The United States has developed plans for a "surge" of law enforcement and even military deployment along the US-Mexican border in case prohibition-related violence in Mexico spills across the border, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said Wednesday. The plans have been in the works since last summer, he said.

[inline:borderpatrol.jpg align=left caption="US Border Patrol"]About 8,000 people have been killed in Mexico's drug wars since President Felipe Calderón unleashed the military against the so-called cartels two years ago, more than 5,300 of them last year. The dead include members of rival cartels, who are fighting the Mexican state as well as each other, along with hundreds of police and soldiers, and innocent bystanders.

Mexican border cities have been some of the hardest hit, with some 1,600 people killed in Ciudad Juarez (across from El Paso) last year and hundreds more killed in Tijuana (across from San Diego). Border area law enforcement and political figures have been increasingly worried that the violence will flow north across the border just like the illicit -- and hugely profitable -- black market trade in drugs does.

"We completed a contingency plan for border violence, so if we did get a significant spillover, we have a surge -- if I may use that word -- capability to bring in not only our own assets but even to work with" the Defense Department, Chertoff told the New York Times in a telephone interview.

Homeland Security officials told the Times the plan called for aircraft, armored vehicles, and "special teams" to be ready to converge on any emerging hot-spots, with the size of the force depending on the scale of the problem. Military forces could be called on if civilian agencies like the Border Patrol and local police forces were overwhelmed, but the officials said that was considered unlikely.

"I put helping Mexico get control of its borders and organized crime problems" at the very top of the list of national security concerns, Chertoff added.

The US has also responded to the violence in Mexico by approving a three-year, $1.4 billion anti-drug assistance plan, the first tranche of which is now flowing to the Mexican state. It will provide military equipment, helicopters, planes, and training.