Harper and Obama continue war in Afghanistan

by Paul Stevenson

Both the Canadian and American governments are still committed to military support for the corrupt Afghan regime.

Canadian soldiers have begun to leave Kandahar in southern Afghanistan after five years of combat. There is a widespread perception, fueled by media reports and the pronouncements of Harper government officials, that Canada’s role in the war in Afghanistan is therefore over.

But with as many as 1,000 soldiers staying behind in a “training” mission in Kabul, this government is still spending hundreds of millions of dollars to prop up one of the most corrupt regimes in the world.

Likewise, the reports of US President Obama’s drawdown of troops is being hailed as the beginning of the end of the war. Again, the portrayal and the reality don’t meet up. The US plans to withdraw as many as 33,000 troops by the summer of 2012.

As there are currently more than 100,000 US troops in the country, the drawdown is simply bringing force levels back to where they were when Obama was elected.

Furthermore, the US plan includes an increase in drone attacks and covert operations.

Both governments are deeply concerned about how unpopular the war is at home and would like to lull people into a sense that it is almost over.

The Harper government is also working to end another headache associated with the war, the Afghan detainee scandal.

For years, Harper has done all he can to stop the release of the detainee files, which may show us which members of the government were aware that they were ordering soldiers to send prisoners to torture. With a majority, he decided to end the discussion and has unloaded 4,000 pages of heavily censored documents about the case, in the hope that the problem will go away.

These documents are but a fraction of the total, estimated to be about 40,000 pages, and don’t answer any of the pertinent questions about what government ministers knew and when.

The Harper government is hoping to hide behind this smokescreen but there are many campaigns in Canada to push for the release of all the documents and to hold accountable those responsible for the crimes against the Afghan people.