Drone Proliferation Issues at Cato Institute

What do Predators, Shadow Hawks, Tarantula Hawks, Reapers, Guardians, and Global Hawks have in common? 

No, they are not all predator species. Yes, they are all flying the skies of North America. And yes they are all drones, or what their breeders call Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs.)  

Although produced (mainly in the aviation-manufacturing complexes of Southern California) by military contractors, the drones in domestic airspace are unmanned but generally unarmed. For the most part, they are data-gathering “eyes in the sky” but lacking attack capabilities – although some smaller drones for law enforcement are being outfitted for possible taser strikes on criminals. 

General Atomics, Honeywell, Vanguard Defense Industries, Northrop Grumman, Lockheed Martin are turning out flocks of drones for the Pentagon – more than $20 billion in UAV contracts in this century’s first decade. 

The U.S. military has been experimenting with remotely piloted drones for several decades. The operational concept guiding drone development was their role in what the military and the intelligence community calls ISR – Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance.  It wasn’t until the U.S. military stepped up its presence in Afghanistan after the terrorist strikes of Sept. 11, 2001 that the Predator drones previously employed for ISR started carrying ordnance – largely missiles – payloads, thus opening up a form of air warfare.

It is commonly said that drones are especially well-suited for the so-called three Ds  – dull, dirty, and dangerous missions. All three types of missions stem from the unmanned character of UAVs. 

Although the drones require remote piloted and extensive crews to sift through data and to manage the launch-and-recovery operations of all UAV flights, the unmanned systems don’t directly put the lives of operators at risk in dirty (entering contaminated areas) or dangerous (entering conflict zones) missions. 

At home and in the close abroad (Mexico), the drone proliferation seen in U.S. counterterrorism and war-fighting mission since 2001 is increasingly paralleled by the deployment of drones on “dull” missions that take advantage of the capacity of UAVs to loiter for long intervals – as part of border security, law enforcement, and drug war missions. 

The surge of interest by law enforcement agencies -- the Department of Homeland Security, U.S. Northern Command and the Justice Department, as well as by advocacy groups such as the House Unmanned Systems Caucus and the Association of Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Systems International -- in drone deployment for these missions has not been accompanied by the congressional oversight and public debate necessary to ensure that drone operations don’t violate the civil rights, privacy, and human rights of all those subject to domestic ISR operations. 

DHS insists, for example, that its Predator missions are fundamental to gaining “situational awareness” – the same terminology used by the U.S. military in “war-fighting” missions.  If subject to proper oversight and regulations, UAVs could increase public safety and U.S. homeland security without putting constitutional and internationally stipulated rights at risk. 

Thus far, however, these checks and balances are not in place.  Nor are these safeguards even being properly considered by U.S. federal, state, and local authorities. 

(As part of an initiative by the Cato Institute to spark more discussion about drone deployments, I am participating in a online forum in Cato Unbound, the institute’s monthly magazine.

Here is a link to the lead essay, “License to Kill” by David Cortright: 

http://www.cato-unbound.org/?p=5591

I will publish the response in the next blog post.)

Big Government, Big Fence on Arizona Border

CounterPunch, January 11, 2012 | Article

By Tom Barry





Time has worn down embossed lettering on the bronze plaque on the 6-ft. obelisk marking the U.S.-Mexico border.

My friend and I had stopped to look at the boundary monument, and were trying to decipher the lettering (English on north side of monument, Spanish on south side) when we hear a vehicle stop. Looking up we saw one of the green-and-white Border Patrol trucks that seem almost as common as cactus and mesquite in southeastern Arizona.

Leaning out her window, a friendly female face framed by an olive Border Patrol cap.

Seeing that we were just two gringos, she smiled, explaining: “I saw some people and came by to take a look.”

She was talking to us through the newly constructed border fence that runs six miles east from the Douglas port-of-entry. The border monument was on the south side of the massive steel border fence that stands, on the average, 18-ft high, making the iron and concrete monument seem puny and all the more dated.

It’s hard, though, to stay friendly on the border which in many areas have become an occupied zone on the northern side while new border fortifications make the Mexico borderland seem like a prison.

Irritated, I mutter back, “Yes, there are people over here.”

This border monument (No. 84) is one of several that stand along the “Internacional,” the road marks the northern edge of “AP” — as Agua Prieta residents commonly call their town of almost 200,000.

Looking out in Agua Prieta at new border fence/ Photo by Tom Barry


In erecting the border fence, the U.S. government has effectively ceded ground to Mexico. The old monuments establishing the dividing line between the two nations stand about three feet on the Mexican side of the fence.

East of El Paso, the Rio Grande/Rio Bravo defines the border east to where river empties into the Gulf of Mexico. But west of El Paso there are no natural boundaries marking which side of the Sonoran and Chihuahuan deserts are in which country.

Following the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo of 1848 and the Gadsen Treaty of 1853, U.S. territory grew by a third and Mexico ceded its northern territories – as a result of the U.S. conquests in the Mexican-American War and a purchased price of $25 million.

The federal government set about marking the new border in 1853 with a string of stone monuments extending from the Pacific coast to El Paso.

But the iron obelisk my friend and I were looking at was not the original marker but one of 276 stone and metal monuments erected every 8,000 meters or so along the border in 1895-96.

During the last half of the nineteenth century the border boomed with mining, ranching, and the coming of the railroad. With the earlier stone monuments in ruins, the U.S. and Mexican governments in 1892 created the International Boundary Commission (later renamed the International Boundary and Water Commission when water issues became contentious) to survey the border.

This monument was result of that survey work, and its bilingual signage a demonstration of the binational accord (for the most part) over course of the line in the sand separating the two nations.

That was before the Mexican Revolution of 1910-17 engulfed Mexico, and before the birth of a modern Mexican nationalism. Today, the relations between the two governments are generally close – brought together first with the North American Free Trade Agreement and most recently with U.S. support for the Mexican drug war.

Yet never before have the people and land of the United States and Mexico been so divided.

Memorial for Lamadrid, shot in back on fence/ Tom Barry.


Between the twin cities of Agua Prieta and Douglas, the divide is stark – and sometimes brutal.

Just down from the border monument is an altar dedicated to the memory of Carlos Lamadrid, a 19-year Agua Prieta resident who died on March 21, 2011 while attempting to climb the fence into Mexico. After a high-speed pursuit by the Border Patrol, Lamadrid, who was a U.S. citizen and was enrolled in the nearby Cochise College, abandoned his truck, and was shot four times in the back by a Border Patrol agent. 

The Border Patrol had received a tip that Lamadrid was transporting marijuana – and 48 pounds of the substance were later found in his truck. In an attempt to divert the attention of the pursuing Border Patrol agents, cohorts of Lamadrid on the south side of the fence threw rocks at the agents and their vehicles – and one agent responded by shooting the youth in the back, killing him.

His family has filed a wrongful death suit. Family and friends had erected a similar memorial to Lamadrid on the Douglas side of the borderline on the spot that he fell to the ground from Border Patrol bullets. But they had to remove the memorial monument late last year to make way for the construction of the new border fence.

Bigger and Vastly More Expensive Fencing

In the past several months the Department of Homeland Security has replaced the 12-ft. high border fence that was erected in 1994 from metal aircraft "landing mats" discarded by the military.

The new fence, which extends six miles east from the port of entry, is a massive structure. It seems impenetrable, with closely spaced steel columns or bollards rising at least 18-ft above the ground and secured by a concrete foundation that is 6-8 ft. deep. Sheer metal plating, approximately 5-ft. high, spans the highest reaches of the fence on its Mexico side, further obstructing potential fence jumpers.

For the Border Patrol, another advantage of the new border fortification is that agents can now see through the fence to monitor activity on the Mexican side. The new fencing on the Douglas-Agua Prieta border is the same design used last year in Nogales.

Bigger and better, the new fencing costs $4.14 million to construct.

“This fence project is a critical component to enhancing the safety and security of not only Border Patrol agents, but the community as well,” said Tim Sullivan, Patrol Agent in Charge of the Douglas station.

Gustavo Lozano of the Nogales-based Fronteras Desiguales [Unequal Borders], advocates for the rights of border residents, said the new fencing sends a “very hostile message especially here in what we call ‘Ambos Nogales.’”

“We think of the two Nogaleses as very unified, as one community separated by a border. But when our government comes up with crazy and stupid ideas like a bigger fence, it’s clearly sending a message to regular people,” Lozano told the Nogales International newspaper.

Border Patrol watching "the line" in Douglas/ Tom Barry.


Driving back north along the Chiricahua Mountains up to Road Forks intersection on I-10, I saw more than a dozen Border Patrol vehicles and only a few private cars. Border security is not just a fortified borderline – complete with new steel fencing, stadium lights, and sensors – but also a U.S. borderland where the Border Patrol seems like an occupying force.

Illegal crossings have dropped dramatically as the number of Border Patrol agents in the adjoining Douglas, Arizona and Lordsburg, New Mexico districts have quadrupled, leaving agents with little to do. On the way north, I was followed two times by Border Patrol vehicles, one driving closely behind me at night without lights .

What the hell is the government doing with our money?

That sounds like a gripe of a right-wing populist. Traveling the border and seeing the massive waste associated with border security certainly makes you feel more sympathetic with the anti-big government right – except that anti-immigrant backlash and retrograde nationalism add up to calls by these same anti-big government rightists for more government spending for border fortifications, drug wars, and immigrant crackdowns.

No doubt, however, that there is something to the anti-big government politics, especially when security – national, homeland, border, etc. – is evoked.

Tom Barry directs the TransBorder Project at the Center for International Policy and is the author of Border Wars from MIT Press. See his work at http://borderlinesblog.blogspot.com/

Copyright 2012 CounterPunch. This article was originally published here.

Join Border Wars Policy Group to follow/discuss border security, immigrant imprisonment, and drug policy issues at: 

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Answers to the Border Drone Numbers Game

CBP has answers to the apparent inconsistencies and errors that I have pointed out in previous postings. Here, here, and here.

In response to a request to clarify the confusing and ostensibly errant numbers, CBP warned “it would be unfair to categorize UAS [unmanned aerials systems] by only using drug interdiction or border crossing metrics.”

Yes, ideally CBP would measure progress in securing the homeland by achievements by other measures, such as its role in countering terrorism and keeping the homeland secure – whatever that means.

The border agency further explains that:

CBP deploys and operates the UAS only after careful examination where the UAS can be most responsibly aid in countering threats of our Nation's security.  As threats change, CBP adjusts its enforcement posture accordingly and may consider moving the location of assets.

Then, the agency trots out the old force-multiplier assertion:

The UAS can stay in the air for up to 20 hours at a time-something no other aircraft in the federal inventory can do.  In this manner it is a force multiplier, providing aerial surveillance support for border agents by investigating sensor activity in remote areas to distinguish between real or perceived threats, allowing the boots on the ground force to best allocate their resources and efforts. 

That’s true. The Predators are called out when ground sensors signal movement. But as OAM’s (Office of Air and Marine) Major General Michael Kostelnik explained at the July 15, 2010 Border and Marine Security subcommittee hearing:

At a standard 15 sensor activations, 12 of them might just be the wind. Two might be animals. One might be a group of migrants, and one might be a big group carrying drugs.

If there is a plausible explanation as to why there has been no increase in the number of drug seizures and immigrant apprehensions despite a jump from 10,000 to 12,000 hours of drone flights, it may be, as CBP wrote in response to the request to clarify its numbers, that: 

UAS is not exclusive to the border security mission. CBP OAM leverages the Predator-B and Guardian UAS as a force multiplier during National Special Security Events and emergency and disaster response efforts, including those of the U.S. Secret Service, Federal Emergency Management Agency, USCG, and other Department of Homeland Security partners.

In other words, the border Predators haven’t been on the border but have been deployed elsewhere on homeland security missions.

Which, would mean, that despite the increased number of Predators and Guardians assigned for border security duty, the drones aren’t patrolling the border and coasts – a scenario, if true, would likely upset all the border security hawks who insist that these drones are needed to secure the border.

It’s more likely, however, that CBP/OAM has from beginning been cooking the books and manipulating -- and that no one has called them on the inconsistencies.

Asked in the same query to show how CBP/OAM disaggregated the drone-related numbers from overall seizure and apprehension data and for the documentation to support its UAV flight-time declarations, CBP/OAM had no response.

Join Border Wars Policy Group to follow/discuss border security, immigrant imprisonment, and drug policy issues at: 

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Declining Immigrant and Marijuana Numbers as Border Predators Increase

Border state politicians like Governors Jan Brewer and Rick Perry together with an array of congressional Democrats and Republicans – notably the leadership of the homeland security oversight committees (including Michael McCaul, Henry Cuellar, and Candice Miller) insist that the increased deployment of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) is fundamental to securing the border.

But as Predator drones have increased, the number of marijuana seizures and arrests of illegal border crossers attributed to drone surveillance has dropped precipitously.

During the six months of operation of the ill-fated first border Predator (which crashed in the Arizona desert in April 2006), the drone accounted for nearly a third of the total 2005-2011 drone-related apprehensions and nearly one-fifth of total drug seizures. 

At congressional hearings since 2005, OAM officials routinely report on the drone program with anecdotes and tributes to the wondrous technological capacities of the UAVs. Facts and figures, costs and benefits, and impact evaluations compared to other border security programs are, however, not routinely reported.

At the July 15, 2010 hearing of the House Homeland Security Committee, then chairman Democrat Bennie Thompson insisted that OAM provide the committee with specific data. Frustrated by CBP’s hyping its high-tech programs without offering any continuing failure to provide Congress with

CBP complied and later submitted that since the inception of the program in October 2005 through July 2010, OAM had flown drones 6,979 hours over the southwestern border, with 7,173 illegal immigrants apprehended and 39,049 pounds of narcotics (all marijuana, according to the July 2010 CBP report) seized.

In the four years since the crash of the first Predator, the border drone fleet had increased to five UAVs. Total UAV flight-time increased seven-fold the hours reported during the October 2005-April 2006 period, yet total drone-related apprehensions were only up three-fold while total drug seizures were up four-fold.

As the number of CBP/OAM drones rise, the productivity – measured by the traditional performance measures of immigrants detained and drugs seized – of the UAV program has dropped precipitously.

The most recent CBP numbers, cited in the agency’s Dec. 27 media release, raise new questions about the cost-benefit of the drone program. 

Flight time rose to approximately 12,000 hours. Yet the roughly 5,000 recent hours (since July 2010) of drone surveillance contributed, according to CBP’s own reporting, to only 325 new apprehensions and 7,000 pounds of marijuana.

To give some perspective on the drug haul attributed to UAV surveillance, in Arizona alone CBP seizes on average 3,500 pounds of marijuana every day – making a marijuana seizure every 1.7 hours. In the past couple of years the Border Patrol has seized approximately 2.5 million pounds of marijuana along the southwestern border.

CBP/OAM hails its “eyes in the sky” drone program has being “cost effective” and a “force multiplier.”

Setting aside the up-front costs of the $20 million drones and the additional maintenance expenses and contractor services fees, and counting only the hourly operational costs, CPB/OAM has spent $17.5 million keeping its drones flying about 5,000 hours over the past year and a half.

In an October media release announcing the acquisition of another Predator for border-security duty in Texas, CBP declared that it “has continued to leverage the Predator B to unprecedented success.”

CBP routinely describes its various border security operations as “unprecedented” success stories. Yet the never agency never cites the precedents involved or even attempts to explain how these precedents in border control have been surpassed by its new initiatives and spending.

If evaluated, as none of the DHS agencies do, in terms of costs and benefits, then the CBP UAV program spent (only in flight costs) $54,846 for every illegal immigrant identified (and later apprehended by Border Patrol teams) on the drone cameras and $2,500 for every pound of marijuana. That’s without factoring in the estimated $20 million that DHS spends for its Predators.

The Larger Threat Picture

Asked at Border and Marine Security subcommittee hearing if the Predators were worth the expense, Major General (Ret.) Kostelnik redirected the question away from actual achievements to the larger threat picture of protecting the homeland against unknown future threats. Kostelnik told the congressional oversight committee:

I think the UAVs in their current deployment are very helpful in terms of the missions we apply it for. I believe we are building a force for a threat and an experience we really haven't seen yet. It is something that is in the future.

Major General Kostelnik summarized his support for DHS strategy to deploy two dozen drones, telling the oversight committee: “So not only are they ongoing force multipliers for the agents and troops on the ground, but they are unique capabilities in unique circumstances.”

Members of the DHS oversight committees also cite national security threats as the rationale for their drone boosterism, and like the major general are equally vague about the specific character of the threats that would justify the billions of dollars needed to continue the CBP/OAM drone strategy.

Henry Cuellar, former chairman and currently ranking member of the Border Security and Marine Subcommittee, has become one of the most prominent boosters of DHS drone acquisition. The Democrat from South Texas and co-chair of the House Unarmed Systems Caucus, explained his enthusiasm for the Predators on the border in his opening statement to the July 15, 2010 subcommittee hearing:

UAVs are one more tool for us to stay steps ahead and leaps

above the threats that we face, and they can help deter and

prevent illegal activity and threats to terrorism against the United States. In the event of a National crisis, they will provide critical eyes in the sky for what we can't see or do from the ground.

DHS does not measure the progress and achievements of the program by the number of terrorists seized, drug lords and lieutenants captured, or “transnational criminal organizations” broken by its border security operations.

Instead, border security programs  -- whether traditional patrolling, the border fence, the “virtual wall” of SBInet, traditional air surveillance, or unmanned aerial surveillance -- continue to be measured by traditional border-control benchmarks: how many immigrants are captured and how many pounds of illegal drugs are seized.

It is a costly numbers game that has done little or nothing to resolve the country’s immigration policy challenges or the failures of its drug control policy. 

Join Border Wars Policy Group to follow/discuss border security, immigrant imprisonment, and drug policy issues at: 

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Marijuana Backpacking Transnational Criminals

Border Patrol early days/Arizona Historical Society

“Transnational criminal organizations.” That’s one of my Google Alerts, and in the past several months I’ve been continually alerted to instances of successful operations against TCOs by agencies of the Department of Homeland Security.

One might assume from the flurry of media releases from Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) that the Obama administration’s new Strategy to Combat Transnational Organized Crime is working.

But most of the reported strikes against TCOs involve Mexican illegal border crossers carrying 50-60 pound burlap bags packed with marijuana.

One recent release reported the arrest of six Mexican nationals, including three juveniles, from Sinaloa packing in 400 pounds of marijuana across the remote Quijotoa Mountain southwest of Tucson.

Another recent purported TCO-arrest also involved six Mexicans carrying similar loads of pot through the Sonoran desert near Gila Bend southwest of Phoenix.

All those arrested – identified by CBP as “suspected smugglers” -- eventually will face deportation, but first they will, if convicted, face jail or prison time.

Border Patrol agents caught another group of three marijuana backpackers the same day carrying 25 pounds of marijuana, and seized an AK-47 from the group.

In its media releases, CBP states that it “is charged with keeping terrorists and terrorist weapons out of the country while enforcing hundreds of U.S. laws.”

Border Patrol in Douglas, Arizona/Photo by Tom Barry

That language dates from the post-9/11 creation of the Department of Homeland Security.

And the following language dates from the Obama administration’s new strategy to combat transnational criminal organizations and its reframing of the “war on drugs” and drug-trafficking organizations (DTOs):

The Border Patrol uses a combination of proven technology, intelligence, and specialty units to target transnational criminal organizations. By impacting their ability to transport contraband throughout the United States, Border Patrol agents have made significant progress toward establishing a secure and safe border environment.

Clearly border security operations and infrastructure have made it more difficult, costly, and dangerous to import illegal drugs into the United States. But it is not at all clear that the border security buildup has brought significant progress toward creating a secure and safe border.

Instead of making the border safer and more secure, the increased border security operations and the associated combat against TCOs have transformed traditional activities of the U.S.-Mexico border – the crossing of illegal immigrants and drugs – into activities that routinely involve high crossing fees and weapons.

No doubt that U.S. border security operations are “impacting their ability to transport contraband,” but the drug trafficking organizations continue to supply the expanding U.S. drug market. Border Patrol agents continue to catch backpacking marijuana smugglers, but this doesn’t mean that these apprehensions “target transnational criminal organizations,” as CBP falsely claims.

Dubious Border Drone Numbers

The overall low number of apprehensions and drug seizures attributed to drone surveillance on the border raise new questions about the efficacy and cost-effectiveness of the unmanned Predator drones deployed by the Department of Homeland Security. 


Even if the numbers of pounds of seized marijuana and of illegal immigrant border crossers were much higher,  the same questions might be asked given the failure of DHS to make a strong case that cannabis and immigrants threaten the security of the homeland.


Yet another problem with the border drone program is that the declared numbers are carelessly formulated by Customs and Border Protection and by its Office of Air and Marine. What is more, it’s unclear whether the number of apprehensions and seizures CBP/OAM does disseminate are entirely attributable to UAV surveillance.

First, it’s not clear whether the cited seizures and arrests are solely attributable to drone surveillance.  CBP and OAM officials have been ambiguous about this. Most agency media releases say that Predator surveillance “has led” to the reported drug seizures and immigrant apprehensions.

Yet other media releases and CBP statements to congressional oversight committees fudge the role of the drones, saying only that drones “contributed to” or were “involved” in the actions that led to the seizures and arrests.

Second, CBP is careless in providing its numbers of arrests, seizures, and flight hours, raising questions about the veracity of the numbers.

The Dec.  27 media release refers to the seizures and arrests during so many drone flight hours – 12,000 hours of drone flight-time since 2005.

But CBP/OAM has over the past year given the media, Congress, and this writer the same arrest and seizure numbers (46,600 pounds of narcotics and 7,500 apprehensions) for varying numbers of reported hours flight-time – for 10,000, 11,500, and mostly recently 12,000 hours of drone air time.

CBP/OAM’s numbers game also includes variations of the numbers of arrests and seizures for the same number of flight hours. Celebrating reaching 10,000 hours of drone air time in June 2011, CBP/OAM released a press statement asserting that the those 10,000 hours of “UAS Predator operations have resulted in the apprehension of 4,865 undocumented aliens and 238 smugglers; the seizure of 33,773 pounds of contraband.”

Setting aside questions about why CBP/OAM can’t get its current numbers straight, the integrity and value of the drone program are also called into doubt by the unimpressive rate in the increased number of drug seizures and immigrant apprehensions reported by the agencies since 2006.

As more Predators are added to the CBP/OAM fleet, the rate of arrests and seizures has dropped dramatically.

Crash and Burn

CBP deployed its first Predator drone in October 2005. Manufactured by General Atomics in the San Diego area, the Predator drone also came with a General Atomics technical team and pilot to operate the drone.

If evaluated against the total numbers attributed to the border Predators since 2005, the quantity of marijuana seized and the number of immigrants apprehended during the first six months of border drone surveillance are outstanding.

When announcing that it was purchasing its second Predator, CBP said that “during its operational period” its first Predator flew 959 hours and supported 2,309 arrests, contributed to the seizure of four vehicles, and the capture of 8,267 pounds of illegal drugs.

That operational period was from October 2005 to April 2006, when the Predator crashed in the Arizona desert near Nogales.

Crash investigators from the National Transportation Safety Board found that the contract pilot shut off the drone’s engine when he thought he was redirecting the drone’s camera. As Major General Michael Kostelnik, who directs OAM, explained to the Border and Marine Subcommittee of the House Homeland Security Committee, “There was a momentary loss link that switched to the second control” -- and the Predator fell out of the sky.

The safety board issued CBP 17 safety recommendations to address deficiencies in OAM’s drone program.

CBP/OAM has not, however, estimated the cost of this strategy. Nor have the agencies reported on the cost of the program thus far. A review of DHS purchasing reveals that the department spent $242 million in drone contracts with General Atomics.

The crash didn’t deter CBP/OAM, which has steadily increased the homeland security drone fleet – which now includes seven Predators and two more expensive maritime variants called Guardians, also manufactured by General Atomics. By 2016 CBP hopes to deploy a fleet of 24 Predators and Reapers protecting the homeland.

A recent report by the Government Accounting Office on CBP’s high-tech border-security programs noted that the UAVs have “significant infrastructure costs with the highest cost risk.” Yet DHS continues to burn through its ever-expanding border security budget without apparent concern for cost-effectiveness or aptness in pursuing the DHS counterterrorism mission. 

Join Border Wars Policy Group to follow/discuss border security, immigrant imprisonment, and drug policy issues at: 

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Playing the Numbers Game with Border Drones

For decades, the Border Patrol has annually boasted of the millions of pounds of illegal drugs it has seized and the number of immigrants detained. 

It’s a practice that border scholar Peter Andreas aptly calls “the numbers game.”

Since the creation of the DHS illegal immigrants and drugs aren’t just illegal, they are now classified as “dangerous people and goods.”

In fiscal year 2011 CBP reports that it seized “nearly five million pounds of narcotics.” But it fails to note that the domestic consumption of illegal drugs, especially marijuana, is steadily increasing despite these monumental numbers or that most of these “narcotics” enter the country from Mexico despite a massive buildup in border security and U.S. support for the Mexican drug war.

In its latest Predator announcement, OAM tried playing the numbers game, but raised questions about the integrity of the numbers in the process. According to OAM:

Since the inception of the UAS program, CBP has flown more than 12,000 UAS hours in support of border security operations and CBP partners in disaster relief and emergency response, including various state governments and the Federal Emergency Management Agency. The efforts of this program has led to the total seizure of approximately 46,600 pounds of illicit drugs and the detention of approximately 7,500 individuals suspected in engaging in illegal activity along the Southwest border [author highlighting].

One problem is the low numbers of seizures and apprehensions attributed to drone surveillance.

Another is that all the “narcotics” seizures CBP/OAM attributes to drone surveillance consist of bundles of Mexican-grown marijuana.  That’s understandable since marijuana constitutes almost 100% of the drug seizures between the ports of entry along the southwestern border – more than 99% along the Arizona border.

But is this small quantity of marijuana spotted by the Predators worth their $20 million price tag (including surveillance systems and support)? That’s not a question that the congressional oversight committees have asked DHS.

Nor has DHS asked itself questions about comparative costs and benefits of border control measures.

Instead, it has poured steadily increasing budgets for border security into all three of its defined instruments of border control, what it calls the “three pillars of border security,” namely personnel or “boots on the ground,” tactical infrastructure (border fence and other physical barriers,” and technology including the “virtual fence” of ground-based electronic surveillance and aerial surveillance.

In CBP-think, all three pillars are equally important and all components of these border-security pillars are equally fundamental to protecting homeland security.

Unimpressive Numbers

Since 2005 the Border Patrol has seized 13.5 pounds of cannabis. This does not include the border marijuana seizures by CBP agents working at the POEs or by other federal and local law enforcement officials.

Yet OAM, which first deployed in 2005, reports that drone surveillance has led to the seizure of a mere 46,600 pounds of marijuana. Drones, then, played a role in seizing less than one percent of the Border Patrol’s total marijuana in the past six years – to be exact only 0.003%.

On the “dangerous people” front, CBP reports that in the six years of the UAV program, drones have contributed to the apprehension of 7,500 suspected criminals detained. That’s small potatoes when compared to CBP’s overall number of detentions since 2005 – 5.7 million immigrants, including the 327,000 detained in 2011. Expressed as a percentage, amounts to only 0.001%.

Just as DHS eschews cost-benefit analysis, it also doesn’t apply risk analysis.  All illegal border crossers and all contraband fall into the broad post-9/11 mission of protecting the homeland against “dangerous people and goods.”  If all are dangerous, then DHS argues that all are targets, and the UAV numbers, while small, still demonstrate that these agencies are on target and on mission. 

Typically, CBP frames its UAVs as a fundamental instrument in combatting terrorism, even though no terrorists have ever been spotted or captured.

CBP says that the Predators play a “lead role in CBP’s critical anti-terrorism mission.”

Two Predators also patrol the northern border, and Cong. Candice Miller, the Republican from Michigan who chairs the House Subcommittee on Border and Marine Security, complains that CBP is slighting northern border security.

The northern border Predators, however, haven’t led to a single interception of an illegal border crosser in the past two years.