NATO’s new secretary-general has called on Canada to maintain its military presence in Afghanistan beyond 2011 – becoming the most high-profile official to publicly tackle the disconnect between Ottawa’s decision to end its military mission and other NATO members’ intentions to continue theirs.
“Of course I’m not going to interfere with domestic politics in individual allied nations, but seen from an alliance point of view, I would strongly regret if that became the final outcome of the Canadian considerations,” Anders Fogh Rasmussen said Thursday when asked about Ottawa’s decision to end the combat mission in 2011.
“At the end of the day it is a question of our own security – we cannot allow Afghanistan once again to become a safe haven for terrorists – and I also think it is in Canada’s interest to ensure a peaceful and stable Afghanistan.”
But Foreign Affairs Minister Lawrence Cannon said the Harper government won’t be swayed by Mr. Rasmussen’s comments.
He said Ottawa is intent on ending Canada’s combat mission in Afghanistan in 2011. That’s the plan laid out in a House of Commons motion adopted in March of 2008 by the Conservatives and the Liberal opposition – a deal that essentially ended their partisan feuding on the timing of the mission.
“As you know the resolution calls for us to end and stop our military intervention in 2011 and that is exactly what we will be doing,” he said. “The government of Canada has made a decision. That decision’s been made known. It’s public and we are going to stay the course.”
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Notes:
We’ve been involved for nine years now doing some very heavy lifting. That’s far longer than we were involved in WW2. While casulties come nowhere close to those our country has experienced in previous wars it may still be fairly argued that our troops are suffering the death of a thousand cuts, not because of anything they are doing wrong but rather because of politicians who want to look good but will not give the go ahead to clean house as required.
In light of that fact I agree with Harper. 2011 he promised and 2011 it will be.
We bring our troops home and wait until NATO gets their shit together (if they ever do).
It’s a damn shame most of the NATO nations feel incapable of carrying their share of the load.
The Secretary-General of Nato should “encourage” the many Nato members who are already there to remove the restrictions and send them off their safe bases and do some of the heavy lifting. Canada has done more than it’s share and it is truly shameful that few of the Nato nations “really” have their troops in harms way. The Sec-Gen should be embarrassed and ashamed to ask Canada to continue. Europe has had a free ride under the umbrella of American and Canadian committments since WWll. It is time they stepped up or shut up.
mid island mike
When Canada cried out for help the Europeans basically told us to p*** off.
What goes around comes around, this country has more than done it share. There are those who, with some reason, argue that for us to leave makes a waste of the losses we have suffered.
The real loss is that if the Europeans had done their proportional share and if the Americans had not gone galloping off to Iraq, this Afgan situation might be at the end of the tunnel instead of being stuck in the tunnel.
Paul I disagree, Iraq is the model. The whole region is imploding because tribalism will not sustain a large population in a global economy.
The enemy is a death cult that does not even wear a military uniform. This is not a war within neat little country boundaries like Afghanistan or even simply against non-state actors groups like Al Qaeda or the Taliban or Hezbollah. It is against, tribalism, against Islamofascism which is spread all over the region and some of it may even live homegrown on your street.
But I do agree, let the Euroweenies step to the plate for once. They have basically disarmed to pay for their excessive socialism and relied on the US to defend them during the Cold War. It is time to switch our troops for German troops.
NATO was a Cold War organization and is basically an anachronism. We need to think in terms of Coalitions of the Willing. So far, the Euroweenies have been “willing” to let everyone else do the heavy lifting. Even Obama hasn’t been able to sweet talk them into carrying their share.