Some National Guard soldiers on border duty to get pistols

MONTPELIER, Vt. – About 200 National Guard soldiers helping protect the U.S.-Canadian border in Maine and four other northern states should be carrying weapons for self-defense before the end of the month.

The Defense Department and the U.S. Customs Service reached an agreement Thursday that will allow the soldiers at certain small border crossings to carry 9 millimeter pistols after they have received five days of specialized training.

The Defense Department is now negotiating a similar agreement with the Immigration and Naturalization Service so that additional Guard soldiers can be armed, said Vermont Sen. Patrick Leahy, a Democrat.

“National Guard troops are needed right now on the borders and they need and deserve the right to defend themselves,” Leahy said. “I am pleased that some of the troops now will be armed.”

The head of the Vermont National Guard, Maj. Gen. Martha Rainville, said Friday she would rest easier once the troops who have been helping regular border agents were able to defend themselves.

“This is good news,” said Rainville. “I have been all along concerned with the soldiers’ safety.”

Vermont has 75 soldiers working at the state’s 15 border crossings with Quebec. About 40 will be armed under the new agreement, she said.

The Guard troops on the border are part of a broad effort to increase border security after the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States. Since March about 1,200 Guard troops have been assisting Customs and INS agents on both the Canadian and Mexican borders.

The heightened border security has not intercepted any terrorists that any officials will acknowledge, but the number of seizures of illegal drugs and other contraband is way up.

On the border the soldiers have been helping regular Customs and INS agents search trucks and cars and offering any other assistance that may be required.

Under the original rules for the deployment developed by the Department of Defense and other agencies, regular border agents have been responsible for protecting Guard troops.

The decision not to arm the troops upset National Guard leaders, and 58 U.S. Senators sent a letter to President Bush asking that the soldiers be armed. They said the troops needed to be able to defend themselves and others if needed.

In Vermont and Washington state, the legislatures passed resolutions calling for the troops to be armed.

The agreement reached between the Defense Department and Customs calls for arming some of the troops in Vermont, Montana, North Dakota, Minnesota, New York and Maine.

Defense Department Spokesman Lt. Col. Mike Halbig said Friday the additional agreement with the INS was still being worked on. He said it would be ready soon, although he did not give a date.

Craig Jehle, the Customs port director who oversees border crossings in northwestern Vermont, said Friday he thought that six of the eight crossings he supervises would have armed troops.

Not all Guard soldiers working along the border come in direct contact with the public and so not all need to be armed, officials said.

The federal government picked which states would patrol the border with National Guard troops, said Pamela Walsh, New Hampshire Gov. Jeanne Shaheen’s press secretary.

“New Hampshire was not one of the states selected,” she said.

Before the soldiers can be sent to the border with weapons, they must each receive five days of refresher training with the pistols.

Rainville said that earlier this week, before the agreement was reached, that she had visited some of the Vermont soldiers on the border. She said the soldiers were eager to receive weapons.

“It’s on their minds,” Rainville said. “They were wanting to know.”