Canada in Afghanistan

Peter MacKay made the announcement today that we all knew was coming.

 

The Harper government is considering a proposal that would keep hundreds of Canadian troops in Afghanistan until 2014 in a non-combat, training role, The Canadian Press has learned.

The move would extend Canada’s military presence in Afghanistan three years past the July 2011 withdrawal deadline set by Parliament, but would remove troops from the front lines of fighting.

It is under consideration because the Conservative government faces international pressure — publicly and privately — to leave behind at least a contingent of military trainers to help address a shortfall in the NATO-led mission.

Well-placed sources have told The Canadian Press they expect Prime Minister Stephen Harper to make a decision soon on a proposal that would send up to 600 troops to Kabul to continue NATO training efforts. The Canadian personnel would not be involved in combat operations.

Read more: http://www.cbc.ca/politics/story/2010/11/07/canada-afghanistan.html#ixzz14fVVnNhP

 

This is what I was both expecting and afraid of, they have no intention of ending the war as advertised.  When these people use the excuse that they are helping the women and children, it is really an excuse for advancing the corporate agenda.  If they wanted to help the women and children, well, I guess they’d be listening to Malalai Joya, who is really a very relevant voice for the women and children of Afghanistan.  Recently, she was in Canada on a limited speaking engagement.  Peter Mansbridge condescended to interview her.  The reason I phrased it that way was because I perceived his tone as patriarichal, condescending.  You decide.

 

 

Ms. Joya interviewed as a woman who passionately wants all military occupation in her embattled country to end.  She speaks eloquently and with a sense of urgency, suffering Mansbridge’s patronizing questions and patiently reiterating her points.  Please watch, you will be moved by her words.

 

These women and children are not better off because of NATO occupation.  They have been used as an excuse for Multinational Corporations to occupy and expropriate international funding, through WTO, IMF, NGO’s and private American Military Industrial Complex Corporations.  They want to “create crisis to facilitate change”, in order to control trade routes, privatise resources and erode sovereign law.  Why else would you install a corrupt puppet regime?  How is that enabling democracy to flourish in this embattled region?  Ms Joya so elequently stated, you can’t impose democracy on another society, it must be won by the citizens and then it needs to be carefully guarded, as we are now learning in our own country.  Which leads me to wonder, how can we impose democracy on another nation when we fail to understand our own?