U.S. Coast Guard Maritime Law Enforcement

Introduction
The U.S. Coast Guard is mandated to ensure and enforce border and maritime security. This critical component to national security plays a vital role in proactively engaging threats and illegal immigration to the United States. U.S. national security is a shared responsibility among all security agencies. Security related issues have been an elusive issue with many attacks directed towards the United States. While immigrants arriving through normal routes through railway, road, and air are easy to screen, arrivals through the sea has proven a challenging issue. Many use dark, poorly manned regions as their harbors to gain entry into the United States. They enter without proper documentation, which becomes hard to identify them from among those with true identification. The U.S. Coast Guards are thus mandated to patrol the U.S. coastlines to ensure those approaching the coastline have proper authentication. Nonetheless, despite the critical role they play in maritime security, various law enforcement issues do derail their efforts.
About the Topic
The topic for discussion in this work is enshrined in U.S. Coast Guard mission challenges. The topic for research is “Enforcement Seams Caused by Differing Laws, Policies & Procedures in relation to Immigration” (U.S. Coast Guard Office of Law Enforcement. 2011, p. 6). According to Bush (2003), the security situation in the world is challenged by ever increasing global terrorism. Introduction of counterfeit products, the need for reinforcement of anti-dumping policies, drug and human trafficking remains a real threat in U.S. (U.S. Customs and Border Protection [CBP]. 2013). Sometimes, balancing between ethics and regional safety remains an elusive aspect (Bush, 2003). Ethical...

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Walser, R., McNeill, J. B., & Zuckerman, J. (2011). The human tragedy of illegal immigration: Greater efforts needed to combat smuggling and violence. The Heritage Foundation. Retrieved 23 November 2013 from http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2011/06/the-human-tragedy-of-illegal-immigration-greater-efforts-needed-to-combat-smuggling-and-violence