National Guard has beefed up border security as Bush planned

Naysayers predicted President Bush’s decision to send National Guard members to the U.S.-Mexico border wouldn’t have any effect on the number of illegal immigrants entering the country.

Guess what? It’s working.

Since Operation Jump Start began six months ago, apprehensions of illegal immigrants dropped by 8 percent overall and 11 percent in Arizona alone.

Opponents of the program claim that having the Guard there hasn’t actually changed anything and that the immigrants simply are entering somewhere else along the border where the National Guard troops are not stationed.

The Border Patrol counters, however, that apprehensions are down because there simply are fewer illegals making it over the border now that the National Guard is helping. The Guard is doing work that allows more than 100 Border Patrol agents to go into the field now.

Among their duties, the National Guard troops have worked on roads, flown on missions and generally increased surveillance of the area. Some 600 Tennessee National Guard members have been involved in the mission since July.

The Guard members at the border never were intended as a permanent solution. They are there only until the Border Patrol has time to recruit, hire and train 6,000 additional agents. The deadline for accomplishing this is the end of 2008.

For the time being, though, the president should take satisfaction in knowing that his decision to send the Guard to the border is working as he had intended it to.