Clark Wilde

History 018
July 21, 2014
The Decade-Long Build Up: Operation Wetback
The Crimes and Consequences of Illegal Immigration: A Cross-Border Examination of
Operation Wetback, 1943 to 1954, written by Kelly Lytle Hernandez, is an excerpt discussing the
immigration campaign to deport some one million persons in the U.S.A. back to, mostly,
Mexico. To begin with, this work tells the fascinating start to the biggest raids of immigration
violators and their deportation back into Mexico. The motivation of this work is to examine the
progression of the U.S. and Mexican Governments in their dealings with the illegal immigration
of Mexicans into the United States. The immigration issue was attacked by recruiting more U.S.
and Mexican Border Patrol, putting fences up in unguarded areas, and propaganda.
The article starts out explaining the invasive political campaign that was to remove any
persons who illegally entered the United States from Mexico; it was called Operation Wetback.
Today the main ideas of U.S. Attorney General Brownells strategy are still in use today.
Although his plan was substantially useful, it had already been taken into effect prior to the
introduction of Operation Wetback in 1954. In fact the removal of Mexican nationals had begun
in the early years of the 1940s. The deportation strategy in the 40s developed slowly and
unevenly until its well-publicized announcement in the summer of 1954 (Hernandez 422). Now
with the plan into effect the U.S. and Mexican governments jointly decided to ramp up their
efforts and thus created the Bracero Program. It allowed Mexican Laborers to work on American
farms, which would detour those who wanted to come without official paperwork. Not long after
the Bracero Program was initiated it lost popularity because farmers in Mexico lost the help that

drove their farms. Mexican officials demanded thatthe United States needed to improve
border control [and to return those who entered without permission] (Hernandez 427).
Propaganda was established by the Mexican press and Government, saying that they would
be subject to racial discrimination and violence (Hernandez 433). Which should, in theory, keep
illegal aliens out of the United States. Later on the Border Patrol began to shave the heads of
repeat offenders and sent them back over the border on trains and buses. The United States began
putting up a fence in areas that would be too easy for Mexican nationals to cross (they skipped
mountains and rivers because of the tough and deadly outcome of trying to cross them would
bring). Mexico, on the other hand, decided to bring military guards that would protect the fence
during its erection. This is the kind of back-and-forth went on where the U.S. supported Mexico
and vice versa. By the end of the initial campaign Operation Wetback had subdued over one
million illegal aliens; before that the number was in the mere 200,000s.
Hernandez challenges that Operation Wetback isnt often heard of because those who it
greatly affected never wrote about it. For instance, much of the cross-border history of
Operation Wetback remains lost in what was never written south of the border (Hernandez
444). Operation Wetback was discussed between a college student and an educated adult with a
few years behind him. The educated adult had never heard about the American immigration
problem with Mexicans and even stated that he didnt know that the Border Patrol existed that
far back into U.S. history. The primary source of this article is The Western Historical Quarterly
which is a good factor because the best way to achieve an accurate account of history is to get it
directly from the place it happened. Even better, the article is published by The University of
Utah. Keeping the source fresh, by having it recorded relative to where it happened, will keep the
truth from being skewed by those who arent at least descendants. This article is well written and

uses many interesting accounts of people and Governments who provide a historically accurate
record of Operation Wetback (Border Patrolmen, immigrants, and politicians). That being said,
The Crimes and Consequences of Illegal Immigration is an excellent piece of literature that is
useful to many groups such as educators, students, and history buffs.
The author could have utilized more accounts of the Immigrants who were returned back
into Mexico. The one Hernandez uses explains that people were treated poorly. For example,
deportees would jump from the moving trains and be half-heartedly shot at by Mexican
officers (Hernandez 433). The deportees were often sick and taken to unfamiliar locations
(Hernandez 433). These two examples show that it is important to have those peoples story
included in this article. The audience should mostly consist of college students at an entry level
because the article does a good job at going into a medium depth, but not deep enough into a
higher level of understanding. The article does a great job of contradicting Give Me Liberty!
because it accounts for both of the political sides of a specific national issue. The article clearly
talks about both the U.S. and Mexican plans and hopes for the immigration problem. Give Me
Liberty! is biased and only accounts for the happenings in the United States. A great read to
accompany this article further and more into depth would be something that tells the personal
accounts of all persons affected by Illegal Immigration.
The Crimes and Consequences of Illegal Immigration: A Cross-Border Examination of
Operation Wetback is a great and accurate account of the invasive political campaign in the
summer of 1954 that took on the immigration problem. This is a great piece to assist students in
the efforts to learn and research the topic of Operation Wetback and those that it affected. The
rest of The Western Historical Quarterly would be a great attribute to this article that was
provided.