Two US soldiers, patrolling the border with Mexico, were stopped by five or six Mexican military personnel on 13 April 2019, who believed they had ventured into Mexico's territory, while in fact the troop were still on American soil, US Northern Command stated. Later reports said that Mexican troops had disarmed and questioned their US colleagues in the course of the incident.
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Despite US Northern Command's explanations that American soldiers had tried to "de-escalate a potential volatile situation", many Twitterians remained unconvinced, stating that such handling of US troops was totally inappropriate.
Many of them slammed the actions of the Mexican military, suggesting that they could be seen as "act of war".
Several netizens called on US President Trump to react to the incident.
Others suggested that he should instead focus all his efforts on finishing his border wall with Mexico to prevent similar mishaps in the future.
Some Twitterians went as far as to suggest that the US soldiers should have opened fire despite being disadvantaged in terms of numbers…
or that Washington should have organised a minefield on its border's perimeter.
However, several Twitter users saw the incident from a different angle, claiming it was Trump who should be blamed for this situation.
US President Donald Trump has been trying for over half a year to secure funding for the construction of a wall on the border with Mexico — a mega project he first announced during his election campaign. Trump argues the wall will stop flows of illegal immigrants, drugs and crime into the US from its southern neighbour, but he was vehemently opposed by Democrats.
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The stand-off between the Democrats on the one side and Trump with Republicans on the other led to the longest government shutdown in the US history in January 2019, which was ended in February, although the sides failed to agree on border wall funding. Trump has since then initiated a state of emergency on the country's south to allocate the necessary funds without congressional consent.