According to several reports across the internet, a group of Army National Guardsmen serving on our Southern border was forced to retreat to safety recently after being fired on by well-armed Mexican drug dealers. There are several points that I want to make about this story:
1. I cannot confirm the location of this alleged event. I have read three different accounts of the event, all claiming a different location and number of guardsmen and attackers involved (one even claimed that uniformed Mexican soldiers were involved)
2. I haven't heard anything about this on CNN, HNN, FoxNews, MSNBC, or the BBC.
3. I have heard nothing through official channels within the guard. I haven't even heard a rumor of this through the National Guard.
As much as I would like to rant and rave about this, I must have a verifiable source for the story. I will keep checking with my friends on the border. If you know of a good source for this story, preferably the AP, please post it in a comment.
Picture of the Week
Really, America?...
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
Gunmen Attack National Guard Border Patrol Site in Arizona
Friday , January 05, 2007
Associated Press
TUCSON, Ariz. — National Guard troops working at an observatory post near the Mexican border were forced to flee after being approached by a group of armed individuals, authorities said.
The event occurred about 11 p.m. Wednesday at one of the National Guard entrance identification team posts near Sasabe, said National Guard Sgt. Edward Balaban.
He said the troops withdrew safely, no shots were fired and no one suffered injuries.
U.S. Border Patrol officials are investigating the incident and trying to determine who the armed people were, what they were doing and why they approached the post before retreating to Mexico.
The incident occurred in the west desert corridor between Nogales and Lukeville in the vicinity of Sasabe, Balaban said.
"We don't know exactly how many because obviously it took place in the dark," Balaban said. "Nobody was able to get an accurate count."
The Guard troops are not allowed to apprehend illegal entrants.
"We don't know if this was a matter of somebody coming up accidentally on the individuals, coming up intentionally on the individuals, or some sort of a diversion," said Rob Daniels, spokesman for the Border Patrol's Tucson Sector.
The west desert corridor has been the busiest in the Tucson Sector for marijuana seizures since last year.
Agents have seized 124,000 pounds of marijuana there since Oct. 1, Daniels said.
With more Border Patrol agents and National Guard troops patrolling the Arizona section of the U.S.-Mexican border, it has become more difficult to smuggle drugs and people across and "that heightened frustration may have been connected to what took place last night," Daniels said.
Officials will make a decision following the investigation about whether changes need to be made in regard to the entrance identification teams, Balaban said.
Since arriving in mid-June, the Guard has assisted the Border Patrol by manning control rooms, doing vehicle and helicopter maintenance, repairing roads and fences, constructing vehicle barriers and fences and spotting and reporting illegal entrants in entrance identification teams.
There are dozens of National Guard entrance identification teams along the Mexican border, including east and west of both Nogales and Sasabe and on the Tohono O'odham Nation.
The troops stand post on hilltops next to army-green tents and serve as extra eyes and ears for the Border Patrol.
www.foxnews.com
they were from the tenn. national guard and they are being awarded for retreating.
PHOENIX — Tennessee Adjutant Gen. Gus Hargett will travel to Arizona next week for a commendation ceremony for four Tennessee National Guard members involved in a confrontation along Arizona's southern border earlier this month.
The guardsman were confronted by gunmen from Mexico and retreated from their post and called for help from the U.S. Border Patrol.
Representatives of the National Guard and other officials have praised the soldiers for their response to the confrontation, which could have erupted into an armed exchange.
But critics have questioned what role the National Guard is playing at the border if it won't confront gunmen who have crossed onto American soil.
The guardsmen were sent to the border as part of Operation Jump Start, which President Bush announced last spring to help slow illegal crossings of the nation's southern border.
The incident involving the Tennessee guardsmen occurred the evening of Jan. 3 while they were on watch at a border post near Sasabe, southwest of Tucson.
Six to eight men wearing bulletproof vests and carrying automatic weapons approached the observation post, with one of the gunmen walking to within 20 yards. The Guard members were armed with M-16s but, per their instructions as part of Operation Jump Start, backed away and called for Border Patrol.
Border Patrol agents arrived by land and air within minutes, but the gunmen escaped south across the border. No shots were fired.
Officials have repeatedly stressed that Guard members are on the border in a backup role and are asked to report, not apprehend, undocumented immigrants.
An Arizona legislative committee will take up the incident at a hearing next week
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,245899,00.html?sPage=fnc.specialsections/immigration
Post a Comment