Personal Reflections


Over the two days our Rotorcraft Pro team embedded with the McAllen Air and Marine Branch, there was very little time to do the normal staging of photo shoots. Instead it was nonstop, relentless, actual mission requests. In that short period we witnessed hundreds of people attempting to cross into the U.S., many apprehensions, and large quantities of drugs captured. This all occurring in one very small sector of the border.


Our team walked away with the sense that the problem, in reality, is even worse than what you see on the news. It’s a battleground on the border. It’s total chaos.


Personally, I find myself with mixed emotions; I am intolerant and sympathetic at the same time. I have


no tolerance for the coyotajes who coerce, smuggle, and abuse people seeking a better life. Nor do I have sympathy for those caught pushing illegal drugs across the border. Yet, having traveled extensively in Mexico, Central America, and South America, I sympathize with honest, hard-working families desperately seeking a better life.


Above all, I am grateful to have been born in such an amazing country as the USA, and I am thankful to the men and women along the border who put themselves in harm’s way every single day to secure it.


50


May/June 2016


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60  |  Page 61  |  Page 62  |  Page 63  |  Page 64  |  Page 65  |  Page 66  |  Page 67  |  Page 68  |  Page 69  |  Page 70  |  Page 71  |  Page 72  |  Page 73  |  Page 74  |  Page 75  |  Page 76  |  Page 77  |  Page 78  |  Page 79  |  Page 80  |  Page 81  |  Page 82  |  Page 83  |  Page 84  |  Page 85  |  Page 86  |  Page 87  |  Page 88  |  Page 89  |  Page 90  |  Page 91  |  Page 92  |  Page 93  |  Page 94