[M]illions could be wandering through Europe, in migrant formation, before the end of the year. At that rate, Europe might end up with a majority non-White population before the United States…
Germans are greeting this first wave of migrants with banners, cheers, and food. But don’t be surprised if these same Germans are hurling xenophobic epithets at sequent waves a few months from now — as predictable strains/conflicts, especially with respect to gainful employment and welfare benefits, become manifestly untenable.
(“European Migration Crisis: Sowing Seeds of Unintended, but all too Foreseeable Consequences,” The iPINIONS Journal, September 7, 2015)
Clearly, I posited that it would be only a matter of months before Germans begin feeling humanitarian remorse. I was wrong. It was only a matter of weeks. 
Consider this vindicating report from the September 22 edition of the New York Times:
With record numbers of migrants pouring across the Hungarian border and rushing west, Germany, the country that had been the most welcoming in Europe, suddenly ordered temporary border restrictions on Sunday that cut off rail travel from Austria and instituted spot checks on cars…
The restrictions put in place by Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government were seen as a strong sign — if not an outright message — to other European Union members that Germany was growing weary of shouldering so much of the burden in Europe’s largest humanitarian crisis in decades without more help and cooperation from other nations.
For others, though, the concern was that if even the richest and most powerful nation in the 28-member union was showing signs of reaching its limit, how would Europe be able to find a path through a seemingly ceaseless refugee emergency?
And consider this more dramatic, but no less credible, report from the September 25 edition of the Daily Mail:
Germany in a state of SIEGE: Merkel was cheered when she opened the floodgates to migrants. Now, with gangs of men roaming the streets and young German women being told to cover up, the mood’s changing…
There is now deepening disquiet in this Christian country, dotted with churches, that it is being overwhelmed by people of a different religion and culture.
Meanwhile, that rich as Croesus Saudi Arabia has refused to open its borders to resettle a single Muslim migrant must suffuse this changing mood in Germany with resentment. And viral (i.e., unsubstantiated) reports about Saudi Arabia offering to build 200 mosques in Germany for resettled migrants to worship (or to be radicalized) could only have fuelled this resentment. After all, the Saudis have a well-earned reputation as the Wahhabi grand wizards of Islamic jihad – who would rather fill the minds of poor Muslims with their radical version of Islam than put a single morsel of food in their bellies.
In any event, I also posited in my September 7 commentary that this migrant crisis poses a far greater risk to EU accord than the Greek economic crisis. That risk came into stark relief last week when the Czech Republic, Hungary, Romania, and Slovakia voted against a policy to apportion 120,000 migrants among member states, defying the tradition of adopting EU policies by consensus. And, as the New York Times duly noted, that number represents “only a small fraction of those flowing into Europe.” Accordingly, I reiterate from September 7:
European leaders should coordinate comprehensive humanitarian interventions, enabled and protected by NATO (not UN) forces, to contain would-be migrants within their borders. It’s clearly far better to provide local safe havens than for migrants to continue risking life and limb, only to end up in splendid desolation in Europe or in fetid isolation in internment camps, where millions are being detained today in Jordan, Lebanon, Turkey, and, increasingly, in Hungary.
As it happens, no less a person than former General David Petraeus, arguably the world’s top military and geopolitical strategist, has now endorsed my strategy for dealing with this migration crisis:
Mr. Petraeus, in his first public testimony since resigning as director of the C.I.A. in 2012, told a Senate committee that the United States should establish safe havens in Syria where a moderate rebel force could operate and displaced Syrians could find refuge under the protection of American and allied air power. (New York Times, September 22, 2015)
Incidentally, much is being made of U.S. President Barack Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin meeting at the UN today to discuss a military alliance to defeat ISIS. No doubt this alliance can prove every bit as successful as the one U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt and USSR President Joseph Stalin forged during WWII to defeat the Nazis.
Except that Putin seems even more determined to divide the spoils of war in Syria between East and West than Stalin was to divide the spoils of war in Germany along similar lines after WWII. That division proved the defining moment of Cold War I. This division could prove the defining moment of Cold War II.
Never mind that Putin has been waging this cold war from day one of his presidency – with the de facto division of Ukraine (complete with Russia’s annexation of Crimea) being his crowning achievement to date.
Still, Obama and Putin would do well to spend far more time discussing strategies to contain this migration than they do discussing strategies to defeat ISIS.
For, on the one hand, even though a very humanitarian gesture, dealing with waves of Syrians migrating to Europe by resettling them is as foolhardy and unsustainable as dealing with waves of Mexicans migrating to the United States by employing them. Indeed, when the United States granted amnesty to millions of illegal immigrants in 1986, it only encouraged millions more to follow their path. Likewise, I fear, when the EU agreed last week to resettle 120,000 migrants, it only encouraged hundreds of thousands more to follow their path.
Frankly, to date, the European response to this migration crisis has amounted to the triumph of heartrending folly over mindful good sense. The irony, however, is that as many migrants will probably soon regret migrating to Europe as the number of Europeans who already regret welcoming them.
On the other hand, I have argued for years that, if only left to their own devices, the warring Muslim factions in Syria (Iraq and Afghanistan) would probably be too busy fighting each other to pose any threat to Westerners (or anyone else). Hell, in such commentaries as “Moderate Muslims Too Busy Fighting Each Other to Fight Extremists,” July 31, 2015, I’ve even pointed out why it’s plainly foolhardy for Obama and Putin to depend on moderates in the region to help them defeat ISIS.
All the same, God/Allah help these misguided Europeans … and these forsaken Muslim migrants.
Related commentaries:
Europe migration…
Moderate Muslims…
Legacy Note: With over 5,600 posts spanning 20 years, I am easily the most prolific blogger on the most eclectic array of topics on the web. That makes The iPINIONS Journal an unparalleled archive of informed political and cultural commentary. Visit the ARCHIVES section in the sidebar or search by topic. You won’t find a more consistent, independent voice on world affairs.