Team Infidel
Forum Spin Doctor
Wall Street Journal
March 16, 2009
Pg. 4
By Stephanie Simon
Some civic leaders along the Texas-Mexico border are beginning to speak out against a request by Texas Gov. Rick Perry for federal troops to protect American communities from the drug wars in Mexico.
The White House is reviewing Gov. Perry's request for 1,000 National Guard troops and six helicopters with infrared night vision. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said last week that the administration was committed to providing additional resources soon.
Many border officials welcome the promise of additional federal resources. But some are pushing back against a possible military deployment, saying federal troops would inflame tensions and spread fear. They say the border has been unfairly depicted as a scary, lawless place.
"It's incendiary rhetoric," said Tony Payan, a political-science professor at the University of Texas at El Paso. "The border gets a bad rap."
El Paso, which sits directly across the Rio Grande from the violent Ciudad Juarez in Mexico, consistently ranks among the top three safest U.S. cities of its size, according to Federal Bureau of Investigation crime statistics. "That side of the story is not getting out," Mayor John Cook said.
Bob Cook, who runs the economic development corporation that covers El Paso and Juarez, says he hears plenty of concern about instability in Mexico. "It comes up in almost every business meeting I have, every dinner party I go to," he said. But he has lived in El Paso on and off for 20 years and says he has seen no deterioration in the quality of life -- except that Americans are less inclined to cross the border at night. Corporations continue to express interest in setting up factories on both sides of the Rio Grande, he said; four new plants are under construction in Juarez now.
Stationing the military along the border, he said, "would be completely the wrong thing to do," because conditions don't warrant it.
Both Mayor Cook and the sheriff of El Paso County, Richard Wiles, reject the call for immediate deployment of federal troops.
Instead, they are requesting federal help to search all vehicles heading south into Mexico, in hopes of cutting off the cash and weapons that sustain the drug cartels and their affiliated gangs.
Southbound inspections are likely to be a key component of the federal response. Ms. Napolitano has also indicated she plans to send more border patrol agents. But it is unclear whether that deployment will be large enough to satisfy Gov. Perry's request.
A spokeswoman for the governor said he was "hopeful we'll get the help and resources we need" but had not heard from Washington.
Gov. Perry's homeland-security director, Steve McCraw, expressed particular concern about the spread of gangs linked to Mexican drug cartels and armed with weaponry including rocket-propelled grenades and .50-caliber sniper rifles capable of piercing most body armor.
Mr. McCraw said the gangs recruit American teenagers at schools along the border for drug distribution, vehicle theft, smuggling and other crimes.
And the sheriff's deputies charged with stopping them are badly outgunned, said Judge Carlos H. Cascos, the chief administrator for Cameron County in the Rio Grande Valley along the border in Texas.
"We're not going to go out there with a 9mm pistol and take on people with AK-47s," Mr. Cascos said. "We need to arm law enforcement better than or equal to the bad guys."
Mr. Cascos said fear hangs heavy along the border. At a recent children's parade in Brownsville, Texas, the sound of two metal chairs banging nearly provoked a stampede, he said. Someone yelled "gunshots" and onlookers fled. The parade was canceled. "People are on edge," Mr. Cascos said
But that tension isn't felt everywhere along the roughly 1,250-mile Texas-Mexico border.
Scott Nicol, an activist who protests the border fencing, took a recent hike along the Texas border, not far from Brownsville, with his wife and teenage daughter. He described the scene as peaceful.
"It's very surreal to read stuff in the papers about how this violence in Mexico is going to spill over," he said. "As far as I've seen, nothing's going on here."
March 16, 2009
Pg. 4
By Stephanie Simon
Some civic leaders along the Texas-Mexico border are beginning to speak out against a request by Texas Gov. Rick Perry for federal troops to protect American communities from the drug wars in Mexico.
The White House is reviewing Gov. Perry's request for 1,000 National Guard troops and six helicopters with infrared night vision. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said last week that the administration was committed to providing additional resources soon.
Many border officials welcome the promise of additional federal resources. But some are pushing back against a possible military deployment, saying federal troops would inflame tensions and spread fear. They say the border has been unfairly depicted as a scary, lawless place.
"It's incendiary rhetoric," said Tony Payan, a political-science professor at the University of Texas at El Paso. "The border gets a bad rap."
El Paso, which sits directly across the Rio Grande from the violent Ciudad Juarez in Mexico, consistently ranks among the top three safest U.S. cities of its size, according to Federal Bureau of Investigation crime statistics. "That side of the story is not getting out," Mayor John Cook said.
Bob Cook, who runs the economic development corporation that covers El Paso and Juarez, says he hears plenty of concern about instability in Mexico. "It comes up in almost every business meeting I have, every dinner party I go to," he said. But he has lived in El Paso on and off for 20 years and says he has seen no deterioration in the quality of life -- except that Americans are less inclined to cross the border at night. Corporations continue to express interest in setting up factories on both sides of the Rio Grande, he said; four new plants are under construction in Juarez now.
Stationing the military along the border, he said, "would be completely the wrong thing to do," because conditions don't warrant it.
Both Mayor Cook and the sheriff of El Paso County, Richard Wiles, reject the call for immediate deployment of federal troops.
Instead, they are requesting federal help to search all vehicles heading south into Mexico, in hopes of cutting off the cash and weapons that sustain the drug cartels and their affiliated gangs.
Southbound inspections are likely to be a key component of the federal response. Ms. Napolitano has also indicated she plans to send more border patrol agents. But it is unclear whether that deployment will be large enough to satisfy Gov. Perry's request.
A spokeswoman for the governor said he was "hopeful we'll get the help and resources we need" but had not heard from Washington.
Gov. Perry's homeland-security director, Steve McCraw, expressed particular concern about the spread of gangs linked to Mexican drug cartels and armed with weaponry including rocket-propelled grenades and .50-caliber sniper rifles capable of piercing most body armor.
Mr. McCraw said the gangs recruit American teenagers at schools along the border for drug distribution, vehicle theft, smuggling and other crimes.
And the sheriff's deputies charged with stopping them are badly outgunned, said Judge Carlos H. Cascos, the chief administrator for Cameron County in the Rio Grande Valley along the border in Texas.
"We're not going to go out there with a 9mm pistol and take on people with AK-47s," Mr. Cascos said. "We need to arm law enforcement better than or equal to the bad guys."
Mr. Cascos said fear hangs heavy along the border. At a recent children's parade in Brownsville, Texas, the sound of two metal chairs banging nearly provoked a stampede, he said. Someone yelled "gunshots" and onlookers fled. The parade was canceled. "People are on edge," Mr. Cascos said
But that tension isn't felt everywhere along the roughly 1,250-mile Texas-Mexico border.
Scott Nicol, an activist who protests the border fencing, took a recent hike along the Texas border, not far from Brownsville, with his wife and teenage daughter. He described the scene as peaceful.
"It's very surreal to read stuff in the papers about how this violence in Mexico is going to spill over," he said. "As far as I've seen, nothing's going on here."