Behind The Wire

Our Prime Minister has stated in the past that Canada does not "cut and run". That we're in the game for keeps. That our partners in war and peace depend on us. We are, after all, sturdy and reliable members of NATO. And neighbour-and-partner to the United States.

Besides which, it is our international responsibility as a wealthy country to accede to the need now and then to become involved in international situations so needful of intervention that we cannot ignore the call to action.

Afghanistan was one of those situations. Initially because any violent entity that compromised and threatened the safety and security of our continental neighbour, by extension threatened us and our safety and security as well. Just as the U.S. could be assured of coming to our aid in a potential attack, we needed to assure America that Canada is there to respond when they were horribly harmed by an inconceivably violent attack of truly vicious dimensions.

We could not possibly have held back in the international engagement to respond to the attack by al-Qaeda, situated at that time in Afghanistan, guests of the Taliban. And since the Taliban refused to surrender Osama bin Laden, their honoured guest, they were signalled for invasion. And there we were, and there we still are, ten years later with almost a thousand of our military remaining, in a strictly training position.

Like other members of NATO, with troops no longer militarily engaged, ours are helpfully giving training in modern military techniques to the illiterate, resentful, Western-detesting Afghan national police and military. And from time to time, their resentment of our presence results in one or another of the Afghan military turning weapons on NATO soldiers.

We are training them to become more competent fighters, but they don't seem to think all that much of the techniques being imparted. Nor do they feel particularly grateful to foreign soldiers who teach how to engage the enemy without actually doing it. For that matter, the enemy is looking less like the enemy as time progresses and more like fellow recruits and tribal members.

And since NATO countries have well publicized their intent to remove themselves from Afghanistan, to the very anticipated dates of withdrawal, and everyone, from distant tribal villages to the government in Kabul, to foreign soldiers, know that the Taliban is prepared to return and instantly remove Hamid Karzai's government, corrupt upstart nuisance that it is, why fight those who will soon regain control?

It's a death-wish.

In fact, the Taliban now have effective and de facto control of much of the country. Anywhere that foreign troops are not ensconced, there the Taliban are, where they are among their own Pashtun people. Who have understood now that the change that seemed on the cusp of permanence, where generous Western donations made some temporary alterations have now faded into the past.

And the future is now much clearer; the Taliban has resurged, resurrected itself, thanks hugely to Pakistan, but also its own patient determination, and resistance to the interloping presence of foreigners who have no business interfering in the Afghan way of life, politics, cultural-religious heritage and custom. Afghans are fed up with disruptions in their lives.

They are prepared to see things return to normal. To what is normal for them. They do not, after all, live in the modern world. What is normal for them was normal in the West many centuries ago.