I'm old enough to remember the Cold War. I was in Europe when there was still two Germany's. I was there when tensions were high and you never knew when and if the balloon was going to go up, bringing forth the entire Red Army screaming through the Fulda Gap.
I've seen the Berlin wall. I've been on patrols at night along the inner German border... Looked at humorless Soviet and East German troops through binoculars, who were in turn looking at me. Both sides thumbing the safeties of our rifles all the time... I was right on the front line, and if the balloon did go up, myself and the men I was with there would have been nothing more than speed-bumps to the thousands of Soviet T-80 tanks that would roll over us.
Freaky times.
Now I read and hear about this, and I find it deeply troubling. A group of people want to build a fence along the 2000 or so miles from the Pacific Ocean in California to the Gulf of Mexico in Texas to stem the tide of illegal immigrants. Where I do feel there's a real problem with illegals crossing the border and at first thought a fence does sound like a pretty good idea. But when you read the website dedicated to this fence it's a little unnerving. I read the description and it sent chills down my spine.
The concrete wall portion of the barrier is roughly four percent of its overall length. Most of it is a fifty yard wide multi-layered composite obstacle comprised of several elements:
A ditch
Coils of barbed wire
Two tall, sturdy wire fences, with sensors to warn of any incursion.
A patrol path for vehicles between the fences
A smoothed strip of sand that runs parallel to the fence, to detect footprints.
Closed circuit TV cameras and motion detectors
All that's missing is the minefields, anti-tank obstacles and the guard towers with machineguns with interlocking fields of fire to match the "defenses" of the DDR I saw when I was in Germany.
A concrete wall? Who would the contractor be, the Stazi? They were pretty good at it, as far as I can remember.
They say it's to control illegal immigration. But once up, who's to stop a later group to reverse it? To keep people in? Things are already getting out of hand if you ask me, from the Right we have the "Patriot Act" which scares the shit out of me... And from the Left we have folks who want to take my guns away and issue national ID cards.
Go too far Right and we have Fascisism, to far Left and we have Communism. Both scare the shit out of me, and we're just blindly following along like lemmings over the cliff.
I agree we have a problem with illegal immigration and I've been accused in the past for being anti-immigrant. That couldn't be further from the truth. We're a nation of immigrants. All our families, at some point have come from somewhere else, excluding the Native Americans.
We have to do something about the illegals, but this is certainly not the way to do it.
One of the great founding fathers of our Republic, Benjamin Franklin once said:
"Those of you who would give up freedoms for temporary safety deserve neither..."
He also wrote a treatise entitled "Fart Proudly" by the way...
Anyway, his words are still as crystal clear today as there were 230 years ago. An Iron Curtain to our south? Not if I can help it.
Go here to read more:
http://www.weneedafence.com/
Copyright 2005 Thomas J Wolfenden
I've seen the Berlin wall. I've been on patrols at night along the inner German border... Looked at humorless Soviet and East German troops through binoculars, who were in turn looking at me. Both sides thumbing the safeties of our rifles all the time... I was right on the front line, and if the balloon did go up, myself and the men I was with there would have been nothing more than speed-bumps to the thousands of Soviet T-80 tanks that would roll over us.
Freaky times.
Now I read and hear about this, and I find it deeply troubling. A group of people want to build a fence along the 2000 or so miles from the Pacific Ocean in California to the Gulf of Mexico in Texas to stem the tide of illegal immigrants. Where I do feel there's a real problem with illegals crossing the border and at first thought a fence does sound like a pretty good idea. But when you read the website dedicated to this fence it's a little unnerving. I read the description and it sent chills down my spine.
The concrete wall portion of the barrier is roughly four percent of its overall length. Most of it is a fifty yard wide multi-layered composite obstacle comprised of several elements:
A ditch
Coils of barbed wire
Two tall, sturdy wire fences, with sensors to warn of any incursion.
A patrol path for vehicles between the fences
A smoothed strip of sand that runs parallel to the fence, to detect footprints.
Closed circuit TV cameras and motion detectors
All that's missing is the minefields, anti-tank obstacles and the guard towers with machineguns with interlocking fields of fire to match the "defenses" of the DDR I saw when I was in Germany.
A concrete wall? Who would the contractor be, the Stazi? They were pretty good at it, as far as I can remember.
They say it's to control illegal immigration. But once up, who's to stop a later group to reverse it? To keep people in? Things are already getting out of hand if you ask me, from the Right we have the "Patriot Act" which scares the shit out of me... And from the Left we have folks who want to take my guns away and issue national ID cards.
Go too far Right and we have Fascisism, to far Left and we have Communism. Both scare the shit out of me, and we're just blindly following along like lemmings over the cliff.
I agree we have a problem with illegal immigration and I've been accused in the past for being anti-immigrant. That couldn't be further from the truth. We're a nation of immigrants. All our families, at some point have come from somewhere else, excluding the Native Americans.
We have to do something about the illegals, but this is certainly not the way to do it.
One of the great founding fathers of our Republic, Benjamin Franklin once said:
"Those of you who would give up freedoms for temporary safety deserve neither..."
He also wrote a treatise entitled "Fart Proudly" by the way...
Anyway, his words are still as crystal clear today as there were 230 years ago. An Iron Curtain to our south? Not if I can help it.
Go here to read more:
http://www.weneedafence.com/
Copyright 2005 Thomas J Wolfenden
5 comments:
When I was younger, I asked my stepdad, "Why do they call you guys wet-backs?" Although he was born here, he explained his point of view. I agree that this new idea is a little extreme, and on the other hand, if we do need to control illegal entry into this country, how would they go about it?
That is crazy shit. Absolutely crazy.
that is exteme and very scary. I know they need control but it sounds too crazy in my opinion. They need more border patrol or something not a big ass concrete fence--where I'm imagining Hitler days or something thinking about it and reading the materials.
It is very scary when you sit back and think of the ramafications
Nice commentary.
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