Flying back to DC, still savoring yesterday’s win. My testimony dove deeply into the numbers showing that Big Bend is *not* an area of high illegal entry.
The transcript will show me saying, “OK this is going to get really nerdy.” And yeah, it was.
From www.marfapublicradio.org/news/2026-10...
![Overall though, WHN's ratings were still low. After a lot of research, on February 26, 1973, WHN became a country music station. The New York Metropolitan Area had never been a country music hot spot, and prior to WHN, the area had only had two country music stations: WJRZ in Hackensack, New Jersey, and WTHE in Mineola, New York. In the early years of WHN's country format, it featured on-air personalities such as Larry Kenney, Big Wilson and Jack Spector. Some of these were holdovers from the previous middle of the road format.
As a country music station, they played artists like Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings, Tanya Tucker, Lynn Anderson, Kenny Rogers, Mel Tillis, Charley Pride, Mickey Gilley, Ronnie Milsap, and many more. Also, they mixed in non-country and country-pop cross-over artists that had country-friendly songs such as The Eagles, Elvis Presley, Anne Murray, Olivia Newton-John, Linda Ronstadt, and others. Over the years, as WHN evolved as a country station, on-air personalities such as Dan Daniel, Alan Colmes, Jerry Carroll and others moved in.
During this era, WHN was programmed by Ed Salamon, who was inducted into the Country Radio Hall of Fame in 2006. Salamon and promotional partner Dale Pon were able to walk the line between country music like Johnny Cash, Dolly Parton, and latter day Elvis, Top 40 radio programming tactics, and the late 70s rock artists –including The Eagles, Ronstadt, Newton-John, and Rogers– who had absorbed country into their contemporary pop– and, using extensive, award-winning television and transit advertising, into one of the most successful Country radio stations in history.[citation needed]](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:t5hgkoxrsxpe3wfisqfeymg5/bafkreie73mfk7ud3oxblasntgcciif5ku6556qmn6j2sa3cjr3a6hqboju)
![During the meetings, Donovan said next steps were decided, which included refining priority network campaign plans, designating roles and lead nations, establishing working groups with specific objectives and milestones, and initiating coalition campaign assessments.
"Between now and November, we are going to write an A3C campaign plan," he said. "We will staff it with our teammates and our members here in the room, and we'll approve it by November."
The general also said coalition nations are eager to volunteer to lead in areas important to them.
"Yesterday, by the end of our session, we went out and made the initial pulse … who wants to lead in different regions? Who wants to lead, to … go after these networks?" Donovan said. "We had volunteers right away, nations that wanted to step forward and take [the] lead in subregions and go after certain threats."](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:t5hgkoxrsxpe3wfisqfeymg5/bafkreic6qrsws5adgfsvxgpauyhdv2zt5mjpmapbefiddhuukb24lmnagy)
![LCF-24: CLB-8 Airfield Clearing [Image 3 of 22]
A yellow Komatsu D155AX bulldozer is actively pushing and clearing soil and vegetation debris on an open field. The machine is identified with the unit marking 'BD-01' and appears to be in operation during land clearing or grading work. The setting is an outdoor construction or agricultural site with trees visible in the background under a partly cloudy sky.
ECUADOR
09.02.2026
Photo by Lance Cpl. Allison White
24th Marine Expeditionary Unit
Subscribe111
A U.S. Marine with Combat Logistics Battalion 8, Littoral Combat Force-24, operates heavy equipment bulldozer to clear an airfield in South America, Aug. 2, 2026. U.S. military forces are deployed to the U.S. Southern Command area of responsibility in support of Joint Task Force Western Hemisphere, Department of War-directed operations, and the President's priorities to disrupt illicit drug trafficking, deter malign actors and protect the homeland through continuous presence. (U.S. Marine Corps photo)](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:t5hgkoxrsxpe3wfisqfeymg5/bafkreia2m2boyeupkbllncglfjaxswlkm2kzl6ztvdj33r3hdagdhblhd4)
![FOREIGN MILITARY FINANCING PROGRAM
[Budget authority in thousands of dollars]
Country/Program
Budget
Authority
Colombia
...-
37,025
Costa Rica
FATHEREA
10,000
Ecuador
10,000
Estonia
...
10,000
Europe/Eurasia
100,000
Latvia
10,000
Lithuania
10,000
Mongolia
3,000
Morocco
20,000
Panama
2,000
Thailand
10,000
Vietnam
12,000
Western Hemisphere Regional (including Peru)
20,250](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:t5hgkoxrsxpe3wfisqfeymg5/bafkreiftp3pyrfh25lgmg3i2fi7rgazbnq5pnd2kwexusv4rrnbpp553ta)
![Even though cocaine production appears to be at record levels, the product itself is small and hard to detect when scattered across such a vast transit zone. The UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) estimates that global cocaine production quadrupled in the decade from 2014 to 2023, rising from 869 to 3,708 tons.[234] Conservatively assuming about 500 kilograms per cubic meter, that entire annual supply could fit into about 225 standard 20-foot shipping containers. (To give a sense of scale, a single large container ship carries about 20,000 such containers.) Break that amount across countless shipments, routes, and concealment methods, and interdiction becomes a classic “needle in a haystack” mission.](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:t5hgkoxrsxpe3wfisqfeymg5/bafkreiezudx75upnjyuafzrukfcwrv3k2233e6tr72n7bjglrrqvnf4eky)
![It is crucial to recall, too, that “small boats on the high seas,” which the boat strikes aim to target, are just one of many options available to cocaine traffickers moving their illicit product from South America to the United States. Other methods include:
Smuggling inside shipping containers aboard boats carrying licit cargo. No estimates exist for how many tons of cocaine are smuggled this way each year, because it is impossible to know what has gone undetected. However, large-scale container seizures have become more frequent in recent years, especially at European ports.[236]
Submarines and semi-submersible craft. These have larger payloads than small boats and are harder to detect. Authorities in Colombia and Ecuador periodically raid sites, often hidden in dense Pacific mangrove estuaries, where traffickers build these vessels.[237]
Small boats making short hops up the coasts of South and Central America. This is more time-consuming than using the open ocean and probably requires paying off more corrupt authorities along the way. However, it involves less time in international waters and is less vulnerable to interdiction, lethal or otherwise, from U.S. forces.
Overland transshipment, usually along road networks, perhaps combined with shorter maritime routes. Land routes are the principal vector for migrant smuggling, and drugs are harder to detect and easier to conceal than humans.
Riverine routes. Traffickers are particularly using the Orinoco and Amazon rivers, and their tributaries, to move cocaine to eastern areas of South America, closer to markets in Europe. The Defense Department’s Humire testified that, in response to the boat strikes, traffickers’ “movements shifted eastward through Venezuela and Guyana into Suriname.”[238]
Aerial routes. Smuggling via small aircraft appears to be less frequent than it was during the 20th century, as U.S.-backed “airbridge denial” programs in Colombia, Peru, Honduras, and elsewhere—which today rarely kill people …](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:t5hgkoxrsxpe3wfisqfeymg5/bafkreiaqy2oqcixpyo5klfqb6puntn7gzzwqm6rwnn7nfu2dxme3oqwfwm)
