U.S. takes border war on the road / Boats being sunk near Ecuador

[Tinoire]

U.S. takes border war on the road

Boats being sunk near Ecuador

By Bruce Finley
Denver Post Staff Writer

Manta, Ecuador - U.S. counterterrorism officials have set up a high-seas gantlet deploying Coast Guard cutters off Latin America and arresting foreign nationals trying to leave their own countries.

Coast Guard crews have blocked at least 37 Ecuadoran boats and detained more than 4,575 suspected illegal migrants over the past four years, records show. Then, over the past two years, they've sunk a dozen emptied migrant boats they deemed "unseaworthy" - setting them ablaze and firing on them with their .50-caliber guns

(snip)

"The president has authority to secure the borders of the United States," said Lt. Cmdr. Brad Kieserman, operations legal chief at U.S. Coast Guard headquarters in Washington, D.C.

Not only off Ecuador, but "anywhere in the world," Kieserman said, Coast Guard and Navy ships will "go to the source of transnational crime and interdict it before it gets to the United States."

(snip)

"Before, I was feeling good about American people being down here. Now, I don't want to see them. We suffer so much because of these people."

(snip)

"To have U.S. ships off the coast of Ecuador sinking boats is not the best public relations for the United States," said Robert Leiken, director of immigration and security studies at the Nixon Center think tank in Washington.

(snip)

http://www.denverpost.com/Stories/0,1413,36~11676~2606736,00.html

[Spinzonner]

1. What's the difference between this and piracy ?

[raifield]

2. We're doing it

:eyes:

Not only off Ecuador, but "anywhere in the world," Kieserman said, Coast Guard and Navy ships will "go to the source of transnational crime and interdict it before it gets to the United States."

By that logic, we can interdict ships off the coast of say, China? Russa? Strange world, this.

[Ian David]

3. It's only a matter of time

Eventually, we'll have our own version of the USS Liberty incident. Just wait until we attack the wrong boat.

[hvn_nbr_2]

10. Only difference: Our boats don't fly skull & cross-bones flag.

[DELUSIONAL]

4. Tell me -- JUST who are the terrorists??

So if the US can go anywhere they damned well please and sink ships and whatever -- does that mean that other countries can do the same thing?

Just who the hell are the terrorists?? WHO is the worlds biggest Terrorist???

[HuckleB]

6. Exactly. Took the words out of my fingertips.

[Fridays Child]

5. Bush Doctrine of Pre-emption, aka "US Rides Shotgun on the World"

[Judi Lynn]

7. They go SO FAR from our own shores on this "mission," don't they?

From the article:

U.S. gunners "sink boats to show the power they have to stop migrants, to show the other fishermen not to (get involved) ... They board with machine guns, put everyone on the floor, tie hands," Moreiro-Vegos said.
(snip)

Gunboat diplomacy

Some analysts see this as contemporary gunboat diplomacy. If foreign armed forces stopped U.S. boats in this way, "we'd call it an act of war," said John Pike, director of the Washington think tank Global Security. "There is no world government to enforce international law. It's always been the case that the strong do what they can, and the weak do what they must."
(snip)

How damned sad for everyone.

Here's the map from the article Tinoire posted. I can't believe they would go so far away to do this. Inconceivable. _Bush is flexing his taxpayer-funded muscles in every corner of the world. Big fella!




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[Judi Lynn]

8. This is an important story. I'm kicking!

[muriel_volestrangler]

9. Wow. Imperialism at its most egregious.

Or should we just call it piracy? It's a close call. The moment they injure anyone during these acts, it's definitely the latter.

[Megahurtz]

11. going anywhere in the world

they want and doing this??? Unbelievable!!!

And they just assume that everyone just wants to flock to this fucking glorious country.:puke:

Don't flatter yourselves.