National Guard Making Road Improvements at Border

The California National Guard, in the latest of a series of escalating drug-interdiction efforts along the U.S.-Mexico border, has launched a $1.2-million project to improve the maze of unpaved roads just north of the international boundary in San Diego.

The initiative, which began Oct. 14, has already drawn criticism from rights advocates concerned about what they perceive as the increasing “militarization” of the border zone.

Since 1988, the National Guard has increased drug-interdiction activities along the U.S.-Mexico border, including posting observation teams with Border Patrol agents and deploying troops alongside U.S. Customs Service inspectors at border ports of entry. The uniformed guardsmen do not make arrests, but only assist law enforcement agencies, officials say.

The purpose of the road-building project, National Guard officials said, is to aid the Border Patrol in its effort to stem the flow of illicit drugs across the border, which has long been a conduit for narcotics and other contraband. The effort is not directed at illegal immigrants, the National Guard says, and there are no plans to post troops for immigration enforcement.

But Border Patrol officials acknowledge that agents will use the roads principally for immigration enforcement, the patrol’s primary responsibility. Smugglers also make wide use of the dirt roads and tracks near the border, but officials said they hope that the improvements will assist enforcement agents more than the smugglers working the area.

“The Border Patrol uses the roads, and we’re just there to help them,” said Lt. Stan Zezotarski, a National Guard spokesman in Sacramento. “The purpose is drug interdiction.”

About 50 guardsmen from various engineering units and numerous pieces of earth-moving and other equipment are participating in the road improvements, the National Guard spokesman said. The hope, according to officials of the National Guard and the Border Patrol, is that better roads will improve the patrol’s ability to maneuver and to detect and apprehend traffickers.

However, in the sensitive, bicultural border area--where a U.S. proposal to build a 4-mile ditch died last year after running into fierce criticism--the increased presence of National Guard troops has already triggered opposition.

“The impression they’re giving is, ‘Hey, we’re going to regain control of that border even if we have to use military force,’ ” said Roberto Martinez, a longtime area activist who works with a Quaker group and closely monitors alleged abuses of immigrants by U.S.-based police agencies.

Among Martinez and other immigrant advocates, there are fears that the roads could be the prelude for new barriers, fencing and additional deployments of troops and agents in the border zone.

The road-building project is the brainchild of U.S. Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Coronado), who has pressed for the use of National Guard troops in a range of anti-drug functions along the border. The effort, according to letters provided by Hunter, is supported by Gov. George Deukmejian, Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney and Immigration and Naturalization Service Commissioner Gene McNary.

The project, involving roads covering about 16 miles of border from the Pacific east to the San Ysidro Mountains, is being funded with $1.2 million in Department of Defense money, the National Guard said. The effort, which began two weeks ago, is scheduled to last four months, officials said.

The rugged border strip in San Diego is crisscrossed by unpaved roads and trails favored by undocumented immigrants, but it is also used by traffickers. Smugglers have brought loads of marijuana, cocaine, heroin and other illegal drugs into the United States aboard vehicles and on the backs of hired hands, or “mules,” hired for the occasion.

“This will help us to do our job better,” said Ted Swofford, supervisory agent for the Border Patrol in San Diego, where almost 800 agents are based, the largest deployment of border guards in the country.

The Border Patrol’s principal mission is to detect and capture illegal immigrants. In the past year, the agency has arrested more than 1 million undocumented immigrants, most of them Mexican citizens.

However, patrol agents have seized huge quantities of drugs while performing their immigration duties. Border Patrol drug seizures along the U.S.-Mexico border have been rising exponentially in recent years, from San Diego to Brownsville, Tex. Just last month, Border Patrol agents seized more than 4,000 pounds of cocaine near Nogales, Ariz., the largest agency cocaine bust ever, after exchanging shots with smugglers.

The improved roads in the San Diego area will assist the agency’s immigration and anti-drug functions, said Swofford, the supervisory Border Patrol agent. “If it helps one, it leads to the other,” Swofford said.

The San Diego area is considered the primary corridor for illegal immigrants for the Los Angeles area and elsewhere in the U.S. interior. It also is a primary entry point for illicit drugs and other contraband from Mexico.

Last month, U.S. customs agents in San Diego discovered more than 4 tons of cocaine in the tank of a gas truck attempting to enter U.S. territory at the port of entry at Otay Mesa. It was the second-largest cocaine seizure ever in California, surpassed only by the 21 tons of cocaine seized in Sylmar last year.