Bombs away

Illegal Mexican immigrants wandering onto an Arizona bombing range are costing Iraq and Afghanistan bound US forces valuable training time:

Since July 2004, the training range has been shut down more than 500 times because of immigrants spotted on the range, causing a loss of more than 1,100 training hours, said Colonel James J. Cooney, the base's commanding officer.

''That's equivalent to almost 46 days of training. We're getting overrun here," he said in an interview. ''Any moment we take away from a Marine's experience base could cost him his life in combat."

Cooney said Marines intercepted more than 1,500 undocumented immigrants on the training range last year and, in the first three months of this year, more than 1,100. Base personnel detain the immigrants and call in Border Patrol agents to pick them up.

''I have to use Marines that aren't trained in that to do that, which puts me at a liability," said Cooney, a Boston College graduate. ''It's completely counterproductive to our whole training operation."

Keep the planes flying and the problem will go away, one way or the other.


Via: Clear and Present