Barbed wire and thousands of soldiers: the militarization of the US-Mexico border increases tension



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President Donald Trump ordered the sending of elements of the army to the Mexican border in response to a caravan of migrants who slowly crossed Mexico to travel to the United States and which is still about 1,448 kilometers (900 miles) away and to which many have abandoned.

While the first members of the military personnel were sent to the border of United States with Mexico was Razor sharp on a bridge and shore on Friday, a sense of unease spread through the Rio Grande Valley in Texas.

The idea that Donald Trump's president is spreading from a besieged border of drug traffickers and other criminals opposes the daily reality of the inhabitants of localities located along the 3,126 kilometers that separate the United States . two of Mexico which are among the safest in the country

and some fear violence if it happens or if the caravan of migrants arrives. Central Americans on the border of the United States, which was the explicit reason for the deployment of troops.

  United States Army personnel place barbed wire barriers along the US border . ] US Army members place barbed wire along the US border. AP

WHAT ARE THE TROOPS INVOLVED?

More than 7,000 active soldiers were ordered to bases in Texas, Arizona and California. It's a mix of forces that includes military police, an badault helicopter battalion, multiple communication units, medico-administrative units, combat engineers, planning units and public relations.

Until Friday, a week later. the Pentagon acknowledged that Defense Secretary Jim Mattis had been a petition approved by the Department of Homeland Security to provide support at the border; the troop deployment is still ongoing, with some 3,500 soldiers already at the base of the operation in the south-west of the country. Of this total, about 2,250 active soldiers are deployed at Texas operations bases, about 1,100 Navy infants are in Camp Pendleton, California, and less than 200 in Arizona. About 100 soldiers are already at the border near McAllen, Texas.

Most soldiers perform tasks to facilitate the action of border patrol officers, provide them housing, feed them and protect them. 19659002] WHAT IS ITS FUNCTION ON THE FRONTIER?

The Pentagon insists that troops will not be badigned to police work prohibited by law. Troops can not arrest people at the border. Your main task will be to support the Border Patrol.

This means that the soldiers will transfer the patrol agents. Along the border, we installed the barriers of the border vehicles, we helped them to solve the communication and security problems of the border agents' camps. The army has also provided border guards with medical care, food and temporary shelter.

WILL THE TROOPS BE ARMED?

Yes, many of them, for reasons of self-protection. 19659002] Military police at the border will be available. Pentagon officials say they plan aircraft for the worst case, in the case of violence, soldiers may be forced to make quick decisions for themselves or for civilians. Military police could, for example, be sent to provide armed security for military engineers who set up barricades in places where no border police officer is responsible for protecting them.

A day later, Trump hinted that soldiers in the Border Area are being reoriented against stone-throwing migrants, the president said on Friday, insisting that those who throw stones are arrested.

"I did not say" shoot ", I keep in mind the reporters in the House. Blanca, the migrants, but some situations might be unavoidable.

The commander in charge of the military operation, Terrence O. Shaughnessy, the Air Force General and the commander of the North Command of the United States, declared that 39, it was the management of migrants mainly the work of the US Customs and Border Protection (CBP), but acknowledged that it "could have" accidental "between migrants Given this possibility, the soldiers "will be fully trained in how to solve it."

Lt. Col. Jamie Davis, Pentagon spokesman, said the army would only deal with not in detail aspects related to the use of force.

DOES THE CONGRESS SUPPORT THE MISSION?

Legislators focusing on the elections from Tuesday to mid -mandat, few reactions were made.A group of Democrats in the House of Representatives sent a letter to Mattis on Tuesday, in which he expressed his rejection of the military mission and demanded answers on costs. The deployment of active troops, he wrote, "only represents the potential for unnecessary escalation of the situation."

Chuck Hagel, former Republican senator and veteran of the military, former Secretary of Defense of President Barack Obama. He said that CNN was "nonsense" because "it has no need, there is no threat".

Army Retirement General Martin Dempsey attacked the mission at the border. On Thursday, he used Twitter to describe the military mission as an "ineffective and over-deployed deployment of soldiers and navies" that would be "much worse" if it used a disproportionate force against the threat of facing the border threat.

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