What if the Migrant Invasion of Ceuta Is Only the Beginning?

When people saw the videos of a horde of North African migrants storming the Spanish-held peninsula of Ceuta, many immediately recalled a famous scene from the film World War Z where a horde of zombies mount a border wall and flood one of the last remaining uninfected cities. Here was a real-life violent invasion of heedless military-aged men stampeding through a small, vulnerable Spanish town, resulting in over 140 deaths, most of them Spanish residents—though, based on Nick Shirley’s recent visit to the area, there are probably many more abuses going unreported.

However, an even closer comparison is Jean Raspail’s infamous novel The Camp of the Saints, which revolves around this very same problem: a mass of unarmed, third-world immigrants invade a Western nation with little resistance because the latter lacks the will to protect itself. Indeed, the parallels are so numerous that one wonders if the ringleaders of the immigrants in Ceuta based their whole project on Raspail’s novel.

Worse still, the parallels with The Camp of the Saints (which I reviewed here) seem likely to continue with the aftermath of the event. At the end of the novel, the success of the first invasion triggers other mass invasions from the global south along with a widespread rebellion of ethnic minorities in the West. Within a few years, the native white populations are immediately subordinated, persecuted, and systematically eliminated.

Considering Spain’s late response and the EU’s vain squabbling, there is every reason to worry that the migrant invasion of Ceuta will happen again. After all, how hard would it be for any dysfunctional backwater in Africa or Asia to direct a swarm of desperate young men toward some unsuspecting border town of the EU? Just as French leadership in the novel could not bring themselves to enforce any serious deterrence on the border, many leftist European leaders suffer from the same ideological misgivings.

As European commentator Eugyppius explains in a recent Substack post:

all it takes to overrun ancient Spanish territory in North Africa is a diffuse social media propaganda campaign, limited cooperation from organised smuggler networks and the momentary inattention of Moroccan border police. Europe stands at the mercy of whatever random geopolitical upset, third-world economic malaise or passing confusion can summon the hordes.

Besides this relative ease of assembling ever more migrant mobs, another factor to consider is these mobs’ Muslim faith. Not only would so many such people struggle to integrate with Western liberal norms and contribute to an advanced economy, they would also pose an immediate threat to public stability and safety. As a matter of history, Islam has spread by the sword, and its moral and political codes are designed to facilitate this spread. Deceit, exploitation, and violence are largely permitted if they serve the goal of advancing the Muslim agenda.

Ironically, a debate that took place at Oxford two months ago on the possibility of accommodating Muslim beliefs and values in Western nations only proved this point. Unable to defend her position of Islam’s supposed compatibility with Western culture, Aisha Khan Aziz told her opponents that they were lucky that police were there to keep them safe from Muslim protesters outside. This threat (and others) combined with an endless stream of falsehoods and deflections made it clear that a large enough Muslim immigrant population would gladly overthrow the Western liberal order when given the chance.

Fortunately, there is still time for Americans to learn from what is happening in Europe. As writers John Daniel Davidson and Brianna Lyman both argue in The Federalist, this is exactly what Democrats would do if they are elected back into office. This already happened under Joe Biden’s administration, which welcomed several million illegal immigrants into the country. Many of them were at least Christian and exhibited less hostility to American culture than their Muslim counterparts in Europe. Nevertheless, Americans have a duty to vote against anti-border, pro-immigration politicians and to support mass deportation for the sake of the country’s economic, political, and cultural well-being.

For their part, Europeans will have to take much more drastic measures if they hope to head off an invasion. In addition to electing nationalist parties who will close borders and deport illegal immigrants, they will have to reconsider their respective relationships with the European Union. As David Harsanyi details in his book Eurotrash: Why America Must Reject the Failed Ideas of a Dying Continent, the EU is a sclerotic organization of out-of-touch bureaucrats who, like crabs in a bucket, will pull down every nation trying to police their borders and reform their entitlement system. Any maverick who dares to defy the EU, like Italian president Giorgia Meloni or former Hungarian president Viktor Orbán, will either be co-opted (like Meloni) or ousted in the next election (like Orbán).

And it is debatable how much time the Europeans have left before a demographic tipping point occurs. Sure, Europeans will probably put nationalist parties into power, as Ryan Girdusky predicts, but this might not be enough if they only implement half-measures and continue relying on the support of the EU. The current Muslim populations will out-reproduce and replace the aging native populations, more waves of newcomers will come in, and the capacity to fight back will disappear entirely.

Hopefully, the invasion of Ceuta will inspire Europeans to take back their destiny—and encourage Americans not to become complacent. Either this moment will be a wake-up call that allows the West to reverse its decline or it will be a confirmation that Western decline is terminal.