The Torch: And THIS is why we're in Afghanistan

Frustration is a part of any contingency operation.

Contingency. That's what any operation is called that isn't actually fighting a declared war. Whether it's peacekeeping, UN interdiction, sanction enforcement, government protection or even ceasefire observervation, all of it is contingency operations.

Regrettably, all of those operations, in which Canada has been involved for the past 40 years have been erroniously labelled "peacekeeping".

From personal experience, I can tell you that "peace" was a seldom seen part of the equation. I can attest to the fact that since the truce was reached in the Korean war, Canadians have fought in the Belgian Congo, Cyprus, the Sinai, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Cambodia and any other theatre which was a contingency operation. In Haiti, we lost a ship to a boiler explosion, not to action, but to overwork and an operational tempo that was unequalled by any other navy.

On Friday, 14 April, 2006, Canadian troops did what they always do on contingency operations. They aquitted themselves with the professionalism and skill which comes from superior training, dedication and just plain guts. As usual, there was no peace. As usual, Canada's professional army, small as it may be, proved that the tradition of Vimy Ridge, Ortona, Rimini, Juno Beach, The Scheldt, Falaise, Kapyong and the Medak Pocket were not abberations. On the 14th of April, the PPCLI proved that having a war-fighting army is an absolute necessity.

They saved the Afghanis.

And by the time Canadian combat troops were finally called in to help on Friday afternoon — after a firefight had raged for several hours — half a dozen Afghan troops were already dead or dying and an equal number were wounded.

A high-level coalition source told the Toronto Star yesterday that Kandahar Governor Asadullah Khalid had informed senior brigade officials that national troops would be dispatched to challenge suspected Taliban militants who had amassed in villages just west of Kandahar city, allegedly plotting strikes against the provincial capital.

It is unclear whether Khalid asked coalition commanders for assistance in the brash operation. But he was certainly not dissuaded from the undertaking, even though the commanders knew instinctively that all hell was likely to break loose, and that Canadian troops from the Provincial Reconstruction Team satellite base would have to be deployed as a cavalry unit to the rescue.

"We can't always be rescuing these guys," the source observed, even as he professed some admiration for Afghan forces going on the offensive against Taliban without coalition chaperones.
Nor was it clear whether Canadian battle group commanders were ever made aware, prior to Friday's fierce engagement, that they likely would be called upon to help restore order and extract the Afghans from their predicament.

Instead, several Bravo Company platoons — they had been involved in an unrelated but collaborative search-and-cordon assignment not very distant from the area along Highway 1 where the shooting clash occurred — were summoned to the scene as circumstances became most dire.

Unable to travel directly as the crow flies, which would have been about 15 kilometres, the Canadian troops had to zig and zag to reach the battle site, arriving only after the brunt of fighting had happened and the Afghan casualties were absorbed.

Bravo Company helped establish a cordon perimeter and one armoured vehicle exchanged fire with the enemy after it was hit with a rocket that demolished one of the vehicle's eight tires.
It was largely Afghan troops who pursued the Taliban into the warren of compounds as civilians, inured now to violence after nearly three decades of war, watched.

Included among the top-hierarchy Afghan dead were the Zherai police commander and the senior police officer from the province. The Zherai district leader was also wounded.

"It was a difficult struggle for Afghan National Police forces and their leadership," a subdued Lt.-Col. Ian Hope, battalion group commander, said last night.

Earlier, the Kandahar governor declared that 41 Taliban were killed in a fight that migrated along a flat-terrain highway but was waged most intensely in a cluster of villages around Sangisar — the one-time spiritual headquarters of fugitive Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar — about 40 kilometres southwest of Kandahar city.

"Acting on intelligence reports that Taliban have gathered in Sangisar to plan an attack in Kandahar, we launched this operation Friday and the fighting continued from morning to evening," Khalid told a news conference.

Hope could not confirm the number of Taliban killed but took no issue with the figure.
His men gave first aid to two injured Afghan police officers at the scene and arranged for them to be airlifted by helicopter to the multinational hospital at Kandahar Airfield.

The Canadian commander — who came upon the scene with his tactical headquarter unit just as attack helicopters had delivered strikes against a labyrinthine compound into which scores of Taliban fighters had fled — praised the willingness of the Afghans to take the fight to their enemy, pointing out that their forces have faced repeated deadly assaults over the past month.
"It shows an awful lot of grit and determination ... to take the fight to the Taliban when required.
"They actually organized this operation. They planned it, they executed it and they called us for support late in the game.

"I applaud their bravery — they're very, very brave — and their determination not to put up with these continuing attacks from the Taliban."

Yet Hope acknowledged regret, even anguish, that the Afghans had not sought assistance or tactically synchronized with a superior Canadian force, before launching their mission. The Afghan forces are, after all, poorly equipped, lacking body armour, armoured vehicles, automatic weapons, rockets, even sufficient ammunition.

"Am I dismayed? I would have preferred that we had had the time to organize a little better, where we could have brought the combat power of our LAVs and our professionalism and our dismounted infantry to bear. We may have saved them some lives."

And, further: "There was no planning involved here. It was a reaction on our part to a call."
However, as Hope also emphasized, the Afghans were under no obligation to share their plans or seek flanking cover for their mission.

"It's a sovereign country and they have national institutions. They do not require our approval to do robust police operations or military operations."

In the aftermath of the protracted battle, though, Hope sequestered himself with the governor and chiefs of police to review what had happened and discuss "how we can do quick-reaction procedures better.

"This is going to be an ongoing effort for myself and my subordinate commanders in the next few months."