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The Evacuation of Canadians from Lebanon Thread

Moving large numbers of people by boat to Cyprus and planes leave from there. Is suspect the planes leaving Beirut go to those countries that people have citizenship in.
My point. Cyprus is intended to be used by several western countries as a 'safe third country' because of its proximity and EU membership. The GofC website says Canadian citizens/PRs evacuated at government expense to a safe third country' will have to pay to travel further. With Cyprus taking to '48 hour or gone' position, I was wondering about the practical application of that.

People showing up by boat directly on Cyprus' shores is their problem to deal with.
 
Not sure. I bet it would compromise the deal in place and they wouldn’t allow said countries to move people to Cyprus first. Cyprus could deny any Canadian charter boat or aircraft to land. Anyone still in country gets arrested then deported.

I’m not that familiar with all of that though.
 
Let the outpouring continue ....
So has our ambassador performed the ritual fleeing the country in a panic aboard a half filled evacuation flight just as the crisis begins, yet ?
Or just will we just content ourselves under manning the switchboards. ? Staffed with people who only have a vague idea of where Lebanon is ?
 
You could hire 3rd tier cruise ships to transport them across the Atlantic to Canada. I hear the Atlantic is beautiful at this time of year.
 
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Or the Caribbean.
Some years back I talked to guy with Global Affairs. Who been involved with evacuation. Third tier ? They should have been so lucky.
Described one of the ships as held together with baling wire and chewing gum .
Apparently the ship been hired sight unseen as it were.
Watching the 2005 Lebanon crisis and Kabul . If I found myself overseas during some sort of disaster or war. The last people I would count on to get me out me is the Canadian Government.
I have no deep desire to have some bureaucrat announce that while they deeply regret my death. It's s my own damn fault for being dumb enough to believe that Government would actually be competent enough to pull off an evacuation.
No thank you I'll try and get out on my own
The really sad part is it really shouldn't be that hard .
 
As I recall that we discussed most of this back in 2005. A lot of people were of the opinion that the Uncle Rick's "big honkin' boat" was the answer .
But whatever the solution was we were all agreed at the very least we'd learned something from this and we'd be ready the next time it happened.
So how's that working out for us again ?
 
How long ago did the warnings to Canadian citizens start going out that they should leave Lebanon? How long before that were there travel advisories warning Canadians not to travel there? At what point does the individual become responsible for their situation rather than the government.

This isn't like the 2004 tsunami, an earthquake or an unexpected coup where Canadian travellers/dual citizens are caught unawares by events and need to be evacuated. These are people that chose to visit/live in a war zone and continued to do so while a semi-state actor (Hezbollah has representation in the Lebanese government) was launching ongoing attacks against a neighbouring state. They were then told explicitly that direct, escalated conflict with Israel was imminent and that they should leave the country. Is the Government of Canada now responsible to evacuate people that ignored these repeated warnings?
 
How long ago did the warnings to Canadian citizens start going out that they should leave Lebanon? How long before that were there travel advisories warning Canadians not to travel there? At what point does the individual become responsible for their situation rather than the government.
July I think.
This isn't like the 2004 tsunami, an earthquake or an unexpected coup where Canadian travellers/dual citizens are caught unawares by events and need to be evacuated. These are people that chose to visit/live in a war zone and continued to do so while a semi-state actor (Hezbollah has representation in the Lebanese government) was launching ongoing attacks against a neighbouring state. They were then told explicitly that direct, escalated conflict with Israel was imminent and that they should leave the country. Is the Government of Canada now responsible to evacuate people that ignored these repeated warnings?
I grew up with Lebanese kids that came over in the 70s.

All of them were convinced that Lebanon would become the jewel of the Middle East again and most were hell bent on going back. Now these were the Christian Lebanese, who tended to live in the mountains etc. The attitude is that this sort of thing is normal, everything will be alright and nothing would happen to them.
 
If anyone cares for my personal opinion on this, read on, if not move on to the next comment.

I figure if you are Canadian, and decide to live abroad and end up in a war zone, or an area that has a history of wars, big or small scale events, maybe you should forego Canadian Passport protection.

Canadians that came from China, thru various escape routes thru Hong Kong in the 60s, 70s were told if they went back to visit family or vacation that Canada could not protect them from arrest or charges from the Government of China.

So if you decide to live in a conflict area, as the Middle East, you should be responsibile for your own rescue plan. You want out, there is always some sort of warning that something bad is coming.

Canada is too far away, does not have the troops, or equipment , or aircraft to storm a airport, and hold it as rescue flights in come and land, load up and depart. Canada does not have a Navy to storm a beach and hold it for boat operations to take people out.

( Canadian Armed Forces are under valued by the government and underfunded, and under manned just my opinion)

Right now we could barely mount an operation to rescue the Canadians who might be stuck in the various hurricane affected areas of the US and they are not in a hostile country.

If every chopper was sent
15 chinooks ( 33-55 troops) ( 825 persons)
85 Giffons (8-10 troops depending on the source) ( 680 to 850 persons could be moved)
25 Cyclones ( up to 22 people ) ( upwards 550 people max )
13 Cormorants ( 15 to 20 depending on seating plan, or standing) ( 260 persons)
13 Jet Rangers ( 2 or 3 plus a pilot) ( 39 people)
( max of 2524 people in a single lift )
the C17, C130 fleets could take that many plus more people in a single lift

But aircraft taskings and operations take a few of each off the list
The US Cenus reports 95 000 Canadians live in Florida with as many as 500 000 homes owned by Canadians ( snow birds)
We cannot rescue them so how do we do a rescue operation in a war zone ?

US Coast Guard has 144 helicopters across the US.

National Guard has 30 plus helicopters operating in the Florida area. Operating in an area less 1% of Canada's land mass


So how the hell does anyone expect Canada to rescue them in an emergency of any kind.




So we would need to use Civilian leased aircraft, pay a huge bill for pilots, crew and aircraft be flown into the Middle East war zone and land at airports that may or not be secure, and not anger the various factions and governments who might take a small dislike to Canadians. Or use cruise ships to take them away.

Then have the people we rescue just return to the area after they complain the lodgings, the hotels they were offered were not up the standard they would expect to live in for any time period.

Estimated 45 000 to 50 000 Canadian maybe living in the Middle East.

In 2006 Canada evacuted 15 000 people , but not all were Canadians, estimated 7000 returned

waste of money and man power ?

but it made the government of the day look good.
 
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