Afstan, Congo, R2P: 'The phrase "stick a fork in it" comes to mind'

Excerpts from a post by BruceR. at Flit (do read it all) that gores all those who think doing what is really often fairly dirty work can be done squeakily-clean. There's a real world out there folks in which being lilly human rights white simply ain't realistic if one actually wants to achieve something (cf. the Allies' alliance with Stalin during WW II); which does not mean one should not try being good guys as far as reasonably possible:

It's nice of Prof. Stephen Saideman to try and resurrect some form of a post-2011 Afghan mission in the opinion pages of the Globe, but surely he's got to see that the ideas he proposes -- perpetuating the PRT and the OMLT presence -- are probably non-starters in the current detainee-allegations-laden realm of public opinion.

There are only two real jailors in Afghanistan. The NDS and American forces. Rightly or wrongly, it's hard to see public support swelling any time soon for any new Canadian mission that turned any detainees our forces were involved in taking over to either of them, unless certain outstanding issues could be said to have been resolved first. Both the OMLT and the PRT (in its police mentorship and other judicial reform aspects) have to work closely with Afghan security forces, including the NDS, and, if current headlines are any indication, their members would necessarily be accused of complicity, sooner or later, in any eventual reports of their excesses if either of those components were to be extended now.

(People like Prof. Saideman who still want to salvage something from this one might be better off advocating in their opinion pieces for a perpetuation of some form of air presence, seeing as it's somewhat harder to take detainees from a helicopter [glad Bruce mentioned air, more here and here].)

The same concern of course would extend to any involvement in the UN's troubled Congo mission helping the Kabila government suppress its insurgency there, should it involve more than a handful of Canadian troops. Not only are Congo's troops certain to be even more, erm, unruly than their Afghan counterparts [more here]...

What we're really seeing here with the most recent detainee allegations (now in Britain, as well), and the lack of good options in Congo, is the real-world limitations that always existed with the whole liberal-idealistic "Responsibility to Protect"/failed-states-intervention doctrine, as the level of military co-partnering with abusive state agencies that would be involved in any such "friendly" intervention seems to be simply inconsistent with Western countries' human rights obligations...