US army unfurls fencing along border with Mexico

LAREDO, United States: They started work in the cool of the morning and moved quickly, uncoiling reel after reel of vicious-looking fencing and tying it with barbed wire to green poles hammered into the ground.

Over the course of three days, a gleaming, shoulders-high barrier of concertina-wire emerged like a silver snake along a lush riverbank, stretching as far as the eye could see. This was the work of 100 or so American troops from the 19th Engineer Battalion, based in Fort Knox, Kentucky.

Rather than finding themselves in a far-off warzone, the soldiers are in Laredo, a busy border town overlooking a stretch of the Rio Grande river in south west Texas, carrying out controversial orders from President Donald Trump.

He has sent about 5,800 troops to the border to forestall the arrival of large groups of Central American migrants travelling through Mexico and towards the US, in a move critics decry as a costly political stunt to galvanize supporters ahead of midterm elections earlier this month.

Before the election Trump called the matter a "national emergency" and warned that so-called migrant caravans were an "invasion" with "some very bad thugs and gang members." So far at least, the most visible aspect of Trump´s deployment is the fence, a visible deterrent and physical obstacle to migrants, designed to corral would-be asylum seekers towards organized points of entry into the US.

Over the weekend, Lieutenant Alan Koepnick´s platoon could be seen stringing concertina wire, which is built to snag clothing, along one edge of a quiet riverside park near down town Laredo. As families walked dogs, grilled sausages and relaxed, the soldiers mounted the wire, occasionally ripping their camouflaged uniforms on its metal barbs.

Koepnick said some Laredo residents had voiced disquiet about the fencing and the presence of US troops. "But there´s also been a lot of support, people coming in, vets shaking our hands, bringing us cakes, water, things like that," Koepnick told AFP. About 100 yards (meters) behind him, a group of people on the Mexican side of the river could be seen standing on the bank.

"You´ll see people across the river cursing at us in Spanish, throwing bottles at us. But on this side it´s more positive," Koepnick said. He and his soldiers were unarmed, but a group of armed military police officers stood by to provide "force protection." Under US law, the military is not allowed to conduct domestic law enforcement in most cases, so soldiers here will not have any direct interactions with migrants.