It was appropriate, yesterday, for us to cross the guard-less Franco-Belgian border on the way back to Brussels. Though there were a few "flying patrol" French Customs agents at the last motorway toll booth in France, the border, as usual, was a spookily empty no-man's land. As soon as we entered Belgium, a gray "freezing fog" enveloped us. At least a new government had been formed in our absence.
Anyway, as of midnight last night, several other European borders will be customs/immigration/police free. Schengen, the little Luxembourg town where intra-European Union borders started being dismantled in 1985, has been a feature of life in the old EU for more than two decades. Now more of the recent EU states (Donald Rumsfeld divisively called them "New Europe") have joined the club.
I have mixed feelings about Schengen and its expansion. Europe's external borders are only as good as the enforcement exerted by its "front line" states. Originally, these were seven of its founding members, clustered around the Rhine and the Alps. As Europe has extended south and east, the outer borders run up against countries with some serious trafficking, security, and immigration problems. Are the new Schengen members up to the challenge?
Europe's outer borders (and for that matter, its endless coastline) are under constant threat of clandestine entry. The EU's western island members, Ireland and the UK, have not yet seen fit to enter the Schengen group, and in France, asylum seekers pile up in the Channel ports trying to enter the UK by any means possible. Boat people, illegal immigrants - these groups can be infiltrated by others, including potential terrorists. People trafficking is accomplished by some of the same circles who deal in weapons smuggling and drug smuggling. I have yet to be convinced that the outer Schengen controls protect Europe's security. Yes, borders breaking the traffic flow can cause delays to commercial truck traffic and tourists in a hurry, but is the cost greater than entrusting your border to some guard on the Slovakian/Ukrainian frontier? I am not so sure.