In this article at The Telegraph, I learned, for the first time, that the U.S. government has teamed up with Mexico to try and battle the drug cartels along the U.S./Mexico border by providing unmanned spy drones to fly along the border and gather intel on drug movements. Perhaps I'm a mushroom here but I had no idea this was going on. I find it interesting that the Mexicans are insisting that they are running this surveillance program - let's see...the drones are American, the pilots of the drones are American....hmmmm.
From the report:
The country's National Security Council said in a statement that the unmanned aircraft have flown over Mexico on specific occasions, mainly along the border with the U.S., to gather information at the request of the Mexican government.
The flights expand the U.S. role in the drug war, in which Americans already have been training Mexican soldiers and police as well as co-operating on other intelligence.
"When these operations are carried out, they are always done with the authorisation, oversight and supervision of national agencies, including the Mexican Air Force," the council said.
It said Mexico always defines the objectives, the information to be gathered and the specific tasks in which the drones will be used and insisted that the operations respected Mexican law, civil and human rights.
So, my next question is this - why aren't these drones equipped with hellfire missiles so when they happen upon five Mexican drug cartel vehicles who have their trucks loaded with drugs and members of the cartel present have automatic weapons, the hellfires can be loosed and rained down upon these Mexican terrorists? Why not?
Do we needs drones to tell us that there are drugs passing over the border into America? Do we need drones to tell us that the cartel people running the drugs are armed? Do we need drones to tell us where along the border they are coming in? Well, obviously, the answer to all those questions is a resounding "hell no." I guess one thing the drones could try to do would to determine the origination point of these drug cartel excursions but I like the idea better of adding the firepower.
Mexico allows US drones into its territory
The country's National Security Council said in a statement that the unmanned aircraft have flown over Mexico on specific occasions, mainly along the border with the U.S., to gather information at the request of the Mexican government.
The flights expand the U.S. role in the drug war, in which Americans already have been training Mexican soldiers and police as well as co-operating on other intelligence.
"When these operations are carried out, they are always done with the authorisation, oversight and supervision of national agencies, including the Mexican Air Force," the council said.
It said Mexico always defines the objectives, the information to be gathered and the specific tasks in which the drones will be used and insisted that the operations respected Mexican law, civil and human rights.
The drones "have been particularly useful in achieving various objectives of combating crime and have significantly increased Mexican authorities' capabilities and technological superiority in its fight against crime," the council said.
The drone operations were first reported on Wednesday by The New York Times.
Mexican politicians have often criticised the involvement of U.S. agencies on Mexican soil. Last week, the Mexican Senate voted to summon Mexico's ambassador to the U.S., Arturo Sarukhan, to talk about allegations that U.S. agents allowed guns to be smuggled into Mexico as part of investigations into drug trafficking.
Mexican Sen. Luis Alberto Villareal said direct U.S. involvement "violates trust and undermines national sovereignty."
More than 35,000 people have died since President Felipe Calderón launched a stepped-up offensive against the cartels in late 2006.
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