Reading Between the Lines

Thomas Walkom, writing in today's Toronto Star, castigates the Senate defence committee for issuing a report that fails to say what it screams when read between the lines: that Canada's "mission" to Afghanistan isn't going to succeed.

The problem isn't with the Canadian soldiers over there. They've proven themselves courageous and dedicated. It's that there aren't nearly enough of them over there, especially not enough over there from other NATO members.

It's that Afghanistan is a medieval society that has no interest in transforming itself into a Western-style democracy.

It's that the government of Hamid Karzai, the one we're propping up, the one our soldiers are fighting and dying for, "routinely shakes down its own citizens. Its army and police are, in the words of committee chair Colin Kenny, 'corrupt and corrupter.'"

The report asks whether Canadians are, "...willing to commit themselves to decades of involvement in Afghanistan, which could cost hundreds of Canadians lives and billions of dollars, with no guarantee of ending up with anything like the kind of society that makes sense to us? If we aren't willing to hang in for the long haul, what will have been the point of five years of Canadian lives and Canadian money disappearing?"

"To ask these questions is to answer them. Most Canadians will not agree to a war that takes decades to prosecute yet produces no results. And if, as the senators conclude, this is the prognosis, then the last five years of Canadian involvement – and Canadian deaths – have been pointless."

So where does this leave us? In my view, we have done our post 9/11 bit for the United States. The reason we're still in Afghanistan is because the US stupidly drained off its fighting force to wage a war of whim in Iraq. Every day our soldiers go into battle, they're paying for George Bush's duplicity.

We have done our job as babysitters in Kandahar while the Americans went out for their night on the town in Baghdad. Time for them to come home and take care of their own kids just like any responsible parents. This babysitter, Canada, needs to go home too.