A Boeing / Israeli Joint Venture - Spy Towers on the US Border

[donsu]

http://counterpunch.org/norrell07182007.html


Boeing has enlisted the aid of Elbit Systems, Israel's major defense contractor, to construct high-tech surveillance along the border of the U.S. and Mexico. So far, the high-tech fiasco is not working and Arizona residents are organizing a lawsuit to halt government spying on U.S. citizens.

Arivaca resident Margaret Keoppen is among those opposing the 98-foot spy tower in her community, part of Project 28 of the Secure Border Initiative.

With a spy viewing range of 10 miles, the spy tower is pointed at the good folks of Arivaca.

"This system is entirely experimental with unknown results and I don't wish to be used as a guinea pig with resulting harm to me, my family, my animals, area wildlife," Keoppen told Project 28.

In Tucson, the search for the biggest joke in town--the environmental assessment of the spy towers -- began at the public library.

"That's odd," said a research librarian, "there are no copies of it here." Diligent, the librarian plowed through the web and made a phone call.

A copy of the environmental assessment for the new high-tech border surveillance was finally located at the Arivaca library. In Arivaca, the draft copy of the assessment arrived on a Saturday in April, with no public notice.

A typed cover letter from U.S.Customs and Border Protection said residents had four days to respond, April 14 -- 18. The library was closed two of those days. Without phone calls from the librarians, no one would have known it was there. Few people had a chance to even read it.

-snip-

"You can not see the border from that spy tower, because of the mountains. The only thing you can see is Arivaca," says one woman living in this community of 2,500.
-long snip-
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read on, see what this hightech tower will do to life and how the other types of border towers are out of order.

shit is going to happen

[Me.]

1. How Convenient For Israel

They'll no longer have to engage people like convicted spy Franklin to ferret out our secrets

[soothsayer]

4. they already produce all our phone switching equipment, and thus can eavesdrop

all they want--don't they?

[Squatch]

2. Ah, good ol' Arivaca.

Been there many, many times. It's a weird town that seems to be the nexus of a dislocated "hippie" crowd, a disgruntled rancher crowd, and a constant flood of illegals that amble up Tres Bellotas Canyon and the Fresnal Split to the south.

Here's a picture of the local convenience store I took last summer:



And here is a view looking south from Fresnal Split to Tres Bellotas (Mexico is about 15 miles in the distance)



(On a related note, this is the exact spot where the NG team was "chased" off their EIT (Entry ID Team) location a few months ago by heavily armed men. Current ROE does not permit offensive rifle fire.)

[Taverner]

3. My guess is that these are also in place to keep people in

Rather than out...