[See also Cavalry to the Border! By  Henry McCulloch]

Two U.S. Representatives from Texas, joined by 17 border-county sheriffs from Texas, New Mexico and Arizona, have written a letter to Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta requesting that military materiel made surplus by U.S. troop withdrawals from Iraq and Afghanistan be redeployed to America's notorious sieve of a Southern border.[War surplus sought for U.S. security |2 lawmakers cite need at border with Mexico, By Jerry Seper, Washington Times, March 27, 2012]

This is an excellent idea.  Of course, it is unlikely to receive a reasonable hearing from Panetta or anyone else in the Obama Administration.  Nevertheless, it puts down a marker. It may force the Obama Administration to go even more blatantly on the record as being opposed to any real security measures along America's Mexican border—and this in a presidential election year.  So far, so good.

But the proposal, while worthy, is incomplete.  A true national defense proposal would involve the redeployment with all due speed to the United States of all U.S. forces from Iraq, Afghanistan, anywhere else they are in the Middle East (the Fifth Fleet excepted), Korea and Europe. 

U.S.-based expeditionary and strike forces can meet America's overseas defense needs on an as-required basis.  There is no need to garrison a vast number of foreign countries while—deliberately—leaving America's own frontiers unguarded.

The U.S. government's Middle Eastern misadventures are insane and serve no valid American interest. But perhaps the most irritating is the continued American presence in South Korea.  In 1950-1953, the United States, with some mostly British help, fought a war to protect South Koreans from North Koreans.  Americans have been sitting on Korea's DMZ for that purpose ever since, at American expense, presumably so South Koreans may live in peace without fear of being occupied by their Communist countrymen. 

Especially now that there no longer is a Soviet Union, one may question why that is America's job.  And one may certainly question why, if Americans at vast expense of blood and treasure over the years are making Korea safe for Koreans to live in, the U.S. government has permitted the immigration of millions of those self-same Koreans to the United States at the same time. 

One of the legion of examples of how U.S. policy is almost never conducted in Americans' interest.

I would take Representatives Poe and Cuellar's proposal a step further.  Don't simply send equipment to the Mexican border.  Send the troops whose equipment it is as well.  As they will be outward-facing, securing the border against incursions by rogue Mexican military and police forces as well as Mexican narcotraficantes and the Muslim terrorists who increasingly are their bedfellows, no issues arise under the Posse Comitatus Act.

A real Defend America program would base U.S. Army mobile forces along the Southern border, with armored cavalry regiments right along the border for reconnaissance and screening, and armored and mechanized infantry divisions echeloned behind them, under the command of corps headquarters.  Those Army forces would be supported, for tactical air support and reconnaissance, by U.S. Air Force tactical air forces.  On the seaward flanks, U.S. Navy and Marine Corps expeditionary forces would stand ready to secure those flanks as required, as well as be prepared to respond to out-of-area contingencies.  The U.S. Coast Guard would augment the naval forces in a drug-interdiction role in the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea, as well as along the Pacific and Atlantic coasts.

That would all make a huge change, infinitely for the better, in the American use of the U.S. armed forces, without maintaining huge overseas establishments (that invariably draw vast immigration in their wake; think of America's history with the Philippines and—again—Korea). 

But that would be America's front line.  Those forces defending America—for a change—would need to be supported by strict interior enforcement of U.S. immigration laws. 

As recent U.S. presidents have seen fit to round out the U.S. armed forces with ever-increasing numbers of foreign mercenaries, while simultaneously rotting the force from within through feminism and, now, homosexualism, the clock is ticking on how long America has before the forces deployed to the Mexican border are so Mexicanized themselves that they approach their task half-heartedly, or worse. 

Take a look at the U.S. Border Patrol, which seems to have become a full-employment program for Mexicans, a gross conflict of interest if ever there were one—and one that troubled President GW Bush not at all, and troubles Barack Hussein Obama even less, if that is possible.

It is not surprising that Rep. Ted Poe is making this proposal; he has been pretty stalwart about border issues. 

More noteworthy is the letter's other Congressional signer, Rep. Henry Cuellar—a Democratic Tex-Mexican.  His support may be a little harder for the Obama administration to ignore. 

All in all, a positive development for those who care about America's National Question.  Let's see how far it goes...

Henry McCulloch (email him) writes frequently for VDARE.COM.