Mexico is meddling in US military, claiming jurisdiction over chicano servicemen

Heroic Mexican-American soldiers and Marines have been among the earliest US casualties in Iraq. So it’s not unusual that the Mexican press and government would be paying attention.

However, rather than honor Mexican-Americans liberating Iraq, the Mexican press – and Mexican officials – claim that the US military is using ethnic minorities as cannon fodder. Some newspapers refer to these Americans as “Mexicans.”

And now, the Mexican government, according to the major newspaper El Universal, is taking “a census of persons of Mexican ancestry who belong to the armed forces of the United States and who are stationed in the war zone.” Not just Mexican citizens or dual nationals serving in the US military, but anybody with Mexican ancestry.

The ostensible reason is to help Mexican-American servicemen make contact with relatives living in Mexico. But Allan Wall, an American writer living in Mexico, sees a larger purpose: “The Mexican government is compiling this database for political purposes. It refuses to support the U.S. military. It has refused to honor these Mexicans and Mexican-Americans as American fighting men. But it wants to exploit their situation in the Iraq war, to score political points at home and how can it be doubted? to gain their loyalty.”

Such concerns wouldn’t stand on solid ground were it not for Mexican President Vicente Fox’s policy speech that he claims jurisdiction over all Americans of Mexican descent, and that is goal is to erase the northern and southern borders of the United States.

Many Americans view Fox as a friend of the US. He isn’t. He has been meddling aggressively in US immigration, welfare, education, and social policies, and has retained his predecessors’ tradition of sticking it to the United States in the UN, refusing to support the liberation of Iraq. Now he’s meddling inside the US military in time of war.

What does it all mean? It’s difficult to say. But it’s something that the US must start watching very closely.