MILITARIZED AMERICAN BORDERS

"ILLEGAL ALIENS"

Operation Gatekeeper was a Clinton-era initiative aimed at stopping illegal immigration at the United States–Mexico border. This program intended to fortify the international crossings with high-priced fencing, thousands of agents, and high tech surveillance. This year also saw the birth of NAFTA,  the North American Free Trade Agreement. The stated goal of Gatekeeper was “to restore integrity and safety to the nation's busiest border”. Operation Gatekeeper was announced in 1994 and in three years, the budget of the Immigration and Naturalization Service INS doubled to 800 million dollars, the number of Border Patrol agents nearly doubled, the amount of fencing or other barriers more than doubled, and the number of underground sensors nearly tripled. The fence would eventually extend through both mountain and desert areas of four states; California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas, but Operation Gatekeeper mainly targeted California and Arizona. Immediately, U.S. migration routes moved accordingly, and soon the business of professional human smuggling became more profitable and increasingly dominated by professional drug cartels.
In a five year period, the border enforcement budget expanded from $6 billion to $10.1 billion, the number of agents jumped to 20,000; 630 miles of new fencing was completed around urban areas; 300 miles of vehicle barriers were erected; a "virtual fence" of technological infrastructure was installed...and more migrants lost their life than ever before. Since Operation Gatekeeper went into effect in 1994, to 2009,  an estimated 5,600 migrants died while attempting unauthorized border crossings. In response to government indifference to migrant deaths, many organizations set up desert medical camps, water stations, aid patrols and  rescue and recovery operations in an attempt to save lives. These humanitarian activities are increasingly met with government opposition and punishment.

 CAN A PERSON BE ILLEGAL?

Along with the enforcement of this clearly defined and absolute boundary, the concept of  'illegal aliens' also emerged nationally, whereas human beings could be breaking the law just by existing, as happens to children of immigrants. 
Similar anti-immigrant sentiment has predictably extended to other rich countries: history shows it is often societies with highly developed economies that work to seal their borders against unauthorized immigrants, and in the process only increase class differences.

<<< PAGE TO BE CONTINUED >>>

1 comment:

  1. Which countries do not require visitors to meet criteria for entry or exit? I've visited many countries, and they all had criteria that had to be met.

    ReplyDelete