Losing The Border War
BY Herschel Smith
12 years, 10 months ago
From The Fix:
An anonymous Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent, speaking exclusively with The Fix, paints a stark picture of the drug war along the US-Mexico Border. The cartels’ traffickers are punching through our borders without fear, he confirms, supplying US streets with cocaine, marijuana, and heroin. But the administration seems more concerned with immigration than with drugs: “Border patrol is very adamant about stopping the illegal aliens,” he tells us. “But border patrol is not adamant about stopping the drugs and the cartels’ vehicles from coming across the border.”
Why does he believe this? He says the Department of Homeland Security doesn’t provide the border patrol with enough manpower to fight the drug war effectively. With around 2,000 miles of vast desert to protect and very little backup, agents find it nearly impossible to apprehend the traffickers. “Cartels transport their drugs across the desert in groups of two or three trucks,” he explains. “And they’re armed with automatic weapons.”
Cartel members know that even if one of the in-ground motion sensors picks up their movements, they still have the advantage. Each border patrol agent on the ground is responsible for a considerable area. And he is only one man with a gun. “Border patrol agents in the desert are often surrounded by the drug cartels or by Mexican military, who have been bribed to help the cartels,” he says, explaining that agents are frequently faced with a stark choice: they can fight the traffickers and die, or they can get out of the way and live. “At the end of the day, we all want to go home to our families alive.”
“We have cameras, and we have motion sensors in the ground,” summarizes our source. “We catch the cartels’ movements on camera. But do we have an agent out there close enough to respond? Do we have backup for that agent that can get out there quickly enough? If we don’t, guess what? We’re going to watch the drugs go through.”
So let’s divorce ourselves from the hotly contested issue of the so-called war on drugs for a moment. A number of things jump out about this report. First of all, the administration certainly isn’t serious about combating illegal immigration, any more than was the previous administration.
Second, while The Fix might be concerned about issues associated with illicit drugs, I’m not. I am more concerned about the criminal insurgency and warlord-ism of the cartels (which only temporally uses drugs, and would and does use anything else to increase their power, such as human trafficking, kidnapping, extortion, gang violence and brutality, and so on).
But even more to the point, we are losing the war at the border. We will lose the war at the border until we cease and desist treating it as a law enforcement endeavor, change the rules for the use of force (away from the SCOTUS decision in Tennessee versus Garner), and deploy the U.S. Marines to the border.
The National Guard isn’t the answer. I have dealt with this many times before, considering whether training has been done, arming orders have been issued, and weapons and ammunition have been checked out of the armory. But the National Guard isn’t doing anything at all to effect border security.
While I loath every word that comes out of the mouth of this president and cannot stand to listen to him, and would in fact blame the fire ants in my back yard on his administration if I could get away with it, removal of the National Guard from the border (as he has ordered) has nothing to do with anything. We have a larger, societal problem. We aren’t ready to fight the war at the border any more than we were or are ready to fight the campaign in Afghanistan.
Prior:
Threat Assessment: Transnational Jihadists and Mexican Cartels
On January 25, 2012 at 2:36 pm, Sparsh said:
Herschel,
For someone who is not familiar with the American border security system, could you provide a description or better yet a pointer to an article on it?
On January 27, 2012 at 8:09 am, RJ said:
Why not look at this border issue with Mexico from another perspective?
Consider what could happen if both countries were given the chance to “vote” for a marriage between the United States and Mexico where Mexico becomes a part of the US.
Yea, that’s right, we become one big happy family where salsa comes north in a new way while going south with our economic power brings about a whole new world for both.
A word of disclosure: I like Mexico and those wonderful Mexicans! Also, I live in New Mexico, being originally from New Jersey…a real garden salad of ethnic varieties!
As to those bad Mexicans, allow me to introduce them to some bad Americans. Those who come from outside of Mexico to sneak into America will have a harder time. Our prisons are just like those prisons in Mexico, only nicer and newer in amenities, kinda.
Tortillas made with North Dakota wheat! Carne Asada with beef from Nebraska!
Oil from Mexico, healthy water from the Culligan Man!
Get the picture?