reed writes

A carpenter doing humanitarian work was murdered in Afghanistan, latest death of a Canadian in that god-forsaken land.

Like many of my fellow citizens, I have been following our involvement in Afghanistan with sadness and horror. 21 Canadians, including this latest one (a murder- but then war is murder) have been killed and the list of our wounded is growing.

Each death strikes at the heart of every caring Canadian and that includes, I’m certain, (well I’m not quite certain of this) the men who decided to send these young people so easily into the heart of danger. More will die in this conflict, that’s a tragic certainty.

Before the initial task was completed, Bush left everybody else in the lurch while he and Blair swaggered off to Iraq. I guess they liked the bombing so much they wanted to do more of it. Sort of like a Guy Fawkes Day and 4th of July all in one for those two bozos.

Anyway, we stepped in with our few guys not too well equipped to try to take up the slack and now we’re doing stuff that we were never intended to do…like combat missions. It’s not at all what we originally agreed to do. Not even remotely.

The mission was to assist in training the Afghan army, to assist in training the police and to assist in the reconstruction effort. That’s why it’s called the International Security ASSISTANCE Force duh.

The Afghan rebels and warlords are experienced guerilla fighters. It’s been a lifelong career for most of them and they’re good at it. They know the terrain and they can endure the climate.

The problem with the changed nature of the mission…how the hell did it get changed anyway?…that never came up in the so-called debate…anyway, the problem is this is an unwinnable war given our small number of soldiers and our lack of training in counter-insurgency tactics.

We’re there carrying water as I call it, for Bush. We’re the water boys and shoeshine guys.

Ironically, it was the Americans who boosted the Taliban to power by arming them against the Soviet occupation.

The U.S. also boosted bin Laden by recruiting radical Muslim fundaments from the Middle East and North Africa to join the fight against the Soviets. Some of them are now the cornerstones of al Qaeda cells in many countries; others are in Guantanamo Bay. Hardly any are in Afghanistan…they’ve mostly gone to Iraq and Somalia and other places God knows which ones.

It’s really important to remember that there is a very long narrative on each side of this chasm between Arabs and Israelis and in particular Palestinian Arabs.

Jews suffered horribly under the Germans and no one, but no one came to their rescue. Got that? No one. Not the Canadians, not the British and especially not the Americans.

American investment in Germany increased by about 50% between 1929, when Hitler rose up out of the pit, and 1941, when the U.S. very reluctantly entered the war.

Prior to that, even though Canadians and Americans knew very well that Hitler was incarcerating Jews in concentration camps, there were severe restrictions on the entry of desperate Jews to both countries.

Take a look at Irving Abella’s book about Canadian policy…it’s called “None is Too Many” That was the Canadian approach of our government to admitting homeless, stateless Jews facing destruction.

Likewise the Americans admitted hardly a single Jewish refugee and certainly none that didn’t have great wealth.

Jump forward then, to 1947, when the United Nations decided to empower the Jewish Agency in Palestine to establish a Jewish Homeland. The U.N. gave the Agency a licence to kill in what amounted to a holy war for survival against the Palestinian Arabs.

Fifteen old white guys from western Europe and North America divided up Palestine into 3 parts…a Homeland for Jews, and a supposed state for the Palestinians. They decreed that Jerusalem would be an international city under an international Council…but it was all just empty words.

Then they washed their hands of the place and said may the strongest prevail.
The only word of warning came from the American President, Harry Truman, on March 25, 1948.

Here’s the core of what Truman had to say-

“The United Kingdom has announced its firm intention to abandon its mandate in Palestine on May 15. Unless emergency action is taken, there will be no public authority in Palestine on that date capable of preserving law and order. Violence and bloodshed will descend upon the Holy Land. Large-scale fighting among the people of that country will be the inevitable result. Such fighting would infect the entire Middle East and could lead to consequences of the gravest sort involving the peace of this nation and the world”

Today, we can see just how right Truman was. We see the millions of refugees and the helpless, hopeless, stateless Palestinian victims…not of Israel, but of the world community, which set them up for the big fall.

But no one listened then and today we have only pathetic excuses for leaders, who haven’t the slightest idea what it’s all about.

This what a member of the U.S. Congress looks like before any vote involving the word Israel.

This is what Collateral Damage Looks Like in Lebanon. God help all those who brought this violence to these innocent people.