Downgrade and Delay - the border fence will never be built
on 02/28/2008 at 11:41 AM
Sorry, ladies and gentlemen. This won’t fit on a bumper sticker. Like many problems in life, there are details.
Many moons ago… from November 1977 to September 1983 to be precise - I was an Agent of the U. S. Border Patrol. I was stationed in Calexico, California (just north of Mexicali, BC, Mexico) and participated in ‘cowboys and wetbacks’ for those years. Calexico station was responsible for about 26 miles of U. S. border. On a normal shift we had about seven agents - one of whom ran the office radio - to cover that 26 miles. That 26 miles included the roughly three miles of ‘urban area’, the legal fiction separating Mexicali from Calexico.
We had sensor devices in those days. Mostly vibration detectors, with some infrared and some magnetometer devices. (We also had fixed wing aircraft spotters who were rather good at locating vehicle and foot traffic on the ground and directing ground units to the location.) For part of that time, I was the ‘monitor tech’ for the station. I surveyed areas for ‘traffic’ (the liklihood of either pedestrian or vehicular crossers), installed and maintained those various devices along the U. S. Mexican border.
They worked well in some places, didn’t work worth a hoot in other places and sort of worked in most places. But none of them caught either illegal entrants or smugglers of any type. To apprehend anyone or anything, we had to get an agent to that location. On any given day, we had more sensor hits than we had agents. Which is much like law enforcement in general; there are always more bad guys than official good guys.
At the same time, we had some eight to ten miles of physical fence, in conjunction with the barrier of the All American Canal. The physical fence in it’s last incarnation was a twelve foot cyclone fence with landing mat material welded to the uprights. (The wire cyclone fence lasted almost long enough for people on the south side to break out the wire or bolt cutters. There were more holes in that fenceline than a liberal’s logic.) The landing mat material topped with barbed wire acted as a ‘slow down’ device, but didn’t really stop the flow of pedestrian entrants. The illegal entrant faction provided ladders, tunnels (usually visible just under the fenceline) and heavy blankets to cross the barbed wire. Net result is, any fence is only partially effective in slowing traffic. Nothing stops the traffic. Just understand that part; NOTHING stops illegal entries. Nothing. Did I mention the illegal entrant traffic cannot be stopped by physical barriers?
The pictures of ‘what works’ are cute, but misleading. Anyone who thinks using Claymore mines and machine guns to kill everyone coming across the Mexican border is - sick. Or just plain evil. Perhaps stupid. Combination of all three. The pictures of Claymore mines and M60 machineguns are seriously offensive in this context. If anyone really thinkss that is the answer, I implore you to move to Iran and sign up as a prison guard.
As I mentioned, the physical fences provide some slowing effect, and the spotting towers are useful (except the spotters need to be changed every two hours - it is unbelievably boring and exhausting spotting. I’ve done that, too.) However, don’t even daydream any fence will stop crossers.
This ‘virtual fence’ is relatively new technology. It is ‘new’ at least in the sense of this application under these circumstances. One notes ‘detecting’ a body passing the border and ‘apprehending’ a body passing the border are two separate functions. Until we have reliable teleportation techology, we will have to dispatch an agent to collect the passing bodies.
I’ve heard a lot of rancor lately from the conservative talk show people about this fence, claiming it to be a failure. I’m waiting for the phrase ‘… vast pro illegal immigration conspiricy ...’ to emerge. I think those shrill voices need to get back to facts and quit worrying about their ratings.
This twenty-eight mile stretch of ‘virtual’ fence is an experiment. I really desire for some of our bretheren (and sisteren) to understand the concept of ‘experiment’. No experiment ‘fails’. It may show that sort of idea won’t work under these circumstances, but that is additional information, not failure.
To recap this particular episode: The U. S. government contracted with Boeing to build a 28 mile section of ‘virtual fence’. The idea was to find out if this technology was a viable alternative to physical fencing. So far, it doesn’t seem to be. On the other hand, it’s only been ‘on line’ for a week or two. I think tweaking it some might be in order, just to see. It may never work. Then again, people didn’t think much of early attempts at surgery, either. Sometimes it takes a while for the techniques and technology to resolve.
By the way, the land at the U. S. Mexican border is (on the U. S. side anyway) privately owned in much of the area. For instance, in Calexico, there is a street running down the border, and private houses on the north side of the street. Just outside, privately owned farmland runs right up the border. The U. S. Government has a ‘right of way’ at the border, but it’s fairly narrow. In order to maintain a ‘no mans’ land’ sort of zone at the border would require the U. S. Goverment to either purchase that land from the owners, or condemn and seize that land. Who votes for govenment seizure of private land for this purpose? Who votes for the expenditure of public funds?
