Virtual Failure on the Border

by Lance Thompson

The Department of Homeland Security announced last Wednesday that the initial 28 mile border "virtual fence" has failed to live up to the claims of its proponents-- to guard our nation’s boundaries with sophisticated electronic surveillance equipment. Further, DHS says the program will be delayed another three years before any more progress is made. This is already six and a half years since Congress authorized securing the borders after the September 11th terrorist attacks.

It’s difficult to ascribe motives to entire government agencies, or even to the administration they serve. However, we can speculate.

If a government entity felt overwhelming public pressure to secure the border, but was reluctant to do so, what would that entity do?

It would propose the most elaborate, complex and expensive system of border security man has ever devised. It would rely on technology that didn’t yet exist, software yet to be written, and techniques never before applied. All of these factors, as with any such project, would be quite expensive, since they would all have to be developed from scratch.

This is not the characterization that would be presented to the public, for whom border security is an important issue. To the public, the "virtual fence" would be a lauded as a deterrent more in line with the advantages of advanced technology, bringing our superiority in high-tech gear to bear on the border problem–a "smart" wall. Certainly, the government entity would argue, it would make more sense to guard our borders with sensors, radar, video cameras and computer security networks than to build a passive, "dumb" wall around the nation’s boundaries.

The virtual wall, in this case known as "Project 28," would begin with a great deal of fan-fare and self-congratulation. It would be touted to the public, who overwhelmingly support a secure border, as a major initiative to carry out the will of the people. The government entity could point to all the technology being brought to bear, the sheer power of innovation and ingenuity being applied to this vital concern.

When the speeches are done, the ribbons have been cut, the balloons and ballyhoo have floated away on the breeze, and the issue is off the table and out of the public eye, then this same government entity could halt efforts on the project and blame it on computer errors, software glitches, disappointing results from new technology, or any of a dozen other scapegoats which defy public scrutiny. "We tried...this is all new...never been done before...couldn’t have foreseen...time for rethinking...technology just wasn’t ready..." Anyone who’s ever brought home a new computer will recognize the plausibility of these excuses.

This is where the vast expense of the project becomes an asset to the government entity that didn’t want it to succeed in the first place. Because now the government entity can take the courageous decision to scrap the whole project and thereby save the taxpayers billions of dollars. Never mind that the government entity never intended for the project to succeed–they can now step back from their own boondoggle and, with sudden objectivity, claim that it was always impossible, and it’s not worth throwing in another tax dollar to fix it. The public, sick of hearing about cost overruns and delays, is glad to be rid of the whole thing.

This scenario would be impossible if the government entity had embarked on the construction of a real fence, an actual wall, a defensible border made of concrete, steel and wire. Because the progress of that project would have been too visible, too easily measured, too common to be explained away by a shrug and a mumbled excuse about "software problems." The progress of a physical wall and fence can be quantified, shown on the news, illustrated with time-lapse photography. "Here’s the wall in 2001, and here it is seven years later–thirty yards farther along." That would be an inescapable embarrassment to the government entity.

There could be no plausible excuses for the delays and failures in a simple physical wall or fence. What reasons could they offer for a wall that did not progress? A sudden nationwide shortage of concrete? Our surveyors can’t find the border? It blocks the migration routes of some exotic desert animal?

No, the physical wall is the choice of the government entity that truly wishes to have an effective, permanent, proven solution to border security. The sophisticated, high-tech, never-quite-perfected virtual fence is the choice of those who want to keep the border open to illegal immigrants indefinitely.

The failure of Project 28 is no surprise. It was baked in from the beginning. And we will still pay for it, in more ways than one.