CLUELESS IN WASHINGTON

By Howard Chua-Eoan

No one in Washington expected the news. Bill Clinton's antidrug czar Barry McCaffrey heard it from the State Department, which had found out about it from reporters. The Drug Enforcement Administration was caught flat-footed, as was the CIA. At a press conference, a chagrined Attorney General Janet Reno said, "What I learned was at the point after the arrest was made."

The man arrested was McCaffrey's counterpart in Mexico, General Jesus Gutierrez Rebollo, a man of reputed honesty and heroism whose appointment only 10 weeks ago McCaffrey had praised effusively. That image began to fade on Feb. 6, when an informant told the Mexican Defense Secretary, General Enrique Cervantes, that Gutierrez was living in a luxury apartment "whose rent cannot be paid with the salary of a public official," a statement from Cervantes' office later said. Summoned to a midnight meeting on the same day, Mexico's drug czar suffered a heart attack when questioned about the apartment, and was ordered into a military hospital.

In the days that followed, investigators discovered a lot about Gutierrez. Not only had he consorted with drug traffickers since at least 1993, but the apartment that triggered the investigation had been given to him by drug dealer Eduardo Gonzalez Quirarte. He is reputed to be a lieutenant of one of Mexico's most notorious narcotraffickers, Amado Carrillo Fuentes, alleged leader of the Juarez cartel. On Tuesday, Feb. 18, wiretaps reportedly confirmed that Gutierrez and two top aides had taken protection money from a Carrillo lieutenant. The general was then placed under arrest.

Washington officials were stunned. Mexico is the conduit for as much as 75% of the cocaine that reaches the U.S. The two-year-old government of President Ernesto Zedillo, which succeeded a regime peppered with charges of corruption, had made great efforts to be seen as a credible partner in the war against drugs. Why then would Zedillo fail to send an early warning when Gutierrez was first suspected--and as a result embarrass the Administration? The timing was especially unfortunate. The arrest took place less than two weeks before Clinton is to send his annual report to Congress certifying Mexico's commitment to the antidrug effort. While Clinton will not decertify Mexico, the news undercuts his claim that antidrug cooperation has improved under Zedillo. Mexican Foreign Minister Jose Angel Gurria, visiting Washington last week, was abruptly summoned to the White House for a reprimand.

According to a senior Mexican official, however, Zedillo and Cervantes had huddled after Feb. 6, deciding not to inform Washington--and thus risk Clinton's wrath--until a solid case developed against Gutierrez. Zedillo may have seen a chance to flex some badly needed muscle and make sure Mexico's generals understood that the impetus to nab Gutierrez came from him--and not the U.S. In any case, Zedillo does not much care for certification. It is, he told Time, "a rather improper procedure, not very consistent with the principles of international law."

Gutierrez claims he was part of an undercover plan to snare Carrillo approved by unnamed "superiors." The byzantine nature of Mexican politics has led to speculation that Gutierrez may have been framed and that the U.S. did indeed push for the arrest. After all, every year at certification time Mexico seems to stage an antidrug spectacle. Might not this year's be Gutierrez?

If so, the White House is putting on quite an act of being angry. It is aghast that the U.S. embassy, the DEA and the CIA, which all maintain large offices in Mexico City, failed to report on Gutierrez. DEA officials in Mexico were not even aware that he had moved into a luxury apartment. Fumed a top Clinton adviser: "This is clearly a major intelligence failure." There were other reasons to be suspicious of Gutierrez. For seven years he had been in command of Guadalajara, where drug money is known to contaminate the officer corps. The drug lords he rounded up were Carrillo rivals. In January, Carrillo evaded capture when his sister's wedding was raided. Officials now wonder if he was tipped off by a well-placed friend.

DEA officials tried to explain the lapse by contending that their agents are so closely watched by Mexican police that they can't move around the country--a symptom of the friction between law enforcers of both countries. The antagonism, say Washington sources, led to sanitized, less-than-informative briefings with Mexican officials. Thus if Gutierrez received sensitive intelligence, DEA officials say, it was not from their headquarters. Still, Gutierrez had other potential, unwitting abettors, including admiring U.S. embassy operatives. Those--and the security of their informants--are now being intensely scrutinized.

--Reported by Tim Padgett/Mexico City and Elaine Shannon/Washington

With reporting by TIM PADGETT/MEXICO CITY AND ELAINE SHANNON/WASHINGTON