In its far north Mexico has a 2,000-mile-long border with the USA, almost all of which is desert. The land here is so harsh that most of it is uninhabited. This acts as a buffer zone between it and its giant northern neighbour – but a buffer that is more advantageous to the Americans than the Mexicans due to the disparity in their technology. Militarily, only US forces could stage a major invasion across it; any force coming the other way would be destroyed. As a barrier to illegal entry into the USA it is useful, but porous – a problem with which successive US administrations will have to
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