Outlaw Guns, and Only Outlaws Will Have Guns...mostly

An article in the Washington Post features Mexico's one and only gun shop.  This "store" is located on a military base in Mexico City.  Mexicans who want to "legally" own weapons must make the trek from wherever they live to Mexico City to purchase guns.  Maybe I should say "gun."  Citizens in Mexico may legally purchase only one gun http://www.elpasotimes.com/juarez/ci_16962619?source=pkg per person.  This gun must be a handgun of no larger than .38 caliber.  Long shotguns and rifles, either single shot or with small capacity magazines, may be purchased under a separate permit, IF the purchaser proves that he is either a hunter or member of a gun club. 

Another permit is required if the person wants to be allowed to carry his gun from his residence to his place of business, and back to his residence.  This special permit applies only to business owners.  The citizen who owns his one gun for personal protection may not legally take the gun out of his residence.  Additionally, to purchase the one gun allowed under the law, the purchaser must prove that he has no criminal record, has fulfilled his service in the armed forces and was honorably discharged.  Further, the purchaser must have references, proof of "honest" income, and submit to fingerprinting and being photographed.  If, after this process, the purchaser is deemed worthy of receiving a gun permit, the purchaser is able to buy his one pistol, and a single box of ammunition.  The Mexican gun laws and gun procurement procedures are hailed internationally as some of the most stringent gun controls in the world.  So Mexico is safe, quiet, and free of gun-toting outlaws, yes?

Umm...no, not the Mexico I seem to recall.

Police sources in the same article mentioned above state that over 93,000 firearms have been seized since 2006, when President Calderon initiated Mexico's current civil war, then called "the War on Drugs."  It is hard to imagine that the guns seized amount to much more than the tip of the iceberg of all the guns illegally possessed in Mexico at this moment.  Most of the guns are believed to be purchased in, and smuggled from, the United States; however, a joint operation between the governments of both nations was conducted to determine if this statistic was correct.  For some reason, both governments have declined to make public the information gleaned from this project.  I am a realist, however, and I can believe that at least a large portion of these weapons are purchased or stolen in the United States and smuggled into Mexico.  Other weapons are smuggled in from points unknown by both the criminal element and corrupt officials of the Mexican government.  For instance, many citizens know that it is much easier to have a policeman obtain a pistol for them than for the resident to make the long trek to Mexico City. 

Nonetheless, have the Mexican gun laws curtailed violence in any way?  I believe the violence and corruption speaks for itself.  The cartels are armed much better than most of the Mexican local and state police agencies.  The cartels are, in fact, able to engage the military and the federal police on a near equal level.  The cartels have unlimited supplies of firearms, as well as access to more powerful weapons such as grenades and occasionally to shoulder-fired missiles.  Police patrols are regularly ambushed with heavy gunfire and bombs.  Then the criminals seem to vanish into the country-side, but not so far away that they cannot maintain an iron-clad fist of control over the cities and the people as soon as police leave the area.  And what about the citizen?  The poor citizen is backed into the darkest, most secure corners of his home, with just one gun and a single box of ammunition to protect himself and his family from the ravages of the cartels' violence.  According the the commandant of national gun shop in Mexico City, about 7,000 pistols and revolvers are licensed to citizens each year.  The person armed with a small caliber handgun is, of course, no match for even one person armed with an assault rifle or grenade.  But, outlaw guns...and the nation is safer, right?

I hope that those who smuggle guns from the United States into Mexico, and those who sell guns to such smugglers, get their just desserts.  But for the average citizen in Mexico who is trying protect himself, I can only say, "vaya con Dios."  Not only is the average citizen cut off from police assistance in most cases, but, in that most dire of situations, the home invasion, our Mexican counterparts are left in the cold, with only their pistol to face off the well-armed outlaw.  Unfortunately, the Mexican gun control system has only proven the golden adage from the "Old West":  If guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have them...well, mostly.