Chronicle Herald : Harper steps up PR offensive on Afghan mission

Harper steps up PR offensive on Afghan mission

September 23, 2006

ACCORDING TO the conventional wisdom in Ottawa, Stephen Harper has done a poor job of convincing Canadians about why our soldiers are getting killed in Afghanistan.

The war in Afghanistan is the issue in Canadian politics now, and Mr. Harper’s success or failure in the next election may well depend on persuading Canadians that we are doing the right thing there and that we can win.

NDP Leader Jack Layton, who wants the troops brought home this winter, is no doubt hoping that more and more Canadians become disillusioned with the war and come to see Mr. Harper as a lackey of George W. Bush.

So far, the mounting death toll appears to be pushing many Canadians toward Mr. Layton’s view. Polls show roughly half of Canadians oppose Canada’s role in the war.

Mr. Harper is trying to turn this around. He started with a ceremony Sept. 11, telling Canadians that we are in Afghanistan to prevent future terrorist attacks. He made the same point in a speech this week to the United Nations.

On Friday, he brought someone to town to make the argument for him. Afghan President Hamid Karzai stood in Parliament and thanked Canada.

"It is a pleasure to be among friends in Canada today and to be visiting a great nation that is a model to the rest of us for all that is good," he said.

Mr. Karzai outlined progress made since the Americans and their Afghan allies drove the Taliban out of office in 2001. Afghans elected a president and a Parliament. Six million children are in school, while the Taliban provided education to only 700,000. Per capita income has risen from $180 to $355. There are six private TV stations, 30 radio stations and 300 newspapers, all, Mr. Karzai joked, "critical of me."

Mr. Karzai said it is sad that the remains of four dead Canadian soldiers — killed in a suicide bombing — are coming back to the country today.

"I sometimes think, what if Afghanistan soldiers were serving in Canada: What would the families of Afghanistan think when an Afghanistan soldier dies in Canada?" he said. "Would they justify it? Would they see the value in it? Would they understand it? And when I think of the interconnectedness between humanity today, the dangers and the virtues, together, I understand that, yes, it is sad, but it is worth it."

At the United Nations this week, Mr. Karzai was critical of Pakistan for allowing Taliban fighters to be trained and equipped in the lawless region near the border with Afghanistan.

In Canada, he was more diplomatic, but he made the same point.

"Our strategy of fighting terrorism in Afghanistan has so far been mainly focused on addressing the symptoms of terrorism; that is, on killing terrorists who come from across our borders," he said. "This strategy is bound to fail unless we move beyond the military operations in Afghanistan and to address terrorism’s political, ideological and financial basis."

Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf recently signed a peace deal with tribal forces in the semi-autonomous region that borders on Afghanistan, promising to remove 80,000 government troops in exchange for a promise that the tribal forces will not help the Taliban. The Afghan government and observers in the region are skeptical about the value of that promise and fearful that the troop withdrawal will allow Taliban fighters to cross into Afghanistan more easily.

Mr. Karzai also discussed Afghan efforts to destroy the booming opium trade in Afghanistan, warning it will take five to 10 years.

"If we do not destroy poppies in Afghanistan, poppies will destroy us," he said. "Therefore, trust us when we say we will fight them — and we will, because we want to have a country as good as yours and a parliament as good as yours."

Right now, Mr. Karzai’s government is not doing a very good job in that fight.

"This year, opium cultivation rose to 165,000 hectares, a 59 per cent increase over 2005," says a recent UN report. "An unprecedented 6,100 tons of opium has been harvested, making Afghanistan virtually the sole supplier to the world."

Canadian troops are not involved in military efforts to destroy poppies but British and American troops are, backing a private American company — DynCorps — that is burning poppy fields. This appears to be helping the Taliban, winning them the support of desperately poor farmers and drug lords.

This week, Gwynne Dyer wrote that the West is bound to lose in Afghanistan unless it stops burning poppy fields and starts buying opium. Mr. Dyer, a Newfoundlander who is one of the world’s top military experts, says things are starting to look bad.

"It begins to smell like the last year or two in a classic anti-colonial war, when the guerrillas start winning and local players begin to hedge their bets," he wrote.

On Parliament Hill on Friday, after Mr. Karzai’s speech, Mr. Harper promised that Canada will win.

The prime minister addressed a rally of several thousand Canadians, all wearing red and waving posters saying Support the Troops.

"Whenever there has been a cause that is just throughout our history, the men and women of the Canadian Forces have been there and prepared to sacrifice," he said. "We don’t start fights, my friends, but we finish them and we never leave until our work is done."

Mr. Harper has even more reasons that most Canadians to hope things go well for our soldiers in Afghanistan.

Mr. Harper’s political future may hinge on the outcomes of battles in the hills outside Kandahar.

smaher@herald.ca