Jack Granatstein, at the Canadian Defence & Foreign Affairs Institute’s 3Ds Blog, cuts through more mindless political spin, this from the Liberals:

The Peacekeeping Mythology Never Dies

It is a great and good thing that the Liberals are supporting the new training mission in Afghanistan. The terms of their support, however, are shamelessly disingenuous. Yesterday on CBC-TV’s “Power and Politics” the Grits’ Dominic LeBlanc talked about how the training role was in the traditional Canadian mode, redolent of our long proud peacekeeping tradition. And that’s why Michael Ignatieff could support it. Blah, blah, blah. This is straight-out pandering to the soft-headed Canadian belief that all we should ever do is keep the peace, preferably with a blue beret firmly fixed on our soldiers’ heads.

But is training equal to peacekeeping? No, it most certainly is not. In the first place, Afghanistan is a state at war, and there is no peace to keep. Then, Canadian soldiers will be training one side in that war, the ANA and ANP, how best to fight the other side, the Taliban…

Words are indeed without meaning for this country’s politicians.

Earlier:

Now also blogging at the Canadian Defence & Foreign Affairs Institute…/Scary thought Update

Lots more on other efforts to keep that peacekeeping flag flying here.

Mark
Ottawa