Kabul is a much more stable, safer city than Kandahar.
It’s true that the sudden rumours the Conservative government would be open to a mission extension in Afghanistan that would involve strictly a training role in Kabul is an about-face to the previous protestations of Stephen Harper that we were absolutely out in 2011. The Toronto Star editorial can’t help rubbing that in, even as it gives an endorsement of the role.
If the editorials floating around the Canadian media are any indication, the mission extension in a non-combat capacity comes with almost unanimous consent. National Post columnist Don Martin gives a curmudgeonly approval. Tim Powers says he believes “we owe it to those Canadians who have made the ultimate sacrifice” to see it through to the end. The Calgary Herald opines a similar sentiment, particularly poignant in that it lost a journalist to the cause of covering the conflict. The Winnipeg Free Press calls the behind-the-wire deployment “a good fit for Canada.” The Guelph Mercury says the sudden “U-turn” by Harper is the right move.
Even the troops, the ones the anti-war crowd profess to want to save from incurring more casualties, are open to a mentoring role beyond the July 2011 exit date. Indeed, in my discussions with the OMLT soldiers in Kandahar, this kind of role really inspires our military trainers.
For all of the examples of media maturity displayed above, it is therefore with disappointment that I read the Toronto Star’s most dishonest scribbler, Jim Travers, characterize this mission as being anything other than the necessary, humanitarian role it actually is.
First of all, Travers gets it wrong almost immediately, by saying we’ll be training Hamid Karzai loyalists instead of killing his enemies. What we’ll be doing, actually, is training ANA and ANP security forces, and likely the same way we’ve been doing for eight years already. Calling Afghan security forces Hamid Karzai loyalists makes about as much sense as calling our soldiers Harper loyalists.
His next assertion is conspiratorial in nature. Creating the impression that Canada’s new mission in Kabul could be labelled a training mission but involve combat operations is, unequivocally, rubbish. Having soldiers placed into an operational support role behind the wire means exactly that. There will be no combat role for Canadian mentors any more than there is now for the operational support staff in Kandahar Airfield who never leave the base during their tours. I met soldiers on their third tour in Kandahar who had never been outside the wire at all.
It’s therefore a wrongful characterization of the role we would play in Kabul to say it would sap military resources, drain the treasury and cost more lives. Firstly, it would sap less resources because we’re cutting personnel by at least two-thirds. And second, barring any lucky air strikes or suicide bombings, chances are that more Canadians will be killed in one day in backyard swimming pools next summer than soldiers from 2011-2014. That’s a fact.
Nowhere does Travers talk about the dynamics of the surge, the time element of that gambit, or how different our role could be in just 10 months. Considering how much he writes about the mission, what he would most benefit from would be getting in on the first embedded media assignment for the Toronto Star in Canada’s new Kabul mission. If he could summon the courage of this UBC student, he might even find out the country is about more than just the death and mayhem he writes about.
Travers is upset because this is the role Bobbyity Rae (his pick as Iggy’s successor) had wanted. Now that Harper is leaking this info out it makes it hard for Bobbyity to criticise Harper’s handling of the mission.
What’s he going to say?
The truth about Afghanistan is that the Taliban does not have the ability to operate out in the open or unopposed.
The Afghanis do however now have the capability and the opportunity to regain control of the country and hold ground against what is basically a criminal gang.
Great article and you went to the place and talked to the people there and saw what was around you as opposed to ” Travesty ” writing from his very safe desk.
Since I’m also playing armchair general I could be wrong here, but if the vast majority of the Afghan people where actively fighting with the Taliban the handful of Canadian and Allied soldiers wouldn’t survive 10 seconds outside the bases with our current numbers of soldiers in place.
Now, the Taliban or the Afghans couldn’t win in a hot stand-up fight but the situation would be much more like the period of Russian occupation where our casualties would be in the thousands and not in the low 3 figures ! Not minimizing our casualties but compared to WWI or WWII where we could lose 10,000 in one battle on one bad day, the situation is very different.
A hot generalized insurgency would be the minimum we should be seeing if the vast majority of Afghans where fighting with the Taliban or enthusiastically supporting the Taliban i.e. it’s a question of scale that leads me to believe that the active Taliban aren’t that numerous or popular.
In any case I could be wrong here, but like I said you saw a great deal first hand and spoke to our guys there and I’m curious to read your opinion on the above ” theory “.
Just to counterbalance the peace at any price view (at least for us), especially on the backs of the Afghans, some realism from the estimable Brian Platt just back from outside the wire in Kabul where Mr Travesty ain’t going to go because he doesn’t care–except about Crvena Zvezda attitudinizing:
http://ubyssey.ca/opinion/platt-back-from-kabul%E2%80%94what-i%E2%80%99ve-learned/#comment-7928
And if you think the US is going to cut and run, especially after the Congressional elections, read this by an American milblogger who was in Afstan as a soldier and is now back as a civilian:
http://www.bouhammer.com/2010/11/so-now-the-date-slips-for-afghanistan/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+AfghanistanBlog+%28Afghan%26Military+Blog%29
I really like his last para; it applies with spades and spinning slot machine wheels to this country.
By the way, after a CF presence of some eight and a half years, almost five years in serious combat, a country of 33 million people has taken 152 dead military personnel. That is no tragedy. It’s one mid-range plane crash. So why all the obsessing unless one views the state’s use of armed force as somehow inherently illegitimate? Sometimes one almost longs for PET though he was strong only domestically.
Mark
Ottawa
After a CF presence of some eight and a half years, almost five years in serious combat, a country of 33 million people has taken 152 dead military personnel. That is no tragedy. It’s one mid-range plane crash. So why all the obsessing unless one views the state’s use of armed force as somehow inherently illegitimate? Sometimes one almost longs for PET though he was strong only domestically.
Mark
Ottawa
Moreover Mr Travesty is not likely to be there outside the wire in the near future. Unlike Brian Platt
http://ubyssey.ca/opinion/platt-back-from-kabul%E2%80%94what-i%E2%80%99ve-learned/#comment-7928
And if you think the US is really going to cut and run combat-wise, see this from an American milblogger, previously there as a soldier and now back as a civilian:
http://www.bouhammer.com/2010/11/so-now-the-date-slips-for-afghanistan/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+AfghanistanBlog+%28Afghan%26Military+Blog%29
Mark
Ottawa
Why would one long for Trudeau who never met a dictator he didn’t like?
Meanwhile we have to get through the next period with many Quebec soldiers from Valcartier deployed. There are probably going to be casualties, which will do nothing for our election chances in Quebec.
[...] The Star’s Travesty Weighs In [...]
[...] When it comes to covering Afghanistan, National Post blogger Adrian MacNair says it’s all in what the reporter chooses to pick and share: “When it comes to the 232-page document released by the Asia Foundation about their Afghan survey, the same problem poses itself. What some of the press decided was critical in the survey is that 43 per cent of Afghans strongly support Karzai’s negotiations with the Taliban. And that’s all they decided to report. It’s almost as if the reporter had already decided the negotiations were the key point, and leafed through in search of some figures regardless of all other information released by the Asia Foundation. Well, that’s one way to write the story. Here’s mine: “Nearly half of all Afghans are confident their country is moving in the right direction — up seven per cent from last year — according to a nation-wide survey released on Tuesday.” ….” He’s also underwhelmed with a recent Toronto Star column on the idea of Canada staying to train Afghan securit…. [...]
[...] letter of mine in the Toronto Star (links added): Re: Canadians need clarity, information, Nov. 9; Taliban waited and Ottawa blinked, Nov. 10; PM’s reversal on Afghan pullout [...]