by ROBERT BECKHUSEN

In recent years, Mexico has made a major shift in how it equips its military. Instead of largely relying on European nations to sell it weapons — as was the case for decades — Mexico is increasingly turning to the United States.

Because there’s a drug war going on … which the U.S. is eager to help bankroll.

It’s not just money, of which the U.S. has provided $2.5 billion since 2008. The U.S. continues to supply Mexico with battle rifles, Humvees, helicopters and gobs of night vision gear. It all comes during an internal conflict that’s killed tens of thousands of people and is still extremely violent.

The country’s largest drug cartels have fragmented. Some cities — such as the border town of Ciudad Juarez — are considerably safer than a few years ago. However, rural areas continue to deteriorate, with smaller and more decentralized drug gangs kidnapping, extorting and killing with impunity.

But Mexico had been wary of buying weapons from the United States.

There’s a series of long and complicated reasons for this. There’s the history of U.S. interventions in Mexican territory, and the reality of domestic Mexican politics. During the Cold War, Mexican politicians were afraid of building too close of a relationship with the U.S. — a hedge against the Soviet Union stirring up trouble in its backyard.

Mexico was never part of NATO, and the country scuttled a proposed U.S. military agreement in 1952 because it came with the condition that Mexican troops help out in “missions important to the defense of the Western Hemisphere.”

At the time, the U.S. wanted Mexico to contribute troops to the war in Korea. But Mexico City saw this conflict as too far removed, and hardly a threat to its own interests.

Mexico preferred to keep its army small — owing to a history of military dictators overthrowing elected governments in the 19th and early 20th centuries. The U.S. offering to help expand the Mexican army in the 1950s? Thanks, but no thanks.

It shows in Mexico’s arsenal. The Mexican navy — in actuality a coastal defense force — is heavily comprised of former U.S. Navy ships donated or sold in the 1980s and 1990s.

But the Mexicans’ armored fighting vehicles are French. Many of their rifles are German. Their artillery is French, Chinese and Italian. On the other hand, there’s plenty of American weapons now, too.