U.S. MILITARIZING BORDERS IN CENTRAL AMERICA
May 8, 2021 CounterVortex
Tecun Uman
by Kevin Lapp, Jurist
The Biden Administration recently came to agreements with Mexico, Honduras, and Guatemala to increase their border enforcement. These agreements aim to reduce the number of migrants who are able to make their way to the US-Mexico border by extending American border defense thousands of miles south of that border. And they do so in a very American fashion—through deterrence achieved by militarizing borders. Now, the US is outsourcing the militarization to other nations.
According to White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki, Mexico agreed to keep 10,000 troops at its southern border, Guatemala will add 1,500 police and military personnel to its southern border and set up 12 checkpoints along the migratory route through the country. Honduras will deploy 7,000 police and military to its border. Subsequent reports indicate that the US has agreed to train members of the Guatemalan task force that will be deployed to the country’s borders. What the US has offered in return, or promised not to do, in exchange, for these commitments is unclear.
The agreements are the latest effort by the United States to address the varying but continual flow of migrants arriving (many of them without authorization to enter) at its southern border. Most are from Mexico and the so-called Northern Triangle countries(Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador). These migrants are driven north by a combination of economic insecurity, violence, crime, governmental failures, COVID, natural disasters and environmental stress, and hope for a better life in the United States.
https://countervortex.org/u-s-militarizing-borders-in-central-america/
