A Line in the Sand

There is a story in today's news that I hope is an April Fool's Day joke. According to the story, the government of Afghanistan is considering a law that would make it illegal for a woman to have sex with her husband or to leave the home without her husband's permission. It would also grant custody rights to fathers and grandfathers.

I know that Afghanistan is their country and that their ways are different than Canadian ways, but if this actually becomes the law over there, then I think Canada has no option but to immediately cease any and all support of the government. In other words, our government should immediately withdraw all of its troops and end all of its financial aid to the government.

If Afghanistan wants to go back to the Taliban's way of doing things -- and I will be the first to agree that they have the right to choose to do so -- they can do so. All that I am saying is that they can do it without the blood and treasure of my country.

111

111 is the atomic number of the element roentgenium (Rg).

A score of 111 in cricket or darts sometimes referred to as a "Nelson".

The 111th United States Congress is currently sitting in Washington, DC.

Opus 111 was Beethoven's final piano sonnet.

In The Lord of the Rings, Bilbo Baggins disappeared during his 111th birthday party.

111 episodes of Miami Vice were made.

1-1-1 is the emergency telephone number in New Zealand.

Rome was devastated by fire in 111 BC.

111 is now the number of Canadian soldiers who have died in Afghanistan.

Down But Not Out

The Taliban scored a major victory when they pulled off a successful rescue raid on the government's prison in Kandahar. Reports say that hundreds of prisoners were freed, including over 400 Taliban fighters. Canadian troops and US Marines are now going door-to-door to hunt the escapees.

I fear that this may be just the start of another bloody summer for our troops, our allies, and the people of Afghanistan. I also fear that people will use these losses to argue that we should not be in Afghanistan.

I dread the next few weeks and months.

Another Day of Sadness

Yesterday two more Canadians died in Afghanistan. Corpoal Nicolas Beauchamp of the 5e Field Ambulance and Private Michel Levesque of the Royal 22e Regiment were killed by a roadside bomb, along with their Afghan interpreter, becoming the 72nd and 73rd Canadian soldiers killed in that country.

Every fatality we've suffered in Afghanistan has been a small tragedy, but there is something particularly sad about this particular incident. Private Levesque had just become engaged to his pregnant girlfriend. Corporal Beauchamp's wife is a Canadian military medic who is also serving in Afghanistan with him. And there is the unnamed interpreter who died alongside the troops. You can guarantee that he left grieving relatives.

A Zen Poll

If a poll is conducted in Afghanistan but nobody seems to listen, did the poll really exist?

In September, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and Environics conducted a poll of Afghans living in Afghanistan about the state of their country. Questions ranged from their feelings about the country's future to their comfort level with foreign troops. Citizens living in Kandahar province were asked special questions about Canadian troops and Canada's role in Afghanistan.

Overall, the poll results showed that Afghans support their national government and are fairly optimistic about Afghanistan's future, with 79% saying they feel the country is going in the right direction. 73% said that they felt women's lives are better off today than they were under the Taliban government. 86% felt they were better off or the same as they had been in September of 2002.

In Kandahar, 60% of the respondents had a positive opinion of Canadian troops. (17% had no opinion or did not answer and a further 4% were neutral towards them.) Of the 19% who reported negative feelings towards Canadian soldiers, 45% said their negative feelings were because of the deaths of innocent civilians.

This is all interesting, but perhaps the most interesting aspect of the poll is how unimportant the results seem to have been. As can be expected, the CBC reports on the poll they commissioned, but the rest of the Canadian media seem to have left it alone. So did the government, which is somewhat surprising given the fact that Canada's commitment in Afghanistan is perhaps the most debated international issue (after Kyoto and global warming).

If you want to see the full poll results, check out this link: http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/afghanistan/afghan-survey2007.html.

The War of Words is Heating Up

You have to give Iranian legislators credit -- they do seem to have a sense of humour.

Yesterday, the Iranian parliament approved a non-binding resolution that called the US Army and Central Intelligence Agency "terrorist organizations". The move was made in response to a US bill that seeks to impose a similar designation to the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard.

I am sure that most Americans will take the Iranian parliament's move as an affront, but I am not entirely sure that they should. The move is a good indication of how many people view the US, and its a far cry from the approved vision of "land of the free and home of the brave that all good men wish to immigrate to". Just consider some of these events and actions undertaken by the United States:

• invading Iraq under questionable pretences;
• deciding to unilaterally create the new category of "unlawful combatant" as a means of side-stepping key provisions of the Geneva Conventions;
• willful use of torture of individuals captured in Iraq and Afghanistan;
• frequent attacks, including aerial bombardment, which kill an inordinate number of innocent Afghan and Iraqi civilians;
• a reconstruction program that sometimes seems designed more as corporate welfare for companies like Halliburton and Bechtel than as a means of helping improve the lives of the average Iraqi.

Historically, the record is not much better:

• using depleted uranium bullets in Kosovo and in the first Gulf War;
• attacks on Iraqi infrastructure that destroyed hospitals and utilities in the first Gulf War, causing the deaths of innocent civilians;
• support for violent coup against Allende in Chile that resulted in the establishment of one of the nastiest regimes in modern Latin American history;
• numerous attempts to assassinate Fidel Castro;
• creating some of the conditions that encouraged the Soviet Union to invade Afghanistan, and then providing arms and money to anti-Soviet forces (including a certain Osama Bin Laden who would come back to haunt the United States);
• supporting the coup that overthrew Iran's democratically elected leader and replaced him with the Shah;
• and, making the world's first nuclear attacks on Japan.

Unfortunately, several of these points were mentioned by the Iranian parliament, so most Americans are likely to ignore them. After all, if a "terrorist" says it, it must be false, right?

We Have Met the Enemy

The fact that you are reading this blog on a personal computer is evidence of the fact that the information revolution has changed the way we live. Sometimes the technology works the way its inventors intended. Other times ... well, let's just say there are unintended results.




Take the case of the barracks at the US Navy's base at Coronado, California. Four L-shaped building were constructed back in the 60s to house sailors. They've stood for four decades without raising any controversy, but thanks to on-line satellite imagery technology, people have noticed something odd about the barracks:








That's right! The genius who designed the barracks facilities laid out the buildings in the form of a swastika. Now, I realize that it has become commonplace in the West to call anyone who disagrees with you politically a "Nazi". I've always felt that the folks who resort to using that particular N-word were resorting to cheap tactics. Now I am beginning to wonder if some of the US government's critics might know more than I've given them credit for.

Of course, the US Navy denies that the barracks were designed on purpose to resemble a swastika, and I have no doubts that they are telling the truth. Intentional or not, however, they exist and offend the sensibilities of many Jewish Americans and others who suffered at the hands of Nazi Germany.

The Navy, to its credit, plans on spending over half a million dollars on architectural changes and landscaping to obscure the obscenity from the air. Which brings me to the wildest part of this story -- a group called the San Diego Tax Fighters has decried the renovations as being "wasteful". While I understand their argument that the $600,000 could be used to purchase armoured Humvees for US forces in Iraq, I think they are missing the point: symbols matter.

Symbols, especially swastikas, mattered in Nazi Germany just as symbols matter in the United States. If you don't believe me, try to burn a flag at a protest. Or place an ad with a dreadful pun on a top general's last name in a major newspaper. That will show you how much symbols matter to Americans.

I know, I know -- the swastika has an honourable history as a positive symbol that goes back several millenia. I also know it was a traditional good luck symbol. And yes, I am aware that the pre-war cloth unit insignia for the 45th Infantry Division of the Oklahoma National Guard was a yellow swastika on a red diamond.

That is all true -- and its all irrelevant. Despite the positive images that other cultures have put on it, the swastika is not a neutral symbol. Not any more. It is a symbol of hatred and oppression and murder and imperialism.

I've complained in past posts that I fear for the America that I love. I've complained about American policies that seem arrogant and imperialistic. I worry because the American government's current world view seems to mirror the racist cultural bigotry that characterized the country's historical dealings with its native peoples (and the people of Cuba, the rest of Latin America, Hawaii, the Philippines, and so many other areas in the world). The fact that a group of "tax payers" begrudges spending money to assuage the sensibilities of people who lost millions to the legions that served the swastika seems to me to be an indication that the hubris is turning inward.

To paraphrase the cartoonist Walt Kelly, America has met the enemy -- and it is them.

Idiocy in Iraq

If you had any doubts as to America's descent into imperial hubris, a couple of recent stories in the Washington Post should help you change your mind.

It appears that the US Army is running a sniper operation in Iraq in which items that can be used to make IEDs (improvised explosive devices) are left lying around where people can find them. Then, as soon as someone picks up the material, they are shot by snipers. That's right -- picking up a piece of scrap metal is grounds for "termination with extreme prejudice", as they say in the movies.

You may be asking what the big deal is. Well, for one, how the fuck can they tell that the people picking up the materials are TERRORISTS? As the fine folks over at Orbat.com (http://orbat.com/site/news.html) pointed out on September 26th, "Poor people will pick up anything to check if it is useable (sic) or can be sold/exchanged." Since the American invasion gave the Iraqi economy a shit-kicking from which it has yet to recover, there are probably hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of people who might look upon wires and usable scrap as a windfall.

If this is how the US Army wins the hearts and minds of the Iraqis, we will be lucky if the entire nation does not become terrorists.

In Memorium: Nathan Hornburg

Canada lost its 71st soldier in Afghanistan this week. Corporal Nathan Hornburg, a reservist with the King's Own Calgary Regiment, died when he came under mortar fire while repairing a Leopard tank. The 24 year old had been in Afghanistan for less than two months.

A Vote Against

These are tough times for western civilization. In many ways, we in the west face choices similar to those faced by people living in Nazi Germany or the communist USSR. While we may not be in a situation to hide the persecuted or to save them from a savage death, we can fight against the dark forces that make it easy for "intelligence" operatives to torture people for information and that treat "warriors" who target innocent civilians with air strikes and missile attacks as heroes and not war criminals.

This evening I got an e-mail from someone who is very dear to me, a woman who goes to church and thinks of herself as a civilized Christian. She did not write the email herself -- she forwarded it having received it from someone else -- but she obviously agreed with the contents, which attempted to explain "why Muslim terrorists are so quick to kill themselves". This is not the first time I have received e-mails like this, but I have never said anything before.

This time I cannot remain silent -- to do so would be the moral equivalent of watching the smoke bellowing from the crematorium at Auschwitz and pretending nothing was happening. I want the world to know that I am fed up with the hate and the racism. I am fed up with the smug superiority that acts as if the west (especially the US) is in the right and everyone else is in the wrong. Lord knows, I support my country's troops in Afghanistan, but I do not and will not condone the sort of hateful, arrogant ignorance that fuels the fires of conflict.

The brilliant Canadian songwriter Bruce Cockburn once wrote, "You've got to kick at the darkness 'til it bleeds daylight." In that spirit, I am going to give my comments to the content of the e-mail I received. I apologize in advance for quoting the content.

I bet you have been wondering!!!
Everyone seems to be wondering why Muslim terrorists are so quick to commit suicide.
Let's see now ...

• No Jesus (By Jesus, I guess they mean the man who commanded us to love our neighbours as ourselves. The same guy who said it was easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to get into heaven.)
• No Christmas (That's right, no commercialized celebrations of consumer excess, because let's face it -- that's what Christmas has largely become.)
• No cheerleaders (Somehow, cheerleaders don't even make it on my list of 100 reasons to love life and to stay alive.)
• No baseball (If only they had professional athletes who regularly inject themselves with dangerous performance-enhancing drugs to admire. Then the terrorists would think twice about blowing themselves up.)
• No football (Just like baseball, except you can add athletes who commit violent crimes.)
• No hockey (As above, but add gratuitous violence during games and drunk driving in the off-season.)
• No Nascar (As above, but add liquor and a prodigal waste of limited resources and voila, another terrorist puts down the bomb.)
• (By the way, I notice basketball and soccer don't make the list. Is it because they aren't "white" enough for the author of the e-mail? Or does the author feel that they are, in fact, a reason to become a suicide bomber? Hmmm.)
• No tailgate parties (There's nothing like gluttony and public drinking to dispel thoughts of suicide.)
• No Costco or Sam's Club (It is hard to motivate yourself to kill yourself for your faith when you still have half a dozen jars of mustard to use up.)
• No Home Depot or Lowe's (Thank heavens for big box stores. Easy access to consumer goods has all but wiped out suicide in western economies. How can you think of leaving this old world when there are so many projects you can work on?)
• No pork BBQ (I am not sure if the emphasis is on the "pork" or the "barbecue" here. Hmmm, Jews can't eat pork. Does that mean they are tempted to become suicide bombers too?)
• No hot dogs (Come on -- if people knew what went into hot dogs, they would be more likely to kill themselves, not less.)
• No burgers (Yeah, lower cholesterol and lower risk of heart attack is enough to make me want to blow myself up, too.)
• No chocolate chip cookies (I get it -- why live if you can't get diabetes?)
• No lobster (No point in living if you can't eat something that you cook while it's alive.)

Hmmmm.....

• Rags for clothes and towels for hats (Perhaps if we (a) didn't bomb the shit out of people and (b) did advocate an economic system that benefited more than just a narrow elite, people would all be able to wear "decent clothes". Anyhow, turbans are a step up from Von Dutch baseball hats in my estimation, and "rags for clothes" is no worse than hip hugger jeans that show somebody's thong.)
• Constant wailing from the guy in the tower (Yeah, why can't those Muslims invest in a decent set of church bells like Christians?_
• More than one wife (At least, "more than one wife at the same time." Civilized people like us have our multiple wives sequentially, the way the good Lord intended us to do it.)
• You can't shave (Hmmm, if all those guys who currently shave their heads when they start to bald were forbidden from doing so, would they become suicide bombers?)
• Your wives can't shave (We all know how hairy them there Mooslim wimmen are, don't we? Apparently bikini waxing and laser hair removal has a moral dimension that has hitherto been hidden from me.)
• You can't shower to wash off the smell of donkey cooked over burning camel dung (Yes, we all know that Muslims eat donkey cooked over camel dung. And they live in the desert and don't know how to read and live in caves and tents instead of houses.)
• The women have to wear baggy dresses and veils at all times (Don't those Muslims understand that tight t-shirts, short skirts, and visible underwear are signs of a truly moral society?)
• Your bride is picked by someone else (As opposed to here, where you pick your bride ... and your second wife ... and your third wife ...)
• She smells just like your donkey (What is this person's obsession with donkeys?)
• But your donkey has a better disposition (Is the author of this piece just racist, or does he/she have a donkey fetish?)
• Then they tell you that when you die it all gets better! (Yeah, they need a religion like Christianity that doesn't offer a vision of a "better place" in the afterlife. Nope, no one has ever tried to buy the average Christian joe off by telling them the pains of this world are insignificant because things will be better in paradise.)

I mean, really, is there a mystery here? Hello!!!

George W. Bush famously said, "If you are not with us, you're against us." If e-mails like this are any indication of what being "with them" in the war on terror means, I guess I am against them. Don't get me wrong -- I opposed fundamentalism in all of its forms and I am a huge advocate of democracy. It's just that I don't believe that justice and democracy are served by spewing hateful racist and sexist garbage like this. And you shouldn't, either.

Cleaning Up - II

I saw a web page the other day that talked about the firms that are profiting the most from the Iraq war. KBR Inc., a division of Halliburton, leads the list with over US $17 billion in war-related revenue in the period between 2003 and 2006. Most of KBR's revenue comes from repairing oil fields and participating in infrastructure projects.

The article limited itself to the top ten American companies, so I don't know how the top 10 Iraqi-owned companies compare, but I somehow suspect that their combined total does not beet KBR's revenue during this period.

To see the entire top ten list, click: http://finance.sympatico.msn.ca/investing/stocks/article.aspx?cp-documentid=5399485

In Memorium: Les Canadiens

Soldiers from 5 Canadian Mechanized Brigade Group, based out of Quebec, recently took over as Canada's main combat contribution to NATO's International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan. Even though they have been in the field for a relatively short time, they have already suffered three fatalities at the hands of the Taliban.

The dead troops are:

• Private Simon Longtin, Royal 22e Regiment
• Master Corporal Christian Duchensne, 5th Field Ambulance
• Master Warrant Officer Mario Mercier, Royal 22e Regiment

My thoughts are with the families and friends of the men.

Kimchee Eating Surrender Monkeys

In the days before the US began the Second Gulf War (aka the First Invasion of Iraq), it was fashionable in amongst right-wing commentators to criticize the French as "cheese eating surrender monkeys" for their opposition to an armed "solution". I am surprised that these same pundits have not attacked the South Korean government as vigorously for caving in the Taliban terrorists who were holding 19 Korean missionaries captive.

Over the weekend, the government in Seoul agreed to continue with the withdrawal of South Korean troops by the year end in exchange for the captives. They also agreed to end missionary work in Afghanistan and to encourage South Korean aid workers to return home. In other words, they agreed to do what they had already planned on doing along with two other meaningless gestures. (Meaningless, that is, unless the missionary trips are in fact government-sponsored.)

Still, the agreement was could have several serious repercussions. First, and the reason most frequently quoted in the news, the deal provides the Taliban with more credibility. (Apparently, thousands of dead Afghans and hundreds of dead NATO troops did not provide the Taliban with enough credibility in some people's eyes.) Second, the deal undermined the authority of the Afghan government, since the Koreans negotiated directly with the Taliban. Third, it may enourage the Taliban to target civilians from other countries since the tactic worked with the Koreans. Fourth, it may encourage groups in other parts of the world to target South Koreans, since they set a precedent of appeasing kidnappers.

I doubt the deal is enough to make the American government reconsider the wisdom of maintaining 25,000 troops in South Korean, but I do not doubt that the memory of the deal will colour relations between the two governments in the future. I hope that Seoul still feels the price was worth paying when this happens.

The More Things Change ...

Yesterday (August 19th) was the 65th anniversary of the raid on Dieppe. The battle was the second major land engagement of Canadian soldiers in the Second World War. It was a complete catastrophe for the Allied raiding party. 913 Canadians died and over 2,000 were captured. Despite a positive spin put on the raid by some historians -- it taught the Allies valuable lessons that could be applied to the invasion of Europe at a later date -- most Canadians feel it was a screw up.

Significantly, the first major land engagement of Canadian soldiers in the Second World War was also a screw up that led to the annihilation of the force involved. Two battalions of Canadian infantry had been lost in Hong Kong the previous December. Those who did not die were captured by the Japanese.

It is rather ironic that these defeats are well-known in Canada, but our victories are generally ignored. It is true that Canadian assault on Juno beach on D-Day had a lot of press over the past few years thanks to the 60th anniversary celebrations, but most people know little of the invasion of Sicily, the battle of Ortona, or the liberation of the Netherlands.

This is a shame, because it underplays a key element of Canadian history and it distorts the true nature of Canada's experience in the world. While it is true that Canada has a tradition of UN peace-keeping -- a tradition which has not really been kept up over the past ten years -- we also have a tradition of fighting when we feel the fight is necessary.

I mention this because yet another Canadian soldier died in Afghanistan. Private Simon Longtin of Canada's famed Royal 22e Regiment was killed by a roadside bomb, making him the 67th Canadian soldier to die over there. Predictably, there are voices clamouring for Canadian troops to either withdraw from Afghanistan or to be reassigned to less aggressive tasks such as provincial reconstruction. (I can understand the former, but I find the latter suggestion particularly dishonourable because it says that Canadian lives are too valuable to risk, unlike the lives of our allies' troopers.)

I am not going to suggest that Canada's current involvement in Afghanistan is the equivalent to our involvement in World War Two. I am not even going to suggest that it is the equivalent of our involvement in Korea. I am, however, going to suggest that critics of the mission should judge it in similar terms.

The Cost of Nationhood

I was saddened to discover yesterday that six more Canadian soldiers lost their lives in Afghanistan. The six, along with their Afghan translator, were travelling outside of Kandahar when an improvised explosive device destroyed their vehicle, killing them all.

Each death in Afghanistan makes my heart ache, but I know that the friends and family of those who died hurt ten thousand times more than I could ever feel. All I can say is that your loss is appreciated and your loved one is remembered.

But it is not the survivors of the casualties that I wish to address -- I want to speak to Stephane Dion and Jack Layton. Specifically, I want to tell them: grow up!

Nobody likes the casualties that we are facing. The soldiers don't. Their families certainly don't. The prime minister does not. The public doesn't. A little nobody like me doesn't. It's a high price, and unfortunately it is likely that the price is going to continue to rise. It is also a price that must be paid if we are to be a sovereign nation. Especially if we are to be the sort of active force for good in the world that average Canadians would like their country to be.

We have committed ourselves to helping the government of Afghanistan. We have committed ourselves to helping the people of Afghanistan. We have seen a truly shitty situation in Afghanistan and we have committed ourselves to helping make it a better place.

I have spent the past two months in a country that has one huge asset -- hope. In a continent where genocide and political strife has happened all too often, the people of Tanzania are hopeful. That is what makes Tanzania such a wonder place. That is what makes Tanzanians such beautiful people.

To pull out our troops immediately as Mr. Layton would have Canada do might save a few Canadian lives -- all of them precious -- but how many Afghans -- each of them just a precious -- would die because they didn't have Canadian troops to help them? Abandoning the people of Afghanistan would rob the peole of hope that life will get better. That may not be a crime, but in my books it is surely a sin.

And Then There Were Six

Sometimes I feel like I am in a parallel universe, a place cut off with the rest of the world. It is not true, of course, but that is the way it feels. If I didn't have access to the internet, I would feel even more cut off.

Sometimes, though, I am reminded that I am not very cut off at all. There is a television channel called Pulse that shows leads from a number of international broadcasters. Depending on the time of the day, you can watch content from CNN, BBC World, Al Jazeera, Deutsche Welle, and South African and Chinese networks whose names I do not know.

When the news was announced that three NATO soldiers died in southern Afghanistan, the headline ran on the "ticker tape" that each network runs at the bottom of the screen. Even though the nationality was not announced, I suspected the soldiers were Canadians. A quick visit to the CBC website last night confirmed it.

This brings the number of Canadian servicemen who have died in Afghanistan since I have been in Tanzania to six:

• Master Corporal Anthony Klumpenhouwer
• Corporal Matthew McCully
• Master Corporal Darrell Priede

And, most recently:

• Sergeant Christos Kangiannis
• Corporal Stephen Bouzane
• Private Joel Wiebe

Every day that new casualties are announced becomes a mini-Remembrance Day for me. I think about the lives that had been lived and the lives that had been lost. I think of the families and friends that the dead have left behind. I wonder if the dead and the survivors know that the terrible sacrifices are appreciated. Most of all, I pray that one day peace comes to Afghanistan. But until that day, I can only remember the men and women who serve, and be grateful that they are willing to do what they do.

The War on Terror - Another Perspective

It was great sadness that I read the news on the CBC website that another Canadian soldier had been killed in Afghanistan. This makes the third soldier to die since I have been in Tanzania and the 57th to die since the mission began. We don't get any Canadian news over here, so I do not know how people are reacting to the losses. I do, however, know that what the men and women of the Canadian Forces are doing over there is important. That is something the local Tanzanians understand.

Last week I visited the National Museum in Dar Es Salaam. Many of the displays were exactly what you would expect from a national museum, but there was one exhibit that caught me completely off guard. In the open courtyard between the various halls of the Museum was a collection of broken metal -- a car, a bike, and other scrap -- that had been salvaged from the scene of the bombing attack of the 1990s.

That is why I am not surprised when some of the Tanzanians I have met speak approvingly of George Bush. Tanzania, like Kenya, experienced the horror of terrorist attacks long before the terrible events of 9/11. They understand what it means to be attacked.

Canada has remained relatively unscathed by the war on terror, and for that I am grateful. I am also grateful that there are men and women who are willing to put their lives on the line to ensure that the people of Afghanistan have a chance to create an alternative way of life to the Taliban regime they had lived under. I just hope that the sacrifices of Afghan, Canadian, and allied service people are not in vain.

CBC's Two Front War in Afghanistan

The CBC is providing people interested in Canada's involvement in Afghanistan with two different approaches to the conflict this week.

The first is, of course, Crazy Eights, is a one hour documentary appearing on CBC Television tonight at 8:00 PM and repeating on CBC Newsworld at 10:00 PM on Saturday. Crazy Eights follows the soldiers of Eight Platoon, C Company, Royal Canadian Regiment for a month as they serve in southern Afghanistan. Eight Platoon, incidentally, has the unfortunate distinction of having suffered the highest casualties of any platoon assigned to Afghanistan.

The second is Afghanada, the half hour draw that airs on CBC Radio One. In previous weeks I would have been hard pressed to decide which program to tune in, but Afghanada is now only heard at 11:30 Friday mornings, so I don't have to choose.

George W. Bush's Linen Anniversary

The second Iraqi-American War began four years ago on this day. President George W. Bush announced the commencement of the air strikes that brought the phrase "shock and awe" to the general public. The troops went in, the statues fell, the dictator was ultimately captured -- and the war goes on.

Four years later, "shock and awe" has been replaced with "disgust and dismay". American troops are still heavily committed on the ground in Iraq, and they continue to take casualties. Iraqis continue to die. The bills mount higher and higher. "Mission accomplished" has become a bitter joke, an exercise in black humour and poor taste.

I do not know the solution to this morass. I doubt that anybody knows the solution. I do know one thing, however. The events of the past four years prove once again that it is easier to start a war than to end one.

In Memorium: Kevin Megeney

It's been a while since I've written about the war in Afghanistan. Unfortunately, the friends and family of Corporal Kevin Megeny laid him to rest on Friday.

Megeney was a member of the reserves who volunteered for service in Afghanistan. He had only been in country for 10 years when he was accidentally shot by a comrade. By all accounts, he was a great guy and a good soldier.

When the news about the death first broke, it was reported that Megeney's family had been called at his insistence. According to the news stories, he was adamant that his mother be called.

I once read a comment in a book about the Second World War that dying soldiers either cry out for God or they cry out for their mothers. Perhaps that is the case, but there is something incredibly touching about Megeney's plea that his mother be notified. Here is a young man who volunteered to put himself in harms way to help the people of Afghanistan, and his last thoughts were of his mother.

I join many other people in extending my sincere condolences to the friends and family who mourn Corporate Megeney's loss, especially his parents (who have publicly requested that no charges be laid against the soldier who accidentally killed their son). I never met the man, but from everything I have learned about him it is obvious that they raised a good man.