When
Donald Trump began his presidential campaign with what was considered
incendiary comments: “When Mexico sends its people, they're not sending their
best... they're sending people that have lots of problems” and that he would
complete the United States-Mexico border fence and “make Mexico pay for
it.”
After my five years with the U.S.
Border Patrol stationed along the southwest border, I learned much regarding
the efforts to solve the 2,000-mile-long border fence and illegal border
crossing interface. The United States and Mexico share several significant
natural barriers, hundreds of miles of treacherous open desert, from California
to Texas, and several impenetrable and unscalable canyons of the Rio Grande
River valley. When you exclude the impassable areas of the border as a
conduit for illegal border crossings, you can focus on those areas that require
additional man-made barriers and law enforcement deterrents…..
(Full
text at link below)
To stop the flow requires a fundamental
shift in ideology in policing illegal immigration.
Strategic and impenetrable fencing augmented by more border control agents, in
high-intensity drug trafficking areas, especially those focused on intercepting
and preventing illegal entries at the border, have proven to be the correct
solution in stemming the flow of illegals and contraband, and for Europe,
undesirable refugees. Pictures of frustrated refugees on one side of a heavily
protected and sturdy fence with numerous border guards on the other epitomizes
the deterrent and collaborative effect of fencing and enforcement. If the cops
go home, the illegals will defeat the fence. If the border agents are resilient
and maintain their presence and vigilance, the refugees go somewhere else.
Policies
focused on finding and deporting illegal immigrants who had already crossed the
border have been negated by this administration and other Democratic
administrations. There may be a few intrepid individuals that succeed in
defeating Mother Nature’s barriers. I was in a Marine Corps Search and Rescue
unit in Yuma, Arizona in the late 70s; it was not uncommon for us to find in
the desert the remains of illegal border crossers. Some will always try their
luck, to go around the border fence that stops in the middle of the
desert.
The Clinton administration withheld
operations and maintenance funding for the Border Patrol as a way to remove
Border Patrol agents from the field in order to facilitate greater illegal
crossings. In 1995, President Clinton wouldn’t say, “Don’t do your job
and look the other way.” We had Border Patrol agents who would buy gas
with their own money to take a USBP vehicle to “go to work” and chase illegal
aliens. My favorite anecdote was that it was so bad under the IN&S and
President Clinton that some agents siphoned gas from the seized cars of drug
smugglers so they could interdict and apprehend illegal aliens. At that time,
the Border Patrol still apprehended a million illegal aliens annually -- and
deported them -- while reporting at least two million illegal aliens “got
away.”
The Obama administration has told U.S.
Border Patrol Agents to not do their job, to not interdict illegal
aliens crossing the border, that if they didn’t like the policy that they could
find another line of work. This policy obviously and effectively removes border
guards from the strategic fencing in those cities and ports of entry, as well
as those who would patrol the border. Any fencing was rendered immaterial by
the direction of the president to stand down. Also, the policy has effectively
grounded every Border Patrol pilot.
The
presidential candidates have recently advocated for up to 20,000 additional
Border Patrol Agents in addition to “a Southern wall” or more robust strategic
fencing. A headline: "Border
Crime Taking a Toll on Residents in Southwest New Mexico, Arizona".
“Residents have said state Highway 80 has become a favorite for Mexican cartel
drug runners who manage to navigate out of the Peloncillo Mountains along the
Arizona-New Mexico border. They want an even more increased presence from the
U.S. Border Patrol.”
America needs several walls along the
Southwest border as well as a policy of enforcing the immigration laws already
on the books. When the Border Patrol is able to do their jobs, they
apprehended and deported a million illegal aliens annually; actions that
weren’t hard or unreasonable. It’s the law.
Ask a Border Patrol Agent where “a wall”
needs to be built and how to prevent illegal immigration -- not a politician.
Mark
A. Hewitt was with the U.S. Border Patrol for five years. He recounts
some of his experiences with the Border Patrol in his espionage
thrillers, Special Access and Shoot
Down.
Read
more: http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2016/03/the_problem_with_the_wall.html#ixzz428xmUkOc
