Posted on 04/05/2005 8:34:29 AM PDT by Kokojmudd
By Michael Marizco ARIZONA DAILY STAR
NACO, SONORA – A Mexican military Humvee moves across the cow pasture; soldiers nod at federal agents in bright orange shirts roving by on ATVs. An hour later, a Sonora State Preventive Police truck moves through a sandy wash, the officers looking for migrants waiting to sneak across the border.
Across the barbed-wire border in Arizona early Monday, excitement grips Minuteman Project volunteers when they observe a group of six people moving north.
Dan Russell, 62, watches the group walking toward him. "They're getting closer," he says. "They could just be reporters." They are.
In the first few days of the Minuteman Project, volunteers have been slowing illegal immigration into the Naco area.They've accomplished that with the help of an unlikely ally: Mexico.
Eager to avoid confrontations between volunteers and its people, Mexico is sweeping the area south of the Minuteman Project clear of migrants.
Gov. Eduardo Bours Castelo has placed 44 members of the new state police force across the border at La Morita, a cattle ranch that leads directly to the border south of Bisbee, said Diego Padilla the governor's Arizona representative.
The state police are working with Grupo Beta, Mexico's migrant protection force, which is plucking migrants out of the desert and depositing them in nearby Agua Prieta, where they are encouraged to wait before trying to cross.
"We are very crude with them; we tell them they may be shot, that there's rancheros out to stop them and hurt them," said Enrique Enriques Palafox, a Grupo Beta commander in Agua Prieta. The point is to terrify the migrants from the area so they won't cross illegally and encounter Minuteman volunteers, he said.
Sunday, the coordinated efforts of the military, Grupo Beta, and the new police force pulled 22 groups of migrants out of the ranch, Palafox said. By Monday, only a handful of people had to be told to go somewhere else.
Even as the Minuteman Project brought national attention to Cochise County's border woes, volunteers had few encounters with illegal entrants. But their presence has brought Mexican law enforcement to this part of the border, and that has had the effect of slowing illegal immigration.
Organizer James Gilchrist said Sunday that volunteers had reported 118 illegal entrants to the U.S. Border Patrol. There is no way to confirm that, because the agency's Tucson Sector says it doesn't keep track of Minuteman callers separately from normal calls from citizens about illegal border crossers.
Since Friday, when the protest started, there have been 78 citizen call-ins leading to the apprehension of 162 people, said Border Patrol spokesman Andy Adame.
What Minuteman volunteers have succeeded in doing is setting off false alarms by tripping ground sensors on the border, he said.
"We're having to work around them instead of concentrating on the actual border where we need to work," Adame said.
The number of illegal entrant apprehensions at the Naco station has dropped.
U.S. and Mexican officials say it's because of Mexico's efforts.
Minuteman organizers say otherwise. "We're having an impact," Gilchrist said Sunday.
● Contact reporter Michael Marizco at 573-4213 or at mmarizco@azstarnet.com.
Surely you jest.
A Charlie Foxtrot only in the sense of the inept Border Patrol managers like Adame.
Again, the Minuteman Project are the sensors for the next month. The sensors where the volunteers are located are unnecessary as there are now eyes and ears on that spot providing a very visible presence which deters potential border crossers from even making an attempt at that location.
Second, the Minuteman Project as PROVEN now that if the Mexican government wanted to stop border crossers instead of enabling as they have been, that it can have a very significant effect on the numbers of actual border intruders.
To this extent, the Minuteman Project has already been a success despite the best efforts of malfeasant morons like Adame. All that is left is for the Project to get some sort of positive response from the Congress or the White House acknowledging that the point has been received and understood. Then this project will have been a complete success.
The Mexican Army has Humvees? I'd have thought Toyota Land Cruisers or Land Rovers or some other non-US jeep like vehicle. They aren't exactly into buying "Gringo" (They don't use the M-16 for example, even though the H&K they do buy is considerably more expensive.
So it's working. Good to know.
"We're having to work around them instead of concentrating on the actual border where we need to work," Adame said.
Setting off sensors that only Mexicans won't do?
Bravo Zulu, Minutemen. After only five days, you've reduced illegal immigration to nada.
ooooooh, you're a Cultural Jihad fan... that splains it...
It is obvious that the Minutemen are being incredibly successful.
All the BP would need to do would be to have the cell phone numbers for the Minutemen. When an alarm goes off, call them and see if it's them. Wouldn't hurt to tell them were the sensors are. But that would require acknowledging that the Minutemen could be a help. That in turn might hurt the BP in the Budget Wars.
The Mexican Army has Humvees? I'd have thought Toyota Land Cruisers or Land Rovers or some other non-US jeep like vehicle. They aren't exactly into buying "Gringo" (They don't use the M-16 for example, even though the H&K they do buy is considerably more expensive.
I thought they always drove Chebbys....
Don't be such a blithering idiot!! Have you not seen the numbers reported by the Border Patrol itself? The numbers of border intruders routinely apprehended in the area - that is NORMALLY apprehended in this area!? Have you not heard the Border Patrol and DHS admit that they only apprehend 1 in 5 border intruders!? The Minuteman Project (not MMK - and I know the stupid, inflammatory, and childish reason you added the K, you race-baiting ass) did not invent those numbers.
I can't believe that you are stupid enough to pollute border-related threads with your moronic FROBL crap when OBVIOUSLY you are absolutely uninformed about the situation as you have just demonstrated. "There really isn't a border problem"!!!? I live here, you fool. I can see it with my own two eyes. And if your head was not so far up your butt you would see it too.
You remind me of the Democrats when Iraq was liberated, or when the elections were held. Good news is bad news for your side. You must be severely disappointed that the Minuteman Project is meeting with great success. You must be deeply saddened that the message may get out that something can, could, and should be done about our porous borders and that something actually might get done.
IMO he's flame baiting - trying to get the thread axed or posters banned. Best to call him on his idiocy without over-flaming, lest you grant him what he really wants.
Take off your tinfoil hat you fool. Those numbers come from DHS itself. They are not invented by any immigration reform or border security group. You've really proven, beyond a doubt, that you know absolutely nothing about this situation and have no credibility when commenting on it. Thank you, you can now be completely ignored.
None of us have a dang thing against people coming here legally. It's all this illegal Bravo Sierra that needs to come to a screeching halt.
save
You were posting fast and furious until I asked if you could provide sourced info for your claims. What's up with that?
You may be correct, dirtboy. Have you noticed in these latest posts there have been no responses from that enlightened one....ClintonBeGone is, well, gone.
Bump for the obvious implications. Good catch.
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