U.S.CONGRESSMAN PROPOSAL:20,000 TROOPS ON BORDER TO PROTECT U.S.FROM TERRORISM ,illegal aliens...

CALIFORNIA COALITION FOR IMMIGRATION REFORM | 7/10/02 | voa-davidk

[voa-davidk]

Colorado U.S. Congreessman Tom Tancredo has recently proposed putting 200,000 troops on the U.S. border to secure and protect our nations borders from terrorist attacks and illegal alienism , saying the Homeland Security bill proposed by Congress is not enough to protect the U.S. from terrorist attacks.

If you were a terrorist and wanted to get into the U.S. to attack inside the U.S. , how would you think of trying to get in unnoticed ? Through the pourous easy to get across U.S. Mexican border ? OF COURSE !

And how would you feel if you were the President of the United States , and a dirty bomb was released by terrorist , or some other devastating weapon of mass destruction ,or a massive suicide attack occured , and you learned the terrorists came into the U.S. across the U.S.- Mexican border , and you the President of the United States could have prevented it by putting 20.000 troops on the border ?

It is not implausible to believe it is possible for Al-Quida to disembark in scuba gear from a Middle Eastern ship off the Mexican coast ,swim to the Mexican coast , and enter the U.S. illegally through the U.S. Mexico border to conduct a terrorist attack . - voa-davidk 7/10/02

[BUSHdude2000]

Thanks for getting the thread up again tonight.

[Torie]

How many times is this thing going to be recycled?

[BUSHdude2000]

Article IV, Section 4 of the United States Constitution: The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened), against domestic Violence.

[MP5SD]

How about land mines covered with glue and rolled in bacon bits? Kind of a like a dirty bomb for muslims.

[alpowolf]

Where are these 200,000 troops to come from? Our military is stretched as it is.

[Consort]

There are many very good arguments for not putting military troops on our borders. There are, however, alternatives to be considered: military service personnel can be detailed, reassigned, TEMDU'd, TAD'd — whatever — to the US Brder Patrol for 2, 3, or 4 years and placed under the administrative and management control of the Border Patrol. They would wear the Border Patrol uniform and recieve related training. This would provide excellent border control training for those personnel and it would help to stem illegal immigration. It might also save money by not having to hire as many civilian agents.

[BUSHdude2000]

Well it's 20,000, not 200,000. We have troops in Bosnia and Korea and many other places where they don't need to be right now while we face this ordeal. Bring them home and put them on the border.

[BUSHdude2000]

Certainly a better solution than we will get from the nay sayers here.

[MP5SD]

20K = 1 Division. We have 10. I still like the land mine idea. I'm sure there are a zillion of them that need to be gotten rid of.

[BUSHdude2000]

Here's what 4,000 of our troops are doing year-round in Bosnia: http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/2001/10/langewiesche.htm

[alpowolf]

Colorado U.S. Congreessman Tom Tancredo has recently proposed putting 200,000 troops on the U.S. border

Looks like 200,000 to me. Besides, given the size of our borders 20,000 is a drop in the bucket.

Even the 20,000 have to be pulled off of other duties, including training to maintain combat readiness. If we're going to do it we would be better advised to expand law enforcement because ultimately it's a law enforcement problem. You need people trained and experienced in the law enforcement techniques used to control borders, not troops trained to destroy everything they see.

[BUSHdude2000]

Look at the title of the thread, it's 20,000 - he made a typo in the first sentence where it says 200,000. Take a look at the link I just posted with regard to how we are wasting the uses of 4,000 troops - and that's just one example.

[alpowolf]

How do you know the typo isn't in the title?

Either way it doesn't matter. You can't do it with only 20,000 troops. And you need well trained law enforcement people not riflemen. And I want our riflemen training to be riflemen rather than distracting them with this scheme.

[BUSHdude2000]

If you actually pursued the idea and read the petition and the legislation, you'd see that the proposal was for 20,000 troops.

[alpowolf]

Fine, it's 20,000. And I'm still telling you it's the wrong way to go. The skills of an infantryman and those of a border guard are different and you can't get around that. And our borders are too large for 20,000 troops to have the desired effect and you can't get around that either.

[BUSHdude2000]

We'll agree to disagree.

[Don Myers]

This thing would be good. Can we start it tomorrow?

[BUSHdude2000]

We need to start it 10 years ago.

[BUSHdude2000]

Tancredo is going to be on C-SPAN's Washington Journal this morning at 9:30 Eastern, 6:30 Pacific - I'm sure the crazy callers on that show will have a lot to say.