Dancing with Afghanistan

Duceppe's on and off again love affair with Harper's Tories seems to be off again. Harper's down in the polls in Quebec. Afghanistan is just as good an issue as any other for Duceppe to impale Harper with. And impale he will, because now is just as good a time as any to go to the polls.

Duceppe's gripe is that the mission in Afghanistan is focusing to much on actually fighting the Taliban. We should be playing "back-up". We do reconstruction not war. That's the Canadian way I guess to Le Chef Seperatiste. Forget the French and English Canadians that died at Vimy Ridge. Canada shouldn't participate in fighting. No reason is given why.

Save one:

"Canada risks getting in deeper and deeper, sacrificing the lives of its soldiers without producing any concrete results, he argued."

This is an interesting argument. The media, in it's shalloweness, doesn't even consider what it means. What Mr Duceppe is suggesting is that a country that takes an active role in peacekeeping, such as the one Canadian troops are doing in Afghanistan, will not produce concrete results. Unfortunately it seems like no one in the media bothered to question him further on this. But it seems reasonable to conclude that Mr Duceppe seems to believe that putting our forces in more of a "re-construction" role will produce "concrete" results.

The flaw with Mr Duceppe's argument is that he assumes that fighting the Taliban and taking a direct role in bringing Taliban fighters to justice doesn't produce "concrete" results. Getting those that were partially responsible for the deaths of hundreds of Canadians on 9/11 thrown into prison is a "concrete" result. Bringing stability to the region by removing these fighters from the battlefield is another "concrete" result.

I would argue that Mr Duceppe has it all backwards. Taking a more "re-constructive" role shows less "concrete" results in the long run. Whatever roads we build, whatever wells we dig they could all be blown to bits by Taliban terrorists seeking to create instability and terror. We need stability, justice, peace and above all Liberty first.

The roads and the wells will come when there is stability and justice. Liberty breeds economic and social well being. Trying to bring Liberty by imposing economic and social norms is like trying to make an egg without a Chicken.

The second flaw with Mr Duceppe's argument is that the role he speaks of is one that Canada has far too much familiarity with. Try telling a soldier to sit back and build that bridge while he sees a genocide going on - or who knows maybe worse? We have a moral duty to act when it's reasonable for us to do so. Doing otherwise puts us on horrible moral ground that reminds me another ill fated peacekeeping mission where soldiers were told not to take an "active" role.

Mr Duceppe should stop dancing with Afghanistan. It's time for him to make a principled stand - not a political one.