Why did SOCOM make a Special Operation-Northern Command?

via Arizona Daily Star.

Based at the U.S. Northern Command in Colorado, Special Operations Command-North will build on a commando program that has brought Mexican military, intelligence and law enforcement officials to study U.S. counterterrorist operations from the U.S. to the war zones, to show them how special operations troops built an interagency network to target al-Qaida mastermind Osama bin Laden and his followers.
The special operations team within Northcom will be turned into a new headquarters, led by a general instead of a colonel and established in a Dec. 31 memo signed by Defense Secretary Leon Panetta. That move gives the group more autonomy, and the number of people could eventually triple from 30 to 150, meaning the headquarters could expand its training missions with the Mexicans, even though no new money is being assigned to the mission.
The special operations program has already helped Mexican officials set up their own intelligence center in Mexico City to target criminal networks, patterned after similar centers in war zones built to target al-Qaida in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Wow.

I could say another useless command especially when this could have been handled with a detachment to Mexico and fall under SouthCom or even NorthCom...but to make a brand new bureaucracy to help train Mexican Millitary and Government Agencies seems like a waste.

Tin foil hat time.

Unless this command is designed to support operations inside the US.  It being commanded by a General instead of a Colonel gives rise to any and all conspiracy theories.

Sorry kiddies.  I don't trust this government as far as I can throw it.  Something is up with this.