So we’re sending members of our armed forces to war, not against another nation but against a radical Muslim movement intent on creating as much upheaval as possible in the always-volatile Middle East.
This time, for the first time since declaring war on Germany in 1939, Canada will go to war independently and not be coat-tailing in a conflict as a member of a United Nations peacekeeping force or as a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in defence of the interests of another member nation.
Last Friday, Prime Minister Harper called on Parliament to support a motion that will send Canadian troops to war in Iraq where their focus as combatants will not be any national army but rather to help root out the forces variously known as ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria), ISIL (Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant) and IS (Islamic State). The final acronym is the one favoured by this militant Sunni Muslim organization keen on establishing a religious state that supercedes as many Middle East boundaries as possible.
Canada is committing six fighter jets and 600 troops who are only, for now, to operate in Iraq against ISI/ISIL/IS targets there and it is this initial commitment of aircraft and related personnel, only for a six-month period, that the House of Commons was debating on Monday of this week.
Two weeks ago in this space, the editorial commentary noted that parliamentary debates on sending troops into conflict had been avoided since the declaration of war on Germany in 1939 and so Monday’s parliamentary event was quite historic in this context.
The Official Opposition NDP in Parliament and the Liberal third party indicated last week through statements by each party’s leader that they would not be supporting Mr. Harper’s motion so, quite unlike the motion to declare war on Germany over 75 years ago, Parliament will not be sending a message of unanimity to the nation.
The Prime Minister’s motion will of course pass easily because of the Conservatives’ majority government and the scene is set for the sending of forces into Middle Eastern combat to be an issue in the 2015 federal General Election.
Of course, once we are committed, we will as citizens come together in support of the airmen and soldiers who are being sent to Iraq. That is what they signed up for and, as it happens, this mission will put some of them into danger. Canada as a nation will pray that they come home to their families whole and safe.
But the six-month time period is troubling because it’s not realistic.
Very few conflicts are resolved this quickly and, as our forces recently experienced in Afghanistan, the allies taking on ISIS/ISIL/IS are dealing with terrorist combatants and the conflict will drag on for as long as members of the enemy forces are willing to volunteer for suicide missions.
So the six-month time frame is more than a little disingenuous and while no one has any desire for a militant Sharia law-based self-proclaimed Muslim government to take root in the Middle East, neither is it realistic to expect that Canadian airpower, with all of the other allies in this cause, will be successful in bombing this group back to the pre-middle ages epoch where their philosophy is rooted.
If we are in an election mode at this time next year, a likely possibility unless the prime minister decides a much earlier election is in the Tories’ best interests, it’s a reasonably accurate prediction that six months will have come and gone and we’ll still be in Iraq, possibly Syria by then, maybe even Lebanon and we may have had to commit more aircraft and ground troops to the fray.
The Liberals and the NDP will be saying “we told you so” to the prime minister and to the Canadian public while the Conservatives will accuse the opposition parties of not supporting Canadian troops.
What would have been far better would have been for our government to have committed our forces for a reasonable length of time after which our mission would have been complete and we could withdraw.
This would likely have had the effect of marshaling a greater spirit of parliamentary unanimity on the issue.
