# Canada reconsiders role in Afghanistan



## schart28 (18 Dec 2007)

Herald Tribune
http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/12/18/asia/letter.php?page=1


PETAWAWA, Canada: On a blanket of fresh snow along the bank of the Ottawa River, 1,000 soldiers from the Royal Canadian Regiment and other units practiced this month for eventual combat in southern Afghanistan.

The troops are destined next year for Kandahar Province, where the Canadian Forces have done most of the fighting for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization against the resurgent Taliban militia. That may not last. With most Canadians opposed to staying in the war, Canada is weighing whether to pull out its 2,500 troops in 2009, which would deal a major blow to the alliance's fragile efforts.

The struggle to keep countries like Canada committed in Afghanistan illustrates NATO's broader problem of transforming itself from a Cold War alliance into one focused on combating terrorism.

"The Afghanistan mission has exposed real limitation in the way the alliance is organized, operated and equipped," the U.S. defense secretary, Robert Gates, said Dec. 11 before a conference in Edinburgh aimed at winning more alliance support for the war.

This is "due to the way various allies view the very nature of the alliance in the 21st century," he said. "We're in a post-Cold War environment. We have to be ready to operate in distant locations against insurgencies and terrorist networks."

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 Prime Minister Stephen Harper of Canada has set up a panel that will offer its recommendations by Jan. 31. The possibility of a pullout troubles some of those who have been in the fight.

Standing beside the Wall of Fallen Comrades at a military base in Petawawa, a two-hour drive from Ottawa, Captain Steve Brown runs his finger over photos of soldiers killed by Taliban mortar shells and American "friendly fire" in Kandahar.

"Canada went in for all the right reasons," he said. "If we don't carry through with what we set out to achieve, it would be a personal disappointment."

NATO faces waning public support in many of the 39 nations that contribute to the International Security Assistance Force, just as violence escalates. Tom Koenigs, the top UN diplomat in Afghanistan, said in October that suicide attacks increased 50 percent this year through September, compared with a year ago. Roadside bombings jumped about 30 percent.

Only about half the 41,000 coalition troops are allowed to engage in combat, according to estimates from analysts like Christine Fair, who served with the UN in Afghanistan.

American, British, Canadian and Dutch soldiers do the bulk of the fighting. Troops from France, Germany and other countries are confined by rules set back home to less-violent areas and have limits on engaging in military operations.

Under these circumstances, finding a replacement for Canada "would be a significant challenge," said Eugene Lang, a former chief of staff to two Canadian defense ministers.

During congressional testimony last week in Washington, Gates chastised American allies for not providing more troops, trainers and helicopters, and for failing to sell the war to skeptical citizens. He also offered praise.

"Some of our allies have more than stepped up to the plate," Gates said. "The British, the Canadians, the Australians and several others have played a really significant and powerful role in Afghanistan."

Canadian lawmakers have given the military a blank check for Afghanistan, where the Canadian Army - whose battle history includes the D-Day landings in Normandy during World War II - is waging its most intense combat since the Korean War.

Canadians are not as accustomed as Americans or Britons to "seeing grinding combat missions," and war casualties have polarized the electorate, said Lang, co-author of "The Unexpected War: Canada in Kandahar," a best seller in Canada.

Seventy-three Canadian soldiers and one diplomat have been killed in Afghanistan, a toll proportionally as high as American casualties relative to the size of the two countries' forces.

"Canadians see their military as a peacekeeping force, not a military force," Lang said.

Two-thirds of respondents in a September poll by Angus Reid Strategies said they did not want to extend the Canadian mission past February 2009, when its mandate expires.

People "have been reacting negatively to the fact that Canadians are more exposed" than other soldiers, said Pierre Martin, a political science professor who teaches at the Université de Montréal in Quebec, where antiwar sentiment outpaces the rest of the country.

Newspaper editorials have faulted the Canadian foreign minister, Maxime Bernier, for not finding others to share the burden. He made a pitch to NATO foreign ministers in Brussels on Dec. 7, though no new troop commitments emerged. The Harper government is "failing at negotiating some sort of rotation with other allies," Martin said.

At the Edinburgh meeting, the Canadian defense minister, Peter Mackay, said he had "very fruitful" discussions about ways to get more countries involved in southern Afghanistan.

The future Canadian role in the conflict should be clarified in February, when Harper says he will inform the alliance of Canadian intentions. Much will depend on the recommendations of the five-member panel headed by a former deputy prime minister, John Manley. Options besides a pullout include expanding training of the Afghan Army and police and shifting solely to rebuilding efforts.

"From now until February 2009, we have our mandate and our orders," Lieutenant General Andrew Leslie, commander of the Canadian Army, said in an interview on Dec. 5. "After that, I don't have a clue."

Back in his office in Petawawa, Captain Brown was working to help grieving families. "All of us, as soldiers, would like to see the job done, and we would like to be a part of that," he said. "Whether or not we have the resources to do that, the government and the people of Canada will have to make that decision."


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