Governor Rick Perry has called out the Texas National Guard to be what he calls a “force multiplier” on the southern border. The governor says that U.S. Customs & Border Protection personnel are so busy attending the thousands of unaccompanied minor children now flooding the Texas-Mexico border that they have no capacity to actually protect anything.

Of course, the Obama administration is sharply critical of Governor Perry. The White House says that national guard troops are no substitute for “comprehensive immigration reform.”

The problem with “comprehensive immigration reform” is that there is widespread and entirely justified concern that such reform will do everything except that which absolutely must be done—which is to say, secure the border.

A nation that can’t control its borders has no immigration policy no matter what laws it passes. A nation that doesn’t know who is coming in, from where and in what numbers has forfeited its sovereignty.

The problem with immigration policy – even if the policy is to effectively have no policy – is that its results are irreversible. Great Britain and France allowed so many millions of Muslim immigrants to enter their countries as to fundamentally and permanently change British and French culture. That both countries now largely regret such policies is too little too late.

Because the results of immigration policy are irreversible, any such policy must begin with secure borders.

On that there can be no compromise.