| Submit your comments on this article |
| Home Front: WoT |
| McConnell : Iraqi terrorists caught along Mexico-US border |
| 2007-08-25 |
| President Bush's top intelligence aide has confirmed that Iraqi terrorists have been captured coming into the United States from Mexico. The confirmation comes from National Intelligence Director Mike McConnell, who talked about the situation in an interview with the El Paso Times recently. "Coming up through the Mexican border is a path," McConnell said. "Now, are they doing it in great numbers? No, because we're finding them and we're identifying them and we've got watch lists and we're keeping them at bay." But, he said, "There are numerous situations where people are alive today because we caught them (terrorists)." Intelligence officials say the numbers and details of such situations are classified, but McConnell pointed as an example to Mahmoud Youssef Kourani, who entered the United States through Tijuana, Mexico, in 2001, and later pleaded guilty to helping raise money for Hezbollah, which has been designated by the U.S. government as a terrorist organization. The goal, McConnell said, is for terrorists to gain admittance to the United States, and then produce "mass casualties." "You've got committed leadership. You've got a place to train. They've got trainers, and they've got recruits," McConnell told the newspaper. "The key now is getting recruits in. So if your key is getting recruits in, how would you do that?" McConnell's office did reveal some numbers, during fiscal 2006, there were 14 Iraqi nationals caught trying to enter the U.S. illegally, while so far in 2007, that number is 16. "Now some we caught, some we didn't," McConnell told the newspaper. "The ones that get in – what are they going to do? They're going to write home. So it's not rocket science; word will move around." Also revealed was that the U.S. Customs and Border Protection intercepted 60 Iraqis crossing the nation's southwestern border in 2006 who were seeking asylum in the U.S., while that number so far in 2007 is 178. The Times report said a U.S. intelligence analyst said there's been evidence that human smugglers, or coyotes, are telling Iraqis to ask for amnesty if they are caught. The typical scenario is this: Forged documents are used to get an Iraqi into a country in South or Central America. Since travel from country to country is allowed without visas in many locations there, they work their way north to the U.S. border. McConnell told the newspaper the numbers are classified, but there have been a relatively small number of people with known links to terrorist groups who have been caught at that point. Kourani, for example, apparently paid a Mexican Consulate official in Lebanon $3,000 for a Mexican visa and then was smuggled into the United States in the trunk of a car. He was sentenced to more than four years in prison after admitting he helped raise funds for Hezbollah. When the newspaper asked U.S. Rep. Silvestre Reyes, D-Texas, of the U.S. House Intelligence Committee, about the situation, he said, "It's not something we would talk about." "We have had intelligence about al-Qaida identifying Latin America as a potential or prospective area where they could come through, but frankly, I'm surprised that the director would make definitive statements like that because, even if it were true, you wouldn't want to publicize that," Reyes told the Times. McConnell was senior vice president with Booz Allen Hamilton, focusing on intelligence and national security, before being appointed to his current post by Bush in February. He previously was the director of the National Security Agency and served as a member of the Director of Central Intelligence senior leadership team before then. |
| Posted by:anonymous5089 |
| #12 Illegal Immigration, MEXICO I'd join the discussion more often guys but most of my blood has boiled off. SHUT THE FUCKING BORDERS |
| Posted by: Red Dawg 2007-08-25 20:39 |
| #11 Get the Chinese to build a wall similar to the Great Wall. It'll be a tourist attraction for generations and stop the influx cold. Demand actual cultural assimilation before anyone talks about increasing the number of legal immigrants. The multicultural mindset is half the problem. End the anchor baby concept. |
| Posted by: rjschwarz 2007-08-25 17:17 |
| #10 How many innocent Americans will have to die needlessly before closing the Mexican border becomes a priority for our political traitor elite? They'll wait for a water reservoir to be poisoned or a nuke to go off first. |
| Posted by: gorb 2007-08-25 16:11 |
| #9 I think that Moose and Glenmore may be on to something. Could it be that we're purposefully leaving an obvious open door in place to draw the enemy to it, rather than another, less watched entry point? |
| Posted by: Robjack 2007-08-25 15:23 |
| #8 Here's the El Paso Time story. |
| Posted by: lotp 2007-08-25 15:10 |
| #7 they will never specify or quantify who or how many have been caught because it puts a face on the terror entrance. That would spur the American people to rise up and demand "where's the GODDAMN FENCE?" |
| Posted by: Frank G 2007-08-25 14:37 |
| #6 Zen, unfortunately, many. Then and only then will the "elites" see this is more important. Unless the attack occurs on the Upper East Side of Manhattan or the Hamptons or Martha's Vineyard will the elites ever consider it a priority. Not until it is "Our Kind, Deah" who get their ox gored. |
| Posted by: eLarson 2007-08-25 14:28 |
| #5 If the story is true (WND is wrong sometimes) and we ARE catching Iraqi terrorists entering through Mexico, then either: 1) a lot more are getting through uncaught, or 2) something like 'moose suggests IS going on, or 3) they're not actually terrorists, but ex-terrorists (e.g. Baathists), coming to the US because they can and it is far better than staying in Iraq. |
| Posted by: Glenmore 2007-08-25 14:05 |
| #4 We can seal the border to terrorists now, and worry about Mexicans later, because we can do something, and on the cheap now, that will stop terrorists in a week or two: Pay Mexicans a bounty for them. Anywhere from $100, to $50,000 for a real top of the line non-Mexican bad guy, paid to Mexicans for a phone call of where the non-Mexicans are crossing. In exchange, they get a seven digit code number. If whoever we arrest is a non-Mexican, they win. If we don't catch them, they don't get paid. Up here, that much money is tiny, but down there it would be like winning the Powerball jackpot. No non-Mexican could get near the border without us finding out about it. Hell, even their own mules would take their money, and then turn them in--an old custom. Best of all, it is so relatively inexpensive to do that the US government doesn't even have to be involved. An individual or a group could chip in and set it up. All they need is a phone number and some money, and to let the Mexicans know, and the tips will roll in. |
| Posted by: Anonymoose 2007-08-25 13:54 |
| #3 I neglected to mention how thousands of Americans are already being killed each year at the hands of Mexican illegal |
| Posted by: Zenster 2007-08-25 13:37 |
| #2 Zen, unfortunately, many. Then and only then will the "elites" see this is more important. |
| Posted by: Brett 2007-08-25 13:31 |
| #1 How many innocent Americans will have to die needlessly before closing the Mexican border becomes a priority for our political traitor elite? |
| Posted by: Zenster 2007-08-25 13:26 |