For background see my previous posts here, here, here and here
A previous post on border violence is here.
All of this violence is to control routes into the U.S. for human and drug trafficking. So as you read these posts ask yourself: Why would anyone deem it in the public interest to designate Wilderness in close proximity to our southern border? Why limit the use of motorized vehicles and mechanical equipment by federal, state and local law enforcement on over 400 square miles of southern NM?
Cartels Finding New Routes To Smuggle Drugs Many drug cartels are feeling the pressure from increased security along the U.S.-Mexico border, hindering their drug smuggling efforts. However, the 10News I-Team learned many of the cartels are finding new routes to smuggling drugs into and out of the U.S. American authorities said Mexicali, just across the U.S.-Mexico border, is a city caught in the middle and is another conduit for the cartels. "The violence in Mexico has definitely gotten worse," said Myers. "The traffickers have proven time and time again that they will do whatever it takes to protect their industry." American police officials told the I-Team smuggling drugs through Mexicali can be as efficient as Tijuana because of the interstate system. Just a few miles from the border, Interstate 8 is now one of the country's most prolific drug smuggling routes, officials said.
COMMENT: Will Interstates 10 & 25 be next? Over 400 square miles of Wilderness would sure help.
The Other War It's a war the so-called mainstream media apparently have decided to ignore. Though its death toll is higher than Iraq's and Afghanistan's combined, it evidently isn't worth covering; and unless you're reading this in the Southwest, you probably haven't even heard about it. The conflict, a full-blown narco-insurgency, has claimed the lives of more than 17,000 combatants and innocents, threatens to undo several democratically elected governments and poses a real and present danger to the United States. It's not the one being fought in Afghanistan. It's the war being waged from the Andean basin all the way north to the Rio Grande. Last week, while our Fox News team was in Texas and New Mexico on a completely unrelated matter, "the war next door" was the principal topic of conversation among the locals we encountered. Just days before we arrived, 16 teenagers celebrating a birthday party were machine-gunned in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, less than a mile from the U.S. border. In the past 12 months, nearly 2,700 people have been murdered in this border city - about 1,000 more than the previous year - making it the deadliest place to live on the planet. The Mexican drug cartels perpetrating the violence next door are competing for "distribution rights" in the lucrative marijuana, hashish and cocaine markets on this side of the porous U.S.-Mexico border. These "distributors" are now exporting their violence, as well. According to the U.S. Department of Justice, cartel "hit teams" have carried out murders and kidnappings in more than 230 American cities. Phoenix seems headed for becoming the kidnapping capital of the U.S. Though overall violent crime has declined in Arizona generally and Phoenix in particular, kidnapping has spiked from fewer than 50 cases in 2005 to more than 350 last year. Local and state law enforcement authorities say nearly all of this increased crime is directly connected to the illicit drug trade coming across the state's 375-mile border with Mexico...
Border Residents Prepare for Possible Spillover Violence The recent spike in border violence has people thinking about safety and how to best protect their families. Some folks are even ready to arm themselves. They're thinking about the possibility of spillover violence, things like home invasions and drug related chases. Their number one priority is to stay safe. Nelda Gonzalez owns Thin Blue Line, where she offers a firearms training program. She says while she mostly caters to law enforcement, she's seeing a spike in civilians who want weapons. Right now there's a two-month waiting list for the course. Gonzalez attributes part of that to increased border violence and the threat of spillover. "I think that's what triggering people to come. They want to purchase weapons." With the shoot outs so close, people are doing everything they can to feel safe. Several Valley law enforcement agencies have confirmed to CHANNEL 5 NEWS they are on alert, ready for the possibility of spillover...
Nine Die in Drug-Related Violence in Northern Mexico At least six people were killed when gunmen attacked a ranch near Ciudad Juarez, a border city in the northern Mexican state of Chihuahua, while three soldiers were killed and three others wounded in a shootout with gunmen in Nuevo Leon state, officials said. Rancho Nuevo, located at kilometer 76 of the Juarez-El Porvenir highway and less than 30 minutes southeast of Ciudad Juarez, was attacked Wednesday night, the Chihuahua state Attorney General’s Office said. The gunmen entered the ranch and opened fire on eight unidentified men, killing six and wounding two others, then fled, the AG’s office said. One of the bodies was found next to an SUV and the others were near some stables. Ciudad Juarez, located across the border from El Paso, Texas, and considered the most dangerous city in Mexico, has been plagued by drug-related violence for years. Police in Nuevo Leon state, meanwhile, said a military patrol was attacked Wednesday on the Monterrey-Colombia highway. The soldiers were ambushed by gunmen in several SUVs, the shift commander of the police department in Anahuac, a border city in Nuevo Leon, told Efe. “The incident occurred around noon near the Salinilla highway,” the police spokesman said, adding that the shootout lasted about 20 minutes. Nuevo Leon Public Safety Secretary Carlos Jauregui confirmed that the shootout happened. Mexico has been plagued in recent years by drug-related violence blamed on powerful cartels...
McStay Family of Four Vanishes Near Mexican Border Joseph and Summer McStay, along with their two boys Gianni,4, and Joey, 3, disappeared almost two weeks ago and San Diego investigators still have no solid leads as to what happened to them. The family, who lives in Fallbrook, Calif., half way between San Diego and Los Angeles, was last seen February 4. Four days later their car was found abandoned in San Ysidro, a small California town right outside Tijuana, Mexico. "I don't understand why it was there. I know she didn't like Mexico," Summer McStay's mother Blanche Aranda told CBS affiliate KFMB. "I can't imagine where they are... I have no ideas. Where they would go?"...
Baby Wounded, Mother Killed in Mexican Border City Authorities in the northern Mexican border city of Ciudad Juarez say assailants shot a woman to death and seriously wounded her 9-month-old daughter. Prosecutors' spokesman Arturo Sandoval says the mother and child were traveling with the child's father when the gunmen chased and attacked their vehicle. The father was not injured. The 24-year-old mother died at the scene of Thursday's attack. The baby suffered a gunshot wound to her head and is in serious condition at a hospital...
Fear grows as drug war rages on Texas border Border residents fear more violence as rival drug cartels battle for lucrative smuggling routes...The spike in violence spans the border from Reynosa to Nuevo Laredo and several Mexican towns in between. The exact number is hard to confirm. On Tuesday, the U.S. Consulate in Nuevo Laredo warned of an "ongoing gun battle" near the Zoo, and in an e-mail alert advised "all U.S. citizens to shelter in place and to take precautions until the fighting subsides." The suggestion that residents were reacting only to rumors angered a woman in Camargo, in the Mexican state of Tamaulipas, who used her cell phone camera to document damage from a gun fight Saturday night in the area bordering Starr County. In a video posted on YouTube, the unidentified woman points out shell casings on the ground, bullet-riddled SUVs, and bodies in the streets. It's some of the most graphic evidence of the bloodshed that has border residents on edge. School attendance was down last week as parents kept their children home along the Tamaulipas border, particularly in Nuevo Laredo and Reynosa. Concern for the region is growing on both sides of the border...
U.S. closes consulate in northern Mexico for bomb threat The U.S. consulate in Juarez, a northern Mexican city notorious for drug-related violence, was evacuated Tuesday and closed due to a bomb threat, police said. The emergency service of Mexican police received an anonymous call before 8:00 a.m. local time (1400 GMT) warning that a bomb had been installed in the U.S. consulate, said Fidel Banuelos, spokesman for the Secretariat of Public Security in Chihuahua state, where Juarez is located. Banuelos said the office was closed while explosives specialists from the Central Intelligence went into the building to search for the alleged device. Banuelos told reporters that a female voice made both calls. Juarez city, located near the border with the United States, is believed to be one of the most dangerous cities in Mexico due to rampant organized crime and drug trafficking...
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