Feral Jundi

Saturday, June 26, 2010

Arizona: Warning Signs Are Not Enough For Border Security -Governor Brewer

Filed under: Arizona,Video — Tags: , , , , , — Matt @ 4:01 PM

Monday, June 14, 2010

Arizona: Pinal County Sheriff–Mexican Drug Cartels Now Control Parts Of Arizona

Tuesday, May 25, 2010

Military News: 1,200 National Guard Troops To Be Deployed To Arizona Border

   Wow, this is great news.  Arizona has been pushing hard for National Guard troops and the White House has finally agreed to allow it.  It’s about time is all I have to say.

     I am not sure what will be purchased with the 500 million dollars, and I am sure that money will mostly go to this NG deployment.  Although we might see an emphasis again on building a substantial wall or fence on the border.  If that is the case, I am sure a contractor or two will be tasked with building that thing. If they do start building the fence, I am sure they will also build a couple of camps out in the remote areas so they can support that effort. –Matt

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1,200 National Guard troops to be deployed to border

5/25/2010

WASHINGTON – U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords Tuesday announced the White House has agreed to her requests to deploy National Guard troops to the U.S. border with Mexico.Giffords called for the Guard’s deployment immediately after the March 27, 2010, murder of Cochise County rancher Rob Krentz.

Giffords also says in a statement Tuesday that President Barack Obama will request $500 million in funding for border security.

In 2006, President George W. Bush sent thousands of troops to the border to perform support duties that tie up immigration agents. The troops wouldn’t perform significant law enforcement duties.

That program has since ended, and politicians in border states have called for troops to be sent there to curb human and drug smuggling and prevent Mexico’s drug violence from spilling over into the United States.

Story here.

Tuesday, May 18, 2010

Technology: SBInet Redux And Drones In Texas

Filed under: Arizona,Aviation,California,New Mexico,Technology,Texas — Matt @ 12:47 AM

I think this is great that they are looking to bring back some form of SBInet and tap into what is currently available on the market to get the job done. There are tons of cool sensors and technologies that folks can use to get the job done, and probably for a whole lot cheaper than what was originally intended.

But the other component of this must be human. You have to have enough folks to respond to all and any incidents out there, and the best sensors and interdiction devices are human brains mounted on two feet. That is why I like the idea of moving more folks near the border and creating FOBs or Stations throughout the border. Get those human sensors called Border Patrol closer to the action. To own terrain, means being on that terrain, and I really don’t think commuting to those areas is the way to go.

I kind of look at this like forest fire fighting, and we had camps strategically located throughout the forests of the West. We have state camps and federal camps, or ‘stations’. Firefighters actually live at these camps during the summers, and these camps keep them close to the action. If the Border Patrol’s ‘forest’ is that border, then they should have stations dispersed properly throughout that border to cover every square inch of that thing.

I should also note that this FOB idea or stations along the border is nothing new. I am sure numerous groups have been screaming for this to happen for awhile. The Arizona Cattleman’s Association even called them FOB’s in their report, as a homage (probably) to the outposts in Iraq and Afghanistan. With the advent of armed smugglers and drug dealers, maybe FOB’s is a more appropriate term for these stations, than just a ‘station’. And with all of these drones and sensors, you gotta have some officers close to the action in order to act on that information and work with the ‘eye in the sky’. –Matt

Edit: 5/20/2010 -Check out this story on SBInet, and why it failed originally.

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Technology Continues to Flow to Southwest Border

June 2010

By Stew Magnuson

While the Department of Homeland Security conducts a program review of its troubled border fence program, Customs and Border Protection has not stopped deploying new sensors in the Southwest, said a senior DHS official.

The Secure Border Initiative’s technology piece, known as SBInet, was designed to create “virtual fences” along remote parts of the northern and southern borders. The program suffered delays, setbacks and cost overruns for years, but the Obama administration signaled its intent to proceed with the plan and field a second version of the system of sensors, cameras and a communications backbone that would tie them all together. That was before the airing of a 60 Minutes report that repeated the conclusions of several Government Accountability Office and DHS inspector general investigations that said the system did not work as envisioned. Two days before the broadcast, DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano announced that SBInet was on hold and that there would be a sweeping review that would look for possible alternatives to the program.

Nevertheless, the department is continuing to spend money on border technology, CBP Commissioner Alan Bersen told the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee. The agency has spent $50 million of American Recovery and Reinvestment Act money to deploy proven surveillance systems along the border. The bulk of that, $37 million, has been used to purchase several mobile surveillance systems — a suite of sensors mounted on a rugged truck that can be driven to hotspots along the border. The Border Patrol has also received $12.3 million to spend on thermal and backscatter imagers. CBP’s Air and Marine division has received $4.5 million to buy thermal imaging and other cameras for its boats and aircraft.

The key difference is that these are “commercially available, stand-alone” technologies, Bersen testified. No money has been allocated for networking the sensors into a larger communications system.

Story here.

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FAA OKs Drones For Texas Border

May 17, 2010

By Mary GradyThe FAA has approved a Certification of Authorization (COA) for an unmanned aerial vehicle to patrol a portion of the U.S.-Mexico border extending from Arizona to the El Paso region of Texas effective June 1. This is one of two COAs that have been submitted to the FAA seeking approval for UAV flights along the Texas-Mexico border.

Tuesday, May 4, 2010

Arizona: Deputy Ambushed And Wounded By Drug Smugglers Armed With AK-47’s

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