# How the British see Harper's leadership in Afghanistan



## big bad john (30 Sep 2006)

This is a typical Telegraph anti war article, but it does have an interesting read on how they see Prime Minister Harper statement in regards to Afghanistan.


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/core/Content/displayPrintable.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2006/09/30/do3003.xml&site=15&page=0

I'd feel happier if I were Canadian
By Vicki Woods
(Filed: 30/09/2006)



If you wanted to feel the public pulse on how we are governed, you needed only to watch BBC Question Time this week. It was unusually noisy, with a single-minded audience baying at Jack Straw for the Iraq war, and David Dimbleby letting the "debate" run on and on.

It wasn't a debate; it was a savaging by an angry mob, or near-mob. If they'd had rotten tomatoes, they'd have chucked them. Instead, they hurled accusations: you lied about WMD, you finagled the casus belli, you misled the British public, you sucked up to Bush, you poodle, you.

Straw said: did not, did not, did not, with all his lawyerly skill, but convinced nobody.

advertisementBrilliantly enjoyable television. Though I always feel a bit uncomfortable when I'm on the same side as a baying mob (the stuckist British sense of fair play being so powerful), I was happy to see Straw face genuine public outrage. It's good for politicians to be thrown in the stocks. The poor beasts don't get out enough.

Straw was unlucky that the panel's token Tory was Kenneth Clarke — not only famously against the Iraq intervention from the start, but also an engaging performer. He struck home like an arrow: "I tend to say that Iraq was the worst British foreign policy mistake since Suez, but, as these dreadful events unfold, I've come to think that Suez wasn't as bad." I thought: blimey, he's right! As did the audience.

Not that it helps the poor bloody infantry who are dodging death daily in Basra (and Helmand – we'll get to Helmand) but I'm glad to be vindicated about my anti-war stance, which is as elderly as Clarke's. I get so many letters from people deeply unhappy about Blair's wars. (Not all: one correspondent crossly addressed me as "the honorary chairwoman of the Wrong-About-Iraq Society".) Daily Telegraph readers are not generally thought of as Make-Love-Not-War appeasers, are they? What they say, over and over, is: "It's not doing Britain any good." And they bitterly resent being called immoral (in so many words) by a Prime Minister in his imitation-of-Christ mode.

Three years ago, the peace-marchers (and Ming Campbell) constantly argued that "half the nation" was against the Iraq war. It never was: a rough third was firmly pro, a third against and a third don't-knows. I can't quite put my finger on the moment when the mood changed: was it after the July 7 bombings? But the "Why are we in Iraq?" question is now answered pretty damningly. We're in Iraq because Tony Blair needed to tell George W. Bush that we would be. Shoulder to shoulder, until the end, for as long as it takes, etc.

The "Why are we in Afghanistan?" question is equally slippery. We went in for reasons that most of us accepted, shocked, blinking and sympathetic as we were in the aftermath of 9/11. George and Tony gave us their tight-lipped bracers about Osama bin Laden being the most dangerous fanatic in history (we agreed); and about civilised nations needing to smack down the Taliban bad hats (we agreed).

It became slipperier when Laura Bush and Cherie Blair appeared on British television to back their spouses. They appealed for the liberation of Afghan women from the tyranny of burqas and begged that they should be allowed to wear nail-polish, please, please. We even agreed with that. Well, some of us. Some of us threw up at the armpit-prickling performance.

I can forgive Mrs Blair for nearly everything she has done during her soi-disant First Ladyship. Her venalities count small in the great scheme of things. But I can't forgive her mugging to camera with her fingers over her eyes in imitation of a burqa. British politicians should not send soldiers to fight and die for nail-polish.

But why are we in Afghanistan now? Tony neglects to say (being otherwise engaged on his Middle East peace legacy) and our lumpen Defence Secretary, Des Browne, sounds a teeny bit muddled. His latest Afghan pronouncement was at the Labour conference: "British forces are risking their lives across the world to end poverty, lawlessness and injustice." In Afghanistan? I didn't know that. Did you know that?

"The job they are doing," he bored on, "creating security which allows people to rebuild their communities, which gives them a chance to end the poverty which stunts their lives – these are our party's fundamental values." There you go, Cherie. Not about nail-polish. All about Labour values.

I never thought I'd ever rather have been born Canadian, but I'm lately beginning to wonder. The new Canadian prime minister, Stephen Harper, is just back from Kandahar, where 2,500 Canadian troops have been since 2002 with plenty of first-class kit and more than enough ammunition.

Why is Canada in Afghanistan? Well, not for the same reasons as Tony gives. Harper told the troops: "Your work is about more than just defending Canada's national interests. Your work is also about demonstrating an international leadership role for our country." Fancy a prime minister running a war in the national interest, eh? The troops clapped and cheered him – and, quite spontaneously, apparently. CBC News quoted a handy major saying: "Morale was at an all-time high after the speech." Yesterday, I read that the military is pressing the Government hard to get all British troops out of Basra (where they sit like rats in a trap). They want more troops deployed to Afghanistan, and I can see why.

They're right in their demands. We should get out of Iraq. I hope to heaven the Army brass gets what it wants, and damn your legacy, Tony. It's our legacy, too.


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## warspite (30 Sep 2006)

It's funny but this anti-war article seems different in tone than the ones over here. More that they're against their governments policies and decisions, not war in general? Unlike our antiwar yuppies, who don't know jack all and spew B.S to the masses in an attempt to voice their loony bin ideals as though they mattered. At least the argument in this article is soundly layed out unlike our antiwar articles, most of which the very thought of raises my blood pressure.

Interesting though how they view Harper over there, I think it can be safely said that Harper is promoting a positive image of Canada to the world.


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## Kirkhill (30 Sep 2006)

warspite said:
			
		

> It's funny but this anti-war article seems different in tone than the ones over here. More that they're against their governments policies and decisions, not war in general? Unlike our antiwar yuppies, who don't know jack all and spew B.S to the masses in an attempt to voice their loony bin ideals as though they mattered. At least the argument in this article is soundly layed out unlike our antiwar articles, most of which the very thought of raises my blood pressure.
> 
> Interesting though how they view Harper over there, I think it can be safely said that Harper is promoting a positive image of Canada to the world.



BBJ - doesn't warspite have something of a point here?  Following from tradition,  the Telegraph (a paper I read religiously) is only anti-Labour wars. Now if it had been a Conservative PM that had gone into Iraq, Afghanistan, Sierra Leone, Macedonia, Kosovo, BH..... have I forgotten any?


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## big bad john (30 Sep 2006)

Very anti-labour, and because of that the whole war.


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