There are ways of making Mexico do our bidding. It’s not like they can defend themselves very well, considering half their country is in the U.S.
.....Or at lease a quarter of the country is in the USA.
Mexico has the greatest defense in the world: being completely undesirable and not worth invading.
One way or another, Mexico is going to end up paying, and paying dearly, for their failure to control their population within their borders.
Mexico may wind up WANTING and BEGGING for the wall before the dust settles.
You see, a secure border is also some sort of protection against cross-border raids, so it may very well be in Mexico’s interests to keep that border as secure as possible.
Because the Current Occupant now squatting in the White, er, “Rainbow” Hut, won’t always be there.
“Its not like they can defend themselves very well, considering half their country is in the U.S.”
The other half is trying to avoid extortion by their drug gangs.
A Tarrif on imports would do the trick—how about all the foreign aid they get? That could build a nice Fence. We can use Prison Labor to build the thing. Illegal drug profits could be seized and used. Trump doesn’t play by the rules.
“There are ways of making Mexico do our bidding. Its not like they can defend themselves very well, considering half their country is in the U.S.”
Good point. And I note that siince the 1950’s, the US hasn’t expanded any. Maybe what we need is not a wall, but a buffer zone. The northern states of mexico are relatively well off. If we’re going to take on mexico’s population, then why not take the land as well? Hold out the carrot of eventual status as a US territory.
Just jawboning something like that would I suspect result in a sudden attitude adjustment on the part of the mexican government.
Seal every port of entry from San Ysidro to Matamoros for 10 days or more except for U.S. registered traffic reentering from Mexico. U.S. business will hurt but Mexico will hurt worse. Nixon once sent the Mexicans a message by having Customs do detailed searches of every vehicle crossing the border. Traffic was backed up for as far as the eye could see.