Invasion!

Earlier this week, from Ian, I learned of this bizarre news story:

Mexican soldiers and civilian smugglers had an armed standoff with nearly 30 U.S. law enforcement officials on the Rio Grande in Texas Monday afternoon, according to Texas police and the FBI. Mexican military Humvees were towing what appeared to be thousands of pounds of marijuana across the border into the United States, said Chief Deputy Mike Doyal, of the Hudspeth County Sheriff's Department.

Mexican Army troops had several mounted machine guns on the ground more than 200 yards inside the U.S. border -- near Neely's Crossing, about 50 miles east of El Paso -- when Border Patrol agents called for backup. Hudspeth County deputies and Texas Highway patrol officers arrived shortly afterward, Doyal said.

"It's been so bred into everyone not to start an international incident with Mexico that it's been going on for years," Doyal said. "When you're up against mounted machine guns, what can you do? Who wants to pull the trigger first? Certainly not us."

An FBI spokeswoman confirmed the incident happened at 2:15 p.m. Pacific Time.

After some initial outrage, my wife and I reasoned that this was almost certainly not the actions of the Mexican Army under the auspices of that government. More likely the action of corrupt officers, which is quite a problem in Mexico.

Even still, even an unauthorized military incursion across our border, unless immediately followed by an abject apology by President Fox, should be answered forcefully -- airstrikes and such. Not to speak of the catastrophic damage we could wreak on Mexico through economic sanctions alone.

But why on earth would Mexico do something that would indisputably be seen as causus belli?

Thankfully, the story turned out to be false. I was skeptical because although there was confirmation by FBI and Texas officials, this "confirmation" was cited by FoxNews. I've found that that organization tends to toss out a lot of red meat at its viewers -- stories that deliberately outrage or inflame its core audience. And then turn out to be, uh, not quite true. As this photo shows, the alleged Mexican military vehicles were not even humvees, as originally claimed. A little skepticism is a healthy thing.