SIAs--special interest aliens--are citizens of countries that either sponsor terrorism or in which terrorism festers. Deroy Murdock reports via Rep. Tom Tancredo that SIAs are increasingly swarming across our border with Mexico:

Between October 1, 2002, and June 30, 2003, Department of Homeland Security figures show 4,226 Special Interest Aliens were apprehended on America's Mexican and Canadian borders. By June 30, 2004, that number had swelled 42.5 percent to 6,022 SIAs from "Countries of Interest" such as those the State Department considers sponsors of terrorism (Cuba, Iran, Libya, North Korea, Sudan, Syria) and others where militant Islam simmers (Afghanistan, Egypt, Indonesia, Iraq, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, and Yemen).

Full fiscal-year 2004 data record the capture of 7 Saudis, 10 Syrians, 18 Lebanese, 19 Iranians, 25 Egyptians, 28 Jordanians, and 164 Pakistanis, among others. If these figures seem small, recall the havoc 19 Middle Easterners unleashed on September 11.

"One must take into account that even the most conservative estimates of the number of folks getting by the Border Patrol are two or three times the number caught," Tancredo said. If so, at least 18,000 SIAs entered America just in the first nine months of 2004.

Perhaps these illegal aliens come here for what most immigrants want: freedom, prosperity, and better lives. But some who violate our borders do so to destroy those things.

"Recent information from ongoing investigations, detentions, and emerging-threat streams strongly suggests that al-Qaeda has considered using the southwest border to infiltrate the United States," former Homeland Security deputy secretary James Loy told the Senate Intelligence Committee last February. "Several al Qaeda leaders believe operatives can pay their way into the country through Mexico and also believe illegal entry is more advantageous than legal entry for operational security reasons."

This should surprise no one who has given more than two seconds' thought to national security after 9-11. With visas for SIAs harder to come by and with increased if at time inept airline security, the Mexican border is the past of least resistance into the US. And the President's Amnesty By Another Name proposal only made things worse.

The unenforced border remains our national security Achilles heel. If terrorists do strike us on our soil again, and that attack has any connection to border insecurity, it won't be just a wartime attack and tragic loss of life--it's the end of the Bush presidency and GOP credibility on national security. Period. If it happens after Bush's watch, he'll still get the blame. And he'll deserve it, unless his administration gets serious about border security in a hurry.