Via DW Com:
Every few meters there’s a rusty steel post holding up lines of barbed wire. From a distance you can scarcely make them out in the sandy, hilly landscape, between the cacti and the desert grass. And under the blazing sun you have to look closely to see all the places where the barbed wire has been repaired. The glint of fresh metal gives them away.
Jim Chilton is 77 years old, and has a bit of a belly. It takes him less than a minute to crawl under the fence. With that he has crossed the border between Mexico and the United States. He’s hung his pale cowboy hat on one of the steel posts, but the Colt stays in its holster on his heavy leather belt – always close at hand.
Almost all are drug smugglers
Thousands of people cross their land every year. No one knows the exact figure. They leave behind tons of plastic rubbish. When cows eat it, they die a painful death. The people cut through the fence, causing further losses when the cows escape. “These days, one of my cowboys’ main jobs is fixing fences,” says Jim.
Above all, fewer and fewer of those who cross the border are people looking for work, hoping for a better life. Instead, they’re drug smugglers controlled by the Sinaloa Cartel, one of the most brutal criminal organizations in the world.
“Crossing the border has gotten way too dangerous for ordinary people looking for work,” says Jim. He explains that they too are forced to carry drugs. He shows photos of bushes with women’s underwear hanging off them. “Those are the trophies the criminals hang there after they’ve raped their victim, sometimes for days.” His steely blue eyes narrow to slits as he says this. “It’s wrong, what’s happening here on my land, what’s happening here in America.”
Fifth generation ranchers
He’s been farming his 20,000-hectare (50,000-acre) ranch, employing four cowboys, since 1987. That’s more than 28,000 football fields – a lot of land, even by American standards. Some 800 hectares belong to him and his wife, Sue; the rest is leased by the state. That’s usual in this Arizona border region. Jim owns a herd of just under 1,000 cows. A former investment banker, with university degrees in politics and business administration, he makes most of his money from the sale of young cattle.
Jim was almost 50 when he decided to carry on the family tradition, giving up his life in politics and banking. The Chiltons have been ranchers for five generations. His ancestors drove the first herds through Arizona in 1888. One of the main reasons why they chose this farm, 110 kilometers (68 miles) southwest of Tucson, was that there are a lot of springs on the land. “Water’s the most important thing in raising cattle,” he says. Thirty years ago the fact that the Mexican border was only 16 kilometers from his ranch, and his land ran right along the border for eight kilometers, wasn’t a consideration for him. Now, this proximity to the international border determines his whole life.
HT: BCF