On the promotional video for Unexpected War Canada In Kandahar
What a dismal trip through the Liberal looking glass that was last night. The program should have been called REVEALED: The Liberals' Oh-So-Convenient Attempt To Cover Their Asses On How We Went To War.
Points in the program where I had trouble deciding whether to throw something at the TV, or vomit into the fish tank beside the couch:
I could continue, but honestly, I'm swallowing back the bile as it is.
Shame on the Liberals for their petty and self-interested motivations for both this mission and the spin they're putting on it in hindsight. Shame on Global, 90th Parallel (I'm sad to say, since after the exceptional Crazy Eights, I was hoping for so much more), and all those involved in putting this extended advertisement for the Stein and Lang book to the public as though it was journalism, and not simply one political party's attempt to rewrite history in their own favour. Shame on the Conservative Party for choosing not to participate, and so leaving the field open for the Liberals to say whatever they pleased without rebuttal. Shame on me for encouraging anyone to watch it.
The only part of the whole piece that I found worthwhile was the time given to Peter Dawe, talking about his late son Matt. LCol (ret'd) Dawe is a class act, and his honesty and courage speaking about his own personal tragedy - the worst any parent can imagine - was extremely moving.
Other than that, what a gross disappointment.
I only hope that years from now, Hillier can actually speak freely about the decisions made from his own perspective. And O'Connor, and Henault, and Mackay, and Harper, and everyone else involved in this mission at the highest levels. Because all this "documentary" did was perpetuate one party's revisionist spin.
Points in the program where I had trouble deciding whether to throw something at the TV, or vomit into the fish tank beside the couch:
- Scott "Beer and Popcorn" Reid saying that "these aren't just political weasel words" or something to that effect. That makes me trust you so much more, Scott. Because everyone knows you turn your partisanship off any time a camera is on you, right?
- Janice Stein, and seemingly everyone else, talking about "early in, early out" or "exit strategy" or some variation on a finite time frame for the mission that involves us doing whatever the government of the day thinks is precisely "our part" and not an iota more. Here's an idea, folks: howzabout our exit strategy is to get the frickin' job done in Afghanistan, so that all the foreign troops can go home. In fact, when was the last time Canada went to war (not blue-bereted peacekeeping, but war) with a clear exit strategy that couldn't be summed up in one word: VICTORY? The implication is that Canada, like those European allies upon whom we heap scorn and derision, has caveats on our participation - not on what we can do while we're there like the Germans or Italians, but rather on how long we're willing to stay. Don't even get me going on the fact that Harper and his crew of blue-tied yes-men seem to have bought into the artificial time-frame crap...
- John McCallum slandering our men and women in uniform by all but saying they're more interested in pleasing their American comrades than they are in pleasing the Canadian government. You, sir, have just shown that every salute you ever received as Minister of National Defence was one too many, you incompetent ass.
- John McCallum saying "We dithered, and so all the safe places were taken and we were left with Kandahar" - or words to that effect. I have never been more ashamed of my government than when I heard him say that the only reason the CF went to Kandahar was because our government was so pitifully incompetent at an international game of musical chairs that the Canadian Forces got left standing when the tune stopped. So much for "The world needs more Canada."
- John McCallum opening his pie hole at all.
- Various aides and staffers and advisers making sure we all knew that had Martin been re-elected, Darfur would be the mission of choice. Ask the Scandinavians how that's working out for them. Or would the Liberals have had us unilaterally invade the country? Deluded asshats.
- Every single Liberal on the program implying that had they known then what they know now, Canada wouldn't have gone to Afghanistan.
I could continue, but honestly, I'm swallowing back the bile as it is.
Shame on the Liberals for their petty and self-interested motivations for both this mission and the spin they're putting on it in hindsight. Shame on Global, 90th Parallel (I'm sad to say, since after the exceptional Crazy Eights, I was hoping for so much more), and all those involved in putting this extended advertisement for the Stein and Lang book to the public as though it was journalism, and not simply one political party's attempt to rewrite history in their own favour. Shame on the Conservative Party for choosing not to participate, and so leaving the field open for the Liberals to say whatever they pleased without rebuttal. Shame on me for encouraging anyone to watch it.
The only part of the whole piece that I found worthwhile was the time given to Peter Dawe, talking about his late son Matt. LCol (ret'd) Dawe is a class act, and his honesty and courage speaking about his own personal tragedy - the worst any parent can imagine - was extremely moving.
Other than that, what a gross disappointment.
I only hope that years from now, Hillier can actually speak freely about the decisions made from his own perspective. And O'Connor, and Henault, and Mackay, and Harper, and everyone else involved in this mission at the highest levels. Because all this "documentary" did was perpetuate one party's revisionist spin.
posted by Babbling Brooks at 5:02 p.m.
7 Comments:
The Torch;
I could not agree more with your comments on the program. What a bunch of whiners our Liberal leaders were ie. "the Generals made us do it, boo hoo". I could not believe Scott Reid when he said; "We committed to combat for a year and then we found we were in a war". Well duh! Here is a review of the book "The Unexpected War" I posted at amazon.ca;
This book comes across as a partisan "whitewash" of two Liberal(Chretien and Martin) government's machinations and duplicities that led to our commitment of combat troops in and around Kandahar, Afghanistan. Defence Ministers McCallum and Graham appear to "walk on water" while General Hillier, many unnamed bureaucrats in Foreign Affairs, National Defence and the Conservative government are blamed for stumbling into and our continuing combat involvement in Afghanistan.
Surprisingly, the real underlying reason we are involved in Afghanistan is given on page 67 by Sheila Copps when she states; "I was at the table(Liberal Cabinet meeting, Feb 4, 2003) when the decision was made, and there were two theatres playing out. One was in Iraq and the other was in Afghanistan and we deliberately made a decision to go to Afghanistan because we knew very shortly down the road we would be asked to participate in a US-led invasion of Iraq which we did not want to do and this was a neat political way of squaring the problem.... of Canada-US relations". It is made perfectly clear that Liberal government leaders were hoping that doing a tough job in Afghanistan would placate the Americans after we refused to support the invasion of Iraq and participate in Ballistic Missile Defence. Senior military officers are blamed for over-zealously advancing this course of action. The book then goes on to say that Canada's generals and admirals tend to be more concerned about their relationships with their American counterparts than they are with their own political masters in Ottawa - is it any wonder when our Liberal foreign policy was predicated on an immature love/hate relationship with the US. There is no discussion on doing the right thing for Afghanistan or Canada.
On page 133 Foreign Affairs are quoted as saying in 2003 that Canada was among the best-equipped militaries in Afghanistan. There is no mention that many CF casualties caused by IEDs could be avoided if Canada had heavy lift helicopters which they did have(Chinooks) until they were forced to sell them in the 90s because of extreme budget cuts. No mention of Canadian combat troops originally deploying to Kandahar in a combat role under US command in 2002 and later in Kabul with dark green camouflage combat clothing and flimsy Iltis jeeps in which at least three Canadian soldiers were killed by IEDs. There is no mention of Liberal opposition to attempts by the Conservative government to speed up the awarding of defence contracts for badly needed equipment in Afghanistan now(eg. replacement Chinooks).
Just over halfway through the book the present Conservative government is blamed for not changing our combat role in 2006 to one of reconstruction and training in other parts of the country other than Kandahar and for extending the mission to February 2009. Easy to say but very difficult to find other NATO countries interested in taking over a combat role and you cannot just pull out and leave a vacuum - it could be deadly for our NATO allies fighting around Kandahar and they would surely question our resolve.
General Hillier gets the blame for signing a flawed original agreement on the handling of detainees in Afghanistan - the reader wonders what one of the authors, the chief of staff to Defence Ministers McCallum and Graham and a professed expert on international security was doing when this supposedly flawed agreement was drawn up and signed.
I will wait until an unbiased, non-revisionist historian investigates and writes a book to get the facts about how we became involved in Afghanistan in the first place and the good things that are being done for Afghan citizens at tremendous cost by our brave and courageous men and women in the Canadian Armed Forces. I will not hold my breath.
Alex Mills
Winnipeg
To repeat my earlier comment:
'Frankly I was distinctly unimpressed. Not a hatchet job but:
*the military leadership were always referred to as "the uniforms" (with an implied snide tone);
*the military leadership were invariably presented as desperate to suck up to the US military;
*the military leadership were presented as in effect lusting for combat to prove they lead a real military--with the implication that combat is not a military's primary function;
*the time line and actions of our various missions in Afstan were presented in such a confusing way that the ordinary viewer would have little grasp of what actually went, and is going, on;
*no mention was made of the other NATO nations engaged in dangerous combat missions in the south (UK, Netherlands, Australia, Denmark), leaving the impression that we were unique suckers to go to Kandahar (no mention also of the US, Poles and Romanians in the east);
*there was considerable combat footage shown with the clear implication that that was the situation facing the CF today--whereas for the last several months there has been very few direct fire engagements and casualties are from IEDs;
*just one example of the flavour--someone being interviewed mentioned the "Iraqization" of the mission as a result of the IED threat. Guess what impact the "I" word had on most viewers.
Pity,
Mark
Ottawa'
Darfur update: it's now three years since PM Martin was Darfur dreaming and there still is practially zero chance of Western troop units deploying there.
But I guess the Liberals would rather wait forever for Darfur than really do something in Afstan. Also ignoring the fact that doing anything effective in Darfur would involve invading a Muslim country without UNSC sanction. Nice thought, eh?
Mark
Ottawa
And from the blog of Canwest TV writer Alex Strachan:
"Canada and Afghanistan, analysis and context"
Mark
Ottawa
Point simplified.
If we were in Darfur the Librano bleating would be that Afghanistan really needs our attention.
Or * * Puleeze, we want to run things again. **
Get lost! = TG
PS> A much better, not so sickening documentary.
TAR SANDS, THE SELLING OF ALBERTA
Thursday March 13, 2008 at 9pm on CBC-TV
repeating Sunday March 16 at 8pm ET on CBC Newsworld.
=============== CBC.ca
Er, let*s hope for no spin. = TG
First off - I have to say I DID NOT watch this "liberal loving - let's put this out just before the Afgan vote and make the Tories look bad" documentary.
I made that decision after seeing the trailers showing Scott Reid making some arrogant, pompous statement, Jean Cretien looking pensive and worried, Paul Martin looking like he is going to cry and...Stephen Harper in fatigues walking with the troops.
I knew at that moment this was NOT going to be a "balanced" report - but then, the media these days are anything BUT balanced.
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