II. REPORTS FROM THE BORDER AREA
The following is an answer to questions I asked of friends who live near Fort Huachuca.
The first is from a former Military Intelligence Officer Vietnam Veteran who has taught at both the US Army Intelligence School and the US Army Combat Surveillance and Electronic Warfare School. He was also a law enforcement officer. At one time he was my Company Commander when I was a First Sergeant at Fort Huachuca.
“As far as I can see, the steel fence extends for about one mile on either side of the ports of Douglas/Agua Prieta and Nogales, AZ/Nogales, Sonora. Don't know about the parts I can't see from the highway.
There is extensive sensor emplacement along the border, and on Ft. Huachuca, to include the East Range. Be that as it may, the Border Patrol is fully engaged on foot, horseback, highway checkpoints and Predator UAV.
In spite of all this, yes, illegals can walk into Ft. Huachuca over or around the mountains. I believe the apprehension rate is up due to the technological barriers (or detectors) in place. Not a good idea to go hiking up Ramsey Canyon - or anywhere else near the border- without a weapon and a cell phone. My next door neighbor, while horseback riding, has seen at least one group of four illegals w/long guns in Miller Canyon. (There is a nice small campground w/a permanent latrine in that canyon that is a well-used illegal pickup point there.)
I live about 1/4 mile downhill from the National Forest border and the same distance south of Miller Canyon. Still have traffic crossing thru the NF up behind my abode, but much less helicopter activity at night in the tracking/gotcha mode.
I trust this helps - remember, it's only my observations. My concealed carry permit is well used!!”
This second item is an article from a retired Brigadier General who was assigned to my company before he retired. In addition to his MI career, BG Bud Strom was a Cowboy. He not only wrote Cowboy Poetry he formed the Cochise Cowboy and Music Gathering that helps youth. He also owned and ran cattle at his Single-Star Ranch in Hereford, Arizona which is right on the border of Cochise County Arizona and Sonora, Mexico. The General passed away in 2012. http://www.cowboypoetry.com/budstrom.htm.
We who knew him to know we are the lessor after his passing.
One rancher's solution to the 'Mexican invasion
By Graham McLeod Freelance contributor
In this second part of a two-part series on illegal immigration and its impact on states bordering Mexico, Orangeville resident Graham McLeod looks at the effect the problem poses for ranchers.
Drug smugglers are only one of the concerns for Bud Strom and other ranchers along the U.S. - Mexican border.
Strom owns and operates the Single Star Ranch near Hereford, Arizona, 70 miles [110 km] southeast of Tucson. (How we came to meet this likable and accomplished gentleman will be explained later.) The ranch, slightly larger than 1,000 acres, sits between Highway 92 and the Mexican border, a few miles from the ranch's southern boundary. It is a peaceful-looking and scenic landscape, set between the San Pedro River valley to the east and the Huachuca Mountains to the west (pronounced 'Wah-chooka').
At 9:15 on a February morning we turn off the highway to tour the ranch. It is a typical mid-winter day in the Sonoran desert: sunny and clear with the temperature near 50F (10C). The elevation is 4,800 feet above sea level.
The Single Star is a working ranch, as attested by Bud's attire — worn jeans, well-used boots, and a sweat-stained Stetson.
The ranch is part of a much larger tract of land that has had cattle grazing on it since the late 1880s. Bud acquired his acreage twenty years ago after it had sat idle for some years.
Bud is a strong advocate of natural farming and employs tried and tested techniques to get the most out of his land and produce the desired product. The ranch is divided into a series of paddocks through which he rotates his 150 head of Herefords, moving them from one to another as the supply dictates.
The grasslands were sparse this past winter because it hadn't rained in the region for nine months, and it's unlikely they will flourish again until torrential thunderstorms occur during the monsoon season in July and August. For now, the cattle must be fed alfalfa pellets to augment their diet. Each fall Bud has no trouble marketing his all natural beef to repeat customers.
After a get-acquainted chat in the bunkhouse, formerly the 'teasing barn', and a walkthrough of a two-story adobe barn that houses his small stable of horses, we headed off in the ranch's pick-up truck to tour the range.
As we drove slowly over the rutted lanes we learned firsthand about the problems the border crossers create for ranchers like Strom.
It is easy to see why the illegal entrants and drug smugglers frequently trespass across his land. The relatively flat ground dotted with Palo Verde trees and mesquite bushes makes for easy walking compared to trails through the nearby mountains.
Border crossers open gates between the paddocks, cut the barbed wire fencing and leave their garbage behind for the cattle to munch on, sometimes with fatal results. Pieces of broken glass or plastic bottles, discarded food containers, and pills taken by border crossers to stay awake ('uppers' for instance) have all been found in the stomachs of animals. Discarded clothing and knapsacks are often found rotting in the desert as well.
Diseases prevalent in many parts of Central and South America — hoof and mouth or hookworm, for instance, — could turn up in local herds, veterinarians fear. Human waste could also be a possible source of disease. In the rollover accident mentioned above, two of the injured had full-blown cases of chickenpox. The passengers were all from Ecuador or Guatemala.
When Strom spots crossers (he doesn't sit up nights watching for them!) he calls the 'green and white taxi service,' as he refers to the Border Patrol, whose vehicles are white with green stripes. Depending on the activity in the sector at the time, they respond fairly quickly and apprehend the entrants before they get much further. On occasion, he has been approached for food or water and has never refused.
Drug smugglers have also crossed his property — he showed us a sturdy metal gate that a vehicle, no doubt a large pick-up truck, had buckled as it smashed through hightailing it back to Mexico.
On one occasion, he found a discarded trash compactor on the ranch, probably left behind after being used to compress large bales of marijuana into smaller and thus more easily hidden packages.
He is very aware that drug smugglers are probably armed and never seeks a confrontation with trespassers. The only weapon he has on hand is a revolver loaded with 'snake shot'. Why? To dispatch a rattlesnake that has bitten one of his animals. The snakes are hibernating now, though, and won't be a nuisance until the warmer months.
As the bite is usually in the animal's nose area, causing it to swell up, the first action he takes is to shove a short length of flexible plastic tubing up a nostril to help it breathe until anti-snakebite serum can be administered. Coyotes, the four-legged variety, preying on newborn calves are also a problem.
The weapon issue has raised Strom's ire on occasion. He has been interviewed by most major networks and featured in a front-page article of the New York Times.
During one interview he was urged to draw his revolver for the cameras. When he refused, the crew stopped filming and ended the interview. It seems they were more interested in creating the impression of a gun-toting rancher ready to take on smugglers than the real story.
Bud has had a few humorous encounters, too. In one, a lone man knocked on his door after crossing from Mexico. He didn't speak either Spanish or English. It took a few minutes for Bud using a smattering of foreign languages and hand signals-to find out that the interloper was from Sicily and wanted to get to Nashua, New Hampshire, thousands of miles away.
Could Bud call him a taxi? Of course! Bud hit the speed dial for the Border Patrol, directed the man to walk down the lane and wait at the highway for the green and white taxi. What his reaction was when the Border Patrol 'taxi' arrived to arrest him can only be imagined!
The federal government is taking steps, albeit controversial ones, to stem the tide of illegal border crossers. For each of the last three fiscal years, over one million illegal entrants have been deported to Mexico.
Homeland Security has proposed the construction of a 700 mile-long fence as part of the solution. Parts of it have already been erected, consisting of 40 ft high metal panels. 'Build a 40 ft fence, and they will counter with a 45 ft ladder', critics have argued. Or tunnel under it. The border area between Mexico and the Single Star Ranch is still open land.
Another measure being tried is a series of towers housing radar, cameras and motion detectors. It is hoped that this 'virtual fence' will vastly increase the percentage of aliens caught crossing the border. The Department of Homeland Security [DHS] has erected one on Bud's ranch, for which he receives a modest stipend.
Ideally, when activity is detected the signal is fed to a central complex in Naco, Arizona, twenty miles to the east, and Border Patrol agents can take action to intercept the illegal entrants. DHS plans to install similar
towers along the Canada-US border. The total for both borders calls for 1,800 towers at an estimated cost of $2 billion.
The system is not foolproof, though, and the detectors on towers, like the one on the Single Star Ranch, are susceptible to false readings caused by a number of factors. A similar line of nine towers on the border southwest of Tucson is to be replaced with a newer version that the Boeing Corporation, the contractor, hopes will overcome the drawbacks in the present system.
Bud Strom has no easy answers to the overall problem, because, as he admits, there aren't any. One of the major hurdles that may never be overcome is the attitude south of the border. Authorities at all levels are bribed to look the other way as the coyotes assemble their charges. Cananea, for instance, is a large town less than 20 miles from the Single Star Ranch and a known major assembly point for would-be border crossers.
For now, Bud can only continue as he has for years, clean up after them, repair the broken fences, and watch for signs of injury or health problems to his livestock.
And he hopes that the worst doesn't happen — acts of terrorism that can be attributed to or abetted by persons who have crossed the vast open border, or an epidemic affecting large numbers of the U.S. population spread by unwitting carriers who have also entered the country illegally.
By Graham McLeod Freelance contributor
In this second part of a two-part series on illegal immigration and its impact on states bordering Mexico, Orangeville resident Graham McLeod looks at the effect the problem poses for ranchers.
Drug smugglers are only one of the concerns for Bud Strom and other ranchers along the U.S. - Mexican border.
Strom owns and operates the Single Star Ranch near Hereford, Arizona, 70 miles [110 km] southeast of Tucson. (How we came to meet this likable and accomplished gentleman will be explained later.) The ranch, slightly larger than 1,000 acres, sits between Highway 92 and the Mexican border, a few miles from the ranch's southern boundary. It is a peaceful-looking and scenic landscape, set between the San Pedro River valley to the east and the Huachuca Mountains to the west (pronounced 'Wah-chooka').
At 9:15 on a February morning we turn off the highway to tour the ranch. It is a typical mid-winter day in the Sonoran desert: sunny and clear with the temperature near 50F (10C). The elevation is 4,800 feet above sea level.
The Single Star is a working ranch, as attested by Bud's attire — worn jeans, well-used boots, and a sweat-stained Stetson.
The ranch is part of a much larger tract of land that has had cattle grazing on it since the late 1880s. Bud acquired his acreage twenty years ago after it had sat idle for some years.
Bud is a strong advocate of natural farming and employs tried and tested techniques to get the most out of his land and produce the desired product. The ranch is divided into a series of paddocks through which he rotates his 150 head of Herefords, moving them from one to another as the supply dictates.
The grasslands were sparse this past winter because it hadn't rained in the region for nine months, and it's unlikely they will flourish again until torrential thunderstorms occur during the monsoon season in July and August. For now, the cattle must be fed alfalfa pellets to augment their diet. Each fall Bud has no trouble marketing his all natural beef to repeat customers.
After a get-acquainted chat in the bunkhouse, formerly the 'teasing barn', and a walkthrough of a two-story adobe barn that houses his small stable of horses, we headed off in the ranch's pick-up truck to tour the range.
As we drove slowly over the rutted lanes we learned firsthand about the problems the border crossers create for ranchers like Strom.
It is easy to see why the illegal entrants and drug smugglers frequently trespass across his land. The relatively flat ground dotted with Palo Verde trees and mesquite bushes makes for easy walking compared to trails through the nearby mountains.
Border crossers open gates between the paddocks, cut the barbed wire fencing and leave their garbage behind for the cattle to munch on, sometimes with fatal results. Pieces of broken glass or plastic bottles, discarded food containers, and pills taken by border crossers to stay awake ('uppers' for instance) have all been found in the stomachs of animals. Discarded clothing and knapsacks are often found rotting in the desert as well.
Diseases prevalent in many parts of Central and South America — hoof and mouth or hookworm, for instance, — could turn up in local herds, veterinarians fear. Human waste could also be a possible source of disease. In the rollover accident mentioned above, two of the injured had full-blown cases of chickenpox. The passengers were all from Ecuador or Guatemala.
When Strom spots crossers (he doesn't sit up nights watching for them!) he calls the 'green and white taxi service,' as he refers to the Border Patrol, whose vehicles are white with green stripes. Depending on the activity in the sector at the time, they respond fairly quickly and apprehend the entrants before they get much further. On occasion, he has been approached for food or water and has never refused.
Drug smugglers have also crossed his property — he showed us a sturdy metal gate that a vehicle, no doubt a large pick-up truck, had buckled as it smashed through hightailing it back to Mexico.
On one occasion, he found a discarded trash compactor on the ranch, probably left behind after being used to compress large bales of marijuana into smaller and thus more easily hidden packages.
He is very aware that drug smugglers are probably armed and never seeks a confrontation with trespassers. The only weapon he has on hand is a revolver loaded with 'snake shot'. Why? To dispatch a rattlesnake that has bitten one of his animals. The snakes are hibernating now, though, and won't be a nuisance until the warmer months.
As the bite is usually in the animal's nose area, causing it to swell up, the first action he takes is to shove a short length of flexible plastic tubing up a nostril to help it breathe until anti-snakebite serum can be administered. Coyotes, the four-legged variety, preying on newborn calves are also a problem.
The weapon issue has raised Strom's ire on occasion. He has been interviewed by most major networks and featured in a front-page article of the New York Times.
During one interview he was urged to draw his revolver for the cameras. When he refused, the crew stopped filming and ended the interview. It seems they were more interested in creating the impression of a gun-toting rancher ready to take on smugglers than the real story.
Bud has had a few humorous encounters, too. In one, a lone man knocked on his door after crossing from Mexico. He didn't speak either Spanish or English. It took a few minutes for Bud using a smattering of foreign languages and hand signals-to find out that the interloper was from Sicily and wanted to get to Nashua, New Hampshire, thousands of miles away.
Could Bud call him a taxi? Of course! Bud hit the speed dial for the Border Patrol, directed the man to walk down the lane and wait at the highway for the green and white taxi. What his reaction was when the Border Patrol 'taxi' arrived to arrest him can only be imagined!
The federal government is taking steps, albeit controversial ones, to stem the tide of illegal border crossers. For each of the last three fiscal years, over one million illegal entrants have been deported to Mexico.
Homeland Security has proposed the construction of a 700 mile-long fence as part of the solution. Parts of it have already been erected, consisting of 40 ft high metal panels. 'Build a 40 ft fence, and they will counter with a 45 ft ladder', critics have argued. Or tunnel under it. The border area between Mexico and the Single Star Ranch is still open land.
Another measure being tried is a series of towers housing radar, cameras and motion detectors. It is hoped that this 'virtual fence' will vastly increase the percentage of aliens caught crossing the border. The Department of Homeland Security [DHS] has erected one on Bud's ranch, for which he receives a modest stipend.
Ideally, when activity is detected the signal is fed to a central complex in Naco, Arizona, twenty miles to the east, and Border Patrol agents can take action to intercept the illegal entrants. DHS plans to install similar
towers along the Canada-US border. The total for both borders calls for 1,800 towers at an estimated cost of $2 billion.
The system is not foolproof, though, and the detectors on towers, like the one on the Single Star Ranch, are susceptible to false readings caused by a number of factors. A similar line of nine towers on the border southwest of Tucson is to be replaced with a newer version that the Boeing Corporation, the contractor, hopes will overcome the drawbacks in the present system.
Bud Strom has no easy answers to the overall problem, because, as he admits, there aren't any. One of the major hurdles that may never be overcome is the attitude south of the border. Authorities at all levels are bribed to look the other way as the coyotes assemble their charges. Cananea, for instance, is a large town less than 20 miles from the Single Star Ranch and a known major assembly point for would-be border crossers.
For now, Bud can only continue as he has for years, clean up after them, repair the broken fences, and watch for signs of injury or health problems to his livestock.
And he hopes that the worst doesn't happen — acts of terrorism that can be attributed to or abetted by persons who have crossed the vast open border, or an epidemic affecting large numbers of the U.S. population spread by unwitting carriers who have also entered the country illegally.
Bud Strom grew up on a ranch in Montana and joined the U.S. Army in his teens. During a 30-year career, he rose to the rank of Brigadier-General, designated by a star on his uniform and an easy call when naming his ranch.
Bud is also a widely known and popular 'Cowboy Poet', and that is how we came to meet him. Cowboy Poets are males and females of all ages and tell about everyday life on ranches throughout their poetry. The tales can be funny, sad, or philosophical, but are always based on true experiences. They are much like balladeers who sing their stories.
Gatherings take place throughout the US west and attract large audiences to listen to as many as 50 or more artists recite their works.
We first heard Bud this past February at the annual three-day gathering in Sierra Vista, Arizona, not far from his ranch. He has also taught poetry to thousands of school children in the area for many years. He has a great CD available titled 'Lightning & Angels' with 19 of his poems on it. Google 'bud storm' for lots of information on Bud and other Cowboy Poets.
This is the conclusion of a two-part series. A former Citizen columnist, Graham McLeod and his wife Pat, a former Orangeville councilor, were in Arizona earlier this year. Part 1 can be found by searching 'Arizona' in the archive at www.citizen.on.ca.
http://www.citizen.on.ca/news/2008/0821 ... s/039.html
Bud is also a widely known and popular 'Cowboy Poet', and that is how we came to meet him. Cowboy Poets are males and females of all ages and tell about everyday life on ranches throughout their poetry. The tales can be funny, sad, or philosophical, but are always based on true experiences. They are much like balladeers who sing their stories.
Gatherings take place throughout the US west and attract large audiences to listen to as many as 50 or more artists recite their works.
We first heard Bud this past February at the annual three-day gathering in Sierra Vista, Arizona, not far from his ranch. He has also taught poetry to thousands of school children in the area for many years. He has a great CD available titled 'Lightning & Angels' with 19 of his poems on it. Google 'bud storm' for lots of information on Bud and other Cowboy Poets.
This is the conclusion of a two-part series. A former Citizen columnist, Graham McLeod and his wife Pat, a former Orangeville councilor, were in Arizona earlier this year. Part 1 can be found by searching 'Arizona' in the archive at www.citizen.on.ca.
http://www.citizen.on.ca/news/2008/0821 ... s/039.html
When one looks over past border crossing activity, it is easy to get a picture that the main areas of crossing have shifted from Arizona to Southern Texas. According to a NY Times article, this occurred around 2012/3. It reads in part:
The New York Times is reporting that for the first time in more than a decade the battle over securing the border has shifted from Arizona to Texas. According to the story:
“Now the Rio Grande Valley has displaced the Tucson enforcement zone as the hot spot, with makeshift rafts crossing the river in increasing numbers, high-speed car chases occurring along rural roads and a growing number of dead bodies turning up on ranchers’ land, according to local officials.
“There is just so much happening at the same time — it is overwhelming,” said Benny Martinez, the chief deputy in the Sheriff’s Department of Brooks County, Tex., 70 miles north of the border, where smugglers have been dropping off carloads of immigrants who have made it past Border Patrol checkpoints.”
·
TEXAS. During a reunion in El Paso, a couple of years ago, I attended a nice briefing that was conducted by the City of El Paso. It covered the progress that the City had made in their long-term problems such as water supplies and crime. They pointed out that El Paso had one of the lowest crime rates in the country. I knew that the crime rate across the Rio Grande River in Ciudad Juarez had gone the other way. Some of my old friends who retired there – a couple worked with border security as a second career. I was advised that once the Border Wall went up, crime went down. Simple as that. One retired SFer I know who lives there just told me “Fences work. “When I lived there around 1980, burglary (I was hit once) and car theft (I was twice hit with one recovery) as about the highest in the nation. These occurred off a post, away from security.
So one can easily surmise that when the U.S. put up fences and controls along the border in the El Paso area, crime went from one of highest rates to one of the lowest rates in the country. I am not sure of the effects at the other major crossing point/population areas but would predict that there would be similar improvements.
The Rio Grande Valley near McAllen, Texas apparently has been noted as having a need for improvement. Contracts for $145 million for construction begin this month, February 2019 for six miles of levee type border wall – the first phase of the 28 miles now in planning.
The success of the El Paso fencing is very much needed here as a large portion of the southern Texas border lies alongside one of the worst crime states in Mexico. The contrast between these two areas clearly shows the value of a good border fence and the warm feeling that good security brings to a community.
The article:
The knock on Lupe Dempsey’s door Friday at the Horse Shoe D ranch, less than a half mile from the Mexican border, hardly surprised the retired Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent.
On her doorstep was a 25-year-old man named Juan who, thirsty and disoriented, told how he’d become lost after illegally crossing the border and had wandered the desert in 110-degree heat.
His story was not unique to Dempsey and others in this west Texas town, where the 18-foot-high U.S. border fence ends abruptly, giving way to a few strands of barbed wire.
Residents say Mexicans wander along the southern side of the border fence for days, searching for the terminus, where – if they make it – crossing is easy. Juan told Dempsey he was from Zacatecas state in central Mexico. He said he had been with three other men, including a 20-year-old rookie coyote – slang for the guides who migrants into the U.S.
Juan paid the young coyote’s managers $3,000, but the group got lost in the scorching desert and split up. And as Juan learned, just getting across the border doesn't guarantee illegal immigrants anything – they’re still in parched land that ranges from desert too barren scrubland.
“I know what he’s going through so I fed him and gave him water,” Dempsey said. “He was very grateful and told me he wanted to go home.”
Crossing into a city, such as El Paso, puts the immigrants in position to get help, if not food and a job. But following the segmented border fence 50 miles southeast to Fort Hancock, population 1,750, puts them smack in the middle of nowhere.
“While it may keep people out in those areas of the fence, it pushes the migrants into more remote areas where it is easy to get lost, it is very dangerous,” Dempsey said.
Dempsey called Hudspeth County Sheriff's Deputy Johnny Schuller, who later turned Juan over to the U.S. Border Patrol. There is nothing for men like Juan in Fort Hancock, where extreme drought has turned once fertile fields of green cotton into dust. Dozens of businesses and ranch homes have been abandoned, many with skeletal roof beams exposed to the blistering sun.
Those who have remained are disdainful of lawmakers who think they have a solution to border security and never ask the locals what is needed. The sentiment here about the Senate-approved Hoeven-Coker Amendment, which calls for an additional 700 miles of fencing and 20,000 Border Patrol agents, is that it is another example of a disconnection from reality in Washington.
Surges in border security has had deadly results. A"funneling effect", where migrants move away from fenced areas, has resulted in Texas overtaking Arizona with the most migrant deaths. In 2012 the Texas Civil Rights Project reported 271 border deaths in 2012. Brooks County, 70 miles from the border, accounted for the highest number with 129.
Ruben Garcia, executive director at Annunciation House, a nonprofit immigrant shelter in El Paso, Texas, said he has seen the effects of "funneling" first hand.
"If we haven't learned anything, when we do these operations it forces desperate people to take more desperate risks," Garcia said.
Since retiring from ICE, Dempsey has been working as an interpreter in an immigration court and has seen the issue evolve over her career firsthand and says the system is working.
“We already have very strict immigration laws government never provided the funding for,” Dempsey said. “We don’t need more laws, we just need to enforce what’s on the books.”
Schuller said when he was patrolling the border during the early days of his career there was great synergy between local law enforcement and the Border Patrol. But since the establishment of the Department of Homeland Security in 2003, Schuller said that cooperation has waned.
“It’s almost a us-and-them mentality, they rarely ask for our advice and cooperation and we are from here and know what goes on better than they do,” said a frustrated Schuller.
As he spoke, two of the missing migrants who had come over with Juan emerged from the shrubs and trees that line the Rio Grande River bed and wandered to the tall rusted metal poles that make up the fence.
Dirty and struggling to walk, the men identified themselves as Enrique Jose, 40, and David Garcia, 35, both of Durango state. They said they had been wandering among the mesquite, greasewood, yucca, and cactus for three days without food and only a small amount of water.
“We want to go back to Juarez,” Jose said. “My feet hurt so bad.”
The men said they crossed the border in the nearby gap in the metal fence which is protected only by four strands of barbed wire on weather-beaten posts just barely able to hold the fence vertical. Their ultimate goal is to find employment in the U.S.
“After we got lost, we decided we wanted to go home, so we climbed the fence back into Mexico,” Jose said.
For West Texans like Dempsey and Schuller, their compassion for migrants runs as deep as their frustration with the federal government when it comes to border policy.
“It’s a sad story, God bless them,” Schuller said as Garcia and Jose shuffled back to the river with less than a half bottle of water each.
https://www.foxnews.com/us/fort-hancock-texas-where-a-fence-and-hope-for-illegals-ends. July 1, 2013, updated November 27, 2015
This will be a never-ending story until the border is effectively closed with adequate walls, fencing, and monitoring. These young men were lucky they survived. They were from Ciudad Juarez, the crime-ridden city across the Rio Grande River from El Paso. As the fencing was improved there, they had to enter the U.S. where the wall stopped.
Lou
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