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Reality
check
Canadians
were hit hard this summer with a convergence of news stories that amounted to a
major reality check, forcing some to reconsider long held assumptions about the
war in Afghanistan.
As
the Canadian military death toll reached 151, Canadians were alerted to the
anger, disbelief and disappointment among western supporters in Kandahar over
CanadaÕs decision to bring home its troops by next summer.
ÒPeople
are very upset about this. Why leave us?Ó said Jalani
Hamayoun, the former deputy governor of Kandahar and
a candidate in parliamentary elections in September.
ÒIt
is important for western countries not to repeat the problems of the past. You
left us in 1990 and we ended up giving our problems to the world. If you leave
Afghanistan, and especially Kandahar, again, there will be more problems for us
and for the world. Nobody from Canada asked anyone in Kandahar City or in the
remote areas about what Canada should do next year,Ó Hamayoun
said. ÒThe only ones who decided this were Canadians. Yet the ones most
affected by this decision are Afghans.Ó
Then
came the Wikileaks, an Afghan diary of more than
91,000 documents that first and foremost revealed the abiding treachery of PakistanÕs
Inter-Services Intelligence service, the ISI, which has helped the Taliban kill
Allied troops in Afghanistan while at the same time soliciting Allied help to
battle the Taliban in Pakistan.
The
leaks also provided evidence that the war in Afghanistan cannot be won —
certainly not with the constraints now in place — and that Afghan
leadership is awash in corruption.
With
Pakistan offering the Taliban sanctuary next door and the government in Kabul
staying in office in order to access Allied aid, the Afghan war is looking more
and more like Vietnam, the lessons of which have still not been learned. That
is, that liberal platitudes lack the spiritual strength needed to win wars and
secure freedom.
In
the case of Afghanistan, when NATO is gone, there will be a violent reckoning
for those who have sided with the enemy and
little hope for any Afghan who ever
dreamed of freedom. ÒWe pray for the Canadians to change their mind and stay,Ó
said a 26-year-old Afghan in Kandahar. ÒWe pray that they donÕt forget us.Ó
Encouraging anarchy
Businesses
were damaged and cars set alight. And now the lawsuits against the Canadian
authorities have begun. And two months on, no one has yet taken responsibility
for the G20 rioting in Toronto.
WhoÕs
to blame? After years of capitulating to the forces of political correctness
and relying on ÒnicenessÓ to see us through every difficulty, we the Canadian
people have laid the groundwork for exactly the sort of anarchy witnessed in
June.
Indeed,
TorontoÕs police and civic leaders set the stage for the summit riots by
advertising their self-paralyzing tendencies well ahead of time.
In
2009, they signalled the cityÕs willingness to be
victimized by masses of Tamil TigersÕ terrorist supporters who flouted the law
by blocking public thoroughfares. Ordinary citizens had to get out of the way,
police failed to act and there were no consequences for city managers who aided the lawlessness. Torontonians said little, and
adversaries took note.
The
story was much the same three years earlier when visitors to an international
fireworks competition in MontrealÕs Old Port were taken aback by Hezbollah
supporters who took over an area near Place Jacques-Cartier in a solidarity
moment with terrorists Òback home.Ó According to reports, two anxious police
considered the matter, and fled.
Should
anyone be surprised then that another boatload of Tamil migrants has arrived on
Canadian shores apparently expecting a free ticket to the nationÕs bounty and
none too shy about expressing their chagrin at learning they would be
incarcerated for a period of time?
Does
this not reflect a growing impression that in Canada there is nothing to fear
from the authorities, be they municipal, provincial or federal, when it comes
to ignoring the law?
Such
betrayal by authorities of citizens and the rule of law spells licence, particularly among the violence-prone who face
non-existent consequences.
Meanwhile,
ÒniceÓ Canadians remain passive as opinion-making elites encourage the underlying
confusion that brings this collapse of will and enforcement, all in the name of unspecified Òhuman
rights.Ó
Whether
in Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto or Kabul, Canadians now appear unable to
distinguish between our enemies and ourselves, dangerously confused about the
threats we face, our worth as a society and even our fundamental duty to defend
ourselves.
No
wonder anarchists believe they have a ÒrightÓ to create any mischief or mayhem
in Canada that suits their purposes.