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2008-02-25 Home Front: Politix

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Posted by Steve White 2008-02-25 00:00|| || Front Page|| [5 views ] Top

#1 If there is no physical fence, I think it's guaranteed failure. All they have to do is rush it en-masse. If half of them get past the border patrol due to lack of manpower, they've more than accomplished what they need to to make it attractive enough for the remaining 50% to try again until they succeed.

Now suppose you build a workable fence. If a couple make it through, they're easily caught if there are sensors to see where they are hiding or running to. And it doesn't take so much manpower.

But what does a workable fence look like? It would have to include a serious risk of inconvenience, death, and injury to be an effective deterrent. I imagine something like a tall concrete outer fence, a somewhat smaller inner fence, guard towers, and landmines or punji sticks or whatever. But a minefield can be breached. Perhaps autonomous guns or something. How are the Israelis keeping the Paleostinians away from their fence? Do they also have a chain link or smaller fence on the outside as well in order to slow down intruders long enough to shoot them?

If this physical barrier were supplemented with some simple laws that required solid proof of American citizenship/resident/guest-worker status for major services like housing, schooling, work, entitlements, major purchases (like cars), wiring money, bank services, and medical care (and hefty penalties all around for breaking these laws), maybe the fence could be toned down. We'd need a serious and reasonably generous guest worker program to offset it, too, that didn't allow for citizenship loopholes like anchor babies. In any case, border security would have to be good enough to keep terrorists out, too, and the US has way more border to worry about than just that between the US and Mexico. Heck, they could just fly right over the fence to LAX for a "vacation" and never go home.

Posted by gorb 2008-02-25 01:33|| 2008-02-25 01:33|| Front Page Top

#2 It sounds like the DHS has so mismanaged the contract that we really don't know what might have worked and what was a mistake. Getting real information from people on the ground instead of big heads in DC would help clear this story up.

Posted by rammer">rammer 2008-02-25 05:25|| www.blogoram.com]">[www.blogoram.com] 2008-02-25 05:25|| Front Page Top

#3 Without a physical barrier to slow and channelize the opponent, it is NOT a fences. Its just a detection system.

Fences stop people. Fences slow them down and make them go around. The make it hard to cross an area.

The "Electronic fence" does NONE of the above.

The whole purpose of a border fence isnt to be air tight, it is to increase the difficulty and time it takes to enter the US to the point where peopel stop trying to do that, and those that continue to try stand out much more easily to sensor systems, and are apprehended.

The "Virtual Fence" is a fraud on the public.

Posted by OldSpook 2008-02-25 08:35|| 2008-02-25 08:35|| Front Page Top

#4 But it makes a good sound bite which is what the Homeland [in]Security Department is all about.

The Virtual fence isn't to secure the border - its to shutup the "racist bigots" who want to deprive mexicans from doing the ~~murders, rapes, and beatings~~ jobs Americans won't do.

Posted by CrazyFool 2008-02-25 08:43|| 2008-02-25 08:43|| Front Page Top

#5 Fences are cheapest and most effective. Then remote sensors. Least cost effective is more agents riding around in SUVs. So what does Congress fund?

Posted by ed 2008-02-25 09:10|| 2008-02-25 09:10|| Front Page Top

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Posted by wxjames 2008-02-25 10:41|| 2008-02-25 10:41|| Front Page Top

#7 I think bull----. We need to have a guest worker program with biometric ID required and enforced, deport anchor babies with their entire family so they are not on the public dime when leaving behind dependents, and get real serious about enforcing the border crossings at only mointored checkpoints. We have armed drones that work very well in the war zone and our border security should be priority one. Poor Mexicans are indistinguishable from terrorists with WMD's, it won't take but once to make it clear we mean business, and start defending against all enemies, foreign or domestic, smoked or ingested. It is quite clear to me why a blind eye is being turned to these human mules freely crossing the Tucson sector as all too many are profiting on this side of it. The "walkers" often end up in the emergency room and psych units on the taxpayer dime, bankrupting the hospitals. I don't blame Boeing as the real hang-up is Congress.

Posted by Danielle 2008-02-25 10:57|| 2008-02-25 10:57|| Front Page Top

#8 The senior management of DHS should operate in 'virtual offices' as well. Sorta like those temps all the school kids are stuck with in the southwest due to overcrowding created by - illegal immigration.

Posted by Procopius2k 2008-02-25 10:59|| 2008-02-25 10:59|| Front Page Top

#9 #3"The "Virtual Fence" is a fraud on the public."
But it's only a virtual fraud, like virtual promisses from Congress.

Posted by Omung Squank9908 2008-02-25 11:27|| 2008-02-25 11:27|| Front Page Top

#10 Let's have no more comments about machine-gunning illegal immigrants.

It gives us a reputation on the Web that we don't want to have.

Illegals should be caught, carefully processed, and gently deported. We don't hate them, we just want them to follow our laws.

And that's strike one, wx. Go ahead- make me happy.

Posted by Steve White">Steve White 2008-02-25 13:36|| 2008-02-25 13:36|| Front Page Top

#11 OK Steve. But I will continune to advocate minefields. With "bouncing bettys".

Just fill them with skunk scent and bank-robbery dye instead of shrapnel.

Posted by OldSpook 2008-02-25 13:57|| 2008-02-25 13:57|| Front Page Top

#12 The redneck in my says we stock the Rio Grande with pirhanas and gators. That's an easy, quick fix to the river-border portion. Then work on the REAL (not virtual) fence.

Posted by BA 2008-02-25 14:13|| 2008-02-25 14:13|| Front Page Top

#13 Sooothe US government enters into a massive contract with Boeing to design, build, and implement an unproven detection system. The terms of payment for the nearly $20 million price tag simply required the successful completion for the project. A little pricey but that sounds fairright? Not surprising, the contract was structured in such a way as to squelch discussion of the predicted limitations. And, of course, the design was introduced with cleverly written clauses for diminished expectations. But heythis has never been tried before. And dont forget this islikehigh-tech and cutting edgemaann. Then a funny thing happened on the way down to the borderthe virtual fence concept turned into an actual failure. Clearly the big-shots at Boeing must have felt awfully bad for the DHS folks as they were forced to endure those embarrassing little phrases like marginal functionality at best". Why else would Boeing agree to give the government a whopping $2 million discount on future work? Where o where will they get that revenue shortfall back? Hopefully they can make it up through that little additional $64 million contract to develop a "common operating picture" system. Normally this is the kind of red meat that politicians love to sink their incisors into regarding government waste and the like. Whats different here is for this first class boondoggle to work the politicians only need that classic deadpan response to the obvious criticisms coming their way in the future. And in this case itsare ya ready The virtual fence was always designed to function in conjunction with a comprehensive immigration policy. Weirdaint it? Its almost like they knew it was gonna happen like this from the get go.

Posted by DepotGuy 2008-02-25 16:32|| 2008-02-25 16:32|| Front Page Top

#14 The whole fence idea, virtual or real, is a crock of crap and a first class boondoggle. We need a Real ID with stiff prison sentences for employers who hire these people.

Hell, the government already knows who I am. The IRS knows my Social Security number, where I live, where I work, how much I make, who my kids are, etc.

So what's the problem with the Real ID? It'd work, that's what. Because that, my friends, is what the government, the Bushes, the Kennedys, the McCains, the Clintons, the Tysons, etc. do NOT want.

So as long as these people are in power we will continue to get red herrings like the virtual fence. None of them will make us any safer from terrorists crossing the border. None of them will make a damn bit of difference in the number of illegal aliens or the amount of drugs coming into the country.

Posted by Ebbang Uluque6305 2008-02-25 16:37|| 2008-02-25 16:37|| Front Page Top

#15 Hopefully they can make it up through that little additional $64 million contract to develop a "common operating picture" system.

Common operation pictures are key to how our military fights now. The first real COP was provided to tactical and higher operations centers in Iraq, fusing real time UAV and other sensor data with command and control systems etc.

From the Joint Forces Command glossary:

Common Operation Picture (COP) - A single identical display of relevant information shared by more than one command. A common operational picture facilitates collaborative planning and assists all echelons to achieve situational awareness.

COPs are central to joint operations, whether that means joint across the services, within coalitions or between law enforcement, emergency responders and possibly military commanders. They ensure a common picture in real time for what's happening in the battle / operational space.

That's especially important in efforts that DOD would call network centric, i.e. based on the use of real time information feeds and supporting software to enable rapid updates to situation awareness and local decisionmaking.

Basically, we had young Captains making decisions in Iraq that in Vietnam or Korea would have required Colonels, because we could a) collect and disseminate detailed info quickly and b) higher commanders could keep tabs on the overall picture much better than previously.

Just thought you'd want to know ... ;-)

Oh, and this other concept from JFCOM might be relevant if things really deteriorate on the border:

Civil-Military Operations - The activities of a commander that establish, maintain, influence, or exploit relations between military forces, governmental and nongovernmental civilian organizations and authorities, and the civilian populace in a friendly, neutral, or hostile operational area in order to facilitate military operations, to consolidate and achieve operational US objectives. Civil-military operations may include performance by military forces of activities and functions normally the responsibility of the local, regional, or national government. These activities may occur prior to, during, or subsequent to other military actions. They may also occur, if directed, in the absence of other military operations. Civil-military operations may be performed by designated civil affairs, by other military forces, or by a combination of civil affairs and other forces

It's the kind of situation in which a COP that spans over to law enforcement would be valuable. Because it may end up being the case that the civilian authorities the military is working with are our own.

Posted by lotp 2008-02-25 17:06|| 2008-02-25 17:06|| Front Page Top

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