Archive for the 'Mexico' Category

Follow the money, and I did, starting with The Washington Post.

He had been dispatched to this part of Brooks County to investigate an open window at an abandoned ranch building — another potential break-in in the nation’s busiest corridor for illegal immigration, where break-ins could mean any number of things. He had driven this way before to investigate robberies where the only item missing was water, stolen by groups of migrant children crossing the desert alone. He had come to confront drug cartel members carrying backpacks loaded with knives and 70 pounds of marijuana. He had come to rescue immigrants dying of dehydration and he had come when it was too late, carrying a state-issued body bag.

… whenever an immigration-related emergency prompts someone here to dial 911, as happens a few dozen times a day, the call rings to a nearly bankrupt sheriff’s office in one of the poorest counties in Texas, where on this day the only available solution to an international crisis was a 37-year-old deputy who earns $11.50 an hour.

Contrast:

The recent flood of illegal immigrants across the southern border has caused many Americans to wonder why our country is seemingly incapable of border security.

A fence is in place in some areas while others are completely open. With that in mind, many Americans will be surprised to learn that the State Department is now funding the construction of a border fence in Ukraine.

Jeryl Bier of The Weekly Standard reported:

Feds Buy Border Fence … for Ukraine

As part of the U.S. Crisis Support Package for Ukraine announced by the White House in April, the State Department awarded a $435,000 contract to B.K. Engineering System in Kyiv for razor wire to help “defend the newly imposed borders between Ukraine’s mainland and the Crimean peninsula.” The contract was awarded on June 12, but was just posted online this week.

An $8 million “non-lethal assistance” package was announced at the same time as a larger $50 million aid package for Ukraine to “help Ukraine pursue political and economic reform and strengthen the partnership between the United States and Ukraine.” The razor wire (Concertina) is included under “[e]ngineering equipment, communications equipment, vehicles, and non-lethal individual tactical gear for Ukraine’s Border Guard Service” that was spelled out in the April Fact Sheet.

So there you have it – the priorities of your government.  And none of this is by accident.  You do understand that, don’t you?

Remember when I told you this?

Now for burials, espenses and the like. It occurs to me that we are still seeing things through the lens of comfortable America, with our attendant luxuries. For anyone who has buried a loved one recently, you know the expense associated with it.

By the time you’ve bought a legal casket, purchased the death certificates and a burial plot, you’ve spent $15,000 MINIMUM. It can run MUCH higher than that if you want a service or a burial plot in a good location. $30,000 – $40,000 is not uncommon, or even more. Much more.

These things are all functions of state regulations and laws. You cannot simply bury people anywhere you want. It becomes a health concern. So let’s say that I’m a rancher living in South Texas or Arizona, and there are illegals on my land because it’s a thoroughfare. If someone perished on the journey, would I be willing to take a shovel out and dig a grave myself (right there where they lay)? Sure. Would I be willing to do it 25 times? Maybe. Would I be willing to do it 500 times? No. I have to hold down a job. And I’m certainly not willing to spend everything I have at $15,000 – $20,000 a burial to ensure all illegals have a proper grave.

You see, this goes well beyond whether I’m willing to spend my time or money on others. Many men are. This redounds to whether I’m willing to spend the money of my children and children’s children on others. And remember, “The good man leaves an inheritance to his children’s children.”

So now, think of the poor ranchers in Texas and Arizona. They have the costs of burial, paperwork, cleanup of the environment of trash, feces, debris and water bottles, and removal of the animal carcasses after the illegals have killed them for food. Furthermore, we all have the expense of education, welfare, food stamps (SNAP), medical care, etc., etc., for tens of millions of illegals entering the country.

Here is a report from the Southern border.

‘I am not surprised to find immigrants dying 70 miles north of the border,’ Burgard told MailOnline, but ‘I am surprised that nine years later it is still a secret to most of the American people.’

‘The Federal Government has long known about this,’ he said, ticking off Texas and Arizona counties where human remains are continually turning up.

‘Local officials who deal with collecting the bodies are so overwhelmed financially that the cost of coroner inquests on each case is dramatically affecting their budgets.’

I’m not suggesting that you ignore the official reports.  I’m suggesting that you can hear it here first.

Mike Vanderboegh links this Zerohedge piece where the following statement is apparently made by someone affiliated with some self-proclaimed militia.

“You see an illegal. You point your gun dead at him, right between his eyes, and you say, ‘Get back across the border or you will be shot.’ …We are not worried about an ‘International’ incident.”

In the clearest possible terms, let me make the following statement to whoever said this: You … are … an … idiot!

Mike further says this:

And if I cannot convince you that the border situation is not the immediate threat that you have to worry about — if you think I am, as some have called me, a “traitor” because I refuse to endorse a precipitate rush to the border — then, okay, fine. But please, do us all a favor and lose the boogeyman face paint. Because Bob is correct, you do look like “dangerous foolish children playing dangerous foolish games.”

Mike is a nice guy, but I’m not.  If you are the one wearing paint or doohickey’s around your face, I don’t really care what you think about me or what I’m writing.

But just to pull these threads a little more, those who rushed to the border to stop this catastrophe use your eyes, but you don’t see.  You listen, but you don’t hear.  You cannot discern the signs of the times because you think you control too much and trust yourself and your power more than you should.

God will humble you, as He will us all.  And now I’ll invoke my theological views, and if you don’t want to read this analysis because of that, you’ve been warned.  Stop reading now, and don’t whine and bitch in the comments about my theology.  I’m not interested.  I’ll just delete the comments.

There are times and epochs when God judges nations and peoples.  We are in one of those times.  The innocent will suffer in the wake of his judgment, for this isn’t personal judgment – it is corporate.  He will not let nations get away with what we’ve done without paying the cost.

The threat of illegals may not be immediate, but it is existential and the things that threaten America will prove fatal.  Illegal immigration and an evil president are only symptoms of the problem.  God has commanded that nations not live with insurmountable debt and usury, and yet our entire economic system is based on that.  God has commanded us to protect the little ones, and yet millions have been aborted since the “freedom” provided to women in Roe v. Wade.  God commands men to work, and calls one who doesn’t provide for his own “worse than an infidel.”

And yet, there are 92 million Americans who are not in the labor force.  The number of unemployed Americans increases by more than 100,000 every month.  What are you going to do, militia?  Shoot every last one of those 100,000 every month?  They represent the same sort of existential threat to the American system as the illegals crossing the border.

You cannot change things.  You cannot shoot enough people, you cannot threaten your way to security, you cannot vote your way out of this.  The system if beyond repair.  America doesn’t exist anymore.  It is finished.  The seeds of its destruction were sewn long ago and they are coming into bloom as we speak.

It is true that I have recommended that we deploy the Marines to the Southern border with specific RUF/ROE to shoot anyone crossing the border with a weapon, whether they constitute an immediate threat or not.  The objection of posse comitatus rings hollow, as border security shouldn’t be seen as a law enforcement function.

But I have also recommended that we see Mexico as an enemy state, close the border to commercial traffic, stop trade and eject all illegals.  Those things will not happen because America lacks the heart to protect its children, heritage, or the integrity of its laws.

My late professor, Dr. C. Gregg Singer, said:

That the Western mind is sick unto death and that Western culture and the civilization to which it gave birth are in serious danger of collapse are facts that have become so evident that few observers are prepared to dispute this conclusion and argue for their vitality (From Rationalism to Irrationality, Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Company).

This is truth, spoken with sadness of heart, for I knew Singer well.  We cannot heal America with furor, we cannot repair what’s wrong with America with our guns.  America has a heart problem.

What can we accomplish?  We and our guns and ammunition can prepare, plan, protect and secure to the extent God allows, our family, clan and tribe.  That should be our focus.  Every attempt to heal America will come to failure without a new reformation.

You do have family, clan and tribe, don’t you?  They are your first concern, aren’t they?

LA Times:

After a lengthy hearing in Tijuana for a Marine reservist jailed since April 1 on weapons charges, a judge Wednesday declined to throw out the case as urged by U.S. politicians and instead scheduled another evidentiary hearing.

Sgt. Andrew Tahmooressi, 25,  who served two combat tours in Afghanistan, was arrested after crossing the border at San Ysidro with a rifle, shotgun, pistol and hundreds of rounds of ammunition in his pickup truck.

[ … ]

Some 74 members of U.S. Congress have called on the Obama administration to work with Mexican authorities to gain Tahmooressi’s release.

On the eve of Wednesday’s hearing, Rep. Lee Terry (R-Nebraska) and Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-California) wrote to the Mexican judge, Victor Octavio Luna Escobedo, reminding him that Tahmooressi is “a Marine Corps veteran who risked his life for his nation and his fellow Marines.”

His case, the two wrote, should be “favorably resolved on the basis that he made a simple mistake at the border.”

Mexican officials have stressed that while the Mexican judicial system is different from the U.S. system, it shares one key characteristic: Cases are not decided by political pressure.

Yea, let me tell you about a pressure that would in fact work.  Shut down the border to all commercial traffic and let that Mexican produce rot in the hot sun, while the Mexican truck drivers go unpaid.  Begin lining the trucks up at the border – Tahmooressi would be released within a day.

But Obama won’t do that, because he hates the United States Marine Corps.  The USMC does things like fight Islamic insurgents in the Anbar and Helmand Provinces, and fight piracy in the Gulf of Aden.  Obama hasn’t the least bit of interest in that sort of thing.

But he gets to double dip on this one.  Obama doesn’t believe that Sgt. Tahmooressi should be able to have those guns anyway, and he certainly won’t tell the Mexicans not to enforce their gun laws, mistake or not.  This isn’t about justice.  Besides, creating problems with the Mexicans would just get in the way of his plans to add voters to the rolls of the DNC and bring about the end of the middle class in America.

From Obama’s perspective, a Marine is on trial for having guns and his trial isn’t subject to the laws of America, which Obama hates.  What’s to dislike about this?

As a followup to Dystopia On The Southern Border, we have this report from Katie Pavlich:

An internal Border Patrol executive summary obtained by Townhall confirms that at least 16 unaccompanied illegal minors (those under the age of 18, according to U.S. government policy), are members of the brutal El Salvadorian street gang Mara Salvatrucha—or MS-13.

Gang members left graffiti on the walls of the Nogales Border Patrol processing center, which suggested they had ties to the organization.

“Border Patrol Agents (BPAs) and Customs and Border Protection Officers (CBPOs), assigned to The Nogales Placement Center (NPC), discovered that 16 unaccompanied alien children (13 El Salvadoran males, two Guatelmalan males and one Honduran male) currently being held at the NPC are members of Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13). The MS-13 gang members admitted to their gang associations following a discovery of graffiti at the NPC.

You are buying guns and ammunition aren’t you?  You are making other preparations, aren’t you?

Mike Vanderboegh recently relinquished support for Rand Paul because of Paul’s stance on immigration.  Rand Paul is basically an open borders advocate.  Mike also calls himself a Christian libertarian.

I wouldn’t propose to speak for Mike, and he wouldn’t want me to even if I could.  Mike can speak for himself.  But I also consider myself both an opponent of open borders and a Christian libertarian.  How then can I take the positions that I do and be consistent?

I have long opposed Rand Paul because of his stance on the border and immigration, and the only Senator I find to be clearheaded on this issue (thus far) is Ted Cruz (and to some extent Mike Lee (to some extent because I need to know more about him).  To the extent that Ted Cruz repudiates my ideas in the future, I will oppose him.  But his views on immigration are far stronger than Paul’s views.  It’s one reason why John McCain and Lindsey Graham hate him so much.

But before we deal with immigration, let’s deal with broader doctrines like libertarianism and what I do and don’t believe.  Let’s deal with the issue of legalization of drugs and one example.  While as a Christian I should say that I care about my readers concerning their spiritual and physical health, from a legal standpoint I don’t care one whit what you put into your body.  That’s from a theoretical standpoint.

Now for the practical side of things.  If you want to legalize drugs of all kinds, then be my guest, right after you turn around socialized medicine and forswear forever my fiduciary responsibility for support for any drug addict or funding of their medical care.  While my hard earned money is confiscated by the power of a badge and gun to support people who will not support themselves, then those people (the recipients of my money) should expect me to be involved in their lives.  My involvement will be as obnoxious and overbearing as I can possibly make it – right up until you no longer want my involvement, and then at that point I will assume you no longer want my money either.  I’m good on both accounts.  Leave me alone and I will leave you alone to do what you want.

This relates to immigration and migrant workers in the following way.  Migrant workers who “do jobs that no one else will do” are a cost to me and other ratepayers and taxpayers that the employer won’t pick up.  When these workers get sick they go to the emergency room, and my insurance premiums pick up the tab.  When these workers have automobile accidents without insurance, my premiums pick up the tab.  And when these workers refuse to pay taxes, I have to pay more.

You see, the existence of migrant workers is a subsidy to corporations, a form of corporate welfare that I pay.  I don’t want to pay welfare to corporations any more than I do to individuals who won’t work.  True libertarians don’t advocate for open borders and then ask me to pick up the tab for the workers.  That’s fake libertarianism, and it proves that the one who advocates it is a farce and hypocrite.   If you want to go libertarian, then go libertarian.  Don’t go half way.  Otherwise you’re just a liar.

There is a larger issue for the border.  I have advocated for Marines being deployed on the Southern border with arming orders and robust rules of engagement.  I see no contradiction here either, just as I advocated robust rules of engagement for Soldiers and Marines in combat in the various campaigns in which we find ourselves.  Leaving aside what one thinks about the campaigns, to deploy men in harm’s way for the purpose of nation building is immoral.  Iraq and Afghanistan were campaigns fought by the social planners (Afghanistan more so than Iraq).

But as long as there are thousands of transportation routes across the Southern border and as long as we are seen as one gigantic trans-American economy, there will be no border security regardless of what we do on the other parts of the border.  No party appears to want the close the borders.  Not the Democrats (it means votes to them), not the GOP (they are in bed with the corporate executives), and no even the so-called libertarians.

Marco Rubio, the erstwhile savior of the GOP, has weighed in on immigration.

In a Spanish-language interview Sunday with the network Univision, Sen. Marco Rubio, the leading Republican on the Gang of Eight comprehensive immigration reform group, made his strongest statement yet that legalization of the nation’s estimated 11 million illegal immigrants must happen before any new border security or internal enforcement measures are in place, and will in no way be conditional on any security requirements.

“Let’s be clear,” Rubio said. “Nobody is talking about preventing the legalization. The legalization is going to happen. That means the following will happen: First comes the legalization. Then come the measures to secure the border. And then comes the process of permanent residence.”

And thus Rubio is advocating adding millions of new socialists to the voting rolls.  As I have explained before:

“For historical reasons to do with the nationalisation of the land under Lázaro Cárdenas and the predominant form of peasant land tenure, which was “village cooperative” rather than based on individual plots, the demand for “land to the tiller” in Mexico does not imply an individual plot for every peasant or rural worker or family. In Mexico, collectivism among the peasantry is a strong tradition … one consequence of these factors is that the radical political forces among the rural population are on the whole explicitly anti-capitalist and socialist in their ideology. Sometimes this outlook is expressed in support for guerilla organisations; but struggle movements of the rural population are widespread, and they spontaneously ally with the most militant city-based leftist organisations.”

One of the reasons for this reflexive alignment with leftism has to do with the the mid-twentieth century and what the Sovient Union and allied ideologies accomplished.  South and Central America was the recipient or receptacle for socialism draped in religious clothing, or in other words, liberation theology.  Its purveyors were Roman Catholic priests who had been trained in Marxism, and they were very successful in giving the leftists a moral platform upon which to build.  This ideology spread North from South and Central America into Mexico, and thus the common folk in Mexico are quite steeped in collectivist ideology from battles that were fought decades ago.

Neocons like Krauthammer are liars.  The Mexican immigrant doesn’t naturally vote conservative.  He naturally votes collectivist.  So don’t expect me to advocate adding more collectivists to the voting rolls.  It runs contrary to my world view.

And it runs counter to Christian libertarianism.  That phrase accurately describes me, but not completely.  I am a consistent Christian libertarian.  That means that neither Ron Paul nor his son Rand Paul cannot trot out the rubric libertarian and expect me to fawn over them just because they want to return to the gold standard (and I do too), or do away with certain government programs and departments (I do too).  Flooding the country with more collectivists won’t do their own cause any good, but they’re too stolid to admit it.

As for Rubio, he is a progressive and collectivist, and his career is over except for the extent to which he allies himself with his natural friends, i.e., other collectivists.  As for me, I take my advocacy seriously.  Don’t expect giggles and grins from me because you simply say a few nice words.  I won’t whore my advocacy out to the lowest bidder.

So you lie to the people, rulers one and all.  Let the foreign nationals and socialists cross the border with impunity.  But as long as they transport their damn gangs across the border, I’ll keep my guns.

From Fox News:

The Obama administration is moving to shut down nine Border Patrol stations across four states, triggering a backlash from local law enforcement, members of Congress and Border Patrol agents themselves.

Critics of the move warn the closures will undercut efforts to intercept drug and human traffickers in well-traveled corridors north of the U.S.-Mexico border. Though the affected stations are scattered throughout northern and central Texas, and three other states, the coverage areas still see plenty of illegal immigrant activity — one soon-to-be-shuttered station in Amarillo, Texas, is right in the middle of the I-40 corridor; another in Riverside, Calif., is outside Los Angeles.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection says it’s closing the stations in order to reassign agents to high-priority areas closer to the border.

“These deactivations are consistent with the strategic goal of securing America’s borders, and our objective of increasing and sustaining the certainty of arrest of those trying to enter our country illegally,” CBP spokesman Bill Brooks said in a statement. “By redeploying and reallocating resources at or near the border, CBP will maximize the effectiveness of its enforcement mandate and align our investments with our mission.”

The last paragraph has all of the right keywords, but I told you what this is really all about Changes in Mexican Border Strategy.  This aligns personnel with the objective of increasing transcontinental and cross-border traffic.  It’s all part of a larger nation and state level plan to make the border less significant, make it easier to cross, and raise cross-border shipments of goods and products, especially with Mexican truck drivers.

Mark Krikorian passed on a revelation that alone should have cost this administration the upcoming election.  In the initial fight with drug cartels fighters, Brian Terry and his team shot beanbags rather than bullets.  But the situation is really even worse than that.

First it was confirmed that Border Patrol agent Brian Terry and his elite tactical unit initially fired bean bags at heavily armed dope smugglers. Now comes news that a Border Patrol training video is instructing agents that, when confronted by a shooter. they should “run away” and “hide”. Only as a last resort, if they are cornered, should agents get “aggressive” and “throw things” at the perps. Throw things? Really; here’s the site of the largest local of the Border Patrol agents’ union describing the training they’re required to undergo. The site reports that the suits in D.C. have “offered to revise and clarify this training” — sure, only because it was exposed. It’s debatable whether Bill Clinton actually loathed the military, but this administration certainly loathes the Border Patrol.

This is sad but not surprising.  It dovetails with the overall administration policy for the border, that is, the last three administrations.  As I have observed, “The National Guard is bored, has little to do other than watch, isn’t under arming orders, and has sagging morale, while the administration is using the lack of security on the border as an opportunity to make political hay on so-called “assault weapons,” and study groups are more concerned about militarization of the border than they are border security.  Don’t look for a secure Southern border in this generation unless something catastrophic happens to the U.S. homeland.  By then it will be too late.”

Securing the border would look so different than what we currently have that it would be indiscernible to the average American, and we aren’t prepared to implement what’s necessary.  The border would have to come before trade and trucking deliveries, all traffic would be fully searched, the U.S. Marines would have to patrol the border, under arming orders, outside of the constraints of the Supreme Court ruling in Tennessee versus Garner, men with weapons would be shot by Scout snipers before they ever became a threat, and e-verify would be implemented on a national level.

Again, don’t look for this unless something catastrophic occurs, such as Hezbollah fighters crossing the border and perpetrating acts of terror.  Right now, trade and cheap labor on the backs of the American taxpayer are far too important to prevent “alignment of our assets with our strategic goals.”  Expect more border station closings and a more diminished Border Patrol.

From Tucson Sentinel:

EL PASO – Border Patrol agents might soon switch from sitting in trucks along the U.S.-Mexico border to helping traffic move more efficiently on the international bridges in this Texas city.

This scenario comes from the idea of Border Patrol agents collaborating with other government agencies.

Border Patrol Chief Michael Fisher in May announced a strategy to fight transnational crimes and drugs, support Homeland Security efforts and aid U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

One possible outcome might be reassigning Border Patrol agents to Customs border crossings to reduce the long wait.

“Currently Customs and Border Protection needs all of the staffing help that they can get – in particular at our ports of entry,” said El Paso City Representative Steve Ortega in an email.

As Border Patrol agents apprehend fewer undocumented people each year, its mission as an agency with resources focused on deterring and apprehending undocumented crossers is being reconsidered.

Currently, Immigration and Customs Enforcement personnel in the El Paso area of responsibility are apprehending and removing more undocumented people through the Secure Communities Program, employment raids and by catching crossers at major ports of entry than the Border Patrol, according to Border Patrol and ICE enforcement and removal figures.

That is why the Border Patrol 2012-2016 Strategic Plan calls for redirecting its agents’ efforts toward relieving congestion and waits at the ports of entry, as well as combating terrorism and transnational crime.

By the close of fiscal year 2011, the typical Border Patrol agent working from Texas to California was apprehending 17.7 undocumented people a year, from a high of 352.2 “illegal alien apprehensions” per agent in 1993. In comparison, the numbers fell even more for agents in the El Paso Sector, from a high of 470 apprehensions per agent in 1993 to only 3.8 apprehensions by 2011.

More agents at entry checkpoints would be a relief for some people of El Paso.

“People would cross to go to work, or to go to restaurants and enjoy the nightlife.  They would cross to see family and they would cross to engage in trade. It used to be pretty easy to cross and it’s gotten more and more difficult,” said border journalist Louie Gilot.

Gilot is the publisher of Newspaper Tree, a nonprofit online news organization in El Paso. Previously, she covered immigration issues as a reporter for the El Paso Times.

For those who cross the border back and forth as part of their daily lives, long waits are too time consuming.

“There used to be no lines when you were going on foot and now there is. I have spent an hour on foot,” Gilot said.

Analysis & Commentary

The reason for the decrease in border apprehensions is more complex than simply painting a picture of success.  The story being peddled here is that border security is improved to the point that the border patrol can now focus on making cross border traffic even easier and more efficient.  The truth is that illegal border traffic is becoming more knowledgeable and efficient, the border patrol (and DHS) is under-reporting “got-aways,” and “soft metrics” are making things look better than they really are.

The U.S. has operational control over only 13% of the Mexican border, regardless of the stories peddled in the media.  This change in strategy has nothing whatsoever to do with being able to focus on efficiency because of improved border security.  It is part of a larger push for more trans-border traffic which has been in the works for some time.

U.S. and Mexican officials are meeting today as a first effort to decide where new border crossings and connecting roads may be necessary, reports HispanicBusiness.com.

At the first Border Master Plan meeting today at the University of Texas at El Paso, representatives will begin identifying future projects, along with project priorities and timelines.

Objectives will also include increasing understanding of the planning process and designing a process that ensures participation from everyone involved in the port of entry projects.

“All sorts of transportation projects and issues will be discussed,” Bob Kaufman, a spokesman for Texas Department of Transportation, told the website. “It will be a binational, multi-government agency meeting. There will be federal, state and local officials that have responsibilities for transportation. The end result will be a list of transportation infrastructure priorities.”

Representatives from the Metropolitan Planning Organization, City of El Paso, the Texas Department of Transportation and the New Mexico Department of Transportation will also be present at the meeting, in addition to U.S. and Mexican federal officials.

“The Border Master Plan is part of a national initiative,” said Roy Gilyard, El Paso’s MPO executive director. “California has a plan and so does Laredo.”

Just to make sure that you understand what is happening, read that last paragraph again: “The Border Master Plan is part of a national initiative.”  Nothing is happenstance or happening by accident.  It’s all part of a larger plan to make the border less significant, make it easier to cross, and raise cross-border shipments of goods and products, especially with Mexican truck drivers.

But take note that ignoring the border (or pretending that is is secure) has its consequences.  The Mexican cartels have the capability to seize control over large geographical areas with great ease.  There is the influence of cartel corruption in New Mexico, and Mexican drug gangs control parts of Arizona.  The cartels have become adept at extreme brutality, but these organizations [previously] “settled matters with a bullet in the head. Not anymore … Now there is a psychopathology at work. Some of these people obviously enjoy this, and they are teaching their surrogates, teenagers, to enjoy it.”

Due to the facts that there are no arming orders for the National Guard troops on the border (causing the troops simply to perform clerical duties), misapplication of the rule of law to these troops (i.e., Supreme Court decision in Tennessee versus Garner), and confusion about the Posse Comitatus Act (i.e., the belief that it applies to border security caused by foreign threats), the law enforcement battle (fought with law enforcement officers, and not enough of them doing the right things) has been substantially lost at the border.

This criminal insurgency crosses the border with as much ease as illegal immigrants, and the lack of border security is as much of a cause of the diminution of U.S. sovereignty and security as it is the increased cost of insurance, health care and other costs associated with illegal immigration and the influx of low skilled workers.

The new strategy at the border isn’t without planning and forethought.  It just isn’t the planning and forethought that one might have guessed would attend issues of national security.  It has more to do with trade, facilitating transcontinental traffic, and enforcing the idea that the United States is an idea rather than a place.

Prior:

Border Lies And What National Guard Troops Do

The Border Is Not Secure

Stability Operations In Mexico

The Texas Border Coalition On Border Security

Losing The Border War

Threat Assessment: Transnational Jihadists and Mexican Cartels

Legalization Of Drugs Won’t End The Border War

Border War

Texas Border Security: A Strategic Military Assessment

Recall that I told you “the National Guard has been “deployed” to the border to perform clerical functions and do overwatch and reporting,” and that the troops have been deployed without arming orders?  Now this.

From The Boston Herald:

The Pentagon began flying military helicopters and surveillance planes over the U.S. border with Mexico last month as part of an effort to withdraw all but 300 of the National Guard ground troops who have helped patrol the rugged border since mid-2010.

The 19-month deployment of 1,200 National Guard troops on the southwest border has hurt recruiting efforts and threatened to strain diplomatic relations with Mexico, Brian J. Lepore, a director at the U.S. Government and Accountability Office, told a House homeland security subcommittee hearing Tuesday.

About 12 Blackhawk helicopters and several fixed-wing manned surveillance planes began flying regular patrols over the Rio Grande in Texas for a mission called “Operation River Watch II” in March. The 300 troops will fly the aircraft, or analyze intelligence about smuggling routes in command centers miles from the border.

The Obama administration deployed the National Guard to build access roads for border patrols and to help spot smugglers. The extra manpower was intended to bridge the gap while U.S. Customs and Border Patrol hired an additional 1,200 agents.

In the first year, the National Guard troops helped apprehend 17,887 illegal immigrants and seize 56,342 pounds of marijuana, which was 5.9 percent of all apprehensions and 2.6 percent of marijuana seizures during that time, officials said.

This is a great report, that National Guard troops “helped” apprehend 17,887 illegal immigrants.  But wait.

National Guard troops could man watchtowers and stare at closed-circuit television screens of the fence line but were prohibited from making arrests, and officials said morale suffered. The National Guard leadership became concerned that the mission, if extended, could hurt recruitment, according to a GAO report titled “Observations on Costs, Benefits, and Challenges of a Department of Defense Role in Helping to Secure the Southwest Land Border.”

Further use of National Guard troops “could create a perception of a militarized U.S. border with Mexico,” State Department officials told the GAO.

And we certainly wouldn’t want to create the perception of a militarized border.  That would be worse than anything else.  And speaking of perceptions, Lanny Breuer is at it again.  Lying and creating false impressions, that is.  Feinstein queued up the issue of “assault weapons” for Lanny, and he responded as intended.

Thank you, Senator, for the question, and for your leadership on this issue. You have, of course, identified the paramount issue that we have to face as we deal with transnational organized crime from the Mexican cartels.

That’s it.  The paramount issue, without which there wouldn’t be any such thing as the Mexican cartels.  American “assault weapons.”  This deceitfulness will be held to account one day, but until then, it belongs in the same category as stupid border security reports like this one.

Today, the Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA) and Mexico’s College of the Northern Border (COLEF) released “Beyond the Border Buildup: Security and Migrants along the U.S.-Mexico Border,” a year-long study on the impact of both countries’ security policies on migration.

The study finds a dramatic buildup of U.S. security forces along the southern border–a fivefold increase of the Border Patrol in the last decade, an unusual new role for U.S. soldiers on U.S. soil, drones and other high-tech surveillance, plus hundreds of miles of completed fencing–without a clear impact on security. For instance, the study finds that despite the security buildup, more drugs are crossing than ever before.

The study reveals that security policies that were designed to combat terrorism and drug trafficking are causing a humanitarian crisis and putting migrants in increasing danger.

Migrants are often subject to abuse and mistreatment while in U.S. custody, and face higher risks of death in the desert. Also, certain deportation practices put migrants at risk. For example, migrants can be deported at night and/or to cities hundreds of miles from where they were detained. These same cities are also some of the border region’s most dangerous, where migrants may fall prey to–or be recruited by–criminal groups. In Mexico, approximately 20,000 migrants are kidnapped a year; many others face other abuses. “Decency demands more humane policies,” said Maureen Meyer, WOLA analyst and co-author of the study.

In addition, “We have reached a point where any further increase in security will yield diminishing returns,” said Meyer.

Yes, we may as well just stop everything and swing the borders wide open.  Our buildup hasn’t helped.  The possibility that it is a drop in the bucket compared to what it needs to be doesn’t occur to this team because they have different presuppositions than you do.  They don’t want a secure border, so it’s easy conclude that there should be no buildup or change in strategy or tactics.

The National Guard is bored, has little to do other than watch, isn’t under arming orders, and has sagging morale, while the administration is using the lack of security on the border as an opportunity to make political hay on so-called “assault weapons,” and study groups are more concerned about militarization of the border than they are border security.

Don’t look for a secure Southern border in this generation unless something catastrophic happens to the U.S. homeland.  By then it will be too late.

Glenn Reynolds links Mickey Kaus writing at The Daily Caller on the border fence.  Mickey links and discusses observations by Mark Krikorian.  Mark’s report is a mixed bag, and I recall reading it with some skepticism.  Mark’s report, which Mickey views as “balanced,” discussed how the larger fences have been more effective (even if the smaller ones aren’t).  The border situation, says Mark, is “better.”  Sorry, but I’m not buying it.  The pitiful parts of the fence are still pitiful, and the larger parts of the fence – well, you can judge for yourself.

Also, here is something to watch for in upcoming debates about the border situation.  Napolitano says that things at the border have gotten far better.  But the Border Patrol (and DHS) is under-reporting “got-aways.” Why would they do this?  Well, soft metrics can make things look better than they really are.

Napolitano cited some specifics of the new index, which she wrote would include “traditional measures” but also other indicators.

“This index would take into account traditional measures such as apprehensions and contraband seizures, state and local crime statistics on border-related criminal activity, and overall crime index reporting,” the testimony states. “But to fully evaluate the condition of the border and the effectiveness of our efforts, this index would also incorporate indicators of the impact of illegal cross-border activity on the quality of life in the border region.”

“This may include calls from hospitals to report suspected illegal aliens, traffic accidents involving illegal aliens or narcotics smugglers, rates of vehicle theft and numbers of abandoned vehicles, impacts on property values, and other measures of economic activity and environmental impacts,” says Napolitano’s testimony.

I mostly agree with the normally clear-thinking Mark Krikorian.  In this case, I continue to advocate U.S. Marine Corps arming orders and patrols along the Mexican border.  Build large fences, but enforce border security by arms.