Professional

Why is Christie Blatchford my favourite journalist when it comes to reporting on the CF?

Well, for a few reasons. Firstly, she...*ahem*...doesn't just talk about the casualties of an operation, she talks about the background for that operation:

It was the savage attack on Haji Kheerbin, the 48-year-old district chief of the volatile Zhari area about 30 kilometres west of Kandahar, that led to the mission.

Mr. Kheerbin was preparing for prayers with his three young children at his side here last Friday when a suicide bomber approached and blew himself up. The youngsters, two sons aged 6 and 12 and a three-year-old daughter, died with their father in the blast.

Secondly, she...*ahem*...doesn't just talk about the casualties of an operation, she talks about the objectives of that operation:

The objective of the joint Afghan-Canadian mission was to retake Gundy Ghar, a large hill about 15 kilometres west of Canadian bases at Masum Ghar and Patrol Base Wilson. As recently as this spring, Gundy Ghar was the site of a small Canadian strongpoint, or reinforced position, but had fallen once again into Taliban hands.

Canadian Forces traditionally have been stretched thin as they take pieces of ground along the Arghandab, then either hand them over to the ANA or ANP or attempt to hang onto them until the local forces, both still rapidly growing and becoming professional, can muster up sufficient numbers to hold them.

The hill at Gundy Ghar offers long views over the green and fertile valley and is strategically important.

Thirdly, she...*ahem*...doesn't just talk about the casualties of an operation, she talks about the strategic context of that operation:

An operation conceived in one tragedy had ended in another, and that in itself is a very Afghan story.

But it was also an illustration of why security is so critical in southern Afghanistan - without it, government leaders and politicians, teachers and doctors and the workers of foreign aid organizations - all of them keen to help this country rebuild - not only can't function, but are also sometimes in grave danger.

It was a civilian, Dave Puskas, an orthopedic spinal surgeon from Thunder Bay, Ont., just finishing up two months at the base hospital at Kandahar Air Field, who put it better than anyone else.

"To suggest that being in a combat is a failure of this mission is so wrong," he said yesterday, just hours before he boarded a plane for home. "Security is the pillar on which everything else depends. Chaos and anarchy never built anything."

Imagine that: a journalist who will dig beyond the shallowest "if it bleeds, it leads" aspects of the story and into the whys and hows of the military operation behind the deaths. A journalist outside the field of sports reporting who is willing to talk about the objectives and strategies of the game itself, rather than just watching the emotional roller-coaster of the crowd in the stands.

We need more like her.