Mexican military in U.S. border standoff

[ALS]

Mexican military in U.S. border standoff
Police say they aided drug smugglers with Humvees, machine guns

Posted: October 17, 2007
3:47 p.m. Eastern

© 2007 WorldNetDaily.com

Mexican Army Humvee
Mexican soldiers and civilian smugglers engaged in an armed standoff with nearly 30 American law enforcement officials on the southern U.S. border, according to Texas police and the FBI.

At a spot more than 200 yards inside the U.S., Mexican Army troops set up several mounted machine guns when U.S. Border Patrol agents called for backup Monday, the Inland Valley Daily Bulletin of Ontario, Calif., reported.

The paper said Mexican military Humvees were towing what appeared to be thousands of pounds of marijuana across the border into the U.S., according to Chief Deputy Mike Doyal of the Hudspeth County Sheriff's Department.

The incident took place on the Rio Grande near Neely's Crossing, about 50 miles east of El Paso.

"It's been so bred into everyone not to start an international incident with Mexico that it's been going on for years," Doyal told the Daily Bulletin. "When you're up against mounted machine guns, what can you do? Who wants to pull the trigger first? Certainly not us."

(Story continues below)


Confirming the afternoon encounter, FBI spokeswoman Andrea Simmons told the paper, "Bad guys in three vehicles ended up on the border. People with Humvees, who appeared to be with the Mexican Army, were involved with the three vehicles in getting them back across."

Deputies captured one vehicle and found 1,477 pounds of marijuana inside, according to Doyal, who added Mexican soldiers set fire to one of the Humvees stuck in the river.

Such incidents are common, Doyal told the Daily Bulletin. Last November, his deputies were called on to back up agents from the Fort Hancock border patrol station in Texas after confronting more than six fully armed men dressed in Mexican military uniforms.

Armed with machine guns, the men were trying to bring more than three tons of marijuana across the border in military vehicles.

Doyal insisted the federal government must do something about the incursions, pointing out the deputies and border agents are not equipped for combat.

But Department of Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff today played down the reports of Mexican military incursions, suggesting many could have been mistakes or criminals dressed in military garb. Last week, Mexican officials denied their military made any incursions.

The Daily Bulletin reported, however, border agents interviewed over the past year believe the confrontations were with Mexican military personnel.

A story by the paper last year highlighted a Department of Homeland Security document reporting 216 incursions by Mexican soldiers during the previous 10 years.

Chertoff downplayed the reports at that time, as well, calling them "overblown."

But border agents contend otherwise.

"We're sitting ducks," said one who spoke to the Daily Bulletin on condition of anonymity. "The government has our hands tied."

As WND reported in February 2006, an American law enforcement officer and news crew in Hudspeth County, Texas, witnessed an armed incursion into the U.S. by men dressed in Mexican army attire, the second such incident in two weeks.

Mexican officials have said their military is forbidden from traveling within three miles of the border, though U.S. border residents repeatedly have spotted mobile patrols of Mexican military units traversing roads that run directly parallel to the international boundary. Mexico says the armed men crossing into the U.S. are paramilitary forces loyal to drug-smuggling cartels.

Republican Reps. Duncan Hunter and David Drier of California last week asked Chertoff, the House Judiciary Committee, the House Homeland Security Committee and the House International Relations Committee to investigate the incursions.

[Agent Smith]

We should be taking our troops out of Iraq and deploying them to the mexican border. This is ridiculous.

[knight0334]

We should be taking our troops out of Iraq and deploying them to the mexican border. This is ridiculous.

That or allow the "militia" to do what we're supposed to do.. ...suppress invasions against enemies foreign or domestic.

[1911shooter]

That or allow the "militia" to do what we're supposed to do.. ...suppress invasions against enemies foreign or domestic.

I'm with you on this one... this is a complete joke and needs to be confronted, another good reason to close our borders and start acting like the only supper power left in the world. stop with the feel good bull crap and stop trying to make everyone feel special. do whats right for our country and if the others fall in with us then fine if not to bad.

[GRoPA]

I'm with you on this one... this is a complete joke and needs to be confronted, another good reason to close our borders and start acting like the only supper power left in the world. stop with the feel good bull crap and stop trying to make everyone feel special. do whats right for our country and if the others fall in with us then fine if not to bad.

That sounds great! Too bad our government would punish us for protecing our border from the invaders.

[ironhorse]

How can ANY government official say that they fight the War against Drugs and turn their back on This ??????????????? We need someone that has some big kahunnas.

Need John Wayne! for president!

[ca2pa]

I'm with you on this one... this is a complete joke and needs to be confronted, another good reason to close our borders and start acting like the only supper power left in the world. stop with the feel good bull crap and stop trying to make everyone feel special. do whats right for our country and if the others fall in with us then fine if not to bad.

well its not that easy unfortunately and i dont think anybody can say that we havent acted like the only "supper" power, i mean we have military presence in almost every part of the world, more than any other country, i think that shows we are the only super power left, right?. I dont think native americans felt "special" when exterminated on their own turf. I dont believe people in iraq feel special by having the U.S. military there. As far as Mexico is concerned, the U.S. will never start any act of animosity, it is not to the U.S.'s convenience fighting with a country so close to home and having their people play such an influencial role in this country. Its not like WWII era where they can just lock them all up like they did with the japanese people.

44.3 million; The estimated Hispanic population of the United States as of July 1, 2006, making people of Hispanic origin the nation’s largest ethnic or race minority. Hispanics constituted 15% of the nation's total population. Now why would the government want to start a fight with the Mexicans on the border simply for smuggling tons of marijuana? There is nothing they can do, like the article says. Besides there are plenty more things far more important for the government to take care of then this (not to undermine it of course, as its not cool that they can do this), how about getting our troops home, or actually fighting the war on terror and not in Iraq? Or finding Osama, i mean they could find Sadam in a hole, why havent they found him?
Oh and the war on drugs, the only people fighting it are the local police (well thats what it seems like), has anybody ever wondered about how other drugs like cocaine get into this country? Who's watching the ports? Regardless of how we agree or disagree on this subject, there is a HUGE market for these goods, and plenty of people dont think about it when they are "lighting it up."

[fultonCoShooter]

dam it guys dont you know, you can't have a North American Union if you shut down the boarder....DUH

[Atomic Dog]

Hell, let's just let them all in. I like Mexican food, and the women are so beautiful. plus Spanish isn't too hard to learn.

/kidding

(This is like slapping a pissed off hooker it's so fun... )

[ca2pa]

LOL well we let everybody else in, many european people (irish, english, german,etc.), whats the big deal right?