional structures in the face of global change and a redefinition of threats. Fundamental changes in international polities occur when the beliefs and identities of domestic actors are altered, thereby also altering the rules and norms that constitute their political practices. These changes can be traced by path dependency and historical law models but the exactitude and accuracy of these models is not consistently accurate.24 Building on this analysis, how can culture (specifically, strategic culture) provide some explanatory power to the existence, or not, of a regional security complex? Perhaps the best starting point is to define culture, expand on this definition to include strategic culture, and finally link strategic culture to institutions in order to assess the probability of a regional security complex emerging within an institutional framework between Canada, the United States, and Mexico. When it comes to “culture,” there is no shortage of definitions. Peter Katzenstein asserts that culture is a broad term that denotes collective models of nation-state authority or identity, which are carried by custom or law. Culture refers to a set of evaluative standards as well as a set of cognitive standards that define what social actors exist in a system, how they operate, and how they relate to one another.25 Colin Gray tells us that culture refers to socially transmitted habits of mind, traditions, and preferred methods of operations that are more or less specific to a particular geographically based security community.26 Elizabeth Kier, using a definition proposed by sociologist Ann Swidler, explains culture as the set of assumptions so unselfconscious as to seem a natural, transparent, undeniable part of the structure of the world.27 Michael Desch contends that, despite the diversity in meanings, a useful definition of culture emphasizes col-

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lectively held ideas that vary relatively little in the face of environmental or structural change.28 Alastair Iain Johnston affirms that, despite the diversity, there is a common thread that links the definitions of culture. Culture describes a bounded, inductive system of assumptions. These are not necessarily internally consistent or rigorously formal knowledge structures. They are learned cognitive mixtures that allow people to put order, understanding, and predictability to the society around them. 29 Interestingly, Vendulka Kubalkova, Nicholas Onuf, and Paul Kowert claim that, from a constructivist point of view, rules are always constitutive and regulative at the same time. By definition, rules regulate the conduct of agents—because rules are normative they will tell agents what to do. Moreover, the regulations of conduct constitute the world within which conduct takes place.30 Culture sets out a system of rules, norms, and behavior putting order to society and making it more predictable by predetermining responses to certain situations. Culture, like institutions, has a coercive capacity to set boundaries for behavior within specific societies. According to the definition forwarded by Johnston, culture is learned, evolutionary, and dynamic, though the speed of change is affected by culturally influenced learning rates or the weight of history. Culture therefore exists only because of the collective intentionality. The rules, norms, and behaviors associated with any specific culture find their power and persuasive capability in the fact that the social unit accepts the given characteristics as the social identity. Equally important is the fact that this identity exists in a given temporal environment and is therefore subject to change as the collective directs it to do so. The point here is not to get lost in a discussion of culture as a dynamic idea but rather to illustrate that culture, and the “sub” versions of culture, can fit well into an identity framework. Culture can be explained outside of a material or interest framework. Within the ideational framework, culture has the power to coerce, to set boundaries for behavior, and to change. This is not to claim that material effects cannot alter culture. A prolonged economic depression may alter the capacity of a state to provide public goods, such as security, which in turn may alter the policy approaches to dealing with a specific security threat. For example, more expensive paramilitary or law enforcement options may be replaced by less expensive educational programs or the problem may even be passed off to the voluntary sector in order to find a solution.

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As noted earlier, culture is often expressed as a more specific subgroup. When we speak of political behavior, it is common to speak of political culture. When we speak of strategic behavior, we use the term “strategic culture.” Stephen Rosen explains that strategic culture is in many ways an analogous concept applied not to the political class of a nation but to the subset of political-military decisionmakers. The purpose is to capture the beliefs and assumptions that frame their choices about international military behavior, particularly those concerning decisions to go to war; preferences for offensive, expansionist, or defensive modes of warfare; and levels of wartime casualties that would be acceptable.31 Ken Booth explains that strategic culture refers to a nation’s traditions, values, attitudes, patterns of behavior, habits, symbols, achievements, and particular ways of adapting to the environment and solving problems with respect to force.32 Johnston’s definition of strategic culture builds on earlier work done by Booth. He contends that strategic culture is “an integrated system of symbols (e.g., argumentation, structures, language, analogies, metaphors) which act to establish pervasive and long lasting strategic preferences by formulating concepts of the role and efficacy of military force in interstate political affairs, and by clothing these conceptions with such an aura of factuality that the strategic preferences seem uniquely realistic and efficacious.”33 Yitzhak Klein provides another definition of strategic culture that may be more amenable to the relationship between the Mexican government and its military. Klein contends that strategic culture is a set of attitudes and beliefs held within a military establishment concerning the political objectives of war and the most effective strategy and operational method of achieving those political objectives. 34 Klein’s definition of strategic culture is similar to other definitions discussed above in that strategic culture is presented as existing within the realm of ideas. It differs, on the other hand, in how it articulates the relationship between the military and the government. In his definition, Klein notes the importance of the attitudes held within the military establishment. However, in countries like Canada and the United States, based on the principles of liberal democracy, the military establishment exists to serve the elected political leadership, which makes a direct link between the military and the electorate. In Canada and the United States, military leadership is represented at the highest level by a civilian (minister of defense in Canada and secretary of defense

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in the United States). The chiefs of defense in both Canada and the United States work for and answer to civilian leadership. By contrast, in Mexico, military leadership at the highest level is represented by military officers (minister of national defense and minister of the navy) who hold cabinet-level positions, suggesting a more direct link between the ruling party and military than in the cases of the United States and Canada. Returning to this scenario of strategic culture, in Mexico the military constitutes the last bastion in the institutionalization of defense of Mexican sovereignty, national security, and, more recently, internal public security. Moreover, the center of gravity in the institutionalization of the presidency and its power—key to Mexico’s governability—rests with the armed forces. This was true in both the authoritarian period (1929–2000) and the weak democratic transition (2000–2010).35 Klein poses some important questions, including querying the sources of strategic culture. He goes on to note that each particular strategic culture is unique and conditioned by its own set of sources. These sources may include history, geography, national culture and politics, economics, law, and technology.36 Similarly, Rosen identifies two sources of strategic culture: the dominant social structures and the degree to which the civilian and military establishments are split.37 Finally, Johnston asserts that one of the problems with strategic culture is the difficulty in determining what cultural artifacts one should analyze. These artifacts could include the writings, debates, thoughts, and words of culture-bearing units such as strategists, military leaders, and national security elites. It could also include weapons design, deployments, war plans, images of war and peace portrayed in various media, military ceremonies, or even war literature.38 Understanding strategic culture can contribute to the capacity (and limits) for Canada, the United States, and Mexico to form and maintain a regional security complex. More specifically, strategic culture provides an indication of the underlying variables that determine state behavior, which allows for some degree of analysis when examining the prospect of future regional security cooperation. We posit that countries with more similar strategic cultures would be more inclined to cooperate on security matters, simply because they share like-mindedness with regard to the use of force and the relationship between instruments of force such as the military or police, the government, and civil society. By most accounts, Canadian strategic culture has been relatively consistent since the end of World War II. For Canada, World War II

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represented a significant turning point for Canadian foreign and defense policy, one defined by cautious internationalism. William Hogg argues that Canadian strategic culture has long been defined by a functionalist approach, whereby Canada sought to make a positive contribution to the stability and order of the international community, however small. This internationalist functionalism was further integrated with a rational or realist approach to international intervention based on Canada’s capability to achieve its goals in the international community.39 Further, Kim Richard Nossal states that Canadian strategic culture was built on defining a grand strategy based on a perspective that sees Canada as part of a larger political community, most notably in the contemporary period as part of the West, specifically identifying with the strategic goals of the United States. 40 In short, Canadian strategic culture is marked by a strong internationalist perspective that, at the same time, is conscious of domestic constraints. This, of course, is reflective of the liberal democratic roots of Canada’s political culture and the relationship with the military as subordinate to the democratically elected government. Moreover, there is a distinct pragmatism to Canadian strategic culture reflected by the rational emphasis on Canadian internationalism and the strong support of US strategic goals. Mexico’s strategic culture, by contrast, is far more introverted than that of Canada. In the context of these changes, the center of gravity has remained divided among the army, navy, and presidential military staff since 1946, when President Miguel Alemán separated the branches of the armed forces and returned them to their barracks following the close collaboration with the United States during World War II. In doing so, he had two primary objectives. One was to head off a coup d’état in the change from general officers to civilians in 1946 and the other was to reduce the power that military leaders had acquired by the end of the war, through giving them a central role in internal security. However, a key distinction for the Mexican armed forces has been respect from the president for their internal laws and prerogatives, such as a lack of accountability to society. Following the 2000 election, this started to change, given that consecutive presidents have not had a majority in Congress and the opposition and the civil society have become reluctant to preserve the authoritarian status quo. Currently, there is an intense dialogue among civilian experts on national security and defense, Congress, and the armed forces regarding the use of force, martial laws, human rights,

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accountability, professionalism, budgets, equipment, foreign relations, external defense, and international cooperation. However, Mexico has not yet fully reformed its armed forces in a more modern fashion consistent with democratic consolidation. Certainly, the military is becoming more influential and political within national security and defense roles. Although Mexico has made vast strides away from the authoritarianism marked by Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) dominance, the civil-military relationship continues to be marked by a military with political influence and autonomy.41 Mexico’s strategic culture is therefore defined by a more politically influential and politically active military. Theo Farrell has identified three characteristics that inform US strategic culture: use of technology, casualty aversion, and legal pragmatism.42 These three characteristics, he maintains, are all related and reinforce the public’s belief in what role the military should play in the international community. Technology minimizes military casualties while legal pragmatism justifies the use of force for international operations. The choice of which international conflict to engage in, according to Oliver Lee as well as Richard Herman and Jonathan Keller, is based on a commitment to liberal democratic principles, notably in support of international trade and commerce.43 In short US strategic culture, like Canadian strategic culture, is linked to the demands of the domestic electorate and a commitment to international engagement that is rational and based on operations that have the potential for a net benefit for the state. The liberal democratic principles of the military serving the needs of the legitimately elected government as well as providing support for an open global economy are consistent between Canada and the United States. The concept of strategic culture is by no means deterministic as a factor for understanding the potential for the emergence of a regional security complex in North America. However, it does provide another avenue for exploring the variable of identity and its impact on security cooperation within the region. Canada and the United States appear to share a number of fundamental characteristics within their respective strategic cultures. Central to this is the commitment to a rational internationalism but, at the same time, a cautious commitment to intervention because of a public aversion to cost (be that in lives or money). In Mexico, by contrast, as a result of the democratization process, an increasing number of domestic actors are now involved in the politics of national security. Congressional

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challenges to the military’s strength in the form of human rights initiatives and truth commissions into past military actions are now challenging the once privileged position of the Mexican military. These undertakings have challenged to some degree the autonomy and power of the military in Mexico but have not shifted the internal security focus that has been the mainstay of the Mexican military. The militarization of the drug war is contemporary evidence of this. In short, an analysis using a strategic culture framework appears to favor security cooperation between Canada and the United States, more so than between either of the two and Mexico.

Reassessing Regional Security Complex Theory

Recall that Barry Buzan, Ole Waever, and Jaap de Wilde’s definition of a regional security complex is “a set of units whose major processes of securitization, desecuritization or both are so interlinked that their security problems cannot reasonably be analyzed or resolved apart from one another.” 44 We argued further in Chapter 2 that, in order to operationalize regional security complex theory, it was necessary to develop a blended approach that focused on identity, institutions, and interests. The emergence or existence of a regional security complex is tied to the links of identity, institutions, and interests that have been or are being developed within the group of states that compose the region. Within the North American region, what we see emerging is a range of asymmetrical linkages at various stages of strength and development. What then does this mean for a regional security model or complex in North America? First, it is impossible to begin looking at a regional North American security model without taking into account the relative strengths of the three states involved; most importantly, the power of the United States. Although we have noted this many times, it bears repeating that the United States is the only superpower that, now in a global financial crisis, has the capacity to act directly and indirectly on a global scale. Moreover, that capacity and the fact that the United States has a global footprint make the United States a factor in the security or insecurity of most states in the world. Certainly, David Lake and Patrick M. Morgan note this in the regional security model that they propose.45 It is interesting to note how the two countries neighboring the United States have reacted to US

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global power. A strong US alliance has allowed Canada an influence in global affairs that is probably much more substantial than it might have otherwise been. This, of course, has led to the conclusion that Canadian foreign policy matters only insofar as what the United States wants. The importance of what the United States wanted was evident in the Smart Border Accord and was further articulated in Canada’s National Security Policy: Securing an Open Society. That policy document stated implicitly the goal of ensuring that Canada would not become a threat or a base of operations for attacks against its “allies,” which would not likely include Mexico. For its part, the Mexican National Security Law (2005) acknowledged terrorism and sabotage and drug trafficking as fundamental threats to Mexico. The security system was unable to reform itself in its transition to democracy, which left vulnerabilities intact and sent a message of a lack of strategy and a confused identity in a regional context. A regional security complex for the United States, on the other hand, is the continuation of the strategy of pushing the perimeter outward. This is not a new strategy by any means. In the late 1880s, as a measure for better controlling the immigrants that entered the United States by way of Canada, the US government encouraged Canada to enforce US law at Canadian ports of entry and also posted US immigration inspectors in the port of Montreal in order to keep unwanted immigrants from crossing into the United States across unmanned land borders.46 The development of NORAD seventy years later served the same purpose. Scholars like David Haglund have made the argument that the United States should focus on what it can get from Canada—security along the northern border and ensuring that Canada does not become part of the problem.47 The Global War on Terror has made the approaches to the United States increasingly important to the homeland. Attempting to protect the homeland by using forward deployment strategies along the border, such as Operation Hold the Line, has proved to be a failure. 48 The border is breached on a daily basis by drug smugglers and undocumented immigrants and, in some cases, such as the Millennium Bomber, by terrorists.49 Pushing the borders outward, by employing a perimeter defense model, serves primarily US security goals, possibly at the expense of the security of neighboring states. It is important to consider that the US and French invasions of Mexico built an anti-imperialist and anticolonial discourse, changing the thinking and politics of the ruling class. Nonetheless, they helped

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to build a national identity, with a clear expression of this trend being the creation of symbols and rituals that represented the nation of Mexico to the outside world and to itself.50 Unlike Canada, Mexico not only received multiple threats of annexation by the United States but also lost over half of its territory, granting legitimacy to an anti-US sentiment that grew extensively between society and government.51 Mexican interests have also diverged from those of the United States, opting for neutrality or confrontation at the United Nations during the Cold War and seeking some degree of regional influence in the post–Cold War era.52 This lack of commonality in identity and interests is certainly part of the cause for the limited institutional development between the two states. Short of NAFTA (which has a number of caveats to keep Mexican laborers from entering the United States), cooperation along the border has been marked largely by local initiatives.53 The Mérida Initiative may well represent the beginning of an institutionalized security arrangement in reaction to a security problem that both sides recognize as critical, although it is far too early to reach that conclusion.54 Outside of NAFTA, relations between Canada and Mexico have always been amicable but never on par with those of Canada and the United States. The trilateral discussions framed by the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America set the stage advancing not only North American relations but also the limited relations between Canada and Mexico. Some observers suggest that the SPP would allow Canada and Mexico to have greater influence over US policy.55 However, there seems to be a greater reluctance on the part of Canada not to water down the special relationship with the United States. The United States seems to share that sentiment, viewing the strategic concerns shared with Canada (e.g., the security of the Arctic) considerably different from those shared with Mexico. At the same time, however, all three countries recognize the gains that can be made in harnessing the strengths of each respective country to work cooperatively to create a safer North America but stand reluctant for a number of self-interests discussed in this book. Without a doubt Canada, the United States, and Mexico are intricately linked in a number of important ways. In August 2003 a massive blackout, which left 45 million people in the northeastern United States and 10 million people in Ontario without power, exemplified the integrated nature of the electrical grid between the two countries.56 In February 2011 when faced with rolling blackouts due to ice storms, Texas sought to purchase electricity from Mexico, further

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illustrating the integrated nature of the electrical grid in North America.57 In addition to the integrated electrical grids, Canada is the largest supplier of crude oil to the United States and Mexico is the third largest.58 It is possible to cite any number of statistics to show the integrated and interconnected nature of North American trucking, pipelines, trains, foreign direct investment, and tourism. The point is that there is a deep integration between Canada, the United States, and Mexico. However, that integration seems to have strict limits when it comes to security. A realist would argue that there are no true interests in forming a trilateral security relationship for any of the countries. Canada is reluctant to dilute its special relationship with the United States. The United States has different strategic interests with Canada than with Mexico. And Mexico, already wary of the United States, is unlikely to significantly engage the United States’ strongest ally, Canada. A liberal would argue that the institutional structures are not yet in place for the development of greater regional integration and, at the same time, comparative institutions have striking contrasts, especially in their respective levels of development. Finally, a constructivist would argue that the identities of the three states are remarkably different. Canada and the United States share similar liberal democratic principles, yet the ideas of internationalism and the use of force are quite divergent. Mexico, by contrast, is a relative newcomer to the world of liberal democracy and continues to struggle with the role of the military within a democratic government. Thus, we see the Janusfaced nature of regional security cooperation in North America. On the one hand, there is increased convergence in the sharing of critical infrastructure, economic development, and social movement. On the other hand, security as a regional issue remains steadfastly bilateral, showing more divergence with regard to the formulation of a trilateral regional security complex. The limit of the development of a regional security complex notwithstanding, there is a great deal of truth to Barry Buzan and Ole Waever’s claim that a regional cluster may provide a better level of analysis for understanding security issues. Without a doubt, shared critical infrastructure, natural disasters, and transnational movement of criminal organizations and illegitimate goods, just to name a few, are clearly evident within the regional context. Certainly, analyzing these security issues within the regional context in many cases provides an accurate security picture on the one hand. On the other, a security complex approach allows researchers to illuminate threats

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that do not respect boundaries, hegemony, and sovereignties to a whole region or individual unit because “the central idea in RSCT [regional security complex theory] is that most threats travel more easily over short distances than over long ones. Security interdependence is normally patterned into regionally based clusters: security complexes.”59 The challenge therefore becomes operationalizing RSCT in a pragmatic manner.

Conclusion

Throughout the book, we have analyzed security cooperation in North America between Canada, Mexico, and the United States within the framework of RSCT on the basis of perceived threats to each nation’s individual and collective security. In addition to the original sector analysis offered by Buzan and Waever, we added the variables of identity, institutions, and interests to this analysis in order to foster further understanding of the nature of these threats and how these countries respond to them. 60 We have argued that, while bilateral security relationships existed in the hemisphere (primarily between the United States and Canada and the United States and Mexico) before 9/11, a trilateral security complex was lacking. Although the formation of NAFTA in 1994 created the conditions on which increased economic cooperation could frame certain issues that had a security dimension (e.g., immigration), NAFTA alone did not create a regional security complex in North America, as defined by Buzan and Waever.61 The terrorist attacks of 9/11 provided the context for a new look at North American security cooperation through the framework of RSCT, built around the threat of terrorism. The United States began to speak of reviving the World War II concept of continental defense. A renewed emphasis on perimeter defense in North America began to take shape and new institutions were formed to address these developments. However, as we have demonstrated, serious differences continued to exist with regard to a shared threat perception, based on issues of identity, institutions, and interests as determined by each country. On some levels, trilateral dimensions to these relationships began to emerge and new mechanisms were created for dialogue and discussion such as the short-lived SPP. Yet it was not until a new threat (the catastrophic natural disaster of Hurricanes Katrina and

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Rita) and old threats (drug trafficking and criminal gang violence) shook the safety and security of all three countries that a new willingness to partner with each other could arise and leaders could begin to collectively address a new perspective on shared threats to North America as a whole. The fear of a spread of violence across the border from Mexico into the United States, in particular, has caused some governors of border states to call for increased US National Guard personnel to patrol the border.62 Mexican government officials have decried the lax US gun laws that allow for the movement of arms into Mexico to fuel the cartel violence.63 Canada also has felt the sting of US policy when it has been criticized for its lax immigration and travel policies, which allow terrorists into the country with the intent to conduct attacks against the United States.64 Yet despite the discord over these sensitive issues that reflect on the identity, institutions, and interests of each country in North America, a quiet revolution is occurring that is bringing all three countries closer together through shared economic and security interests. In this light we believe the nations of North America have come to approximate on some levels, but not fully assimilate into, a regional security complex as defined by Buzan and Waever.65 Adding to this new security environment is a revolution in energy and green technology sectors that portends an increase in shared resources, vulnerability, and security with regard to threats to critical infrastructure such as power generation and economic sustainability. While Canada and the United States integrated their power grids beginning in the 1960s, Mexico is now also coming online with the United States, as evidenced by the Texas ice storms of January 2011 and the sharing of electrical power during those environmental threats to domestic production. If anything, the ongoing scare over nuclear power plant vulnerability in Japan has heightened the sense of concern in the United States over this sector of the nation’s energy production needs and increased the demand for safe energy in North America. Energy security may provide the context in which the future of an emerging North American regional security complex will be tested. These hemispheric linkages have expanded in recent years, bypassing some of the more contentious issues with regard to state sovereignty and national identity. The implications of this crossborder networking of energy sectors, in light of the continuing threats from environmental disasters and new threats in cyberspace, only

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increase the need for Canada, Mexico, and the United States to find ways to cooperate to protect critical infrastructures as each nation comes to accept mutual vulnerabilities and transparencies. Power generation and mutual dependency and vulnerability provide one example of the growing complex interdependencies with security implications in North America. Growing linkages in critical infrastructure will further challenge Canada, Mexico, and the United States to find areas of cooperation with implications of securitization, as amity will of necessity need to replace enmity in both bilateral and trilateral relationships. Certainly, each state has to rethink those issues according to its own national needs, legal systems, and institutional capacities to overcome bureaucratic and political resistance. It is still unlikely that formal institutional processes will completely overcome individual state identity and interests. However, as the stakes of state survival increase at the behest of newly emerging threats so also do the risks of not finding mutual solutions to shared security concerns. Evidence of the growing interest in finding common ground on which to build a trilateral security relationship in North America is that, within the past four years, there has been an unprecedented number of academic- and practitioner-level meetings and engagements involving key leaders from the United States, Canada, and Mexico. The theme of trilateral security cooperation has been addressed by academics and professionals in diverse venues offered by: the American Political Science Association; the Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholars; the Forum of Federations; the University of Guadalajara; Colectivo de Análisis de la Seguridad con Democracia A.C.; the National Institute for Public Administration (Mexico City); the University of Texas, El Paso; USNORTHCOM; Canada Command; Mexican Naval War College; Virginia Military Institute; East Carolina University; Queen’s University (Kingston, Ontario); and the Royal Military College of Canada. At an unprecedented meeting in Washington, DC, in March 2010, the military commanders of USNORTHCOM, Canada Command, and senior Mexican Army and Navy officers shared a podium for the first time in a public forum addressing the threats that all three nations faced from the growth of drug trafficking organizations operating as nonstate actors who do not respect borders or states. The commander of USNORTHCOM, US Air Force general Gene Renuart, argued that Mexico could learn from the US effort in the War on Terror in Iraq and Afghanistan since criminal gangs operating in

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Mexico use tactics similar to those of terrorists. While his colleagues did not totally agree with the assessment, what was noteworthy was the effort to frame the concept of regional security in terms of a partnership in which the military forces of all three countries can (and should) work together to face such mutual threats.66 That conference generated a subsequent meeting, “Common Agendas and Differences in North American Security: Canada, the United States, and Mexico,” hosted by the Mexican Naval War College and the University of Guadalajara in Mexico City in April 2011.67 Attendees included the ambassadors of all three countries, members of Congress, and senior military and security personnel from all three countries. The conference attempted to answer the questions: Where have we come from? Where are we today? And where do we want go? This meeting and the previous gatherings of practitioners and academics from North America reflected serious attempts by Canada, Mexico, and the United States to discuss the threats facing the region and to think pragmatically on how security cooperation can proceed trilaterally in North America through institutional mechanisms that reflect each other’s interests while respecting each nation’s identity and institutions. As developed by Buzan and Waever, RSCT remains a valuable analytical tool for addressing the nature of security cooperation between and among states based on shared threat perceptions. 68 Their original theory sought to redefine the nature of security relationships beyond the traditional military sector focus by introducing other sectors that help to define relationships such as political, sociological, environmental, and economic sectors. We have attempted to add further definitions to their analysis by focusing specifically on North America and introducing the variables of identity, institutions, and interests into the security equation. We have provided a critical analysis of Buzan and Waever’s theory through examining these variables in light of the changes occurring in the contemporary security environment post-9/11. As with any attempt to apply theory to practice, or to operationalize a concept such as securitization, efforts can and do come up short. We do not portend to argue conclusively, or causally, that the existence of a regional security complex in North America can be proven using the qualitative methods employed here; neither do we infer that a quantitative study could be any more conclusive. Nor do we accept the notion of some kind of genetic code in North America

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that compels all three states to an inevitable union.69 Rather, we offer another perspective on the complexity of security relationships between states, the challenges states will face in the light of new (and old) threats to confront them unilaterally, and the growing nature of interdependencies in the international security environment. Although we do not find a true trilateral security relationship present in North America that would fully assimilate Buzan and Waever’s conception of RSCT, we do see specific threats that have caused Canada, Mexico, and the United States to work together to deal with their impacts.70 Significant identity issues, based on security cultural impediments, exist that preclude further convergence of institutional mechanisms to operationalize the process of securitization in North America. However, as certain events (e.g., natural disasters) have demonstrated, shared interests can at times help to resolve differences and to provide the impetus for new levels of security cooperation. The increased dialogue that is taking place today between these nations’ military forces, police organizations, and other government agencies does at least indicate a willingness to move beyond the “past is prologue” response toward new prospects for regional security cooperation.71 Just as no one state has all the answers, neither does any one academic or practitioner. Thus, we have sought to bring together the collective views of both academics and practitioners from Canada, Mexico, and the United States to explore this topic of perimeter defense and regional security cooperation in North America. If the three of us can work together despite differences in institutional backgrounds, national identity, and even academic interests, then quite possibly our three countries can do likewise to face security challenges in the future. We hope so.

Notes 1. “Declaration by the Government of the United States of America and the Government of the United Mexican States Concerning Twenty-First Century Border Management,” May 19, 2010, www.whitehouse.gov/the -press-office/declaration-government-united-states-america-and-government -united-mexican-states-c, accessed April 4, 2011. 2. For a complete list of priority issues, see “United States–Mexico Bilateral Action Plan for Endorsement at the Inaugural Meeting of the Bilateral Executive Steering Committee on Twenty-First Century Border Man-

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agement,” n.d., www.usembassy-mexico.gov/pdf/plan-eng.pdf, accessed April 4, 2011. 3. “Declaration by President Obama and Prime Minister Harper of Canada: Beyond the Border,” February 4, 2011, www.whitehouse.gov/the -press-office/2011/02/04/declaration-president-obama-and-prime-minister -harper-canada-beyond-bord, accessed May 5, 2011. 4. Ibid. 5. Malcolm Anderson, Frontiers: Territory and State Formation in the Modern World (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1996), 2. 6. For an overview of alternative approaches to border studies, see Hastings Donnan and Thomas M. Wilson, Borders: Frontiers of Identity, Nation and State (New York: Berg, 1999), especially chapter 3. 7. David Newman, “Boundaries, Borders and Barriers: Changing Geographic Perspectives on Territorial Lines,” in Albert Mathias, David Jacobson, and Yosef Lapid, ed., Identities, Borders, Orders: Rethinking International Relations Theory (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2001), 138. 8. See Tony Payan, The Three US-Mexico Border Wars: Drugs, Immigration and Homeland Security (Westport, CT: Praeger Security International, 2006). 9. See Peter Andreas, Border Games: Policing the US-Mexico Divide (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2000); Peter Andreas and Timothy Snyder, ed., The Wall Around the West: State Borders and Immigration Controls in North America and Europe (New York: Rowman and Littlefield, 2000); and Timothy J. Dunn, The Militarization of the US-Mexico Border, 1978–1992: Low Intensity Conflict Doctrine Comes Home (Austin: CMAS Books, University of Texas at Austin, 1996). 10. See Chad Haddal, “Border Security: The Role of the US Border Patrol,” Congressional Research Service Report to Congress, August 11, 2010, www.fas.org/sgp/crs/homesec/RL32562.pdf, accessed May 5, 2011. 11. “Declaration by President Obama.” 12. “Declaration by the Government.” 13. It is important to recall that in April 2002, because of the terrorist attacks, the United States extended its military’s Area of Operational Responsibility with the new USNORTHCOM, to include Mexico and Canada within its homeland security perimeter, without consensus or agreement of Mexico and Canada. This set up the framework for future relations with its neighbors. 14. Chris Brown, “Borders and Identity in International Political Theory,” in Albert Mathias, David Jacobson, and Yosef Lapid, ed., Identities, Borders, Orders: Rethinking International Relations Theory (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2001), 135. 15. Anderson, Frontiers, 2. 16. Andreas, Border Games, 88–89. 17. For an overview of Operation Fast and Furious, see “The Department of Justice’s Operation Fast and Furious: Accounts of ATF Agents,” Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, June 14, 2011, http://oversight.house.gov/images/stories/Reports/ATF_Report.pdf, accessed July 10, 2011.

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18. Ibid., 28. 19. “Mexican Lawmakers Livid over US ‘Operation Fast and Furious,’” Christian Science Monitor, March 9, 2011, www.csmonitor.com/World /Americas/2011/0309/Mexico-lawmakers-livid-over-US-Operation-Fast -and-Furious, accessed July 10, 2011. 20. Author’s interviews with US Border Patrol agents, El Paso, Texas, May 15, 2009. 21. “Cross-border Gun, Drug Ring Busted,” Canadian Broadcasting Company, March 11, 2010, www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2010/03/11 /project-folkestone.html, accessed July 10, 2011. 22. “Nine Men Arrested in Cross-border Drug Arrest,” Toronto Star, March 29, 2009, www.thestar.com/News/Canada/article/607651, accessed July 10, 2011. 23. Barry Buzan and Ole Waever, Regions and Powers: The Structure of International Security (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004). 24. Roy Koslowski and Friedrich V. Kratochwil, “Understanding Change in International Politics: The Soviet Empire’s Demise and the International System,” International Organization 48, no. 2 (Spring 1994): 223– 224. 25. Peter Katzenstein, ed., Culture of National Security: Norms and Identity in World Politics (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996), 6. 26. Colin Gray, War, Peace and Victory: Strategy and Statecraft for the Next Century (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1990), 45. 27. Elizabeth Kier, Imagining War: French and British Doctrine Between the Wars (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997), 26. 28. Michael Desch, “Culture Clash: Assessing the Importance of Ideas in Security Studies,” International Security 23, no. 1 (Summer 1998): 152. 29. Alastair Iain Johnston, Cultural Realism: Strategic Culture and Grand Strategy in Chinese History (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1995), 34. 30. Vendulka Kubalkova, Nicholas Onuf, and Paul Kowert, International Relations in a Constructed World (New York: M. E. Sharpe, 1998), 68. 31. Stephen Rosen, “Military Effectiveness: Why Society Matters,” International Security 19, no. 4 (Spring 1995): 12. 32. Ken Booth, quoted in Colin Gray, Weapons Don’t Make War: Policy, Strategy and Military Technology (Lawrence: University of Kansas, 1993), 192, note 28. 33. Alastair Iain Johnston, “Thinking About Strategic Culture,” International Security 19, no. 4 (Spring 1995): 46. 34. Yitzhak Klein, “A Theory of Strategic Culture,” Comparative Strategy 10, no. 2 (January–March 1991): 5. 35. Abelardo Rodríguez, “Challenges and Risk for the Mexican Armed Forces: National Security and the Relationship with the United States,” Center for International Policy, Americas Program, November 23, 2010, www.cipamericas.org/archives/3670, accessed July 29, 2011. 36. Klein, “A Theory of Strategic Culture,” 5. 37. Rosen, “Military Effectiveness,” 6.

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38. Johnston, “Thinking About Strategic Culture,” 49. 39. William Hogg, “Plus ça Change: Continuity, Change and Culture in Foreign Policy White Paper,” International Journal 59, no. 3 (Summer 2004): 533. 40. Kim Richard Nossal, “Defending the Realm: Canadian Strategic Culture Revisited,” International Journal 59, no. 3 (Summer 2004): 514–516. 41. Alberto J. Olvera, “The Elusive Democracy: Political Parties, Democratic Institutions and Civil Society in Mexico,” Latin America Research Review, special edition (2010): 102. 42. Theo Farrell, “Strategic Culture and American Empire,” SAIS Review 25, no. 2 (Summer–Fall 2005): 8. 43. Oliver M. Lee, “The Geopolitics of America’s Strategic Culture,” Comparative Strategy 27 (2008): 281; Richard K. Herman and Jonathan W. Keller, “Beliefs, Values and Strategic Choice: US Leaders’ Decisions to Engage, Contain and Use Force in an Era of Globalization,” Journal of Politics 66, no. 2 (May 2004): 576. 44. Barry Buzan, Ole Waever, and Jaap de Wilde, Security: A New Framework for Analysis (Boulder: Lynne Rienner, 1998), 201. 45. David Lake and Patrick M. Morgan, ed., Regional Orders: Building Security in a New World (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997), 25. 46. Todd Hataley, “Constructing Border Security: An Institutional Analysis of the Canada–United States Border,” PhD dissertation, Queen’s University, Kingston, Ontario, 2006. 47. David Haglund, “The US-Canada Relationship: How ‘Special’ Is America’s Oldest Unbroken Alliance?” in John Dumbrell and Axel R. Schäfer, ed., America’s “Special Relationships”: Foreign and Domestic Aspects of the Politics of Alliance (London: Routledge, 2009), 60–75. 48. Dunn, The Militarization of the US-Mexico Border; Joseph Nevins, Operation Gatekeeper: The Rise of the Illegal Alien and the Making of the US-Mexico Border (New York: Routledge, 2003). 49. Clark Kent Ervin, former inspector general of the Department of Homeland Security, has documented the weaknesses associated with keeping the “enemy” beyond the boundaries of the United States. See Clark Kent Ervin, Open Target: Where America Is Vulnerable to Attack (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006). 50. On a research trip to Mexico City, the authors were struck by the strong suspicions that Mexicans had of US intentions. One senior Mexican bureaucrat went so far as to suggest that the war on drugs was a US creation in order to allow more of its influence in Mexico. On another occasion, a senior Mexican government official mentioned that he was planning to retire in Spain where his children were currently being educated. Authors’ personal interviews and meetings conducted in Mexico City at various academic and government sites, May 12–13, 2009. Confidentiality of sources’ positions and comments precludes identification. 51. E. Florescano, Etnia, Estado y Nación: Ensayo sobre las identidades colectivas en México (Mexico City: Nuevo Siglo/Aguilar, 1997), 491–493. 52. “A free trade agreement will institutionalize acceptance of a North American orientation to Mexico’s foreign policy. Just think how this con-

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trasts with past behavior—if you listened to Mexico debating at the UN, you would have thought they were our enemies.” John Ross, The Annexation of Mexico: From the Aztecs to the IMF (Monroe, ME: Common Courage, 1998), 188. 53. US Border Patrol officers working along the border between El Paso and Ciudad Juárez have been able to work together cooperatively on public safety issues. This common concern for public safety has allowed the US Border Patrol to share a radio frequency with the Ciudad Juárez police for the purpose of responding to public safety calls along the border. Authors’ personal interviews and meetings conducted in Ciudad Juárez and El Paso, May 14–16, 2009. Confidentiality of sources’ positions and comments precludes identification. 54. For example, regarding cross-border transport services under NAFTA, Mexico calls these restrictions a violation of Articles 1202 and 1203 of the treaty by the United States, giving preferential treatment to Canadian companies vis-à-vis the Mexicans. In March 2011, President Calderón’s visit to Washington, DC, under the umbrella of Mérida Initiative discussions, allowed for a discussion of the cross-border transport issue and the search for a deal that would seek a solution to this controversy by translating this into compliance with the obligations adopted by the United States to ratify NAFTA and easing entrance of Mexican truck companies that were previously authorized by the United States to operate in the border states. See “Palabras del Embajador Carlos Pascual” (Version Anticipada), Cámara Americana de Comercio de Monterrey, April 12, 2011, Club Campestre Monterrey, Mexico, Traducción Extraoficial, http://spanish.monterrey.us consulate.gov/pd_ambo_041211.html, accessed May 15, 2011. 55. James R. Edwards, Jr., “The Security and Prosperity Partnership: Its Immigration Implications,” June 2007, Center for Immigration Studies, www.cis.org/spp_and_immigration.html, accessed June 29, 2012. 56. “Blackout,” CBC, August 20, 2003, www.cbc.ca/news/background /poweroutage/, accessed July 10, 2011. 57. “Mexico Provides Electricity to Ice Storm–Hit Texas,” Statesman, February 2, 2011, www.statesman.com/news/texas/mexico-provides-electricity-to -ice-storm-hit-texas-1228481.html, accessed July 10, 2011. 58. “Crude Oil and Total Petroleum Imports—Top 15 Countries,” US Energy Information Administration, November 29, 2011, www.eia.gov/pub /oil_gas/petroleum/data_publications/company_level_imports/current/import .html, accessed July 10, 2011. 59. Buzan and Waever, Regions and Powers, 4. 60. Ibid. 61. Ibid. 62. Perry Stein, “Texas, Arizona Seek More Troops for Mexico Border,” Wall Street Journal, June 30, 2010, http://online.wsj.com/article/SB100014 24052748703374104575337362109092700.html#, accessed March 28, 2011. 63. President Calderón’s visit to the United States in March 2011, for meetings with President Obama and members of the US Congress, highlighted the continuing tensions over drug trafficking into the United States and arms trafficking into Mexico. In one particularly embarrassing incident,

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Index

Adams, John Quincy, 47 Afghanistan, 104; coalition actions in, 104; Operation Enduring Freedom in, 112 Agreement on Mexico-US Cooperation in Combating Drug Trafficking and Drug Dependence (1989), 143 Aguilar Zínser, Adolfo, 109, 110 Alamillo Flores, Luis, 60, 63 Alaska-Canadian Highway (ALCAN), 65 Alemán Valdés, Miguel, 67, 202 Alliance for Progress, 146 Alliance for the US-Mexico Border (2002), 189n32 Al-Qaeda, 1; attempts to enter through Canada, 7n7 Amaro, Joaquín, 60 American Revolution, 43 Ángeles, Felipe, 54 Aristide, Jean-Bertrand, 89 Ashcroft, John, 116 Association for Security and Prosperity of North America (2005), 189n32 Autopac Agreement (1965), 182 Ávila Camacho, Manuel, 56, 61, 62 Battle of New Orleans (1815), 47 Beyond the Border (2011), 194, 195, 196

Bi-National Planning Group (BPG), 111 Bioprotection, 129 Biosecurity programs, 15 Bi-technical Group US-VISIT Program (2003), 189n32 Blanco, Katherine, 134 Bonillas, Ignacio, 56 Bonner, Robert, 169 Border Commanders Conferences, 107 Border Enforcement Security Task Force (BEST), 178, 179 Borders and boundaries: change in functions of, 195; economic impacts on closures, 114; importance post-9/11, 104; infrastructure problems at, 113, 114; infrastructure targets at, 114; Integrated Border Enforcement Team (IBET), 177, 178; joint or shared jurisdiction over, 177, 178; militarization of, 195; open, 16; perimeter defense and, 114–117; porous, 115; problems along US-Mexico, 195, 196; regional, 180, 181; securitization of, 129, 195–196; shared environmental resources and, 15; Smart Border Accord, 7n4; tightening, 9; trade and, 16; transparency, 85; US-Canada disputes, 113; variation in controls along, 195

239

240

Index

Borders Working Group, 194 Boundaries. See Borders and boundaries Bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), 15 Bush, George H.W., 79, 84, 97n24 Bush, George W., 5, 118, 128, 130, 131, 134, 143, 147, 150, 158, 170, 181 Calderón, Felipe, 95, 118, 141, 143, 146, 149, 151, 154, 173, 181, 184 Calhoun, John C., 46, 47 California Proposition 187 (1994), 17 Calles, Plutarco E., 54, 56, 62 Canada: amity in relations with United States, 114, 136, 137; areas of disagreement with United States, 112–114, 118, 119; assistance to United States with Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, 132–138, 161n28; binational defense policy with United States in World War II, 57; Bi-National Planning Group (BPG), 111; Canada Border Services Agency in, 111, 114, 123n37, 177, 179; Canada Command in, 106, 155; Canadian Red Cross, 136; Canadian Security and Intelligence Service (CSIS), 111, 116; civil-military talks with Mexico, 150; claim of territorial sovereignty over the north, 25; Coalition for Secure and TradeEfficient Borders, 113; collective liberal democratic identity relations with United States, 174–176; commonalities with United States, 43, 44, 137, 171; concern that United States would close border crossings, 115, 116; cooperation with US law enforcement agencies, 179, 181–184; Correctional Service of Canada, 111; Criminal Intelligence Service of Canada, 182; declined to

endorse Declaration of Independence, 45; Department of National Defense, 136; differences with Mexico in support of United States, 127, 196; disagreement with United States on Iraq, 79, 97n20, 112, 119; disagreement with U.S. on threat perception, 5, 59, 125; domestic role of military in, 14; eases supply disruptions of oil during Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, 136; economic and humanitarian interest in assisting United States in Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, 1, 135; economic integration with, 42; effect of American Revolution on, 43; evolving security role in North America, 154–156; fear of terrorist attacks emanating from, 106; fears of loss of identity to United States in, 84; in “Five Eyes” security agreements, 78; Foreign Affairs Canada, 136; formation of new political institutions in, 111; French Canadian sovereignty movement challenges in, 17; geostrategic importance, 171; heightened border security with United States, 176–181; historical relationship with United States, 38n46, 43–51; Hyde Park Agreement (1941), 65; increased convergence of security interests with United States, 74, 132–138; integration of US technology/military equipment into armed forces, 65; interest in economic security, 172, 173; internal debates on appropriate security strategy in, 5; involvement in OAS, 89; joint combat action with United States, 65; lacking shared physical security interest with Mexico, 94; long special relationship with United States, 23, 171; Mackenzie Institute, 116;

Index

mirrors structure of Department of Homeland Security in new institutional formations, 111; National Parole Board, 111; national security interests, 172, 173; as nation of peacekeepers, 171, 173; nongovernmental organizations in, 136; in North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), 78–79, 121n7; in North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), 33, 81–86; in North American Treaty Organization (NATO), 78–79, 121n7, 135, 155; Ogdensburg Agreement (1940), 64, 70n61, 171; opting for parliamentary system of government, 53; opts for internationalist position post–World War II, 77; organized crime in, 182; political culture in, 43; post–Cold War change in foreign policy, 89; post9/11 security relations with United States, 103–120; pressure from United States for War on Terror support, 112–114; Public Health Canada, 136; Public Safety Canada, 111, 136, 137; reaction to summit process, 88–89; refusal to support United States action in Iraq, 104; refusal to support US National Missile Defense System, 119; regional security interests dominated by US relations, 25; retention of British values in, 53; Royal Canadian Mounted Police in, 111, 178; in Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP), 128–138; security policy documents, 170–171; security problems at United States border, 115–117; security relations with US in World War II, 64–66; shared defense industrial program with United States, 65; shared sense of identity with United States, 114, 137; Smart

241

Border Accord with United States, 7n4; strategic culture of, 202; successful realignment of security relations with United States after 9/11, 110–111; support for invasion of Kuwait, 80; support for “prosperity” over “security” aspects of SPP, 129; support for United States in Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, 106; threat of loss of sovereignty to United States, 128; threats to, 42; trade with Cuba, 20, 87; Treaty of Westminster and, 42, 43; in US Northern Command (USNORTHCOM), 105, 106, 107; in World War II, 57, 64–66, 70n61 Canada Border Services Agency, 111, 114, 123n37, 177, 179 Canada Command, 106, 137, 155 Canada–United States Accord on Our Shared Border (1995), 113, 182 Canada–United States Partnership Forum (1999), 113 Canada–United States Test and Evaluation Program, 79 Canada-US Framework Agreement on Integrated Cross-Border Maritime Law Enforcement Operations, 178 Canadian Red Cross, 136 Canadian Security and Intelligence Service (CSIS), 111, 116 Cárdenas, Cuauhtémoc, 98n32 Cárdenas del Rio, Lázaro, 56, 59, 60, 61, 63 Carranza, Venustiano, 54, 55, 56 Castañeda, Jorge, 109, 110 Castro, Fidel, 87 Cédras, Raoul, 89 Center for Hemispheric Defense Studies (CHDS), 91, 100n62 Center for Strategic and International Studies, 149 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 126, 159n4

242

Index

Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA), 94 Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), 108 Chapultepec Conference (1945), 74, 108 Chrétien, Jean, 118, 128 Civil War (1861), 42 Clark, Wesley, 121n14 Clay, Henry, 46 Clinton, Bill, 85, 87, 94, 98n32, 101n73 Clinton, Hillary, 85, 181 Coalition for Secure and TradeEfficient Borders, 113 Colombia: drug trafficking in, 118 Colosio Murrieta, Luis Donaldo, 83, 95 Common Market of the South. See Mercosur Complex interdependence theory, 38n41 Conference of Defense Ministers of the Americas (CDMA), 89–93, 93; agenda of, 90–92; Mexico’s observer status at, 90; procedural arrangements, 100n61; Williamsburg Principles, 90 Conflict: intrastate, 9; managing, 73; regional, 9, 22; resolution, 16; superpower, 9 Constitutional Convention (1787), 44, 45; Committee of Detail, 45 Constructivism, 29 Contadora Group, 77 Convergence: in regional security, 4, 193–212 Correctional Service of Canada, 111 Counterterrorism, 118 Crawford, William, 47 Crime: cross-border, 183; money laundering, 182; organized, 2, 12, 118, 126, 141–142, 150; regional networks, 181–186; smuggling, 182; transnational, 5, 9, 12, 16 Criminal Intelligence Service of Canada, 182

Cuba: considered security problem by United States, 20, 21; nonrecognition by United States, 20, 76; pressure by United States to force regime change, 87; trade with Canada and Mexico, 20, 87 Culture: coercive capacity of, 199; defining, 198, 199; political, 171, 200; rules and norms of, 199; security, 43–56, 198–204; strategic, 198, 200, 201 Customs Trade Partnership Against Terrorism (C-TPAT), 114 Dávila Caballero, Arturo, 60 Declaration of Independence (1776), 43, 45, 49 Declaration on Border Management (2010), 180, 189n32 Defense Ministerial of the Americas, 4 De la Barra, Francisco L., 54 De la Huerta, Adolfo, 55 De la Madrid Hurtado, Miguel, 81 Department of Homeland Security (DHS): perimeter defense and, 5 de Witte, John, 60 Díaz, José Porfirio, 42, 53–54, 70n51 Disasters, natural, 2, 4; commitments to fighting, 90–91; relief and assistance from military in, 14; unification of three governments of North America in common threat, 134. See also Hurricanes Katrina and Rita Divergence: in regional security, 4, 193–212 Dominican Republic, 94; invasion by United States, 76 Dream Act, 191n52 Drug(s): cartels, 16, 17; consumption driving trafficking market, 140; as threat to security, 118; trafficking, 5, 16, 141–142, 150, 162n41; transport routes, 140; US perception of problem of, 144

Index

Eberhart, Ralph “Ed,” 105 Echeverría Álvarez, Luis, 76 Economic: assistance from United States, 74; disputes, 16; expansion, 94; hegemony, 74; integration, 85 Economic security, 15–16, 32; regional trading blocs and, 15; regulated international trade regime and, 15 El Potrero del Llano (Mexican ship), 62 El Salvador, 76; Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (FMLN) in, 76 Embargo Act, 46 Enhanced Border Security and Visa Reform Act (2002), 169 Environmental sector: security and, 14–15 Estrada Doctrine, 138 European Union (EU), 10 Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (FMLN), 76 Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), 108 Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), 132, 134, 136, 137, 139 Findley, Rick, 101n74 Fitzgerald, Mark, 137 Foreign Affairs Canada, 136 Foreign Terrorist Organizations, 117 Fox, Vicente, 37n35, 88, 108, 109, 110, 118, 124n63, 128, 140, 156 Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), 85, 88 Fujimori, Alberto, 103 Galván Galván, Guillermo, 153 Good Neighbor Policy, 57, 59, 66 Gorham, Richard, 80 Group for Law Enforcement and Cooperation Against Narcotics (2002), 189n32 Grundy, Felix, 46

243

Guatemala, 77 Gunrunner Impact Teams (GRIT), 179 Hamilton, Alexander, 51 Harper, Stephen, 128, 158, 194 High Level Contact Group for Drug Control on US-Mexican Relations (1997), 143 HMCS Athabaskan (Canadian ship), 137 HMCS Toronto (Canadian ship), 137 HMCS Ville de Québec (Canadian ship), 137 Homeland Security Act (2002), 108, 134 Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, 1, 125, 132–140; assistance from Mexico, 6n2; Canadian assistance with, 1, 132–138; economic threat from, 134, 135; effect on oil refining capacity, 135; exposure of vulnerability to unanticipated events, 5, 132; Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and, 132, 134, 136, 137, 139; Mexican assistance with, 138–140; response to as victim of homeland security policy, 134; shows failure of coordination at multiple levels of government, 134 Hyde Park Agreement (1941), 65 Identity: collective, 30, 31; hemispheric, 87; legitimization of, 31; linked to institutional roles, 30; national, 170; nationalistic, 69n48; North American, 170–172; regional, 90; in regional security, 28–30; shared, 6; shifting from state to regional, 13; substate, 16; systematic evolution of, 41 Identity-institutions-interests framework (I-I-I), 4, 10, 28–34, 127; global threats to, 5; role of military and, 14

244

Index

Immigration: differing United States–Mexico views on, 21; as hurdle to cooperation, 167; limited access to public services and, 17; reform, 124n63; undocumented, 12, 16, 21, 114, 115 Influenza: avian, 15, 128; pandemic, 126, 128; swine, 15, 126 Institutions, 30–32; assigned roles by, 30; association with amity and enmity, 31; building, 57, 174–176; codified as formal rules and norms, 31; as cognitive entities, 31; context in which policy decisions made, 31; continuity and change in, 41; cooperative, 6; environmental, 15; hemispheric security, 75–77; international, 26; linked to will of collective identity, 31; military, 91; multilateral security, 74; need to create new, 104, 107–111; political, 111; regional security, 13; role in defining social reality, 31; shared interests and, 6; social commitment to, 32; stabilizing function of, 198; transparency in, 88; understanding change and, 198 Integrated Border Enforcement Team (IBET), 177, 178, 183, 197; International Joint Management Team, 177, 178 Integrated Maritime Security Operations (Shiprider), 178 Inter-American Defense Board (IADB), 79, 108 Inter-American Democratic Charter, 103 Inter-American Reciprocal Aid Treaty (1952), 75 Inter-American Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance (1947), 75–77, 108 Interests, 32–34; defining action, 32; national, 32; regional, 33; systematic evolution of, 41 International Boundaries Water Treaty Act (1909), 15 International Energy Agency (IEA), 136

International Joint Commission, 15; management of boundary waters between Canada and United States, 37n22 International Joint Management Team, 177, 178 Iraq: lack of support for US strikes in, 104, 112; Operation Iraqi Freedom in, 112; preemptive action in, 104 Isolationism, 66, 73, 168 Jackson, Andrew, 47 Jefferson, Thomas, 45, 46, 49, 50, 51 Johnson, Stephen, 150 Joint Mexican-US Defense Commission, 62, 63, 64, 151 Keating, Timothy, 132 Kennedy, John, 146 King, Mackenzie, 64 Kuwait: United States invasion of, 80 La Faja de Oro (Mexican ship), 62 Latin America: conversion of militaries to US model, 91; coups in, 55, 103; expectation of recognition from United States for role in World War II, 75; Foreign Terrorist Organizations in, 117; interventionist/tutelage policy of United States toward, 59; lack of agreed upon perimeter with United States during World War II, 58–59; lack of support for US strikes in Iraq, 104, 112; skepticism of United States’ interests in World War II, 58; tilt toward fascism and pro-German feeling in World War II, 58, 70n64; United States intervention in wars for independence in, 48, 56 Leadership Summit, 158 Lend-Lease policy, 60 López Portillo, José, 76 Louisiana Purchase (1803), 45, 49

Index

Mackenzie Institute, 116 Madero, Francisco I., 54, 55 Madison, James, 46 Manifest Destiny, 49, 50–51 Marshall Plan, 74 Martin, Paul, 112, 118 McCaffrey, Barry, 101n73 McDonough, Thomas, 47 Memo of Understanding on Mexican Repatriation (2004), 189n32 Mercosur, 10, 94; founding, 101n70 Mérida Initiative (2007), 100n65, 125, 175, 181, 185, 189n32, 206; binational effort to combat shared threat, 143–144; common ground between United States and Mexico in, 146–148; conditions placed on resources for, 145, 146; difficulties in policy coordination in, 148–152; financing for, 145; recognition of transnational/global interdependence in relations with United States, 143; strategic implications for Mexico, 156; trilateral perspective, 140–156; US Congress and, 145–146 Messersmith, George, 63 Mexican Doctrine of War, 63 Mexico: assistance from in Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, 6n1; assistance to United States with Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, 133, 134, 138–140; austerity measures in, 82; authoritarianism in, 56, 83; binational defense policy with United States in World War II, 57; border enforcement cooperation with United States, 179–181; challenges to government from drug cartels in, 17; civil-military talks with Canada, 150; Civil Prevention System in, 138, 139; concentration of wealth in, 54; concern over United States’ interventions in Latin America, 76, 77, 172; concern that United States would close

245

border crossings, 115, 116, 118; as constitutional monarchy, 52; Contadora Group in, 77; contentious borders with United States, 114, 115; criticizes United States interventions, 80, 172; cultural and identity issues with, 114, 115; decision to militarize fight against drug violence, 154; democratization in, 88; development gap with North American neighbors, 86; differences with Canada in support of United States, 127; differing identity than United States, 44; disagreement with U.S. on threat perception, 5, 59, 125; divergence of security interests away from North America and United States, 74; early security doctrines in, 54–56; economic and humanitarian interest in assisting United States in Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, 1, 135; economic inequality in, 83; economic integration with, 42; Estrada Doctrine, 138; examination of sovereignty in, 67n1; fear of terrorist attacks emanating from, 106; as federal republic, 52; financial crisis in, 82; geostrategic location of, 148; guerrilla-caused gas line explosions in, 150, 151; heightened border security with United States, 176–181; historical relations with United States, 51–56; humanitarian support offered to other nations by, 138, 139; inability to develop national security strategy, 110; inability to provide stability and control at border with United States, 127; instability due to drug cartels, 95, 118, 140; institutionalization of political structure of, 60, 62; Institutional Revolutionary Party in, 82, 203; internal debates on appropriate security strategy in, 5; lacking

246

Index

shared physical security interest with United States and Canada, 94; lack of cordial coordination in security relations with United States, 108–112; lack of national security agenda, 108–110; lack of support for broad hemispheric security cooperation through military organizations, 91; limited cooperation with United States law enforcement, 196–198; loss of territorial control along US border, 190n40; major transit zone for illegal drugs, 118; Mérida Initiative and, 140–156; Mexican Doctrine of War and, 63; Mexican Revolution in, 70n52; military-to-military relations with United States, 152–154; narcotrafficking strategy in, 141–142; narcoviolence as main threat to security in, 173, 184, 185; National Action Party (PAN) in, 88; National Defense Commission, 153; National Development Plan, 173; nationalistic identity of, 69n48; National Plan of Development in, 141; National Public Security System in, 173; national security interests, 173–174; National Security Law (2005), 173, 205; naval cooperation with, 107, 153; need for economic assistance from United States, 74; neo-Nazi movement in, 58; neutrality in Gulf War, 80; in North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), 33, 81–86; in OAS, 75, 76; objections to inclusion in US Northern Command (USNORTHCOM), 105, 106, 107, 111, 112; opposition to United States positions, 76; Organic Laws of Army and Navy (1926), 61; organized crime in, 2, 12, 118, 126, 141–142, 150, 181–186; Plan of

Iguala in, 52; post-9/11 security relations with United States, 103–120; presence of US military in, 60; principle of nonintervention in, 96n8; privatization in, 82; reaction to summit process, 88; refusal to negotiate boundary line with United States, 52; refusal to sign military assistance pacts with United States, 75; refusal to support United States action in Iraq, 104, 112; revolution in, 53–54; role of military in governance in, 56; security cooperation with United States, 59–64; Security Strategy and the Combat of Organized Crime, 141–142; seeking autonomy from United States influence, 74; signatory to Rio Treaty, 75; Smart Border Accord with United States, 7n4; standardization of processes for military operation with United States, 153; strategic culture of, 202, 203; support for “prosperity” over “security” aspects of SPP, 129; symbolism of support offered in territory lost to the United States, 138; threats to, 42; trade with Cuba, 20, 87; view of threats from United States, 69n48; view on emigration being a right of movement by government, 115; in World War II, 57; Zapatista uprising in, 82, 83 Meyers, Richard, 137 Military: institutional/cultural roles of, 14; security sector, 13–14; subordination to civilian authority, 91 Military Cooperation Committee, 79 Monroe, James, 47–50, 96n5 Monroe Doctrine (1823), 47–50, 57, 67, 96n5; Roosevelt Corollary (1904), 59, 70n67 Mulroney, Brian, 84

Index

Muñoz Ledo, Porfirio, 98n32 Mutual Support and Integrated Lines of Communications Memos of Understanding, 79 Nagin, Ray, 134 Narcoterrorism, 91 Narcotrafficking, 150 National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States (9/11 Commission), 108 National Drug Control Strategy, 144 National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, 153 National Security Act (1947), 108 National Security Research Center, 152 National Security Strategy, 132, 144 National Strategy for Homeland Security, 132 Nicaragua, 77; occupation by United States Marines, 70n67; Sandinistas in, 76; United States in, 76 9/11 Commission, 108 North America: border relations in, 194–198; economic cooperation in, 81–85; economic interdependence in, 42; furthering security cooperation in, 125–159; heightened border security within, 176–181; historical relations between Canada, Mexico, and United States, 43–56; identity narrative, 170–172; inability to form trilateral security relations, 79–81; institution building in, 174–176; lack of interest in merger in, 167; perimeter defense and terrorism in, 59; post-9/11 security relations in, 103–120; securitization of, 85; security issues, 41–43; territorial boundaries established, 42; threat perceptions in World War II, 43;

247

World War II security cooperation in, 57–66. See also Security, North American North America Aerospace Defense Command, 155 North America Maritime Security Initiative (NAMSI), 153 North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), 93, 101n74, 105, 121n7, 135, 137, 205; expansion to include maritime and land-based approaches, 111; Mexican integration into, 149; US-Canada cooperation in, 78–79, 155 North American Competitiveness Council, 128, 130 North American Energy Security Initiative, 128 North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), 93, 130; calls for reassessment of, 85; challenges to, 85–86; cross-border interaction and, 2; economic integration and, 81–86; environmental group opposition to, 169; opposition to, 98n32; political impact of, 85; as power multiplier for Canada and Mexico, 33; ratification of, 69n46; security dimensions of, 4, 5; shortcomings of, 86; as trilateral arrangement, 169; unresolved issues in, 86 North American National Security Policy, 169 North American National Security Program, 187n4 North American Treaty Organization (NATO), 93; Canada in, 135, 155; modification of purpose, 198; sharing intelligence within, 97n19; Standardization Agreements, 92; US-Canada cooperation in, 78–79 Obama, Barack, 85, 126, 147, 158, 173, 179, 181, 194

248

Index

Obregón, Álvaro, 54, 56 Ogdensburg Agreement (1940), 64, 70n61, 171 Operation Enduring Freedom, 92, 112 Operation Fast and Furious, 193, 196–198 Operation Hold the Line, 205 Operation Iraqi Freedom, 79, 97n20, 112 Operation Just Cause, 80 Operation UNISON, 137 Organization of American States (OAS), 74, 77; Canadian membership, 77, 79, 89; Conference on Hemispheric Security, 91; expansion of hemispheric cooperation and, 76; inability to reach consensus on crisis in Central America, 77; Inter-American Democratic Charter, 103; seen as means to counter United States influence, 75, 76; suspension of Cuban membership in, 99n53 Organizations: criminal, 37n36; issue-oriented, 37n36; nongovernmental, 26, 29; transnational, 17, 37n36 O’Sullivan, John L., 50 Padilla, Ezequiel, 74 Paine, Thomas, 51 Pan-American Conference, 59 Pandemics, 2 Papaloapan (Mexican ship), 139 Peace Aztec program, 99n39 Pearson, Lester, 77 Perimeter defense, 194; border agreements on, 194; borders and fences within, 114–117, 176–181; criticisms of, 3; Department of Homeland Security and, 5; emergence of, 36n8; expansion of, 169; external threats and, 167, 168; lack of trilateral agreements on, 194; North American, 169; post-9/11, 4; through expansion

of preexisting security structures, 5; US Northern Command and, 5; during World War II, 58–59 Permanent Joint Board of Defense (US-Canada), 64, 65, 66, 74 Perot, H. Ross, 98n32 Perry, William, 89, 91, 95, 101n73 Pershing, John J., 55 Plan Colombia, 146 Plan Marina, 133 Plan of Action Against Violence and Increased Public Security at the Border (2006), 189n32 Plan of Action for Border Security (2004), 189n32 Plan of Action for Cooperation on Border Security (2001), 189n32 Plan of Iguala (1821), 52 Political: culture, 27, 171, 200; institutions, 111; participation, 88; violence, 17 Politics: identity-based, 16; international, 29; nontraditional players in, 29; regional, 1 Polk, James, 51, 52 Pope, Maurice, 65 Porter, Peter B., 46 Posse Comitatus Act (1878), 14 Power: asymmetrical distribution of, 26; military, 14; polarity in distribution of, 21, 24, 26–27; relationships, 23; state, 32 Public Health Canada, 136 Public Safety Canada, 111, 136, 137 Punta del Este Conference (1967), 87 Reagan, Ronald, 76 Rebollo, Jesús, 95, 101n73 Regional: actors, 13; boundaries, 25; conflict, 22; defining, 36n10; importance of in international relations, 22; integration, 10; politics, 1; proximity, 42; security interaction, 2; security threats, 23; trade, 10, 15

Index

Regional security complex theory (RSCT), 4, 6n2, 10, 18–22; anarchic structure of autonomous units in, 21, 24, 25–26; boundaries dividing neighbors in, 21, 25; considerations driving security complexes in, 10; defining, 11, 19; differing identities in, 30; identification of regions of security interdependence, 24; institution-building process in, 80, 81; need to account for strength of United States and, 204; nonexclusivity of, 20; operationalizing, 24–28; polarity in distribution of power in, 21, 24, 26–27; presence of borders in, 24; reasons for using, 22–24; reassessment of, 204–208; relationship of actors in, 20, 21; role of superpowers in, 19, 20; structure of, 19, 20; threats and, 19; understanding of amity/enmity among units, 21, 27–28; variables needed in, 21, 22 Renuart, Victor, 150, 151, 152, 153 Ressam, Ahmed, 1, 116 Ridge, Tom, 110 Rio Treaty (1947), 75–77, 76, 79–81, 108 Rockefeller, Nelson, 73 Rodríguez, Abelardo L., 54, 56, 60 Rodríguez, Nicolás, 58 Roosevelt, Franklin D., 57, 59, 60, 64 Roosevelt, Theodore, 59 Royal Canadian Mounted Police Act, 188n26 Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), 111, 178 Rumsfeld, Donald, 92 Saddam Hussein, 104 Salinas de Gortari, Carlos, 80, 81, 83, 84 Sandinista Front for National Liberation (FLSN), 76

249

Security: additional resources for, 9; “all hazards” perspective, 5, 95, 125, 159n1, 168; aviation, 129; bilateral relations, 3; border, 129; changing considerations of, 12; Cold War era, 73–95; collapse of Soviet Union and, 80; collective, 73; culture, 6; defining, 11–13; economic, 15–16, 32; environmental, 14–15, 133; external threats and, 2; global, 73–95; hemispheric institutions of, 75–77; homeland, 9; identitybased politics and, 16; for inbound US flights, 2, 7n3; initiatives, 4; of the Americas, 4; integration, 13, 174; interaction, 2; interdependence, 24; internal threats and, 2; local, 9; maritime, 129; military sector, 13–14; national, 32; new emphasis on, 9; physical, 32; policies, 5; political sector, 17; politicization of, 13; primary components of, 11; public, 14; regionalist view, 73; as result of power relations in international community, 37n14; sector analysis, 13–18; shared conceptions of, 10; as social construct, 12, 20; societal sector, 16–17; trilateral relations, 3, 5; universalist view, 73; variations between groups, 12 Security, North American: asymmetric interdependence in, 41; attempt by U.S. to extend boundaries in, 33; belief that threats could come from within the region, 23; domination by last superpower, 23; driven by US territorial concerns, 23; effort by US to control agenda in, 23; hegemonic position of United States in, 33; historical overview, 41–67; identity-institutions-interests framework and, 28–34; issues in, 41–43; perimeter defense and,

250

Index

36n8; unipolar system in, 27; in World War II, 57–66 Security, regional: approaches to, 4; contradictions/tensions in, 167–187; convergence, 4, 193–212; cooperation, 4; distribution of power in, 21, 24, 26–27; divergence, 4, 193–212; economics and, 4; identity-institutions-interests framework, 10; regional orders conceptual approach, 10; regional security complex theory and, 10; selfinterest and, 16; trade blocs and, 16; understanding, 9–35; variables in, 3 Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP), 5, 125, 206; Canada in, 128–138; evolution of, 128–132; inability to solve issues, 158; institutional diagram of, 131fig; lack of strong endorsement for, 130; major policy initiatives, 128; need to find means of collaboration/cooperation with Canada and Mexico, 126, 127; as plot to reduce sovereignty, 130; prevention and response to external and internal threats to North America, 128, 129; purpose to increase regional cooperation, 128; skepticism over, 128, 130; working groups, 129 Security complexes theory, 126 Security cooperation: convergence/divergence issues, 6, 193–212; hurdles to, 167; Hurricanes Katrina and Rita and, 132–140; new momentum in, 125–159; objective of promoting security of United States, 58; regional, 73–95; significance of immigration to, 167; tensions in, 5, 6; US-Mexico, 59–64; during World War II, 57–66 Security culture, 43–56, 198–204; regional security integration and, 198–204

Security relationships: bilateral vs. trilateral, 168–176; Canada– United States Test and Evaluation Program, 79; impact of historical events on, 4; interactions shaped by identity-institutions-interests, 4; Military Cooperation Committee, 79; Mutual Support and Integrated Lines of Communications Memos of Understanding, 79; North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), 78–79; North American Treaty Organization (NATO), 78–79; Permanent Joint Board on Defense, 79; post-9/11, 103–120; post–World War II, 74–81; primarily bilateral, 92; redefining, 5; Technology Research and Development Projects Memo of Understanding, 79 Shiprider, 178, 183 Silva Herzog, Jesús, 90 Sir William Alexander (Canadian ship), 137 Smart Border Accord, 7n4, 128, 183, 205 Social: behavior, 32; collective, 12, 13; commitment, 32; constructivism, 29; facts, 30; reality, 29 Somoza Debayle, Anastasio, 76 Soviet Union: collapse of, 80, 86 Spanish-American War (1898), 50, 59 State(s): anarchic nature of system, 21, 24, 25–26; as autonomous units, 25; behavior of, 32; capability of, 32; changing security concerns of, 25; choices based on national interest, 32; competition for power in anarchic systems, 32; decisionmaking about violence by, 25–26; deferral to international agreements, 33; defining security and, 11, 12, 13; domestic/foreign policy of, 32; interdependence, 16; interests, 32–34; as

Index

key actors in international relations, 32; legitimacy of, 17; organizational stability of, 17; possible deferral to regional interests, 33; power, 32; sovereignty, 170 Stettinius, Edward, 73 Summit of the Americas, 4, 86–89, 94, 189n35 Taft, William Howard, 55 Taylor, Zachary, 52 Technology Research and Development Projects Memo of Understanding, 79 Terrorism, 5; Al-Qaeda, 1, 7n7; alteration of relations in North America, 5; attempts at, 1; Christmas bomber, 1, 2; development of new continental security defense perimeter and, 59; international, 12, 128; new threats of, 104; regional responses to, 103–120; security environment and, 5 Threats, 3, 4; “all hazards” perspective, 5, 95, 125, 159n1, 168; asymmetrical, 9; against border infrastructure, 114; crime, 12; differing perceptions of, 5, 59, 125; European powers, 48; external, 2; from fundamental Islamic groups, 117; identification of, 12; illegal drugs, 118; internal/external security against, 6; localized, 9; military, 14; nonrecognition of borders, sovereignty by, 6; nontraditional, 9; reconceptualizing, 41; redefining post-9/11, 117–119; regional consequences, 2; shared, 127, 167, 168; to societal groups, 16, 17; to state legitimacy, 17; terrorism, 5; of terrorists integrating with undocumented migrants on Mexican border, 115; trading partners as, 16; transnational, 16; undocumented immigrants, 12; United

251

States vulnerability to, 104; in World War II, 57–66 Trade: barriers, 84; blocs, 169; border difficulties with, 113, 114; borders and, 16; cross-border, 174; disputes, 16; environmental security and, 15; fostering hemispheric identity through, 87; institutionalized arrangements for, 15, 16; interdependence, 16; liberalization, 16, 172; protectionism, 169; regional, 10, 15; through North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), 81–86 Transportation Security Agency (TSA), 108 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, 51, 52, 69n46 Treaty of Juárez (1911), 54 Treaty of Paris (1783), 43 Treaty of Westminster (1931), 42 Truman, Harry, 74, 75 United Nations: Charter, 75; Mission in Haiti, 89; support for, 73 United States: acceptance of coresponsibility for drug violence in Mexico, 143; acquisition of Alaska by, 68n8; adjustment of isolationist views, 66; amity in relations with Canada, 114; annexation of Mexican territory, 51–53; areas of disagreement with Canada, 112–114; attempts to annex Canada, 47; bilateral free trade agreements, 94; Bi-National Planning Group (BPG), 111; border enforcement cooperation with Mexico, 179–181; Border Patrol, 108, 115, 177; Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, 196–198; as “city on a hill,” 51; collective liberal democratic identity relations with Canada, 174–176; in Colombia, 118; commonalities with Canada,

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Index

43, 44, 171; concern with perimeter defense during World War II, 58–59; Constitutional Convention, 44, 45; contentious borders with Mexico, 114, 115; cooperation with Canadian law enforcement agencies, 179; Customs and Border Protection (CBP), 122n19, 169; Customs Service, 108; differing identity than Mexico, 44; domestic role of military in, 14; end of support for military regimes, 87; ends isolationist policies, 73; exceptionalism of, 50; expansionist interests in, 46, 47, 50, 51, 52, 53; fears of loss of identity to Mexico in, 84; Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), 132, 134, 136, 137, 139; focus on containment policies, 74, 86; foreign policy of nonintervention in Mexico, 60; gains control of Florida, 47, 49; greater effort to control regional security agenda by, 23; hegemonic position of, 33, 41; heightened border security with Canada and Mexico, 176–181; historical relations with Canada and Mexico, 38n46, 43–56; Homeland Security Act (2002), 108; Hyde Park Agreement (1941), 65; Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), 122n19, 177, 179; Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), 108; institutional restructuring post-9/11, 104, 107–111; intervention in wars for independence in Latin America, 48, 56; invasion of Kuwait, 80; joint combat action with Canada, 65; lacking shared physical security interest with Mexico, 94; lack of cordial coordination in security relations with Mexico, 108–112; lead role in determination of global security relations, 74; as lone super-

power, 9; long special relationship with Canada, 171; Mérida Initiative and, 140–156; Mexican Revolution and, 53–54; military assistance to Mexico, 83, 84; military-to-military relations with Mexico, 152–154; “morally superior” institutions in, 50; National Missile Defense System, 119; National Security Act (1947), 108; National Security Strategy, 173; need to keep threats out of Western Hemisphere, 57; in Nicaragua, 76; non-recognition of Cuba by, 20, 87; in North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), 81–86; North American National Security Policy, 169; Office of National Drug Control Policy, 118; Ogdensburg Agreement (1940), 64, 70n61, 171; organization of branches of government, 45; perception of drug problem in Mexico, 144; regional security issues for, 41–43; representative institutional structures in, 44; reshaping security strategy and institutional structures, 104; role in Latin American coups, 55; role of National Guard in, 14; security cooperation with Mexico, 59–64; security culture in, 43–56; security problems at Canadian border, 115–117; sees Canada as source of potential threat (post9/11), 27; shared defense industrial program with Canada, 65; shared sense of identity with Canada, 114; Smart Border Accord, 7n4; as sole superpower, 80; standardization of processes for military operation with Mexico, 153; strategic culture in, 203; Transportation Security Agency, 108; turns down request to increase military spending in Mexico, 112; universalistic ideals

Index

and policies of, 41, 42; use of National Guard in, 121n6; values and identity of, 44; vulnerability to emerging terrorist threats, 104; War Hawks and, 46; in World War II, 57–66 USA PATRIOT Act, 120 US Army, 49 US Border Patrol, 108, 115, 177 US Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, 196–198 US-Canada Free Trade Agreement (1988), 84, 113, 182 US-Canada Smart Border Accord, 179 US Code, 14 US Customs and Border Protection (CBP), 122n19, 169 US Customs Service, 108 US Department of Defense, 107; distinguishes between homeland defense and homeland security, 121n6 US Department of Health and Human Services, 136 US Department of Homeland Security, 108; Strategic Plan, 110 US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), 122n19, 177, 179 US Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), 108 US Joint Task Force Bravo (JTF-B), 76, 96n13 US-Mexican War (1846), 42, 50, 51–53 US-Mexico Border Partnership Action Plan, 179 US-Mexico Joint Declaration Concerning Twenty-First Century Border Management (2010), 194, 195, 196 US National Missile Defense System, 119 US National Security Strategy, 173 US Navy, 49

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US Northern Command (USNORTHCOM), 105–107; conference on pandemic flu by, 126; explores Mexican integration into NORAD, 149; Hurricanes Katrina and Rita and, 137; Mexican objections to inclusion in, 111, 112; naval cooperation with Mexico, 107; perimeter defense and, 5; relations with Mexico, 152–154; Unified Command Plan, 105, 121n7; USCanada cooperation in, 78 US Office of National Drug Control Policy, 118 US Southern Command (USSOUTHCOM), 107, 121n7, 121n14 US Space Command, 105 Vega, Clemente, 105, 111, 112, 149 Villa, Francisco “Pancho,” 54, 55 Violence: decision to use, 25–26; drug, 3, 143, 154; enlarged levels of, 5; globalization of, 169; increases in, 154; political, 17; terrorist, 169 Vulnerability, 5 War of 1812, 42, 45, 46–47 War on Terror, 4; focus on homeland security and defense in, 168; identity politics and, 17; regional responses to, 103–120; as securitized issue with differing policy responses to, 27 Washington, George, 44, 45, 49, 50, 51 Weapons trafficking, 2, 140, 182, 196–198 Williamsburg Principles, 90 Wilson, Woodrow, 55 Working Group on Homeland Security and Border Cooperation (2003), 189n32 World War II: American Theater of Operations in, 36n8; attack on

254

Index

Pearl Harbor, 61, 168; continental theater of operation in, 57; Good Neighbor Policy in, 57, 59, 66; institutionalization of close collaboration between US and Canada, 64, 65; Joint US-Mexico Defense Commission in, 62, 63, 64; Lend-Lease policy, 60; perimeter defense during, 58–59;

US-Canada cooperation in, 64–66; US-Mexican cooperation in, 59–64 Zapata, Emiliano, 54 Zapatista National Liberation Army (EZLN), 82, 83 Zedillo Ponde de León, Ernesto, 88 Zimmerman Telegram, 55–56

About the Book

Has the emergence of new transnational threats—terrorism, drug cartels, natural disasters—affected the dynamics of security relations among Canada, Mexico, and the United States? What is the likely future of these relations in a highly securitized world? Richard Kilroy, Abelardo Rodríguez, and Todd Hataley trace the evolution of security relations in North America from the bilateral approach that existed prior to the events of September 11, to the unilateral US approach of perimeter defense after September 11, to the creation of a trilateral regional security framework. Their analysis highlights both the move toward cooperation and the significant obstacles that limit the potential for an effective regional security complex. Richard J. Kilroy, Jr., is professor of regional and analytical studies

at the National Defense University. The views expressed herein by Richard Kilroy are his own and do not reflect the official policy or position of the National Defense University, Department of Defense, or the US government. Abelardo Rodríguez Sumano is professor of international studies and international security at the University of Guadalajara. Todd S. Hataley is adjunct professor at the Royal Military College of Canada and research fellow at the Centre for International and Defence Policy at Queen’s University.

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