Posted on 01/30/2006 9:05:38 AM PST by Mount Athos
Members of a violent international gang working for drug cartels in Central and South America are planning coordinated attacks along the U.S. border with Mexico, according to a Department of Homeland Security document obtained by the Daily Bulletin.
Detailed inside a Jan. 20 officer safety alert, the plot's ultimate goal is to "begin gaining control of areas, cities and regions within the U.S."
The information comes from the interrogation of a captured member of Mara Savatrucha, or MS-13, a transnational criminal syndicate born from displaced El Salvadoran death squads from the 1980s.
The MS-13 member, who claimed to have smuggled cocaine for the Gulf Cartel, explained a plan to amass MS-13 members in Mexican border towns such as Nuevo Laredo, Acuna, Ojinaga and Juarez. The Gulf Cartel runs its drug smuggling operations from Del Rio, Texas, to south of Matamoros, Mexico.
"After enough members have been pre-positioned along the border, a coordinated attack using firearms was to commence against all law enforcement, to include Border Patrol," the alert states.
Mike Friel, a spokesman for the Department of Homeland Security and Customs and Border Protection, would not comment specifically on the alert.
Through investment, technology and infrastructure, Friel said, Homeland Security is "determined to gain control of the border."
Law enforcement officials along the border said they had not received the alert.
Sheriff Sigifredo Gonzalez of Zapata County in Texas said he was angry about the alert because he has never received information from the Department of Homeland Security about this or any other threat along the Texas border.
"That is something that I was not aware of, but information like this should be given to us immediately," he said.
Gonzalez said it's another example of poor communication between law enforcement agencies.
"Since Sept. 11, we heard there was going to be a sharing of information, but today we still haven't received anything," he said. "All the information of threat levels, I get through the media."
In Arizona's Santa Cruz County, where in May a sniper shot two Border Patrol agents in the legs, Sheriff Tony Estrada said he was alarmed by the documented threat.
"That message seems to be the strongest type of indicator that they are seriously planning to use force," he said.
Estrada added that it shows how frustrated the smugglers have become, but said the plot is a "bad idea" that wouldn't work.
"It would be real dumb move," he said. "If that should happen, and if any of our agents are threatened or injured or killed, it's going to create a lot of unity and cooperation."
Gonzalez added that his deputies have seen increasing violence from drug cartels and what he believes are Mexican soldiers working for them.
A member of the 16-county Texas Sheriff's Border Coalition, Gonzalez said he would immediately inform other sheriffs.
As a precaution, he would change how his deputies operate, he said. Some of his deputies have been patrolling the border alone.
"We're going to be better prepared, and the officers will too," he said. "Unfortunately (the cartels) are not going to wait."
According to a secretary in the office of Texas Department of Public Safety spokesman Tom Vinger, Vinger said he had no information about the potential threat.
Andrea Simmons of the FBI's office in El Paso, Texas, said she is familiar with such threats, but said her office is not investigating any such attacks.
"We haven't had any specific threats regarding that or any information for us to be able to follow up on," she said.
AGENTS UNDER FIRE
The alert documents several armed, brazen attacks on Border Patrol agents between May and January.
Violence at the border has risen dramatically during the past couple of years, according to law enforcement officers all along the border.
Estrada said crime there is "more competitive, more profitable and more violent," and that increased scrutiny at the border and intensified law enforcement efforts have frustrated criminal elements in Mexico.
A smuggler named Pablo "El Patron" Mercado said he will no longer tolerate the loss of contraband and has ordered smugglers to carry firearms, according to a Jan. 13 alert referenced in the document.
Sgt. Benjamin Reyna of the Bisbee Police Department in Arizona said he's seen much more violence in the past several years.
"It's on the increase," he said. "They have a lot less fear of law enforcement now."
Reyna said cartel enforcers, smugglers and people suspected of being current and former Mexican military are taking shots at law enforcement officers.
CENTRAL AMERICAN INTERESTS
The primary subject of the alert concerns a confrontation between a U.S. Department of Agriculture inspector and 20 men armed with assault rifles in the area where a creek feeds into the Rio Grande in Zapata County on Jan. 9.
The inspector, who was on horseback, said a boat dropped the group off inside U.S. territory.
Some of the subjects appeared to be carrying automatic assault rifles, and threatened to shoot the inspector's dogs, the alert stated.
The inspector had his gun and badge hidden under his jacket so the men could not see that he was a law enforcement agent. He told the armed men he was a rancher.
"(He) stated that he believed this might have saved his life," the alert stated.
The inspector, who is fluent in Spanish and has lived near the border all his life, believed the men were not Mexican nationals, based on their accents.
The incident report concluded that the men probably were from Central America and members of either MS-13 or ex-Guatemalan Kaibiles, a military special forces unit specializing in jungle warfare and counterinsurgency.
Is W. off taking violin lessons?
I'll believe this when I see it happen.
Estrada added that it shows how frustrated the smugglers have become, but said the plot is a "bad idea" that wouldn't work. "It would be real dumb move," he said. "If that should happen, and if any of our agents are threatened or injured or killed, it's going to create a lot of unity and cooperation."
Unity and cooperation. What nice liberal buzzwords. If this happens, it needs to create a lot of armed violence from our military forces.
The good news?
They will all be clustered in a few locations and easier to round up.
Dumb criminals........
If you talk to the people who live along the border, you will learn that they are aleady doing that.
And the Federal Government does not give a damn.
Great plan. Screw 85% of the country to pander for votes with 10% who'll never vote for you anyway.
If that's his plan, he's dumber than Algore.
Screw 85% of the country to pander for votes with 10% who'll never vote for you anyway.
The sheeple will never awaken on their own, but when the right incident comes along, and it will, there will be hell to pay.
Yep. There will be hell to pay until the next Important Item of Interest comes along.
"These are the lads whose training graduation exercise sometimes includes cross-border raids on Belize, to the interest of the Gurkhas frequently stationed there. The last such dust-up of which I'm aware involved Gurkha Paras from C Company, 2nd Battalion, as I recall."
Could you please give me some details?
That'll be TWO reasons to celebrate May 16.
Could you please give me some details?
I first spent time with the Gurkhas in the early 1990s, following work as a photographer in Guatemala with a military escort prior to my layover/ R&R in British Honduras/Belize. A couple of very bright young Brit officers wanted to pick my brains about generalities- Guat troop effectiveness, morale and equipment- and were both polite and convincing. The British BRITFORBEL [BRITish FORces in BELize] detatchment of the time [circa late '70s to mid-1994] had been a necessity during the time of the Carter Administration, the Brits probably correctly expecting that the Monroe Doctrine would not be rigorously enforced...and the Guats postured and probed several times during the period.
There were several RAF units involved as well as the ground-pounders, with a couple of designitions and squadrons, but an RAF Puma helo flight and a flight of four Harrier ground attack aircraft were the most prominent- a few other types were active at various times as well. The groundpounders included one infantry and one artillery battalion with 105mm Light Guns, which provided very nice cover for repeat visits by the SAS, which may have included ops in Guatemala, about which deponent sayeth not.
There were also Kaibiles cross-border operations into Mexico in this same [early '90s] time period, chasing FAR insurgents who'd been pursued into Mexico at Cuarto Pueblo and El Petén. The resulting refugees added to a growing problem on both sides of the border, and gave the Kaibiles something better to do than pester British troops that were pretty good at shooting back.
That would be freakin' brilliant.
Our President is dead set on ignoring border issues and they're going to make it absolutely necessary for us to send in the troops?
Don't these morons know when they have it good?
Thanks. Were there ever any actual combat between the Guatemalans and the British/Belize forces? If so, the Guats probably were on the worse end of it. BTW, didn't the MS-13 originate in some way from the FMLN?
see post #2
There was a time when people stood up against evil men. When the murderers were hung in town square for every one to see. A time when a man was either for this country or not. When Pearl harbor was attacked, we responded with nuclear force and the situation was solved. When the nazi's were doing their genocide tour, the world stood up together and crushed them. There was a time when the word Community, meant somthing. Human trash like MS13 parade up and down your streets, threatining your children and you stand idol. Teenagers beeing mutilated with machettes, police officers being assasinated. Fogrein terrorists murdering by the thousands. And what do americans complain about the most? Gas prices. What do they focus on? American Idol. I am ashamed to live under the same flag as these so-called Americans. I long for the day when the average american has a back bone and does somthing about it. I long for the day that the average american decides to quit depending an incapable (or unwilling) government to act. YOU, my fellow americans are the ones who are going to have to do somthing about it. The United States is THE LARGEST consumer of cocaine in the world. Our government beat the Nazi's....but it cant beat a drug dealer? Do you realy believe that you and the government have the same goal on that subject? The most powerful nation to ever exist, and we cant beat a street gang? This is a load of crap and it is not the america that they advertise. You know what I think. I think its time for EVERY american to man up. Every one has alot of hard talk, but no follow through. The average american is scared. The average american is too affraid of true sacrafice. Too affraid to give what it will take to get this country back on track. And most hide behind the excuse that, our ancestors made those sacrafices so we wouldnt have to. Well, ya know what, the corruption, hate, tyrrany and the totolitarianism is back. Now what.What will we do? Sit around, point fingers and stick peices of paper in a box to pitt against each other to see who has the right to make the next lame attempt. Yeah, I can see our modern society doing that, before standing up for itself. I believe in what america used to be, what it once was, and what it still could be.....but what it is......what we have let it become, is not looking too pretty. YOU decide whether or not MS 13 will strike fear into your community! You decide whether or not that dope dealer will stand on YOUR street corner! YOU decide what happens to those who terrorize your community! YOU are america. You are free. Act like it. You are now free to go back to watching the simple life.
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