Posted on 09/07/2003 3:31:18 AM PDT by sarcasm
WASHINGTON -- The Department of Homeland Security is considering the use of unmanned drones along U.S. borders to find illegal immigrants, but a citizen group is beating the agency to the punch.
The group, American Border Patrol, purchased and equipped three large model airplanes with cameras and night vision systems and began using them for patrols last week. It has set up radio sensors along a stretch of the Texas-Arizona border to help guide the drones.
"We're ready to go," said Glenn Spencer, who leads and largely finances the Sierra Vista, Ariz., group. "We'll be out there flying along the border, sending the images night and day."
The group's goal is to eventually monitor the entire U.S.-Mexican border and post numbers of illegal immigrants missed by the U.S. Border Patrol on the Internet or on television every day, he said.
"Our objective is to say, like a traffic report, 'Yesterday, 4,800 people tried to enter the United States illegally, and the Border Patrol successfully stopped 2,600 of them. . . . The rest are on the way to your schools, hospitals and jobs,' " Spencer said.
The group's Web site recently featured a story congratulating its mascot -- a 10-month-old German shepherd -- for finding its first "suspected border intruders." The dog located 37 immigrants during a pre-dawn walk. They later were apprehended by the U.S. Border Patrol, the site said.
Spencer's group and others like it have alarmed immigration advocates, who say the citizen patrols are vigilante mobs motivated by xenophobia and racism.
The Border Action Network, an advocacy group for immigrants, has launched a campaign to find Mexicans and other immigrants who have been mistreated by citizen border patrol groups while trying to enter the United States illegally. The idea behind the effort -- which includes billboards, posters and radio spots -- is to help the immigrants file civil cases against the groups.
"Enough is enough," Gustavo Lozano, a member of the network, said at the campaign's launch earlier this year. "These groups have hunted Mexicans and other immigrants with dogs, guns and high-tech surveillance equipment. We've heard reports of beatings, deaths and other abuses."
Spencer denied the American Border Patrol is a vigilante organization or engaged in any such actions.
"We've never stopped anybody. We do not apprehend anyone," he said. The group simply spots illegal immigrants and calls the authorities, he said.
Spencer was arrested in August, but not on the border. He was taken in for firing a rifle on his property and hitting a neighbor's garage. Spencer said he fired the gun to scare off what he thought might be an intruder because he had received death threats.
Mario Villarreal, a spokesman for the Bureau of Customs and Border Protection, said the bureau encourages citizens to report suspicious activity along the border.
"We appreciate the community's help and support," he said.
But Villarreal added that the government discourages private parties "from taking matters into their own hands" and that all efforts should be "within the parameters of the law."
Villarreal said the U.S. Border Patrol hasn't purchased any drones but is seriously considering doing so. The agency tested drones in the late 1990s in south Texas and participated in an operation last year in which a military drone was used to catch a drug smuggler on the Canadian border, he said.
Spencer's three drones, which he said range in cost from $12,000 to $21,000, have internal electronic guidance systems and camera transmitters. They fly at an altitude of about 300 feet and are able to send and receive radio signals to and from a van where members of the group monitor computer screens.
Sensors the group has planted at various locations in the desert detect the presence of people. The group then can send the drones to check those locations.
Spencer, who previously led an immigration control group in Los Angeles, said he was using $180,000 of his own money to fund the American Border Patrol.
"I have bet everything I've got on this thing," he said. "If it doesn't work, if it fails, I will be working at McDonald's."
But if the drones work and the video can be broadcast live, Spencer said he expects donations to start pouring in.
Unmanned aerial vehicles have been used for monitoring since the 1950s, but they came into vogue for military use in the 1980s. They played a starring role in the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
Most often they are used for military intelligence gathering, reconnaissance and surveillance. Some also can carry armaments. A strike in Yemen late last year on a vehicle believed to be carrying members of the al-Qaida terrorist network was widely believed to have involved a Predator drone firing a Hellfire missile.
The Pentagon is exploring even more uses for drones and plans to spend several billion dollars in coming years developing them.
Already the military has a wide range of unmanned aerial vehicles.
The Marine Corps Dragon Eye, for example, weighs only about 5 pounds and has a wingspan of 45 inches. It is designed to fit in a backpack and can fly for about an hour, giving troops a television view of what is just ahead of them.
The Global Hawk, on the other hand, is 44 feet long and has a wingspan of 116 feet.
It can fly as high as 65,000 feet, stay in the air for 24 hours and, the military says, survey in one day an area equivalent to the state of Illinois.
Well, they or somebody like them have already used bolt-cutters to cut the chains to the gate to access a walled area to steal over $6,000 worth of equipment from ABP's HQ. They also succeeded in getting Glenn Spencer arrested when he was firing his rifle, the following evening, to scare off their next foray into the HQ property. I guess if you're defending your property against thieves and potential murderers (this incident followed many death threats) you better make sure no rounds ricochet off the ground to strike any inanimate objects.
The Border Patrol is more than happy to have the help being provided them by citizens who have the courage to protect their land and do so. As far as I know, there has not been an incident of illegal immigrants being harmed since the early 90’s when a frustrated rancher roughed up some trashing his land for the umpteenth time. Now with so many citizens doing their constitutional duty in protecting their country with in the confines of the law, more illegal aliens are detained and reported then the Border Patrol takes over.
Doing business as usual – by committee – in Washington, is like using a one horse powered motor on a 60 foot boat; it takes forever to make a turn in the right direction.
Citizens like Mr. Spencer and Chris Simcox are not vigilantes, they are doing what this cumbersome government can’t - get its act together to protect our borders. Thank heavens for such men!
First he nominates James Ziglar, an open borders, pro-illegal immigration Libertarian financier to head the INS. Then he nominates Aguirre, a politically connected hack of a Cuban banker to replace him at HS.
Big deal.
Since Latinos seem to vote against Republicans no matter what the latter do, can you blame them?
The only place they're more ballanced is in Texas, where much of the hispanic population has been there for multiple generations and is thoroughly assimilated. In most other states, like Arizona, New Mexico, New York, and even Florida, if you exclude Cubans from the analysis, hispanics are just as leftist as in California.
On another note, please do not disparage my home state. We are being overrun, it is true, but that is not our fault since we do not have control over immigration policy. When we tried to do something about it some tyrant of a federal judge stopped us.
Before you dismiss California voters as wacky, do not forget that California voters were the first to revolt against against affirmative action and bilingual education. And as I said before, we were also the first to revolt against illegal immigration, but a federal judge stopped us. You can hardly blame us for that.
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