President Donald Trump’s escalating threats against Mexico have led to calls for a guerrilla struggle of national resistance from across the political spectrum, uniting the Mexican people as almost never before in modern times.

A string of elder statesmen warn that the country faces grievous injury and is now in a state of de facto hostilities with Washington, forcing Mexicans to fight back on every front and whatever the cost.

“An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth,” said former president Vicente Fox. “Trade is important, jobs are important, but they are not as important as dignity. We must not be cowed or it will paralyse us,” he said.

Felipe Calderon, who led the country a decade ago, said Mexico must retaliate immediately and where it hurts most, targeting counter-sanctions against the districts of US congressmen who have been the most vocal supporters of Mr Trump’s plans for a border wall and his talk of trade tariffs.  

“We are seeing the behaviour of a bully. He who declares war against us will have to respond. There are going to be costs. Mexico will suffer. But we’ll show the size of our country and what our people are made of,” he said.

“We must have a retaliation strategy in every area where the bilateral relationship with Mexico has value. We must put everything in the balance,” he told a forum on Mexico City’s Televisa.

Mr Calderon said Mexico should fight tactically in the US courts and global bodies to tie the US administration in knots, targeting the lines of cleavage in Mr Trump’s own political base. It is a strategy used before in a cross-border trucking dispute, but this time it would be on a much greater scale.

“We must revise the whole relationship point by point, including the presence of US agents in our country,” he said. Anti-terror co-operation on Isis should be frozen.

“They have to understand that they cannot take Mexican support for granted. Trump has no idea what this means in terms of security and fighting organised crime and narco-traffic,” he said.

David Fuller's view

Could we have already seen the best of Trump in less than ten days as President?  I certainly hope not as that would be the ultimate nightmare, and not just for the USA.  

I am assuming that he is more sensible than that.  However, what we know is that he has a huge ego and shoots from the hip, not least on a range of topics which neither he nor any other individual could fully understand on their own.

I credit Trump with appointing a strong, independently minded cabinet.  While they are all very likely to be appointed, Democrats are in no hurry to end the hearings, which will not be completed before sometime in February.  Rex Tillerson, Secretary of State, is the most important and very capable but he will not hold office before this Wednesday, at the earliest.  

I do not think any of them would hesitate to confront Trump on a serious issue, but we will soon find out.  Trump respects them so he is likely to listen.  Meanwhile, Trump has already started some potentially destructive fires, with countries, some of his own powerful CEOs and the US population which did not support him. 

Wake up Trump and smell the coffee.

Here is a PDF of AE-P’s article.