Mexican soldiers cross into U.S., hold border agent at gunpoint

Four Mexican army soldiers crossed the border into the U.S. and pointed their rifles at a U.S. Border Patrol agent on August 3. The incident was the Mexican military's 43rd incursion across the U.S. border since last October, the beginning of the federal fiscal year. Most of the other incursions, however, did not involve firearms.

The incursion occurred on 2 a.m. on the Tohono O'odham Indian Reservation, 85 miles southwest of Tucson, in an area just north of the border, which is fenced only with barbed wire.

The Mexican soldiers held their weapons on the U.S. Border Patrol agent for several minutes until he identified himself in Spanish. At that, they lowered their guns and walked back across a gap in the fence.

T.J. Bonner, president of the National Border Patrol Council, the union for Border Patrol agents, said "It's a minor miracle that none of our agents have been killed or seriously injured,“ “It's inexcusable to not know where the border is" when military units have global positioning capabilities, “ he added.

"We're working with the Mexican government to make sure that this doesn't happen again. This can't be happening," said Lloyd Easterling, a Border Patrol spokesman in Washingto