Should Canada Go To Iraq?

I cannot comment on other militaries, in regards to what is covered in their pre-deployment training. I know that as a recce patrolman, I had to learn phrases and customs of the Afghani people, on pre-deployment training. The officer who was killed by the axe would have had extensive training in that field for that was his role, he was part of a civil reconstruction team... Thats why he had to take his helmet off, so that he could gain the trust of the locals and then ensure they could take advantage of what the Canadian military was offereing them in terms of reconstruction and what not.
We have many translators and some interpretors here... Some who left this country during the time of Russian occupation and some that came later. We also have locals that we use.
No I have not read the book RAJ, but as I said we are somewhat immersed in the culture. Canadians have always been sensitive to other countries cultures, which is now to a fault I think.
You can say what you want, and quote who you want, but there will be a certain lacking in your mindset until you have experienced this place first hand.
And I hope that with whatever comes out of this, that historians will say that yes We had troops on the ground trying to make a difference, the best way possible. But we won't really know what they say until this is all over and the troops are home.
 
Dear Pete,

With this reply I have the most respect for you. You could have took a totally different tact in the reply and didn't. Thank you. I appreciate you acting as a gentleman. And I understood about the taking off of the helmet and laying down of his weapon. But I also understand that under Afghan culture and tribal laws that was about the worst violation there could have been. And if those Canadian soldiers had been Moslems it would have causd all the tribes in that region to make war on that tribe in total.

And you are correct in stating that you can not understand certain aspects without being there and having done that. But even that can be taken to a dangerous extreme (ie WW1 was an example of that to where the only the generals with 30-40 years combat and military experience could know the way which the Canadians proved wrong if you remember in the last year of the war).

What I hope everyone involved in Iraq and Afghanistan (ie Afghanistan especially) understand is that there is no such thing as being successful in that region unless you are totally immersed in the people, culture and most important the religion. This is not the advise of a bean-counter or a book worm but those that have been there the last 150 some years and even recently.

The hard part most new-comers have with Afghanistan is understanding the part played by religion. And I just don't mean the understanding of Islam. No matter how hard NATO and other forces try in Afghanistan we are never going to win the so called "hearts and minds" war. Just can't happen. A retired US Army colonel whose main career was in the Arab world wrote ARMY (ie the number on publication of the US Army) stating that in the clearest terms. To the Afghans (ie especially those on the Afghan-Pakistan border area) we will always be nonMoslems. And that counts against us more than we can possibibly understand. So you understand the people, culture and religion to basically keep the hatred/dislike to a low roar and not make it any more worst than it already is. To wit "It may not be very flattering to our amour propre, but I feel sure I am right when I say that the less the Afghans see of us, the less they will dislike us. " (General Roberts in 1880 to the PM on Afghanistan and the Afghan tribes)

Finally, did any of the lessons in Afghan culture warn you not to ever ever scratch your ear with your left hand as they talk or if you see them scratching their ear with their left hand or tuggng their beard with their left hand to be on alert that you are basically being insulted?

Jack E. Hammond

NOTE> I sure hope they are not expecting you all to hump the Eryx on patrols while in Afghanistan and instead rely on the Carl Gustav. I know some US Army and Marines also who would rather have you M72 LAWs instead of their AT-4s on patrols. The US Army has funded at last some purchase of M72s from Norway realizing that the AT-4 is overkill for Afghanistan and way to heavy.
 
Well, in regards to your tribal comment, every tribe is different here... I don't have much time at the moment for a proper relpy, and there are a lot of things I cannot say for reasons of OPSEC, which means I can't back up a lot of my statements. If I have time later on I will try and give a proper reply...
 
Damien435 said:
A-Q attacked the World Trade Center before, years later Osama was captured in Sudan and the Sudanese made an excellent proposition to the US. "We will give him to you and you may do with him what you with." This came after the first WTC attack, after the bombing of the Marine Barracks in Beirut, and after the attacks on the US Embassies in Kenya and.... Tanzania(?). Then President Clinton turned the offer by Sudan down saying "We do not want to become involved with international terrorism."

WTF!?

A-Q had already hit US interests around the world multiple times, claimed responsibility for them, and was on the FBI's Most Wanted List, Clinton said no because the US was not hit at home and so long as they only struck at US military interests and installations in some poor country who cares, right? (Ever wonder why I say Democrats are destroying America? There's one very good example.)

My point? Years later A-Q attacked America in what has become known around the world as 9/11. 3,000 Americans dead, 3,000 families devastated, a city was paralyzed by fear, all flights over American skies were cancelled and for the first time since 1920 not a single commercial aircraft was flying. For three days the FAA would not allow aircraft to fly, all sporting events for almost an entire week stopped, businesses were closed, schools shut down (in the NY area, others tried to pretend nothing had happened but when a kid runs around the halls yelling "Holy :cen:! WWIII just started!" you tend to put things together quite quickly.), the White House was evacuated, Army and Marine special forces were running around the White House lawn as they evacuated key personel, and the President was forced to take a very long detour from Florida, to Texas, to Omaha, and then to Washington. All this and more could have been prevented but Clinton did not want to get involved.

I can assure you, someone somewhere is out there plotting against America and all of the West in general as we sit here and argue. You may go ahead and try hiding behind the Atlantic but as America has found out "she (the Atlantic) aint so big as she used to be." and one day Canada will have their own terrorist attacks to deal with. Then your choices will be A.) Go on the offensive and get those who have wronged you and any who intend to do so in the future or B.) Do what Spain did and belly up.

BTW, there were more than 2 nations involved in the second gulf war. I believe the number is 11.

More to come after work. (pertaining to the History of Al Qaeda, the Iran-Irag War, and Desert Storm.)
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em......damein,abt the spanish running away from iraq,u seem to have forgotten that MAJORITY of the spanish people STRONGLY OPPOSED the war in iraq.so please,don't call them cowards.
 
centurion_ue said:
em......damein,abt the spanish running away from iraq,u seem to have forgotten that MAJORITY of the spanish people STRONGLY OPPOSED the war in iraq.so please,don't call them cowards.
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According to the "news organizations", so did the majorities of the other allies but when things get tough, you've got to get tougher. The Spanish military didn't run, the Spanish politicians ran, that's a big difference.
 
According to the "news organizations", so did the majorities of the other allies but when things get tough, you've got to get tougher. The Spanish military didn't run, the Spanish politicians ran, that's a big difference.

So u mean that the spanish military ought to have stayed even against the wish of theire ppl who opposed the war?Zappatero's govt. won the elections `cos he opposed the war like most spaniards,whiler aznar was kicked out `cos he went against the wish of his pple and seen as a lapdog.Zappatero simply did what they(the spanish pple) wanted.that's democracy for u.

Back to the topic,i serious doubt that canada will send their troops to iraq.the ooposition to the war was quite much,and i don't see the canadians changing their stance soon.

If the War on Terror is simply a catch phrase to you, then you are sadly mistaken. Since Canada has a superpower at it's borders, it doesn't have to do anything while other smaller Country allies are dieing face dow in the desert. I call it shameful.


missileer,i may not be a canadian,but my friend,what u've just posted is simply wrong.u seem to have forgotten that the canadians are fighting side by side with u.s soldiers down in afghanistan,and some have paid the ultimate price.and pls,canada may not have much compared to u guys when it comes to military hardwear but i'm certain that they'll be able to defend themsewlves even if the US wasn't there.
 
Missileer said:
According to the "news organizations", so did the majorities of the other allies but when things get tough, you've got to get tougher. The Spanish military didn't run, the Spanish politicians ran, that's a big difference.

Missileer

Spainish public opinion was absolutely against this war from the start. Iraq and the Madrid Bombings that resulted from Spains involvement in Iraq were the principal reasons why PM Jose Aznar lost the election.
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Centurion, if Bush had told the American people we were going into Iraq to remove a brutal dictator who was killing his own people with chemical weapons and locking them in underground prisoners till the day they died the majority of the American public would have been against him because the West is trying to run from all the mistakes we have made in the past.
 
Damien435 said:
Centurion, if Bush had told the American people we were going into Iraq to remove a brutal dictator who was killing his own people with chemical weapons and locking them in underground prisoners till the day they died the majority of the American public would have been against him because the West is trying to run from all the mistakes we have made in the past.
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you sure?
I'd dearly support him for that..
 
Jack- If we want to really win the war in Afghanistan then the only real option would be to invade Pakistan. The typical Afghan, especially down south hates Pakistan and blames them for everything, and really Pakistan did put the Taliba in power, aswell they are putting up Jihad schools so that young Afghans can learn how to detonate themselves properly. But they have an open border. If troops were massed along the border, and Afghanistan was cordoned off, then what we are doing now would work. We would be able to completely destroy the weapons caches and kill off the rest of the Taliban, but unless that border is closed and noone gets though, we still have a leak.
Hearts and Minds? Well you have the best army in the world for that kind of stuff. We work along side the locals, and the average person likes the Canadians. Now whether they are lieing, I have no idea.
My 2 cents for today
Oh yeah... And the others here who feel like slamming Canada, because we didn't do what you said... Well deal with it... We have supported you with everything else, but at the end of the day we are an indepedant country and we will do what we feel is right. Get over it,is the US going to piss and moan for the rest of eternity about it? Get over it and soldier on. We already have many commitments. And before Iraq, ratio wise we had more troops and more commitments overseas than the US, doing missions that had little or nothing to do with national interest, but with humanity. It pisses me off that all the armchair generals on the internet decide to slam Canada because of this stuff. Think about Kosova, Yugo, Sierra Leone, Haiti, East Timor, Sinai, Haiti, Afghanistan and all the other holes that we have been busy working in. Thats all I have to say about that
 
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Damien435 said:
Centurion, if Bush had told the American people we were going into Iraq to remove a brutal dictator who was killing his own people with chemical weapons and locking them in underground prisoners till the day they died the majority of the American public would have been against him because the West is trying to run from all the mistakes we have made in the past.
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Thats one hell of a better reason!
 
Dear Pete,

Understand, I was never for asking the Canadians to go to Iraq. They wanted to go and I understood why. But I believed they were better doing what they had been doing. That is also the way I felt about the Aussies. They should have concentrated all their forces in Afghanistan. And we should never have pushed the Spanish into going to Iraq with us and they should have instead went to Afghanistan. But politics demanded token forces which in the end I believe would accomplish nothing. And in the end cause a negative feeling of those nations. Imagine if Spain and Australia had sent all their forces to Afghanistan.

But I do respect the Canadians for one item: Even though some European NATO nations (eg France and Germany) were pushing for the new forces in SE Afghanistan to only patrol near "the wire" Canada made it clear they were going to patrol aggressively. That took guts.

But that still does not erase the fact that Canada for its nations size, population and GDP has way to small an army. Check out Holland which has no where near the sea coast or reliance of sea trade and half the population and its armed forces. Especially the army. You will be astonished.

What I can not figure out is why Canada turned down the offer of an Iwo Jima class helicopter carrier that was going into mothballs. It would have been free except for having to refit it, etc. It would have been perfect for the role that Canada sees for its ground forces.

My fear about the military of Canada is not the small size of its ground forces, nor the fact it is mothballing a substaintial part of its air force, but its navy. That is one item that Canada needs to be very strong on. It could in the future be blackmailed (ie piracy, seizure of Canadian citizens overseas, etc) over something it can not forsee today. A navy is one thing Canada should spend big on. It has made a start with obtaining those four modern submarines from the UK -- ie a modern submarine with a well trained crew can give Canada immense leverage.

Finally, on the subject of Pakistan. I am glad to see someone at last state the truth about the Taliban (ie everyone believes it is the creature of the US CIA). Some British experts on the region have revealed the reason behind the Taliban being created by Pakistan. Pakistan unknown to most of the public has HUGE natural gas deposits. The Afghans after the Russians left were serious about using an Iranian port to ship that natural gas (liquified of course). But Pakistan wanted one of its new ports (ie Pakistan is poorer than a church mouse) and created the Taliban to basically make Afghanistan a client (ie think colony) state of Pakistan and gain control of that natural gas wealth. Before 9/11 Pakistan was even working hard with the Taliban on a major highway from Afghanistan to a sea port.

Jack E. Hammond

NOTE> Even though I have stated the above about the poor state of Canadas military, I have always believed that the US has not treated Canada right in defense/trade/foreign policy and in fact shafted many times on of the best friends that the US has have. As one US Secretary of State has stated "If a nation can not get along with Canada and settle things reasonably, they can not get along with any nation."
 
AlexKall said:
Thats one hell of a better reason!
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Looking back on it yes, but I don't think you understand how lazy most Americans have grown. One of my co-workers almost earned a trip to the hospital when he told me I was stupid for joining the Army while we were at war. (We were standing near a deep fat fryer, yes, I did contemplate holding his hand in the fryer for a bit.)
 
Damien435 said:
Looking back on it yes, but I don't think you understand how lazy most Americans have grown. One of my co-workers almost earned a trip to the hospital when he told me I was stupid for joining the Army while we were at war. (We were standing near a deep fat fryer, yes, I did contemplate holding his hand in the fryer for a bit.)
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Haha, well I wouldnt know about that, I'm the oposite, I want to join the military but cant (too late now anyways :(), even though im in the "reserves", would have liked to do some FN missions, make a difference :) But my knee refused :-(

My knee would snap with that kind of weight, smaller things can make it unusable for a day or two :(
I hope I can get it operated but I just a guy that never visits a hospital unless the option would be to sit in a wheel chair all my life heh, stupid but im stubborn to keep without the help of doctors and such. Kinda think i have diabetes though buts its the same thing, I just have a boundry in me when it comes to hospitals, but I'm trying to take the step every day haha
 
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If Canada was in agreement with the U.S. at the beginning of the war, then yes, they should have gone in.

However now, it's evolved into something more and Canada has no duty, or right to go into Iraq.
 
Pete031 said:
Fow anyone who has seen the news, I imagine things have changed a bit...
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I'm guessing your reffering to the possibility of JTF2 (Canada's special forces) rescuing the hostages in Iraq?
 
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