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Afghanistan: Why we should be there (or not), how to conduct the mission (or not) & when to leave

If that is true it sounds like someone is developing a bad case of tunnel-vision.

I wonder how they would categorize the 82nd's involvement at Musa Qala with the Royal Marines, the Danes, the Estonians and the ANA.
 
A post at The Torch:

I wonder what M. Dion thinks...
http://toyoufromfailinghands.blogspot.com/2007/12/i-wonder-what-m-dion-thinks.html

Mark
Ottawa
 
Looks like US will something serious about the Federally Administered Tribal Areas in Pakistan:

U.S. Troops to Head to Pakistan
http://blog.washingtonpost.com/earlywarning/2007/12/musharrafs_woes_have_opened_a.html#more

Beginning early next year, U.S. Special Forces are expected to vastly expand their presence in Pakistan, as part of an effort to train and support indigenous counter-insurgency forces and clandestine counterterrorism units, according to defense officials involved with the planning.

These Pakistan-centric operations will mark a shift for the U.S. military and for U.S. Pakistan relations. In the aftermath of Sept. 11, the U.S. used Pakistani bases to stage movements into Afghanistan. Yet once the U.S. deposed the Taliban government and established its main operating base at Bagram, north of Kabul, U.S. forces left Pakistan almost entirely. Since then, Pakistan has restricted U.S. involvement in cross-border military operations as well as paramilitary operations on its soil.

But the Pentagon has been frustrated by the inability of Pakistani national forces to control the borders or the frontier area. And Pakistan's political instability has heightened U.S. concern about Islamic extremists there.

According to Pentagon sources, reaching a different agreement with Pakistan became a priority for the new head of the U.S. Special Operations Command, Adm. Eric T. Olson. Olson visited Pakistan in August, November and again this month, meeting with Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, Pakistani Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee Chairman Gen. Tariq Majid and Lt. Gen. Muhammad Masood Aslam, commander of the military and paramilitary troops in northwest Pakistan. Olson also visited the headquarters of the Frontier Corps, a separate paramilitary force recruited from Pakistan's border tribes.

Now, a new agreement, reported when it was still being negotiated last month, has been finalized. And the first U.S. personnel could be on the ground in Pakistan by early in the new year, according to Pentagon sources [emphasis added].

U.S. Central Command Commander Adm. William Fallon alluded to the agreement and spoke approvingly of Pakistan's recent counterterrorism efforts in an interview with Voice of America last week.
http://voanews.com/english/2007-12-21-voa6.cfm

"What we've seen in the last several months is more of a willingness to use their regular army units," along the Afghan border, Fallon said. "And this is where, I think, we can help a lot from the U.S. in providing the kind of training and assistance and mentoring based on our experience with insurgencies recently and with the terrorist problem in Iraq and Afghanistan, I think we share a lot with them, and we'll look forward to doing that."

If Pakistan actually follows through, perhaps 2008 will be a better year.

By William M. Arkin |  December 26, 2007

More here:
http://forums.milnet.ca/forums/threads/67704/post-638627.html#msg638627

Mark
Ottawa
 
PM Harper speaks out:
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20071226.wharper1226/BNStory/National/home

Prime Minister Stephen Harper said he is uncertain whether Canadians at large understand the importance of remaining involved in Afghanistan.

His observation in a recent year-end interview with The Canadian Press comes after almost two years of combat operations in Kandahar, the deaths of 73 soldiers and one diplomat, and bitter, often partisan debates back home.

Parliament will be asked by spring to vote on what kind of mission Canada should undertake after the current mandate expires in February, 2009.

Asked whether he believes Canadians truly appreciate what is at stake in the decision, Mr. Harper said: “I don't know, the short answer is I don't know.”

There were times during 2007 when the Conservatives were almost overwhelmed, under daily attack in the House of Commons and on the editorial pages, over their handling of the war.

Poll after poll made it clear that Canadians believed they were paying too high a price to bring peace and stability to the war-torn region and wanted out.

As the seemingly endless procession of casualties mounted [emphasis added--what rotten hyperbole] throughout the spring, there was a point in June when it looked as though Mr. Harper blinked, suggesting that the combat mission might not be extended beyond the current deployment without a consensus among parliamentarians...

“The government understands we took on an important international commitment for important reasons of international security that in the long run impact directly on our country,” he said an interview in the living room at 24 Sussex Dr.

A poll released in the weeks after the Throne Speech suggested that the public was overwhelmingly against continuing for another three years beyond the current mandate.

“So I don't know whether Canadians do – or don't – understand. I think Canadians are deeply troubled by the casualties,” he said...

“Nobody is more troubled by that than I am” about the rising number of war dead and wounded, Mr. Harper said quietly. “These are our finest men and women. When we lose them, these are the worst days I have. I have no worse day than when I get this kind of news.”

He said the soldiers and diplomats on the ground understand the importance of staying, despite the heavy price they have paid directly...

“All we can only hope from the Manley exercise is that it causes parliamentarians, particularly in our official Opposition – which as you know commenced this mission – to sit back and think about what is in the best interest of the country before a vote is actually held,” he said.

“We really have got to avoid – on this one – taking a decision for reasons of short-term politics [emphasis added--Messrs Dion and Duceppe have only short-term politics in mind; Mr Layton is simply a flaming anti-American peacenik]. We must take a decision that is in the long-run interest of the country, its international reputation and the respect we should all show for the sacrifice our men and women have made to secure it.”

Some critics have argued that Mr. Harper could have found no more hawkish a Liberal than Mr. Manley to lead the non-partisan panel. They suggest the panel has been rigged to give the Conservatives the answers they want to hear.

The Prime Minister bluntly dismissed the notion.

“We will get the report and look at it.”

He said he hopes Mr. Manley comes forward with a clear, immediate recommendation for the future of the mission. Beyond that, Mr. Harper wants to see a sense from the panel of where it sees Afghanistan going in general, regardless of the length of the Canadian deployment.

If you have the stomach, look at the "Comments" at the Globe and Mail
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20071226.wharper1226/CommentStory/National/home

Two recent ones:

G Money  from Hamilton, Canada writes: People don't understand whent they aren't entirely informed. Take for example the pipe line Mr. Karzai's former employer wants to run from southern Russia to Pakistan through Afghanistan. No pacification = no pipe line. That's all it's about. It's not about popular freedom, it's about corporate freedom.

Paul Chislett  from Windsor, Canada writes: Mr. Harper, I "get" Canada's involvement in Afghanistan. It is a criminal occupation of a foreign country at the behest of the criminal Bush regime in Washington. I demand our troops out now and that you, sir, cease playing warlord.

My response to the first comment above:
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20071226.wharper1226/CommentStory/National/home#comment1548964

...(Mark Collins, from Ottawa, Canada) wrote:  G Money: Here's a letter of mine in the Ottawa Sun, April 25 (no longer available online):

'In his letter of April 23, Albert Bertrand claims that the war in Afghanistan is about American "access to the petroleum from Central Asia."

That is simply left-wing mythical nonsense.

Afghanistan has no relevance to access to central Asian oil. Most of that oil is in Kazakhstan, far to the west of Afghanistan, and Kazakhstan has no need for Afghanistan as a pipeline route.

Kazakh oil is exported via Russia and to China. It will now also be shipped, following an agreement with Azerbaijan last year, across the Caspian Sea to Azerbaijan and onward by pipeline to a Turkish port on the eastern Mediterranean. Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan equally have no need for any Afghan pipeline should they ever become major oil exporters.'

There's almost no oil in Afstan itself.'

More details:

'Pipe Dreams: The origin of the bombing-Afghanistan-for-oil-pipelines"
theory'.
http://www.slate.com/?id=2059487

There is no need for an oil pipeline through Afstan now that the
Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline is open:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan_pipeline
htm

'...the $4 billion Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline, which opened with much fanfare in July and links Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Turkey. At the
ribbon-cutting, the 1,109-mile pipeline was hailed as "the Silk Road of the 21st century,"bypassing Russia to bring oil from the world's third-largest reserves in the Caspian to a Turkish port on the Mediterranean, where it can be loaded onto tankers to supply global markets...'

There is however a long-standing plan for a natural gas pipeline from
Turkmenistan through Afstan to Pakistan and (maybe) India. But that is hardly a vital US national security or capitalist interest.
http://www.indianexpress.com/story/227070.html

Mark
Ottawa
 
And here's my submission.

What I read here is mostly a lot of cheap shots at our PM.
They might be what proves him right.
I have to ask, what do you desire instead?
How would acheive that goal?

To withdraw from Afghanistan WILL NOT cause peace or anything like it.
So to declare that Canada's involvment is a bad thing is useless.

What Canadian and Afghans desire cannot be achieved by simply sending soldiers home. To suggest so PROVES beyond doubt that all of the whinging
is done by people who don't "get it".

Casting aspersions and calling names doesn't cut it.
I have never seen anything suggesting a rational alternative.
Why doesn't someone come up with a realistic solution
rather than simply complaining that the government is wrong?

Comparisons with the Soviet occupation are equally specious.

For the record:
Afghanistan has had elections.
Afghanistan is no longer the poorest nation on earth.
Infant mortality is DOWN.
Afghans are no longer subject to Totalitarian rule.
The Taliban are now largely an external foreign force.
Schools are opening
Schools are educating girls.

How would risking all of this by changing our foreign policy
be a good thing?  How is the hope for security a bad thing?

PM Harper is right.

I wonder if they'll print it?
 
Flip: They did:
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20071226.wharper1226/CommentStory/National/home#comment1549186

Mark
Ottawa
 
Oh god...

You should have put a warning around that link.  I felt the need to read some of the comments, and now my ears are bleeding.
But the worst part, it is like seeing a train wreck.  You don't want to watch, but you can't turn away.
 
I consider this a bit of a probe.

I directly challenged "them" to suggest some improvement
to Canada's Afghanistan Policy.

They did not.

More huffing and puffing and accusations.
That's all they've got apparently.
No facts, no logic no effort to persuade.
Just leftie noise.

Like I said - Maybe Harper's right.  ;)
 
Koenigsegg: Well, I did write "If you have the stomach..." ::)

Mark
Ottawa
 
PM Harper speaks to Maclean's.  Not a very spirited approach and ignores the fact that the Germans were educated, and had a lot of experience in running an effective state and a modern economy --hardly a realistic or fair comparison.  Plus the Marshall aid that dwarfs the assistance to Afstan.  Moreover Germany was not "fully restored within four years".  Bosnia or Somalia would be better comparisons.
http://www.macleans.ca/article.jsp?content=20071227_193713_1392
...
On Afghanistan, the dominant defence and foreign policy file, Harper again looks ahead to tough choices. Rather than talking up the military mission in Kandahar as an inspiring undertaking, he used the year-end sit-down to vent frustration at slow progress in building a self-sufficient Afghan government. “You know, the United Nations and our allies will have been in Afghanistan 10 years in 2011. For God’s sakes, Germany was basically fully restored within four years; Germany joined NATO ten years after it was conquered.”

He does not seem to be willing to accept anything like an open-ended commitment in central Asia. “To say that Afghanistan would need decades and decades just to do the basic security work, I think is pushing credibility,” Harper said. “Not just pushing the patience of the Canadian public and the military, pushing the credibility of the effort. A sovereign government must, at some point, say, ‘We can actually deal with this on a day-to-day basis. We can be responsible.’”

Still, he signalled he doesn’t expect the panel he set up to advise him on Afghanistan, chaired by former Liberal Cabinet heavyweight John Manley, to suggest Canada try to withdraw anytime very soon. (Manley’s panel is expected to deliver its advice early in 2008.) The whole point of the panel, he said, was to avoid “some very wrong decision here that would hurt our security, hurt our international standing with our allies, and that could, I think, do permanent damage to the Canadian Forces.” What Harper seems to be hoping for is a plan for remaining an active military player in Afghanistan, while demanding the Afghan government somehow move toward standing on its own...

I would agree that if the Afghans can't take on much of the security load within two/three years then it will be hard for many countries to stay seriously committed.

It seems to me however that Mr Harper is losing his own commitment to the Afghan mission; maybe he never really was that serious about it, imagining rather along the lines of Paul Martin that it wouldn't be that big a deal and would provide domestic political (remember that first visit to Kandahar in March 2006?)
http://www.cbc.ca/story/world/national/2006/03/12/afghan-troops060312.html
and international diplomatic rewards.  The reality has proved rather different and difficult.  Perhaps that's why the prime minister is so ineffective at "selling" the mission.

Mark
Ottawa
 
MarkOttawa said:
Flip: They did:
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20071226.wharper1226/CommentStory/National/home#comment1549186

Cripes, what a bunch of gearboxes.  Clearly, the Glob doesn't have moderators for their boards.  :P
 
I think we should take heed of this column by Lawrence Martin, reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions (§29) of the Copyright Act from yesterday’s Globe and Mail:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20080103.COMARTIN03/TPStory/?query=The+Afghan+Mission%3A+Do+We+Settle+For+A+Bronze+Medal+Or+Risk+Going+For+Gold%3F
The Afghan mission: Do we settle for a bronze medal or risk going for gold?

January 3, 2008

As the tall tale has it, four high-school students were asked to write an essay about elephants.

The British youth chose the title Elephants and the Empire. The French student, predictably, went with Love and the Elephant, and the American opted for Bigger and Better Elephants. For the Canadian, there was no hesitation: He chose Elephants: A Federal or Provincial Responsibility?

Apparently, it was the late Liberal Robert Winters who foisted this pachyderm anecdote on us, his way of illustrating our sober-minded, dullish stereotype.

In keeping, John Manley, no banister-slider himself, has observed that Canadians are burdened by a bronze-medal mentality. In his coming report on our future in Afghanistan, many are betting that Mr. Manley, prodded by his lopsidedly conservative committee, will bring in a go-for-gold recommendation - another extension of our warrior role in Kandahar.

Having tilted the other way some months ago, Prime Minister Stephen Harper now appears to favour a prolongation as well. Over the holidays, he gave an interview in which he sounded puzzled that Canadians didn't understand the significance of the stakes in Afghanistan.

An Angus Reid Strategies poll released this week will leave him more puzzled. It showed 61 per cent of Canadians rejecting a war extension beyond the February, 2009, deadline. Fifty-three per cent wanted our troops to come home before that date.

That, one might say, is bronze-medal Canadian stuff. We've done our thing, our work has been saluted, time to move on before casualties climb.

The poll, reflective of others, poses a potentially knotty problem: public opinion going one way, while Mr. Harper and perhaps Mr. Manley going the other way - with an election imminent.

In the short term, public opinion is not likely to change, and the problem is not, as the PM seems to suggest, that Canadians don't get it. They've had the significance of the Afghan mission drummed into them for two years running. Such has been the tub-thumping to "support our troops" that it is now politically incorrect, if not utterly disloyal, to take issue with any aspect of our military performance.

The Canadian rank and file see the importance of the war, but they see a lot of other things as well. They've seen humanitarian progress in Afghanistan but not much military progress. They see practically no chance of the Taliban's being eradicated, no matter how many years our troops are there.

They've also witnessed an excess of government bungling and mismanagement on this file. They've seen a defence minister, Gordon O'Connor, dismissed following one stumble after another. They've seen a detainees controversy involving alleged torture and our government's taking pains to hide information about it. They've seen sole-sourced defence procurement being investigated by the Auditor-General. They've seen feuding between Rick Hillier, Chief of the Defence Staff, and the Prime Minister's Office, and politicization of the war in the form of a rushed debate - all of two days - for the first extension of the mission.

In addition, they've seen no push from our Conservative leaders for a diplomatic solution - the type of approach our country has traditionally favoured. Shamefully, there's been zero questioning, only passive acceptance, of Bush administration policy on Afghanistan and Iraq. A major reason for our combat role in the Afghan hot zone was to appease Washington. As is made clear in the book The Unexpected War, Liberals were so troubled in having rejected George Bush's missile-defence plan that, resorting to a colonial mindset, they felt they had do something quickly to score points with the White House.

Mr. Harper shouldn't be surprised by Canadians' manifest ambivalence toward the Afghan mission. They've had a lot of time in their sober-minded way to think about it and to draw fair-minded conclusions. They've seen the mission extended once and they appear unwilling to see it extended again. They seem content with a bronze-medal performance.

The problem is, if the Canadians vacate and the Taliban return to power, it's not a medal that will hang proudly on their walls.

I think Martin, here staying firmly in his lanes as an expert on national politics, has got it about right. The Government of Canada (whether headed by Jean Chrétien, Paul Martin or Stephen Harper) has failed to convince Canadians that our mission in Afghanistan is worthy of the sacrifices. The reasons so many, waaaay too many, Canadians reject the mission are many and varied and include an unhealthy dose of adolescent, knee-jerk anti-Americanism and an equally unhealthy fixation on the myth of Pearsonian, baby-blue beret style peacekeeping as Canadians national niche. But, suffice to say, too many Canadians are unconvinced that their soldiers (the neighbour’s kid, the co-worker’s son or daughter) are doing the right thing or doing things right in Afghanistan.

That may be because, as I believe to be the case, none of Prime Ministers Chrétien, Martin or Harper really believe in the mission qua mission. I think all three took a deeply cynical view of the Afghanistan operations – seeing them (successively Kandahar then Kabul and now Kandahar again), as Martin suggests, as ways to appease the Americans – as though the Americans were an enemy who would punish us if we dared disagree with them too often. If that is the case, and I repeat I believe it is, then we have wasted and are wasting the lives of brave young men and women for the sake of unprincipled politicians.

But: we’re there; Canadian soldiers are engaged – even though Canadians are not. Canada has put its reputation and its lives on the line and now many Canadians want to back away – to settle for the bronze, as Martin puts it. Bigger BUT: Martin correctly tells us that the bronze will tarnish quickly and we will be haunted by the failure – the people of Canada will be haunted by the disgrace of the defeat they, themselves, administered to their own armed forces.

Canadians don’t want to stay in Afghanistan. That’s the fault of successive governments which sent us to, and then back to Afghanistan and then kept us there while, all the time, being unable to “sell” the mission to Canadians because they – the politicians- don’t really believe in their own rhetoric. Why should Canadians want to ‘stay the course’ when it is pretty clear that even politicians who were enthusiastic for the mission in 2002 have changed their tunes. (If Stéphane Dion was not a mission supporter then he was, or is now, dishonest because every single minister in the Chrétien and Martin cabinets must have been a supporter or a liar – no other option exists for members of cabinet in a Westminster style parliamentary governemnt.) Equally, Canadians can see that Prime Minister Harper extended the mission to sow dissent in the ranks of the Liberal Party of Canada, not because he thought he was ‘doing the right thing.’ Why should Canadians be anything but ambivalent?

Even though Canadians do not want to stay, a responsible national government will keep us there because this is a situation in which settling for the bronze will not be good enough. It will leave an indelible stain on our national reputation – the one in which so many, many Canadians take so much pride. This may be an unwinnable war in the minds of politicians and the pundits, but that’s because they do not understand the real, essential ‘victory conditions’.

We can, indeed must leave Afghanistan as soon as we can – as soon as we have accomplished the tasks we accepted and set for ourselves. They are difficult, but not impossible tasks; they require a gold medal performance.

Let’s go for the gold! 

 
I found this flip flop on his part rather interesting:

The Canadian rank and file see the importance of the war, but they see a lot of other things as well. They've seen humanitarian progress in Afghanistan but not much military progress. They see practically no chance of the Taliban's being eradicated, no matter how many years our troops are there.

He does end his piece well with the Bronze meaning nothing if we pull out and the Taliban take over again.   I do hate being considered a "Quiter".
 
I agree to a certain extent. We do suffer from the "mentality of mediocrity" in most things...except hockey. When the going gets tough (or expensive) the Canadian public tends to want to cancel out. (Avro Arrow, EH101, HMCS Bras Dor etc...) The mentality of "quick fixing" things tends to be at play too.

I too would like to see us stay the course and finish what we've started. In this regard I think the CDS has a more realistic view than a lot of folks. It will take at least 10 years and we should be prepared to stay that long.  The benefits to enhancing our stature on the International stage as a credible actor will be incalculable. We are already being viewed in NATO and G8 as a "doer" now (and not just a "talker") due to what we have committed to in Afghanistan. If we can leave with a gold medal, to use the analogy, we will regain status as a responsible, active Middle Power again. Our investment in upgrading our Armed Forces is also a step in establishing our credibility as a Nation who is prepared and able to act and not just sit on the sidelines bleating platitudes.
 
As usual, I remain impressed with the way E.R. Campbell thinks and writes. Sadly, I disagree with his one line that "the people of Canada will be haunted by the disgrace of the defeat they, themselves, administered to their own armed forces."

I can't image the psyche of the average Canadian being "haunted" by much of anything.
Being haunted would require more thought and conscience than is present in the rhetoric of anti-Americanism, political correctness, or occasionally, a wide-spread but short-lived spasm at something Paul Bernardo-esque. Such Pavlovian salivation that passes for a Canadian moral superiority will certainly keep Canadians from being troubled by the long-term consequences of opinion polls' simplistic, quick-fixes.

And I suspect that such a dispirited outlook in this comes from having seen humanitarian and military progress......yet fully expecting it to be squandered in pandering to vote-chasing.
 
A National Post editorial (reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions (§29) of the Copyright Act):
http://www.nationalpost.com/story-printer.html?id=213821

Canadian soldiers are at significantly greater risk of death in Afghanistan than their counterparts in the British and U.S. armies. The death rate of our soldiers even surpasses that of American servicemen in Iraq, according to a National Defence Department analysis obtained by the National Post and reported in yesterday's edition.
http://www.nationalpost.com/todays_paper/story.html?id=211624

In its analysis, Canada's defence department calculated that we are losing soldiers at a proportionate rate 2.6 to four times higher than the Brits and Americans in Afghanistan, and 2.6 times higher than the U.S. military in Iraq. For Canadian soldiers serving in Afghanistan, the death rate ranged from 1.3% to 1.6% (compared to 0.3% to 0.6% for their allies in Afghanistan and 0.5% to 0.6% for U.S. forces in Iraq.)

Expressed in the starkest terms possible, that means the chance of the average Canadian soldier dying while stationed in Afghanistan during a calendar year is about one in 70. This figure is so high as to exceed the risk posed to Canadian troops during the Second World War in all years but 1944.

These numbers may not surprise Canadians, who have been torn over the merits of our Afghan mission since Paul Martin sent roughly 2,000 of our troops into the most dangerous southern region of the country -- Kandahar -- to combat the Taliban in May, 2005. With the remains of Canada's latest Afghanistan victim -- Gunner Jonathan Dion -- being repatriated just this week, Canadians do not need reminding of the peril that faces our troops working to rebuild Afghanistan and secure Afghanis against the murder and mayhem spawned by the Taliban and the foreign jihadis that increasingly swell its ranks. Still, the numbers demonstrate just how dangerous things are for the brave men and women who are leading our mission in Afghanistan.

They also point the way to making our mission in that country safer.

Between December, 2001, -- when Canadians first landed in Afghanistan -- and December, 2006, our forces lost 44 soldiers. Five died in friendly fire incidents, five in accidents, 12 in combat and 22 -- half the total -- were felled by ambushes while on ground patrol.

In 2007, the trend was more pronounced. In that year, our forces lost 30 more soldiers. All but five were lost to roadside bombs or improvised explosive devices (IEDs). (Two others died in combat situations, one in an accident, one in a suicide and another under suspicious circumstances that did not entail enemy involvement.)

All in all, of the 74 soldiers who have fallen in Afghanistan, 63% died as a result of roadside bombs or IEDs. Where Canadians face the greatest danger is not in combat with the Taliban, but on the roads, providing security and reconnaissance or traveling on resupply missions to forward operating bases.

The British, Americans and Dutch, who all have large numbers of troops stationed in the dangerous areas of southern Afghanistan, have lower casualty rates because they were better prepared for this kind of terrorist warfare. They did not put their troops on dangerous roads driving Iltis jeeps, an open vehicle with no armour, as Canada did. They have access to drone aircraft, and so can avoid sending troops out on dangerous road reconnaissance missions.

Most importantly, the U.K., United States and Netherlands have troop-transport helicopters at their disposal -- the Dutch having bought theirs from Canada, which, under Jean Chretien, sold them off to save money. Consequently, the armed forces of all three countries can bypass dangerous roads and move troops and supplies around more safely than can we.

We no longer send our troops out in Iltis jeeps -- we now have better armoured vehicles -- and France has dispatched six Mirage fighter jets to help us in Kandahar. But Canada still does not have the troop transport helicopters it truly needs.

Canada has a history of being initially unprepared for war. That was certainly true in 1914 at the outbreak of the First World War. It was true in 1939, when Canada declared war on Nazi Germany, and it has proven to again be the case in the current conflict.

Despite being ill-equipped in 1914 and 1939, Canadians were prepared to finish the job. And we trust our troops -- and our government -- will apply the same fortitude in Afghanistan. Yet it remains tragic that dozens of our soldiers have fallen, and hundreds more remain at risk, because of a failure to procure the equipment they need to execute their mission in the safest manner possible.

I don't think Iltis's have been much used on the latest Kandahar mission, where the great majority of casualties have been (and I don't think our allies, esp. the Brits, have generally had better vehicles in the south than we); we have drones (Sperwers, though how good they are...); and it was the Mulroney gov't that sold the Chinooks in 1991.  Don't our journalists do any real research?

Mark
Ottawa
 
Don't our journalists do any real research?

That's always been our real problem in Afghanistan.
It's all about opinion...........And everybody's got one.
 
Flip said:
That's always been our real problem in Afghanistan.
It's all about opinion...........And everybody's got one.

Opinions are fine but when they are presented as fact, they should at least be correct.
 
Sadly, I disagree with his one line that "the people of Canada will be haunted by the disgrace of the defeat they, themselves, administered to their own armed forces."

I can't image the psyche of the average Canadian being "haunted" by much of anything.


I fear Bob has zeroed in on a key factor - the national "what me worry" attitude. There was a story about an end year poll in one of the papers recently. It found that the Canadian people felt the rest of the world was descending into chaos - sort of a Churchillian "new dark age" [my words] - but were smuggly and serenely confident that we would avoid all the trials and tribulations in the year to come.

 
At which point they risk a rude awakening.

Whereupon they shoot the messenger, Steven Harper, and enlist the combined talents of Stephane and Jack to lead them through the valley.

Now there's a scary thought.
 
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