By David Orland

As details concerning the identity of the 21 suspects arrested in Britain's latest anti-terrorist raids begin to emerge -- the Times reports that they are "believed to be British citizens, many of Pakistani origin" -- it is worth recalling that almost every terrorism story has an immigration angle.

Britain's South Asian population largely arrived in the country during the first big wave of post-WWII immigration in the 1950's and 60's. It would be hard to fault the Blair government for bad decisions made well over a generation ago.

But what about the bad decisions being made today?

The Times' Camilla Cavendish writes:

It is hard to think of another issue over which there has been such concerted and effective censorship. For years, this Government has systematically underestimated the numbers of people coming in, selectively picked data to overstate migrants’ net economic contribution, dismissed questions about those figures as scaremongering and ordered the bewildered burgers of the big cities to rejoice at the new rainbow world in which they found themselves. [...]

“If we are not careful”, Frank Field, the Labour MP, said recently, “we will be transformed into a global traffic station. That is not what most people mean by being part of a country.” It is time to make some decisions. Do we want to be the doormat of globalisation, passively accepting that people will flow to where the money is, no matter what strain is put on Britain’s social fabric? Or do we mean something more by a country? And if so, how do we preserve it? In talking of setting an optimum level for immigration, Mr Reid has signalled a potentially significant shift in what was a wilfully passive policy: a woolly mix of kindness, fatalism, a desire to fill skill shortages and a sense of duty to countries such as Poland (a sense I share). There will no doubt be much wrangling over who gets to sit on the committee that will dictate the numbers. But that will be academic unless the Government can also reduce illegal entry. Official figures put the number of illegal immigrants at 900,000, but it is thought to be three or four times as many. So far there has been no real political will to stem the flow. Few companies have been prosecuted for hiring illegal labour.

Sound familiar?

Over a generation after their parents and grandparents first arrived in Britain, many British Muslims continue to entertain a nostalgic and sometimes violent attachment to their ethnic and national origins. Will the millions of immigrants who have arrived in the UK under Blair's watch be any different?

Sadly, the Blair government only now seems to be posing the question.

http://www.michellemalkin.com/immigration/