The Torch: Canada's Post-2011 AFG Mission: Why Communicate When We Can Pick Pepper from Fly Poop?

You’d think it was pretty straightforward, right?

Canada’s sending 90 more troops to train Afghan troops and cops, right? It’s even pretty clear in the news release:

The Honourable Peter MacKay, Minister of National Defence, today announced in Kabul that the Government of Canada is committing up to 90 additional personnel, primarily to support the training of the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF). Of this increased contribution, the majority will augment the NATO Training Mission – Afghanistan (NTM-A), while the remainder will provide increased support within Joint Task Force – Afghanistan and ISAF headquarters, until the end of Canada’s mission in 2011 ….

Notwithstanding what the point is of sending 90 more troops for about a year (thanks, Mark, for pointing that one out to me), at least one reporter listening to the Minister was reading some wiggle room in the Minister's comments (highlights mine):

…. MacKay, while speaking at the end of a conference call from Kabul, seemed to add an element of ambiguity to just what the Canadian role will be after its military has pulled out of Afghanistan.

“There are other ways that we will continue to contribute. Training is obviously one of those options, and I suspect there will be further discussion about what the mission will look like post-2011,” MacKay said.

He did not elaborate, leaving it unclear whether he was hinting at a military role for Canada or simply referring to other, non-military forms of training assistance.

(….)

“We cannot be here promoting and protecting the democracy of Afghanistan and not respect the democracy of our own Parliament,” MacKay said Thursday.

“That parliamentary motion has placed parameters around the military mission.” ….

Compare the second red bit with what MacKay’s boss, the Prime Minister, said during Question Period last week:

The Government of Canada’s position is very clear. The military mission will end in 2011. It is also clear that other countries want something else. However, it is the Government of Canada and the Canadian people who make the decisions for our country.

To say that the Parliamentary motion “places parameters” around the military mission, to me, is quite different than “it’s over – full stop.”

The key parameter I read in the motion, as I said in July of last year, is that Canadian troops have to be out of Kandahar by the end of 2011, not Afghanistan.

Remember how Canada was looking for civilian contractors to train Afghan army officers in Kabul in December 2009?

So, the equation could be:

Civilian instructors

+ basing them in Kabul

= staying within the “parameters” of the March 2008 Parliamentary motion (no CF troops in Kandahar)

Another scenario: Remember (more here and here) how Canada was in line to get some light planes refitted as “a medium altitude reconnaissance surveillance system” to be flown by civilian contractors – even if they’re only scheduled to do their sneaky Pete counter IED work until mid-June 2011? So, it could also be: