United States/ Mexican Border Wall for Reducing Drug Trafficking in the United States - Essay Example

?United s/ Mexican Border Wall for Reducing Drug Trafficking in the United s Introduction The border between the United s and Mexico is two thousand miles long, extending from San Diego, California to Brownsville, Texas. In 2005, the construction of a border fence, a 2 billion dollar project, along the USA-Mexican border was made mandatory by the Congress, in consultation with the U.S. Homeland Security. The purpose of the border fence was to “reduce drug and arm trafficking, and to lower the risk of terrorism” (Esmanech, 2010, p.3). Various legislation have been passed by the United States government towards deterring illegal immigration, and task forces have been deployed for guarding the border area. American Civil Liberty Unions have not supported the raising of the border fence which according to them causes severe negative outcomes to the territory, and will not help to achieve the objective of the construction. Esmanech (2010) reiterates that llegal immigration and the trafficking of drugs and arms is perceived as a global problem, which the U.S. cannot control or reduce by raising a border wall. Thesis Statement: The purpose of this paper is to support the view that building a wall across the entire U.S./ Mexican border would be more effective in reducing drug trafficking than the barriers in major locations that are currently in place. The United States/ Mexico Border Fencing Initiatives Due to increased illegal immigration, several miles of stronger fencing and sensors were installed in 1995-96 in heavily populated border areas such as San Diego, California, and El Paso, Texas, where the U.S. Border Patrol was also strengthened. Operations such as Hold the Line in Texas, Operation Gatekeeper in San Diego, and Operation Safeguard in Arizona focused on regions where the largest numbers of undocumented people entered the United States. These initiatives aimed to encourage immigrants to enter legally through designated points of entry (Lybecker, 2008). The border fence while reducing the flow of illegal activities through the U.S./ Mexican border, has the objective of allowing enough time for Border Patrol to react promptly with appropriate actions. The Patrol has a short reaction time in urban areas, while the officers can use up to 90 minutes to react to a potential infiltration, and devise and implement a suitable plan of action (Esmanech, 2010). Policies which formed the nucleus of these operations together with the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) changed the U.S.- Mexico border policy from low enforcement to high security management. The policies and various governmental regulations and reform acts restricted the flow of immigrants into the United States. At the same time, the resulting disadvantages, according to Lybecker (2008) were that, although these policies targeted urban areas rather than the pristine or rural regions, they still created environmentally adverse outcomes through the construction of roads and barricades, and greater numbers of patrols monitoring the border. Some negative impacts are expected from constructing an impermeable and continuous wall along the U.S./ Mexican border. It will block the flow of wildlife from one side to the other, depriving them of their natural habitat and food supply. Further, the border fence will cut across the campus of the University of Texas at Brownsville, and other major localities. Additionally, the border fence in southern Arizona is negatively impacting a tribe of 25,000 people located there, whose territory extending into Mexico will be cut in half, and they have also lost their power supply. Additionally, since their culture and habitat will be affected, tribal pilgrimage to view their festivities is declining because of increased border enforcement (Esmanech, 2010). Post NAFTA: Increased Immigration Control by the United States Drug trafficking and illegal immigration into the United States are highly interlinked, as are other illegal activities resulting from uncontrolled traffick at the US/ Mexico border. Deterring illegal immigration is one of the most significant and politically sensitive policing tasks. This is because of the paradox of economic integration between the United States and Mexico with a loosening of controls over cross-border economic activity, contrasting sharply with increasingly restrictive constraints on the entry of unauthorized immigrant labor into the US. Thus, while the “North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) promotes a deterritorialization of the economy, U.S. border control initiatives reinforce state claims to territorial authority” (Andreas, 2002, p.593). This view is supported by Coleman (2005), who describes the border as a security-economy nexus in US statecraft. According to NACLA (1999), even though border control measures may fail to deter illegal immigrants, the controls reinforce territorial identities, “symbolize and project an image of state authority, and religitimize the boundaries of the imagined community” (p.21). Similarly, Andreas (2002) argues that increased border policing has less to do with actual deterrence and is mainly for the purpose of managing the image of the border, and for coping with the growing contradictions of economic integration. While the escalating border control campaign has generated some counterproductive outcomes, and has failed to control illegal immigration significantly, the measures have successfully created the appearance of a more secure and orderly border. The policy focus on the border has diverted attention from the old and well established cross-border labor market that is an integral part of the interdependence between Mexico and the United States. With increasing closeness between the two countries in recent years, there is an increasing friction between promoting the opening of the border and liberalization of markets, and the compulsion to close the border to immigrant labor. These tensions have further reinforced pressures to escalate border policing. The U.S.- Mexican Border after September 11, 2001 After the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, major changes were again undertaken in the U.S.- Mexico border, when border security and protection became the main concerns for U.S. policy makers. Additional regulations emerged from the enactment of new legislation, to create a more impermeable border. Thus, the border was changed from a semipermeable gate through which the two countries maintained connections, to a more impermeable filter. By 2006 numerous urban regions of the border in the United States had double and triple fencing. Additional deterrents to entry were introduced through road construction, patrols by off-road vehicles and low-flying helicopters, and lighting projects. Further, the National Guard’s “Operation Jumpstart placed additional troops along the U.S.- Mexico border to help U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agents with logistics and observation activities” (Lybecker, 2008, p.341). The Secure Fence Act of 2006 passed by the 109th Congress, authorizes and partially funds the Department of Homeland Security the possible construction of seven hundred miles of fencing and barriers along the U.S.- Mexico border. These long stretches of fencing are to be contructed mainly in rural areas of California and Arizona, connecting existing border barriers in urban locations. Supporters of the Secure Fence Act of 2006 believe that there will be a reduction in the number of crossers in these areas, resulting in a decline in environmental degradation due to crossers. However, degradation due to patrolling and barrier construction continues to take place; but these initiatives have caused a decline by 27 percent in the number of illegal immigrants apprehended on the border (Bowers, 2007). On the other hand, critics of the Bill state that crossers will probably avoid the newly fenced areas in Arizona, instead continue to change crossing locations. Consequently, it would be likely that crossers will move into New Mexico and Texas; therefore “rather than a lessening of environmental degradation, there will be an expansion of environmental disruption into new areas” (Lybecker, 2008, p.342). The post-2001 policies resulted in the construction of barriers and infrastructure, and introduced practices such as surveillance from a variety of sources. These transitions in both urban and rural regions again changed the functions of the U.S.- Mexican border into filters, funnels and watch houses, with greater impermeability. In urban areas border crossing stations permitted legal immigration as well as entry of specified goods into the United States. Thus drug trafficking was brought under control. The border in rural areas had been a porous facilitator, which the construction of barriers changed to more impermeable gate or filter. Thus, for the entire length of the border, recent policies have created an increasingly impermeable border. Within urban areas, the borders have become impermeable at a greater speed than in rural areas (Lybecker, 2008). Consequences of Greater Impermeability Along the Entire Border The construction of barriers along the length of entire border has resulted in declining numbers of legal immigrants being apprehended by the Border Patrol personnel. This decrease in apprehensions indicates the reduced numbers of attempted illegal crossings in this area (Haddal, Kim & Garcia, 2009). In urban areas, decrease in illegal crossers has caused lower levels of environmental degradation, with fewer paths and roads being created by the immigrants. Consequently, fewer native plants are destroyed by clearing or burning, and fewer invasive species are introduced. However, among the substantial environmental damages caused in urban areas such as San Diego due to the construction of physical barriers interferes with wildlife habitats and their development (Minard, 2006). On the other hand, according to Lybecker (2008), in less populated areas, there were only minimal benefits from the increasing impermeability. For instance, in the town of Nogales, Arizona, the construction of a three-mile long fence did not deter illegal crossing. People with the intention of crossing found various ways to do so, either by scaling the fence or simply walking around a barrier. Therefore, the Nogales fence only caused a shift in the crossers’ location, which subsequently resulted in environmental damage. However, wildlife also found similar paths around the barriers. Hence, though environmental degradation spread to different areas, migration of animals and the dimensions of their habitat did not change. Many rural regions are targeted by crossers; for example in the region near Yuma, Arizona, apprehensions of illegal crossers increased by 591 percent between 1992 to 2004. This indicates the great increase in the numbers of people attempting to cross the U.S.- Mexico border in this region, and increased border patroling resulting in extensive degradation of the environment. Conclusion This paper has highlighted drug trafficking through illegal immigration at the United States-Mexico border, and the effectiveness of the barriers constructed along the border, in preventing illegal entry of people and goods. It was found that building a wall along the entire length of the border, instead of only at important locations, had desirable outcomes in most urban areas. However, in some rural areas, illegal immigration intensified because of its deterrence in other regions. Further, the evidence from research indicates that people determined to enter illegally could find ways to do so, irrespective of the continuous fencing along the border. Additionally, the border with differing degrees of permeability and impermeability does not solve problems, only shifting them to other new locations. The raising of a wall through the length of the border which can consistently provide impermeability, is at tremendous cost to the United States in terms of taxpayers’ money and the human resources involved in patrolling and controlling illegal immigration and drug trafficking. More sustainable and long-lasting solutions have to be identified, and suitable measures implemented, for beneficial results for all concerned. Instead of isolating the two countries, preventing their mutually contributory interactions through border barriers, the Mexican government should take powerful steps to eliminate drug production and smuggling. Further, the quality of life and standard of living of the Mexican people should be improved within the country, so that illegal immigration into the United States comes to an end. References Andreas, P. (2002). The escalation of U.S. immigration control in the post-NAFTA era. Political Science Quarterly, 113(4): pp.591-616. Coleman, M. (2005). U.S. statecraft and the U.S.-Mexico border as security/ economy nexus. Political Geography, 24(2): pp.185-209. Esmanech, T. (2010). US-Mexico border fence. Research paper. Retrieved on 25th April, 2011 from: http://www.scribd.com/doc/11470086/US-Mexico-Border-Fence-Research Haddal, C.C., Kim, Y. & Garcia, M.J. (2009). Border security: Barriers along the U.S. international border. Congressional Research Service. Retrieved on 26th April, 2011 from: http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/homesec/RL33659.pdf Lybecker, D.L. (2008). The policy of border fencing between the United States and Mexico: Permeability and shifting functions. Journal of the Southwest, 50(3): pp.335- 346. Minard, A. (2006). U.S. immigration law could harm desert animals, critics say. National Geographic News. Retrieved on 26th April, 2011 from: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/03/0331_060331_desert_fence.html NACLA (North American Congress on Latin America). (1999). NACLA Report on the Americas. The United States of America: University of California Press. Read More