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Letter to the Editor:
Making the War in Afghanistan a Decisive Issue in the Federal Election - Not Possible
CPS Election Analysis 2008 - Week 2
September 7, 2008
Editor, FOS
Making the war in Afghanistan a decisive issue in the federal election will not be possible, in my opinion, since both the major parties are in harmony on keeping our troops in combat until 2001. But we must be vocal against this war. I cannot express how deep is my dismay that we are fighting in Asia, when we had the wisdom not to do so in Vietnam.
Canadians should stick to our traditions of peace-keeping. That means, we send troops in UN uniform to places where a truce has been signed and the exchange of fire and violent acts have been suspended. We interpose between the sides, and we do not allow belligerents to come into contact violently. Since 1956, when Lester Pearson proposed this force at the UN during the Suez Crisis, it has been our pride to keep peace -- not to "Make Peace" by waging a war. I am proud of this record.
Canadians should know that, even under the authority of British imperial governments in our early history, we have never sent our soldiers to kill and maybe die for the sake of defeating an insurgent section of a people against their own government. For example, in 1899, Britain asked our aid in South Africa to fight insurgent Afrikaaner colonists, and we refused to send our soldiers. (Canadian volunteers could join the Imperial Army.) Today, some Afghans support rebellion, insurrection, uprising; they do not recognize President Hamid Karzai's republican regime, ruling from Kabul, as the government of their choice.
The facade of democracy is thin, and the Afghans have valid reasons not to want Karzai's government, of feudal lords enriched by war or narcotics, to have power over all the country. Let us drop the use of the simplifying word, "Taliban." Afghans opposed to Karzai are not united behind one leader, party or set of political goals. But they do want an end to foreign interventions, an end to violence as a way of life, an end to grinding poverty.
Canada does not have a role in shaping the political order, economic system, and religious culture in Afghanistan; that is a domestic Afghan job, for Afghans alone. And if it is likely -- many say it is -- that a tribal/ civil war would then decide the Afghan future, I see no role for Canada in military interventionism. They have the right to be wrong, as we want for ourselves, and no foreign power should intrude on their internal disputes.
Nor do I see a role there for NATO, under its weak pretence of UN justification of NATO's aggressive "ISAF" mission against rebels. Until now, Canada did not fight counter-insurgency wars, and NATO never had such a counterinsurgent purpose in its history. Canada has no good reason to remain in NATO now, and NATO itself should disband as a military alliance. The Cold War was its purpose and that is behind us -- if NATO does not provoke another frigid spell by its stupid aggressions.
Canadians can fight the Conservative-Liberal policy of acting as "world-order police force" in the poor nations. Our history and traditions need to be better understood. We can actually make an argument from a conservative position -- we want to preserve the wise tradition of our past foreign policy -- as well as attacking the gross injustice of this Afghan war, so lethal for masses of civilian people. That should be the political line progressives of the Left and peace-activism adopt in the federal election campaign.
The NDP have been clear that they want an end to combat now. To stiffen their stance, constant questioning of the Mission by Canadians will show the NDP this is an issue they might turn to advantage. The Green Party too might learn that strongly identifying itself with peace will benefit it at the polls. Then the Liberals will notice, and Ignatieff's faction will lose influence, I would hope. When the Liberals awaken to their error in keeping our troops in combat until 2011, they might retract from that stance. It is the practical path to getting our soldiers out of one of the poorest nations on earth.
Write, phone, email, carry protest signs in the street! This war is so wrong; our national will must be aroused against it.
CJ - Nelson |