After the events of 9/11, the US has dramatically altered the political landscape for positive immigration reform, and so has the old adage that good fences make good neighbors. The saying has now taken on a new meaning now that the Senate has voted to construct a 370 mile “Border Wall” along the Southern border.
The short term plan for border security involves the National Guard. However the long term plan is another story. Via Gordo at appletreeblog.com, the New York Times report that the construction of the “Border Wall” will go through the Secure Borders Initiative (SBI) which will involve BushCo defense contractor regulars with their expensive toys.
…to really patch up the broken border, President Bush is preparing to turn to a familiar administration partner: the nation’s giant military contractors.
Lockheed Martin, Raytheon and Northrop Grumman, three of the largest, are among the companies that said they would submit bids within two weeks for a multibillion-dollar federal contract to build what the administration calls a “virtual fence” along the nation’s land borders.
Using some of the same high-priced, high-tech tools these companies have already put to work in Iraq and Afghanistan — like unmanned aerial vehicles, ground surveillance satellites and motion-detection video equipment — the military contractors are zeroing in on the rivers, deserts, mountains and settled areas that separate Mexico and Canada from the United States.
The contractors will not only supply the technology but they will also develop the strategy on how to use the technology and how to utilize the soldiers to secure the borders.
“This is an unusual invitation,” the deputy secretary of homeland security, Michael Jackson, told contractors this year at an industry briefing, just before the bidding period for this new contract started. “We’re asking you to come back and tell us how to do our business.”
Sounds like BushCo is outsourcing the Pentagon as well as privatizing the military and this is not new according to Peter W. Singer, Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution. (PDF):
The industry, known as “privatized military firms” (“PMFs”), range from small consulting firms, comprised of retired generals, to transnational corporations that lease out wings of fighter jets or battalions of commandos. … [F]rom 1994-2002, the U.S. Defense Department entered into over 3,000 contracts with U.S.-based firms, estimated at a contract value of more than US$300 billion. PMFs now provide the logistics for every major U.S. military deployment, and have even taken over the Reserve Officer Training Corps (“ROTC”) programs at over two hundred U.S. universities; that is, private company employees now train the U.S. military leaders of tomorrow. In fact, with the recent purchase of Military Professional Resources Inc., a PMF based in Virginia, by the Fortune-500 corporation L-3, many Americans unknowingly own slices of the industry in their 401(k) stock portfolios.
Prior to March 2003, the Pentagon contracted with Northrop Grumman to their unmanned Predator drones, Global Hawk, in the invasion of Iraq. The same type of unmanned Predator drones that will be used for the border according to the New York Times report. It was also Northrop Grumman who manned the B-2 stealth bombers weapons systems in Iraq.
Another contractor that will enjoy the spoils of the war on immigrants is Raytheon. Raytheon plans to provide a package of sensor and video equipment that is currently used in Iraq. Back in Oct 2005, Raytheon stated in a press release it was awarded $1.1 million from the U.S. Department of Defense’s Counter-Narcoterrorism Technology Program Office for Raytheon ‘s Project ATHENA.
Project ATHENA is a joint battlespace information infrastructure that enables the integration of a wide range of information and data provided by a variety of sensors and information sources. It provides a common operating picture of real-time events, which enables responders to quickly discern information and respond to threats arising from the maritime environment.
Then in April 2006, Raytheon completed their test on Project ATHENA in Brownsville, TX.
A high-tech system to guard the southern U.S. border known as Project Athena was tested recently by Raytheon.
The Athena command and sensor network was used for six weeks to support Border Patrol and Customs operations with surveillance and “actionable intelligence” in the sprawling Rio Grande sector.
According to Raytheon’s Press Release:
Raytheon Company’s Project Athena successfully completed an operational demonstration along the southwest border of Texas to provide persistent multi-domain surveillance and “actionable intelligence” to a joint interagency task force in support of Department of Homeland Security (DHS) law enforcement agencies.
The Athena integrated C4ISR (command, control, communications, computers, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance) and sensor system was rapidly fielded to support the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Rio Grande Sector and 14 other interagency partners. During the six-week mission, Athena and CBP successfully detected, intercepted and deterred transnational threats, drugs, and alien smuggling across the U.S.-Mexican border over a large joint operations area including 160 miles of coastline, 120 miles of land border, and nine ports of entry.
It is hard to tell what the true function of Project ATHENA would actually do from the news clipping or from the press releases. However, in Dec 2005, the Boston Globe ran a story on another test Raytheon conducted. The article is very disturbing.
Athena is part of a larger push by Raytheon, the nation’s fifth-largest military contractor, into homeland security. With the growth in spending expected to slow in the second half of this decade at the Department of Defense, its top customer, executives of the Waltham company have set their sights on capturing more business from the Department of Homeland Security and other agencies that fund new programs protecting air and sea ports, borders, railroads, and highways.
Project Athena, which seeks to foil both terrorists and drug traffickers, was deployed for a 45-day field demonstration at the Port of Buffalo this fall. Raytheon is now using feedback from the US Northern Command on the Buffalo trial to refine the system’s “anomaly detection and response” capabilities as it prepares for deployments at two other US ports this winter and spring. Thus far, Raytheon has won $8.5 million in contracts from the Pentagon’s Counter-Narcoterrorism Technology Program Office for Athena, but it’s positioning itself to compete for much larger orders when the opportunity arises.
…
“The ‘who pays’ issue hasn’t been resolved,” noted Mary Anne Sudol, defense and aerospace analyst for the New York brokerage Caris & Co. “There’s been a lot of tugging between the federal, state, and local governments, and the independent port authorities. Ports say it’s a federal mandate, but the Homeland Security department says the responsibility rests with the port authorities.” … [T]he heart of the Athena system uses sensors, cameras, radars, public databases, and satellite imagery originally rolled out for military programs.Project Athena is a networked system that can be installed at shore sites or quickly assembled at remote command posts. It integrates information from a variety of sensors and data banks to track container and tanker ships and other maritime activity. Software programs crawl through thousands of online shipping records to identify suspicious ships based on their ownership, history, registration, or destination. Once they are identified, Athena operators can track targeted ships through aerial or satellite surveillance and alert defense authorities to a potential threat.
As it expands, the system will also track activity in and around coastal airports and in air space over the ocean, working on the premise that a hijacked plane could attack an oil tanker, or a terrorist on a ship could launch a shoulder-fired missile at a passenger jet. Similarly, alternating between wide-area views and zooming in on specific targets, it will seek to keep tabs on smaller boats, coastal industrial plants, rail installations, and ground vehicles traveling on roads near ports.
According to the NY Times, another high tech toy will be used will come from Lockheed Martin. Lockheed has plans to use the Tethered Aerostat Radar. According to the Federation of American Scientists (FAS):
Tethered Aerostat Radar System is a balloon-borne radar. The primary aerostat mission is to provide radar data in support of other federal agencies involved in the nation’s drug interdiction program. One aerostat, located at Cudjoe Key, Fla., transmits TV Marti, which sends American television signals into Cuba for the U.S. Information Agency. The air drug interdiction program consists of land-based aerostat radar detection ballons along the U.S. southern border and in the Carribbean, and a series of airborne surveillance assets such as P-3 AEW, interceptor aircraft, and apprehension helicopters. The purpose is to seal off the border to illegal drugs coming in by aircraft. The program has been expanded to interdict the narcotic flow before it gets to the U.S. border.
…
But aerostat balloons are not perfect. Weather, terrain, and other factors affect the performance of the aerostats. They have proven to be a fair weather friend. They must be brought to ground in high winds. Significant problems have plagued the contractor trying to get the bugs out of the aerostats plan for the Texas border.
Formidable problems that will arise as DHS and PMFs navigate through uncharted territory – these problems will consist of accountability, ideology, and national interest. And by definition a private military company is a business regardless they are in Iraq or the Southern border, their primary purpose is not to pursue US policy, but to make money. The stakes at protecting our borders are far higher than in the corporate realm: in this most essential public sphere, national security and people’s lives are constantly put at risk.
Canada Says No Plans for Guard on Border
Now, living in MI, and having crossed the Canadian border repeatedly, I can say from firsthand experience, prior to the present administration, there was no big deal about crossing the border. None of this nonsense w/showing id, needing passports, and crap like that.
I guess they haven’t received the memo yet, after this year, they will need a passport to enter. We have become the American Roach Motel.
I have several students who live in Canada. On any given day, they have a very hard time getting across the border into the U.S., even with a passport.
They routinely have to leave hours earlier into to be sure that they will not be stuck having their entire vehicle searched while their classes start. One young woman, born in Wales, has lived in Canada since first grade or so, has had her entire car searched slowly at least three times in the past year. And the guys. . . it is even worse. I had a Canadian student, born in London, whose parents were Iranian. He finally gave up on finishing his degree here, and is doing so in Canada, even though he had to switch majors. He was repeatedly accused of being anti-U.S.
I don’t expect walls for Canada to go up soon, (we aren’t afraid of white people, you know) but it is no longer easy to cross back and forth.
What you just described is my birthtown, Laredo, TX. Just coming back, forget it, you might as well sleep in your car.
Sheesh!
Not what I’d want to do.
When I was in my teens, my late grandparents owned a small summer place in Canada. And, Dad uses to commute to work regularly. At that time, the biggest concern was whether or not he had citus fruits in his lunch!
I mean, crossing the border then was nothing, he knew all of the customs agents and they knew him. Crossing the border was basically a “Hey, how are you?” kind of thing.
Permit me, with apologies.
They just put those awful superglue strips in the bathrooms in our “new” old office building where I work, to catch mice that someone on another floor had seen. No warning given to us (and we haven’t seen any mice, either. The women’s john had 8 of these around the tiny room.
Two days ago, one of our grad students walked in behind her rambunctious toddler, who promptly stepped on two of the superglue strips with his sandaled feet. He almost immediately managed to glue himself to his mom. You can imagine the difficulties.
One of our border-crossing grad students suggested that Bush have the border sprayed with Superglue. Much cheaper than building a wall. And all those who voted for the wall should, of course, be required to inspect the barrier, at very close range. . .
I came up with a slightly different approach myself.
If a wall along our southern border is considered to be a good idea, which I doubt, why not make it out of material appropriate to the area — adobe bricks. Anyone from either side of the border who wanted to work on it could show up and start building for the day and the Mexican and American governments would pay the workers. People could work side by side with citizens of another country. Americans who wanted to work on it could (so none of that talk about Mexicans stealing American jobs.) Mexicans who wanted to work on it could. (And maybe if they were getting paid a decent wage, they prefer to stay in their own homes and be less inclined to cross.) This WPA type project could span thousands of miles and be as high and as wide as imaginable. (Take that Great Wall of China.) Artists could decorate both sides. There could be a picnic area in the middle — a sort of no man’s land where Americans and Mexicans could socialize, play chess, listen to music, whatever.
I wonder if Lockheed Martin is accepting proposals for the project?
Got this in the mail this am…
From a blog by Tom Burka…?
The pandering insanity of this administration is boundless.
Peace
Bushco hasn’t managed to piss off?
.
TUCSON (KVOA News 4) May 21 — In the Rio Grande Valley, an area known for both blended cultures and intense U.S. patriotism, National Guard soldiers recently back from Afghanistan are taking stock of President Bush’s plan to use their ranks to patrol the Mexican border.
… but not all his soldiers were as eager to get right back to work building triple-layer fencing and handling other logistical duties.
“Today’s a last day for a very long time,” 24-year-old Spc. Joe Pena said, his companions nodding in shared relief when they marked the official end of their yearlong deployment. “We’re not looking to wear this uniform much longer.”
Pena says he disagrees with having the National Guard patrolling the border.
“It’s not the right thing to patrol the border, ’cause that’s not what they’re for,” he said. “You’re taking people from high-stress areas; you’re putting them somewhere they don’t belong. People are going to be getting killed. It could be detrimental.”
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."▼ ▼ ▼ MY DIARY