Let’s put this in perspective. Here is a map of the counties of Arizona. The red blob is the Tohono O’odham Indian Reservation, an enormous corridor for illegal aliens and drugs on both sides of the border. Large parts of it are almost empty. About 10,000 permanent residents.
http://i.imgur.com/7unEVGb.gif
Including adjacent desert area, it is about the size of Delaware. For illegal aliens whose destination is Phoenix, in Maricopa County, and drug smugglers who transport through Pinal County, it is about 180 miles from the border.
Phoenix Metropolitan Area is 16,573 square miles.
Sheriff Joe Arpaio has a lot of deputies. He also has a reserve, and more than a dozen specialized posses for things like lake diving and mounted and mountain rescue, rotary and fixed wing aircraft, etc.
But there is no way they can hope to patrol enough desert to matter.
Pinal County, with the drug trafficking, is likely more dangerous. Its Sheriff has issued his deputies surplus M-16 rifles.
So what impact can the Minutemen have? Actually a goodly amount. They not only report hundreds of illegal aliens, but contact LEOs about drug smuggling. And they also save a lot of lives, because that is a very harsh desert and about 300 illegals die out there every year.
As often as not they do operate on private ranch lands, but they need to function throughout the range.
I live in southern Arizona. I know the geography. I’ve driven that section of road many times. It does NOT need armed civilians of unknown training, without coordination with the cops, patrolling it with rifles.
If I ran around on public streets, armed and telling people I was their self-appointed protector, and I didn’t cooperate with law enforcement, just who in the hell do you think I would be helping? That is a shooting waiting to happen.
If I saw these guys, I’d assume they were drug smugglers. I wouldn’t talk to them, show them my ID, or do squat to cooperate with them. MY gun would be out, and I’d be ready to use it to defend myself.
Then these buttheads had the gall to refuse to cooperate with cops in uniform, with badges. They deserve time in jail!
