INTER-AGENCY PEACE: INTERDICTION REQUIRES COOPERATION

A couple of formerly fractious federal agencies are going to make nice
- -- officially. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the
Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) have
effectively signed a peace treaty -- a memorandum of understanding --
that should allow the two agencies to work more closely together and
not get involved in turf wars.

A recent report from the Government Accountability Office took the
agencies to task for a lack of cooperation in the effort to stop
weapons from going into Mexico.

The agreement came at the start of a two-day summit in Albuquerque
designed to teach law enforcement officials about better ways to
battle arms-trafficking.

Acting ATF director Kenneth Melson said of the pact, "It will send to
all of the agents ... in both ATF and ICE a clear and unambiguous
direction as to where our agencies are going in this fight against
drug-trafficking."

John Morton, nominee to head ICE, said, "We're not going to fight
about who's doing what. We're going to work together."

Both men were at the summit and signed the agreement.

It's interesting to note that both agencies have acting directors, not
permanent ones. Having permanent direction should be a priority and
should have happened before this summit and before the issue of
cooperation came to a head. Possibly some of this could have been avoided.

Arms-trafficking is an extremely important concern, something that's
even more obvious to those people who live along the southern border.

Weapons smuggled into Mexico enable the drug cartel-related violence
there that has killed untold thousands over the years, and which
claimed more than 200 lives just in June.

Cooperation between federal agencies is vital to the arms interdiction
effort. Under the agreement signed June 30, ICE and ATF will share
intelligence, improve communication, and use personnel from both
agencies to participate in anti-trafficking initiatives and
weapons-possession investigations.

Morton said, "We're not going to be having two independent
initiatives; we're going to have one coordinated effort to go after
firearms-trafficking and related violence on this side of the border
and the other side of the border."

We hope that cooperation actually occurs. Inter-agency cooperation and
cooperation with Mexico are a huge part of stopping
weapons-trafficking.