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The Canada-Afghanistan Solidarity Committee has released a report urging Canada to continue an active role in Afghanistan after the military mission ends next year. Committee co-founder Terry Glavin and Nasrine Gross, an Afghan-American writer at Kabul University, discuss the situation on the ground.

Come quick, CBC! I have access to top-secret documents proving that the Canadian government officials at the highest levels deliberately handed over enemy combatants in Afghanistan to Lex Luthor and Gorrila Grod for super-villain style interrogation. My research shows that the prisoners were probably subjected to unhealthy doses of Kryptonite and freeze rays.

I can’t actually show you the documents, of course. In fact, I can’t offer any proof to substantiate my claim due to legal technicalities. But I assure you, my evidence is 100 per cent verifiable and I have no motivation beyond the desire to share the truth with my fellow Canadians.

That should be good enough for the CBC, right? I mean, you’ve set a precedent.

Further reading for those interested in the background on this bizarre saga:
Maybe some former Liberal ministers should be worrying about their asses

Facts: The previous Liberal government and Afghan detainees

“Torture in Afghanistan: The Liberals knew” redux

Afghan detainees and the former Liberal government/Human rights Update

More interesting moments in journalism:

They need our help now more than ever. Will Canada stand by the people of Afghanistan post-2011? Will we support our ally or turn our backs? It’s not too late to change course from where our foreign policy seems to be headed in the absence of strong moral and political leadership from all parties.

I hope the people of Canada are not going to leave us alone and they are going to support us after 2011 as well. Afghans cannot make their lives stable without the support of other international friends, especially Canadians.

Especially after spending lots of time and lots of energy, and we together have spilled a lot of our blood in support of Afghans. If Afghanistan is not stable, then stability of all countries around us in this global village will be at risk. It’s very important to remember that Afghans are also human beings. They also wish to have a better future for their families and their children and it’s not possible for us to make it alone. We need the support of friends, especially Canadian friends.

If you’re going to be in Ottawa on March 9 and want to learn more about the future of Canada’s involvement in Afghanistan, you have to attend this. It’s about keeping our promises.

During the Vietnam war, American forces were obsessed with body counts. In a jungle war where the South Vietnamese and US forces were theoretically in control of all territory, while actual military control extended only to the nearest treeline, counting enemy deaths served as some kind of grotesque marker for military success. In the end, these metrics were utterly beside the point. The Americans bugged out under the cover of a peace deal that was promptly torn up as communist tanks crashed through the gates of the presidential palace in Saigon.

Americans and NATO forces like our own don’t publicize body counts anymore. It’s not just because Vietnam tainted the practice. Partly, this is because they work for politicians elected by populations that have only rarely been comfortable with the scale of carnage made possible by industrial methods. Body counts may have helped certain soldiers win promotions, but this sort of information doesn’t do much to win the hearts and minds of the home front. Instead, we focus today on the more traditional metrics of success on the battlefield — territory and the support of the people who dwell within it.

These days, it is the Taliban who are obsessed with body counts — as usual, without distinguishing combatants and civilians. In the heart of Kabul, seventeen Afghans and foreigners were murdered this morning by suicide attackers. The enemy boasts of their “glorious” victory over medical doctors, a documentary film-maker, government officials and three Afghan policemen. It was a brutal act, only slightly dulled in its effect by the parade of Taliban atrocities that have come before it.

While the Taliban are focused on the body counts of doctors, film makers, aid workers and ordinary Afghan civilians, ISAF and the Afghan National Army are concentrating on the end-game. It’s not about counting corpses — it’s about boots on the ground and ordinary Afghans having a chance to get on with their lives without worrying about getting their throats slit by barbarians.

We’re still early into this surge, as our own soldiers and our allies have finally been given the resources they need to do the job. But the early signs are promising. Finally, we can start looking at what comes after the thugs have been routed. By 2011, we may already be a good ways along this road.

Further Reading
On This Day, The Birthday Of The Prophet: A Taliban Atrocity In The Streets of Kabul
Turning the Tide Against the Taliban

What’s in store for Canada in Afghanistan post-2011?

The Canada-Afghanistan Solidarity Committee (CASC) will unveil its Vision for Canada’s Role in Afghanistan Post-2011 on March 9 at the National Archives Hall in Ottawa. The event, called “Canada and Afghanistan: Keeping Our Promises”, is hosted by the Free Thinking Film Society of Ottawa and is also a fundraiser for the Afghan School Project.

Tickets: $30 regular admission, $15 students
• Purchase tickets online:
Online at http://www.canilf.org/news/
• Purchase tickets in person:
Ottawa Folklore Centre (1111 Bank Street, Ottawa)
Compact Music (190 Bank; 7851 ½ Bank Street, Ottawa)

If we remain true to our tradition as Canadians and responsible members of the international community, we’re going to help finish the fight in Afghanistan — notwithstanding those commentators who seem to think that we ought to put down our weapons at the behest of the IOC or VANOC at the same time that Taliban snipers are shooting at ISAF soldiers from behind human shields.

The scary thing is that I can’t detect the slightest trace of satire in the Georgia Straight’s latest hit-and-run propaganda attack on Canada’s mission in Afghanistan. I think editor Charlie Smith might actually be serious:

I think it’s time for the IOC to include some penalties for those who violate the truce, including NATO leaders.

If Prime Minister Stephen Harper, Chief of the Defence Staff Walt Natynczyk, and U.S. vice president Joe Biden were refused entry into Vancouver Olympic venues for being warmongers during a truce period, perhaps this world would suddenly get a little more peaceful.

Smith seems to suggest that UN Secretary Ban Ki Moon actually wants Canadians to throw down their weapons and bug out of Afghanistan ASAP.

That’s a distortion of the truth. The UN bigwig couldn’t have been more clear about the importance of Canada’s boots on the ground. Remember this?

Once again, the opportunists are on the rise, seeking anew to make Afghanistan a lawless place — a locus of instability, terrorism and drug trafficking. Their means are desperate: suicide bombs, kidnappings, the killing of government officials and hijacking of aid convoys. Almost more dismaying is the response of some outside Afghanistan, who react by calling for a disengagement or the full withdrawal of international forces. This would be a misjudgment of historic proportions, the repetition of a mistake that has already had terrible consequences…

The United Nations, alongside national and international counterparts, non-governmental organizations and Afghan civil society, will continue to provide the Afghan government whatever assistance it needs to build on these achievements. Our collective success depends on the continuing presence of the International Security Assistance Force [emphasis added], commanded by NATO and helping local governments in nearly every province to maintain security and carry out reconstruction projects.

In any case, there can be no truce with these fanatics. Their idea of a ceasefire is an off-season to recruit child suicide bombers and make some point about the unifying spirit of religion by spraying acid in the faces of girls who want to learn to read.

Let’s be clear. The UN wants us in Afghanistan. Our NATO allies want us in Afghanistan. The long-suffering Afghan people want us in their country. The only true warmongers are those who would have us abandon the field to let the Taliban conquer an entire nation.