This was backed up by Col. Ben Anderson's recent testimony.
Cochise County View of the Border (congressional testimony by US Army Col. (retired)
March 10, 2003
(excerpt)
In southeastern Arizona, where the main concentration of illegal alien and drug traffic exists, (upwards of 1.5 million illegal aliens per year successfully cross into the United States through Cochise County alone), the stationing structure already exists for rapid deployment. Ft. Huachuca provides a perfect location for border operations of any needed military units.
Military engineer units from the active and reserve components can rapidly emplace requisite fencing in areas where needed. Units (active and reserve) can be rotated to maintain the operational tempo of other Department of Defense missions. The task is simple and requires very limited training, if any at all. Standard "rules of engagement" suffice.
Concurrently, INS and Border Patrol forces can take on their mandated task of searching out illegal aliens within the county and repatriating them to their country of origin.
Finally, the military would be genuinely welcomed by the local citizenry who are frustrated at the unsatisfactory state and national response to the problem.
It is a wining situation for the military, for the local citizenry, the state and the nation.
Basic suggested concepts include, but are not limited to -
The security of the U.S. border should be accomplished with a combination of Border Patrol, selected regular Military, National Guard & Reserve and a little innovation.
The Border Patrol should apprehend, process and repatriate illegal aliens in accordance with their mission.
The National Guard & Reserves assume those logistic and maintenance functions (transportation – truck and bus driving, vehicle maintenance, communications and administrative tasks, house keeping tasks, etc.) to free up Border Patrol personnel to concentrate on their basic mission.
The regular military provides high tech reconnaissance, surveillance & scouting with manned aircraft and UAVs, monitoring of remote areas, air-lift, and selected units to secure remote areas of the border. The border mission will provide an excellent training opportunity. Most importantly, the border mission is a national security mission.
Some more innovative concepts include -1. Ultra-light aircraft. Ultra-light aircraft would be appropriate for daytime missions. Ultra-lights are inexpensive (cost less than current Border Patrol SUVs), low maintenance, require only limited training (do not require an FAA pilots license), and fly low & slow allowing for excellent tracking of illegal activity. They can be either single or double occupant and would allow for a dedicated pilot and tracker. They are available for purchase in Arizona.2. Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs). UAVs that are in the current inventory provide the nighttime continuation of the daytime mission, yet with advanced high-tech all-weather and limited visibility sensors to acquire and track infiltrating illegal movement.Both ultra-lights and UAVs can complement each other with reverse cycle maintenance: Ultra-light maintenance at night and UAV maintenance during the day. All UAVs would be stationed and operate from Ft. Huachuca. Ultra-lights would be ground transported to the area of use. State of the art light-weight high-tech communications and position locating systems can be easily installed in proposed ultra-light.
3. Native American Border Patrol Augmentation. A dedicated Native American Border Patrol augmentation would be an excellent way of capitalizing the unique and honored traditional skills of our Native American citizens. Their time honored skills at tracking and outdoor skills can be tapped to the nation’s advantage. They should be employed as trackers working in conjunction with US military, Border Patrol, ultra-lights and UAVs.A military occupation specialty (MOS) type training program could provide structure to the concept. Entrusting them with our national borders would be a compliment to their heritage along the line of the “Code Talkers” of WW II. A name for consideration would be “Border Stalkers”. It might be that this new opportunity would provide a needed and well-deserved niche for the Native American community beyond what is currently available. Currently such a concept is in place with the “Shadow Wolves” of the U.S. Customs Service on the Tohono O'Odham Reservation in southern Arizona.
The Shadow Wolves unit is composed solely of Native Americans of Blackfoot, Cheyenne and Pima tribes who are known for their uncanny ability to track aliens and the drugs they may carry.
See: http://www.tucsonweekly.com/tw/2001-09-27/feat.html and http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,70147,00.html