[andyt]

Quote:

What on earth were we doing in Kandahar? Now that it’s all over, that question hangs in the air. Decades hence, students will be stumped by that question in much the same way I was when my high-school textbook opened to Canada’s place in the Boer War. It was full of sound and fury, but signifying exactly what? How did we pour five years, more than $18-billion and 158 lives into something so large and nebulous? How do we avoid repeating the mistake?

The process that led from Canada’s modest 2001 participation in the Kabul operation into the five-year semi-colonial Kandahar odyssey that began in 2006 remains something of a mystery. I’ve heard diplomatic and military officials of very high rank tell me they don’t really know how Canada became embroiled. Al-Qaeda had already been banished from Afghanistan by the time we entered the south. Our soldiers were professional, extremely courageous, calmly civilized and never quite sure what had caused them to be there.

We now have some surprising answers. A team of analysts with London’s Royal United Services Institute, a security think tank, gained unprecedented access to the confidential documents and British official records of the decision by NATO members in 2003 and 2004 to expand the Afghan war. Matthew Willis analyzed the Canadian decision, which was deeply entwined with Britain’s. His paper, to be released this month, describes a decision made in secret by senior Armed Forces officials, without the knowledge of NATO or probably of Canada’s prime minister.

“The Canadians and the British,” a senior NATO official told Mr. Willis, “hammered out the whole thing without NATO’s assistance, behind closed doors. … We were not aware of the details.”

While Canada was ostensibly fighting as one member of the 42-nation NATO International Stability and Assistance Force, the decision to establish a base in Kandahar, the most dangerous province, was negotiated in London without the knowledge – and against the advice – of the Brussels-based military alliance. NATO had been pressuring General Raymond Henault, then head of the Canadian Forces, to set up a mission in the provinces of Chaghcharan or Herat.

But Canada’s military officials had other ideas – and most were rooted in Canada’s experience, five years earlier, in Bosnia. They had come to dislike fighting with some other countries – Mr. Willis writes of “the Canadian leadership’s aversion to partnering with the Italians or certain other European nations.”

The generals also felt that the Bosnia and Kosovo missions hadn’t won Canada much international fame or recognition. Those had been real coalitions, and Canada had blended into the background.

“The reason went well beyond a Canadian desire to be patted on the back,” Mr. Willis writes, citing his interviews with Canada’s military leaders. “It was about being able to make one’s voice heard in the political and military fora where mission-defining decisions were being taken, including, not least, plans for the use of Canadian soldiers. It was thus also about improving Canada’s ability to exert its influence in accordance with its interests and values.”

Prime minister Paul Martin must have known that Canada’s troop commitment, just shy of 3,000 soldiers, was the most it could muster, and might not have been enough for a large and deadly province (it did prove to be inadequate). But the generals pressed ahead. Part of it, they told Mr. Willis, was a desire to please Washington.

He raises the “contentious question why the senior Canadian military leadership, and the defence and foreign affairs departments, persisted in pushing the mission forward. Ostensibly, the military was seeking redemption after a decade of unremarkable performances in unremarkable (read: peacekeeping) theatres; or perhaps it wanted to show the U.S., the Canadian public and other key allies that it really could do combat if called on.”

“Implicit and sometimes explicit in all of the above,” he concludes, “is the idea that Canadian planners were pursuing a principally national agenda divorced from the NATO plan and heavily conditioned by beliefs about what would go over well in Washington.”

It is discomforting to think that this dangerous war was prolonged beyond the ouster of al-Qaeda in order to further interests of organizational pride and stature. But this was a big part of the decision.

This may well be the reality of modern war, as we saw in Libya this year, where a handful of countries forged an ad hoc alliance in confidential meetings far outside of NATO’s vision and without all its members – a cafeteria NATO, if you will. It is a less formal process, but one whose miscalculations can cause years of damage.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/wor ... le2294450/

So was boosting the pride and stature of the military worth the lives lost? We certainly didn't defeat the Taliban

[martin14]

Reason 13874 to not read that whiney rag.

Aside from the moronic question, it's also inappropriate.. we still have people over there.

[2Cdo]

andyt wrote:

Quote:

The process that led from Canada’s modest 2001 participation in the Kabul operation into the five-year semi-colonial Kandahar odyssey that began in 2006 remains something of a mystery.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/wor ... le2294450/

So was boosting the pride and stature of the military worth the lives lost? We certainly didn't defeat the Taliban

From the second paragraph on wasn't worth the paper it was printed on. Fact checking must not be a requirement for reporters with The Mop and Pail.

[martin14]

Mop and Pail....


Never heard that one..

[BartSimpson]

andyt wrote:

What on earth were we doing in Kandahar?

Andy, you need to write to your MP and demand that Canada withdraw from the Commonwealth, NATO, and NORAD and all other mutual alliances and treaties. Then, when you're as isolationist as the USA was in the 1930's you won't have to answer such troubling questions.

[andyt]

BartSimpson wrote:

andyt wrote:

What on earth were we doing in Kandahar?

Andy, you need to write to your MP and demand that Canada withdraw from the Commonwealth, NATO, and NORAD and all other mutual alliances and treaties. Then, when you're as isolationist as the USA was in the 1930's you won't have to answer such troubling questions.

You want to argue against what's written in the article, fine. But your point doesn't address that.

[andyt]

2Cdo wrote:

andyt wrote:

Quote:

The process that led from Canada’s modest 2001 participation in the Kabul operation into the five-year semi-colonial Kandahar odyssey that began in 2006 remains something of a mystery.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/wor ... le2294450/

So was boosting the pride and stature of the military worth the lives lost? We certainly didn't defeat the Taliban

From the second paragraph on wasn't worth the paper it was printed on. Fact checking must not be a requirement for reporters with The Mop and Pail.

So you know better the workings of military command than analysts who have access to confidential documents?

[BartSimpson]

andyt wrote:

BartSimpson wrote:

andyt wrote:

What on earth were we doing in Kandahar?

Andy, you need to write to your MP and demand that Canada withdraw from the Commonwealth, NATO, and NORAD and all other mutual alliances and treaties. Then, when you're as isolationist as the USA was in the 1930's you won't have to answer such troubling questions.

You want to argue against what's written in the article, fine. But your point doesn't address that.

Yes, my point does address what's in the article. Asking why Canada established a base in Kandahar is the same as asking why Canada established bases in postwar Germany. Because the job and Canada's obligations had not been completed.

Your article says that 'al Qaeda was ousted' but the fact remains that al Qaeda was never ousted and that it remains pervasive in Afghanistan. Last year NATO lost 43 troops to actions by infiltrators with the Afghan forces. That is hardly emblematic of an ouster and it makes clear that the Taliban mutts are still active.

So if you're left to wonder why Canada is there then Canada needs to withdraw from her military alliances. Such things are complex these days (as if they were ever simple) and getting called out to Afghanistan is par for the course if you want your friends to help you out in the Balkans or etc. And if you are utterly against Canada being involved in international military affairs then, again, Canada needs to withdraw from her military obligations.

[andyt]

Fail Bart. I guess I have to pull out the relevant piece for you:

Quote:

While Canada was ostensibly fighting as one member of the 42-nation NATO International Stability and Assistance Force, the decision to establish a base in Kandahar, the most dangerous province, was negotiated in London without the knowledge – and against the advice – of the Brussels-based military alliance. NATO had been pressuring General Raymond Henault, then head of the Canadian Forces, to set up a mission in the provinces of Chaghcharan or Herat.

If Canada wanted to pull more than it's load in a good war, I have no problem with that. But what was the point of the war once Al Qaeda had been routed? If it's true, that the reason for going to Kandahar was to show how tough we were, I don't think that's worth losing lives over.

You might know better than me, but in the European wars, there were also instances of Canadians (under British command, so must have been wwi) being used as cannon fodder.

[DanSC]

[BartSimpson]

andyt wrote:

Fail Bart. I guess I have to pull out the relevant piece for you:

Quote:

While Canada was ostensibly fighting as one member of the 42-nation NATO International Stability and Assistance Force, the decision to establish a base in Kandahar, the most dangerous province, was negotiated in London without the knowledge – and against the advice – of the Brussels-based military alliance. NATO had been pressuring General Raymond Henault, then head of the Canadian Forces, to set up a mission in the provinces of Chaghcharan or Herat.

If Canada wanted to pull more than it's load in a good war, I have no problem with that. But what was the point of the war once Al Qaeda had been routed? If it's true, that the reason for going to Kandahar was to show how tough we were, I don't think that's worth losing lives over.

You might know better than me, but in the European wars, there were also instances of Canadians (under British command, so must have been wwi) being used as cannon fodder.

You're not much for understanding how militaries work or how diplomacy works.

Canada's base being established in Kandahar was not a frivolous act of a Canadian military out on a lark and while the author of the article seems to think that this is the case the reality is far different. If Brussels was not so keen on the idea that does not mean that Ottawa, Washington, and London were not supportive of the idea. There's a very insular, coffee shop kind of culture in Brussels and it is not at all unusual for key NATO decisions to end up being made outside of NATO's HQ.

After the Balkans war Brussels lost a lot of credibility with the respective home offices of NATO and that no one cared about the opinions of a bunch of pansies in Brussels is no surprise to anyone who has had to deal with them.

Oh, and if al Qaeda had been 'routed' as you say, then explain to me again why Kandahar was so dangerous? Hmmm?

[andyt]

You can't tell the diff between Taliban and Al Qaeda? If the rest of the military thinks like you, no wonder Astan is such a mess?

Was Al Qaeda routed in Astan? If not, why did Canada cut and run?

[2Cdo]

andyt wrote:

So you know better the workings of military command than analysts who have access to confidential documents?

If the analysts had access to confidential documents which this reporter used as his story, why did he make a glaring error in his paragraph. I'll wait to see if YOU can figure out what it is.

With the extremely obvious error posted so early in his story, it leads me to question how accurate or truthful everything else is in the story.

[BartSimpson]

andyt wrote:

You can't tell the diff between Taliban and Al Qaeda? If the rest of the military thinks like you, no wonder Astan is such a mess?

Was Al Qaeda routed in Astan? If not, why did Canada cut and run?

The wall of separation between the Taliban and al Qaeda is a figment of the Western imagination and the penchant of the Western mind to try to define everything. Most of these guys do not self-define as anything other than jihadi or mujahideen.

The two organizations act interchangeably and even seamlessly on many missions and cell leaders are often in both chains of command. I won't say they are one-and-the-same but at the operational level it often makes no difference.

[martin14]

andyt wrote:

You might know better than me, but in the European wars, there were also instances of Canadians (under British command, so must have been wwi) being used as cannon fodder.

Jesus andy, EVERYONE was being used as cannon fodder in WW1.

It's how that war was fought, all sides, all fronts.


What now, you want to spin off and start whining about WW1 ?

Stop pulling shit out of your ass, it stinks too much.