bush reduces troops....along the US-Mexico border

[The Straight Story]

Effort to draw down troops on border draws mixed reactions
By Megan Scully CongressDaily August 10, 2007

The Bush administration began quietly last month to reduce by half the number of National Guard troops deployed along the U.S.-Mexico border, a move that has triggered objections from lawmakers and governors, but brought an expression of confidence by the chief of the Pentagon's National Guard Bureau that the drawdown would not impede border security operations.

In an interview this week, Lt. Gen. Steven Blum said the Guard -- which last year dispatched 6,000 troops to assist the Border Patrol -- is withdrawing personnel that are no longer needed because of the success of the mission over the last 14 months.

"We're pulling down specific skills and people from places where, over the last year, we don't need them because the Border Patrol's capabilities have come up in those areas, the number of agents has come up, the number of infrastructure has come up," Blum said.

His views are at odds with Southwest elected officials, who are battling the administration over the reductions. By next month, 3,000 troops will remain along the border, a reduction that was planned when President Bush announced the mission, dubbed Operation Jump Start, in May 2006.

http://www.govexec.com/story_page.cfm?articleid=37719&d...

Now I keep hearing that the terrarists is a coming here via the border, and bus is reducing the troops along there...which makes me wonder...either he does not believe that (and I think he has said more than once there is a threat of them sneaking here via the border) or he doesn't care.