The Canadian Peacekeeping Myth (Merged Topics)

[Roy Harding]

Well, if nothing else, in 2011 when the battle group leaves and the PRT should be staying, hopefully whomever is in power will give it the green light and skip the political BS.

(Emphasis added by Roy)

Jeezus - I've been away for a while. 

When did you get issued rose coloured glasses?

Roy

 

[zipperhead_cop]

(Emphasis added by Roy)

Jeezus - I've been away for a while. 

When did you get issued rose coloured glasses?

Roy

They are called "vermillion" and they are in the system now.  ;D

I missed you too!  :-*

 

[ModlrMike]

Like Mr Harding, I too have served in many missions both under UN and NATO control. While I agree with some of Mr Ignatieff's comments, I found most of that speech dripping with hipocracy. I was most struck by his descriptions of Canadians as "they" rather than "we". This speech will come back to bite him on the a$$.

 

[Edward Campbell]

Lorne Gunter is, rightfully, incensed at he Liberals, not just Ignatieff, in this column, reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions (§29) of the Copyright Act from today’s Ottawa Citizen:

http://www.ottawacitizen.com/opinion/Liberal+myth+making/1818552/story.html

Liberal myth-making

By Lorne Gunter, The Edmonton Journal

July 23, 2009

According to Maclean's magazine's website, Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff told an Irish university audience in 2005 that Canada's peacekeeping reputation was "entirely bogus." What's next, Ignatieff labelling multiculturalism "a complete sham"? Universal health care "an unmitigated disaster"? Bilingualism "an utter farce"?

The notion that Canada is a nation of peacekeepers, not soldiers, is one of those national myths -- like health care, multiculturalism and linguistic duality -- that the Liberals spent 40 years trying to manufacture. The peaceniks and flower children around Pierre Trudeau calculated that if they could convince the rest of us that Canada was without a warrior tradition, they could decimate our military and go around to international conferences boasting about how their commitment to peace made them morally superior to the Americans.

They also talked themselves into believing that if we had no war-making capacity -- that if we were a "soft power" -- the belligerents in the world's worst conflicts would trust Canada as the "honest broker" for their settlements.

Everybody now, put your hands together and sing Give Peace a Chance.

One thing got in the way of the Liberals' plans, though -- the professional resolve of our military.

Even as the Grits under Trudeau and later Jean Chrétien cut our military budgets and our troop strength by half and more, and subjected the men and women wearing Canada's uniform to such ridiculous experiments as unification -- in which all three branches of the military were rolled into one -- Canada's soldiers, sailors and air force personnel slogged on.

For decades without adequate equipment, with little respect and with almost impossible orders, they somehow managed to maintain our nation's reputation for top-notch soldiering. No one doubted that Canada's armed forces could do more with less than any military in the world, while at the same time retaining the respect of allies and foes alike.

Peacekeeping may not always have been what our forces thought was the best solution to conflict, but given that that was all their civilian masters were permitting them to do, they made the best of it.

They knew the world had always been a dangerous place -- and would always be dangerous, despite the Kumbaya spirit that had infected Ottawa -- but if they had to confront that danger only through a peacekeeping filter, then so be it.

In Bosnia in the mid-1990s, for instance, the rules of engagement set for our peacekeepers permitted them to return fire only when rounds fired at them by the warring factions came within a metre.

I can't imagine having to turn the other cheek, as it were, in the face of an enemy shooting at me within arm's-length. Still, our peacekeepers bore that obligation with pride and dignity and did their best to protect innocent people caught in the midst of the fighting.

In all, at least 114 Canadians have been killed while on peacekeeping duty around the world in the past half-century. It takes a special kind of bravery and dedication to one's country to go knowingly into hostile territory with one hand tied behind your back by politicians who only care when you foul up, who respect you very little and who always promise new equipment and resources but seldom follow through.

Having said all that, then, you'd expect I would be furious with Ignatieff over his remarks four years ago at the University of Dublin's Trinity College, and I am, in a way.

It was not the Canadian legacy of peacekeeping that was "entirely bogus," it was the Liberal misuse of that legacy that was. What was "disgusting" was the way the Chrétien government and then the Paul Martin government hid behind peacekeeping's skirts to avoid having to take sides in the world's hot spots.

It was a Liberal tendency, not a Canadian one, to, as Ignatieff added, rather "bitch about their rich neighbour to the south than actually pay" the price for a military that could intervene where needed to prevent humanitarian disasters.

Ignatieff's error in Ireland was to claim most Canadians were equally guilty of the irresponsibility and arrogance that were hallmarks of Liberal foreign policy for 40 years.

He should have blamed his own party -- not Canadians as a whole -- for the timidity whitewashed with moral boastfulness that was Canadian foreign policy from the late 1960s onward. And he should never, ever have said anything that could even remotely have been misconstrued as a slam on our peacekeepers.

The sole bright spot in Canadian foreign affairs during the Liberal era was the competence of our military despite the stresses the Liberals put them under.

Ignatieff also added, "If you are a human rights defender and you want something done to stop [a] massacre, you have to go to the Pentagon, because no one else is serious."

Iggy's unpardonable sin was in blaming our peacekeepers, indirectly, rather than placing blame where it belonged, with his own party.

Lorne Gunter writes for the Edmonton Journal.

© Copyright (c) The Ottawa Citizen​

I think Gunter is 100% correct.

This is a tack the Conservatives can exploit if, big IF, the story has “legs.”

To address SeaKingTacco’s point: Yes, indeed, that Conservatives can try to exploit this to help the NDP attack the Liberal’s Trudeau/peacenik wing.

 

[ltmaverick25]

Unfortunately I dont think this story is going to get legs.  The vast majority of the media simply do not want Harper in office anymore.  Its become painfully obvious.

 

[Edward Campbell]

Here, reproduced under the fair Dealing provisions (§29) of the Copyright Act from today’s National Post, is an interesting take on Ignatieff:

http://www.nationalpost.com/opinion/columnists/story.html?id=7331bcda-07d6-4055-a045-e2d418e4aabd

Ignatieff may be more frank than wise

John Ivison, National Post

Friday, July 31, 2009

Michael Ignatieff has a vision of a Canada that celebrates its 150th birthday in eight years, having undertaken a number of bold national initiatives under his leadership -- from opening the Northwest Passage in the Arctic to building high-speed rail links between major cities; from developing east-west energy corridors to developing a single economic space for labour and trade from ocean to ocean.

"The ambition of our ancestors should be inspiring us to equal them in daring today and tomorrow," the Liberal leader concluded in his recent book, True Patriot Love.

The problem, he believes, is that Canada is a country in which it is difficult to dream.

Mr. Ignatieff's frustration is specifically targeted at the Conservatives' decision to drain the federal coffers by cutting the GST, a move he believes (correctly) was aimed at hobbling the ambitions of any future Liberal leader.

Yet this hints at a wider vexation at the diffidence of many of his countrymen and women. In previous incarnations as a journalist and academic, Mr. Ignatieff has been more frank than was wise for anyone with ambitions in politics when it came to the perceived shortcomings of the country he now would like to lead. The latest in a growing list of less than flattering statements unearthed by the Conservatives includes the suggestion that many Canadians are reflexive anti-Americans; that we have been pretenders on the world stage; and, that we have a "bogus" reputation as peacekeepers.

The Conservative attack ads have found their mark. But Mr. Ignatieff's most immediate concern is coming up with an affordable platform in time for a general election to differentiate himself from Prime Minister Stephen Harper. Given that the Liberals have waved the Conservatives' economic plan through Parliament, their pitch appears to hinge on providing the national vision for our age that Mr. Ignatieff laments in his book is currently lacking.

For Mr. Harper, progress should come in small, incremental steps and sweeping visions have no place in practical politics. It is the Conservative Harper and not the Liberal Ignatieff who is the true heir to Canada's longest-serving prime minister, William Lyon Mackenzie King, who famously said: "It's what we prevent, rather than what we do, that counts in government."

Mr. Ignatieff sees himself in the mould of the great nation-builders --John A. Macdonald, Sandford Fleming and Donald Smith -- men who he argues understood the political ties that bind the nation run east and west and that those linkages need to be strengthened to offset the economic north-south drift. His resources may have been constrained by the GST cuts and the Conservatives' stimulus package but Mr. Ignatieff believes he can still offer up two or three mega-projects that will inspire true patriot love.

If his book gives any clues, signature proposals may include a beefed-up national highway system, high-speed rail links between cities such as Vancouver and Calgary and a national energy strategy that advocates processing more oil and gas, while creating a petroleum reserve to protect Canadians against fluctuations in supply from foreign countries.

You could drive a coach and horses through some of his proposals. For example, Mr. Ignatieff dismisses what he calls "the logic of money" -- that is, that the market dictates energy flows. "What exactly is being Canadian worth to us in dollars and cents? How much are we prepared to invest to keep our country in one piece?" he argues in his book.

Quite how unity would be enhanced by an idea that sounds suspiciously similar to the late and unlamented National Energy Program is unclear. But you get the picture -- and it is painted on a broad canvas.

It is subtitled: Michael Ignatieff is coming for your good. The worry is, he might be coming for all your goods.

jivison@nationalpost.com

It is “interesting,” in part, because Ivison agrees with me that Harper’s GST cuts “aimed at hobbling the ambitions of any future Liberal leader.”

Further, some of the commentariat are trying to give legs to the  “bogus peacekeeping” assertion.

 

[Retired AF Guy]

This is exactly why I have a love/hate relationship with the idea of Ignatieff.  I beleive his original speech that he gave while in the US is dead on and needs some genuine debate here in Canada.  However, now that he has gotten into Canadian politics he is shying away from his previous viewpoints, which I think is a shame.  Also, extremely aggrevating is the fact that Harper and Ignatieff seem to have way more in common then they have differences, when both of them are being honest anyway.  Ignatieff joined the wrong party.  Now, instead of having two possibly great leaders working together, they are pulling themselves down working against each other.

Right you are; both Harper and Ignatieff have very similar views. To take two examples, both are very pro-US; and both supported the US invasion of Iraq (as did 60% English Canadians polled by-the-way). So how did the two men end-up on opposite sides of the floor?

My take is that when Ignatieff decided to enter Canadian politics, the party most in-line with his views (the Conservatives) was filled by Stephan Harper. It would have Ignatieff years to buildup an organization, recruit supporters, raise money, etc, to oust Harper, but he was in a hurry and couldn't wait. The Liberals party on the other hand, was ripe for plucking; the party was still suffering from the Adscam fallout, riven by infighting between Chretien and Martin factions, and led by an ineffective leader (Dion). And it worked! Ignatieff was crowned leader (more by default than anything else) and is now ready to take on the Harper and the Conservatives. Whether Ignatieff can lead the Liberals to victory in the next election (probably this fall) who knows? If he doesn't, expect the knives to come out and he'll be gone.

 

[ltmaverick25]

If the liberals do lose and Ignatieff is replaced, that would be very bad.  The liberals would end up falling hard to the left again and that is never good.  I prefer Harper by far, but we need Ignatieff as liberal leader long enough for the party to return to the center.  As much as I like Harper, the conservatives wont hold on to power forever.  Eventually another liberal will get in, and I sure as hell hope its not a lefty like Rae.

 

[Edward Campbell]

The modern Liberal Party of Canada has been, generally, a big spending, big government, conservative party. The only “leftie” they picked was Trudeau – we have no idea how Celine Stéphane Dion might have operated; he talked left, but so do most Liberals, including Ignatieff. Liberals, generally,campaign left (see penultimate paragraph on the link) and then govern from the centre-right: as did King, St Laurent, Pearson and Chrétien. (Trudeau was a certifiable “leftie” and Turner doesn’t count.)

Oddly, the American leader closest to Liberal tradition was George W. Bush, a big government, big spending conservative.

 

[McG]

We should retire “peacekeeping” from lexicon
The Ottawa Citizen
A. Sean Henry, Colonel (Ret'd) - Ottawa
11 Aug 09

Re: National peacekeepers day, Aug 10.

Misguided attention paid to peacekeeping continues to undermine Canadian support for the counter-insurgency combat mission in Afghanistan.

Those who are determined to prolong the myth of peacekeeping now seek to place operations in Afghanistan in that category.

This is nonsense. Peacekeeping was never effective at preventing conflict. Moreover, in recent times it has been associated with disasters in the Balkans, Somalia and Rwanda. It was always a peripheral issue in Canadian defence policy, and in later years Canada absorbed strong criticism from allies for using it as an excuse to avoid contributions to conventional military operations.

It is time to retire peacekeeping from the Canadian lexicon and accept post-Cold War gritty reality.

This involves contributing military resources to combat operations in defence of Canada's national interests. The latter are at stake in Afghanistan as we seek to eliminate an important base for terrorism.

The government of Canada should demonstrate leadership by educating Canadians in these matters.

 

[MarkOttawa]

A letter of mine sent to the Toronto Star and not published:

Where are our peacekeepers?
http://www.thestar.com/comment/article/678155

In their August 8 article Walter Dorn and Peter Langille lament that Canada has been "abandoning UN peacekeeping operations" and that the Canadian Forces' focus has been "shifted to NATO, where they are not doing peacekeeping but are conducting counter-insurgency operations" in Afghanistan.

That ignores one very important fact. The NATO mission in Afghanistan is itself a United Nations mission. The UN Security Council has repeatedly authorized that mission, including its combat role, most recently in September 2008. The mission is a much a UN one as any other.

What Messrs Dorn and Langille actually seem to lament is that Canada is not now participating significantly in "peacekeeping" operations run by the UN itself. They specifically cite the missions in Haiti, Lebanon, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Darfur. But none of these operations seem to have done all that well in truly establishing peace; and, Darfur aside, they have been going on for many years with no end in sight (as is likely to happen in Darfur too).

It should also be remembered that the UN peacekeeping mission in Bosnia and Croatia--in which the Canadian Forces played a major role--was a crashing failure. Peace was only established after NATO intervened forcefully by bombing in 1995. NATO then replaced the UN in charge of running the international military force on the ground.

In the case of Afghanistan the cry is always raised, "What's the exit strategy"? I would like to know the exit strategy for participation in UN peacekeeping missions. After all the Canadian Forces took part in the UN operation in Cyprus--which still goes on--for 29 years before they were withdrawn in 1993.

I suspect what Messrs Dorn and Langille really object to is Canada's taking part in a combat mission--even under a UN mandate.

References:
http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs/2008/sc9450.doc.htm
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/ops/deliberate_force.htm
http://www.comfec-cefcom.forces.gc.ca/pa-ap/nr-sp/doc-eng.asp?id=2279
http://vac-acc.gc.ca/remembers/sub.cfm?source=history/canadianforces/factsheets/cyprus

Mark
Ottawa

 

[MarkOttawa]

And a letter the Star did publish (give them credit):

Focus has been with NATO allies
http://www.thestar.com/comment/article/679680

Reeacekeeping legacy a proud one,
http://www.thestar.com/article/678640

Letter, Aug. 10

Martin Meslin's letter is a prime example of the sort of cultural mythology that dogs Canada. Canada's last major peacekeeping operation was in the early days of the collapse of Yugoslavia in Bosnia-Herzegovina. That mission was then assumed by NATO with a more robust mandate when the UN failed to stop the violence there. While Canadian Forces members have participated in limited scale UN peacekeeping operations in Eritrea, Haiti and the Democratic Republic of Congo, our main focus in recent years (long before Stephen Harper) has been supporting efforts with our NATO allies [in, e.g, Bosnia and Kosovo--including an airstrike role with CF-18s in 1999]. To suggest that Harper had any impact on the relative importance of peacekeeping in this country is factually utterly wrong.

Nick Butler, Oshawa

Mark
Ottawa

 

[McG]

This article touches on a lot of subject area.  I've posted some of it in the big Afghan debate thread, but I thought this bit was more fitting with our discussion here:

After Kandahar
Canada will pull its troops out of combat in Afghanistan in 2011, and we must decide what the new role will be for our military
Major-General (ret'd) Cam Ross
The Ottawa Citizen
17 Aug 09

Canada will reduce its commitment in Afghanistan in 2011. As Canadians consider their future role in the world they must not confuse reality with wishful thinking.

While the extent of Canada's withdrawal from Afghanistan has yet to be determined, Ottawa has clearly signalled Canada will have a reduced combat footprint. The key words are "reduced" and "combat." We can initially expect 1,000 to 1,500 troops remaining to assist in training and development.

And there will no doubt be an element of combat capability that will be included to provide security for those trainers and civilians.

However, the bulk of the Canadian battle group will return home. The new NATO chief does not want that to happen. He wants Canada to stay the course; but that is not likely.

…

The burr will be replaced by familiarity, "traditional peacekeeping" -- regardless of the logic of staying the course in Afghanistan.

Many Canadians believe that UN peacekeeping is our traditional overseas military role. It is falsely perceived to be "safe," it exemplifies our desire to compromise, to be nice -- Jean Chrétien's "Boy Scouts." It is our "comfort zone," as the NDP and others would say.

But what is "traditional peacekeeping"? Too many UN veterans have vivid memories of being shot at and blown up whilst under the UN flag to believe that the calm portrayed on the back of our $10 bill, labelled Remembrance and Peacekeeping, is a realistic portrayal of their peacekeeping duties. Since 1948, traditional peacekeeping has cost us 114 lives; Canada has the third-highest toll on the UN's country casualty list behind India and Ghana.

Since the end of the Cold War, the demand for international intervention has grown almost exponentially. In June 2009, the UN had 93,216 military personnel deployed on 17 missions worldwide compared with only 12,084 personnel on 15 missions in 1999. The foreseeable future does not herald a rosier picture. The Haitis, Sudans and Congos of the world will not be solved easily or overnight.

The face of peacekeeping has changed. With the exceptions of Italy and France, 18 of the top 20 peacekeeping contributors are developing countries.

For a well-to-do country of 34 million, Canada's current contribution is abysmally small in numbers. Canada ranks No. 52 for UN peacekeeping with only 55 military personnel deployed on 10 UN missions.

Whether it's a combat role with NATO or a peacekeeping mission with the UN, we should be cognizant of our own limitations. Something is wrong if we can only deploy about 3,000 military at a given time. Our wishful thinking is that we are a middle power that can positively influence troubled lands. The fact is that we are punching well below our weight class in both security and development, not in quality but in quantity.

What is certain is that there will be increased interest in Canada returning to its perceived default position, more for political expediency than sound foreign policy. A return to the UN fold will resonate well with the voters. A re-commitment to Haiti will be especially attractive for Quebec voters. To say no to the UN on the grounds that we don't "do" peacekeeping any more would be unwise, especially at a time when Canada is aggressively seeking a January 2011 seat on the UN Security Council. And the response of "sorry, we have already given at the office" will no longer apply post-2011.

Do I personally advocate a return to the traditional role of peacekeeping? No. Peacekeeping reloaded? Probably. But, realistically, the peacekeeping of today is scarcely identifiable as the task defined in 1956 by Lester Pearson. We should change that $10 picture for one that depicts Canada's Armed Force as the capable warriors they are and stop deluding ourselves -- effective peacekeeping sometimes needs a big bat.

M-Gen (ret'd) Cam Ross, a former UN assistant secretary general and force commander of UNDOF on the Golan Heights, is a fellow of the Canadian Defence and Foreign Affairs Institute.

I think, that if one wants to see effective "peacekeeping of today" they will see something that looks a lot like the mission we are departing in Afghanistan.

 

[FormerHorseGuard]

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20090921/afghanistan_poll_090921/20090921?hub=Canada

I read the story  and wonder why  am I never called for one of these polls. I am not pro war or pro peace keeping missions. I do not see peacekeeping or a war mission any  differerent they  are still putting our troops in danger and putting them at risk. Some risks are worth the effort some are not worth the effort. Is the war worth the effort yes because the small changes we bring to the country  will bring small changes around the world and those small changes become huge changes and affect everyone.
I think the media is partly  to blame for the negative feelings about the current mission, would we of redrawn from WW1 or WW2 because of a negative report on the body  count. I think the body counters are sick and demented. The first soldier to come home and the last soldier to come home will the two  that the reporters always remind us of everytime they  get a chance.These images are rerun very chance they  get. They  do not seem to rerun images of the caskets coming home from the various Peace Keeper missions. They  do not seem to remember the losses on various missions. They  do not recall the largest battle Canadian soldiers had in the former Yugo during a Peace Keeping mission. Guess it was a slow news day  and there was no dead Peacekeepers to report on  so it was over looked.

Soon as the media gets a hold of the facts and reports them in what  ever twisted context they  want to air the facts, they  can change public opinion on anything they  want.
I think if Canadians knew the full story and were able to make their own minds up the pol results would be differerent and they  would see PeaceKeeping just as risky  as any  war.
Just so everyone knows I have never been on any  sort mission in my  time of service.
This is just my  personal opinions.

 

[PuckChaser]

I'm just glad they wisely left comments disabled for that story. Its an uninformed powderkeg.

 

[gcclarke]

Hmmmm that's nice. Shame that it doesn't matter in the least because we don't have a tendency to take our orders from public opinion polls. If they feel that strongly about it, they can go ahead and contact their MPs. 

 

[Ex-Dragoon]

I wonder how many people would stay in the Forces if we went to a strictly peace loving, blue beret wearing, hand holding military...peace force?

We could rename our infantry battalions to the 1st HuggieBears, 2nd ILoveYou and the 3rd PlayNiceOrIWIllStompMyFeet  :

 

[gcclarke]

Can I get posted aboard HMCS Cocktail Party?

 

[Edward Campbell]

A few points:

• Despite what at least a large minority of Army.ca members appear to believe, polls are, broadly, well and “fairly” conducted. The major polling firms have no vested interests in the outcomes – they are not in the business of misleading their clients by providing situated data. Political polling firms are even more concerned to be “fair” and accurate. Their clients need to tune their message to public opinion; polling forms who provide inaccurate data go broke. Most of the big polling firms in Canada have been in business for a long time because they do their jobs properly. They do not ignore your opinion because you are pro-military; they do not hang up on you because they do not want your opinion; and they do not situate the appreciation. The poll, commissioned by DND for its own information, is probably exactly as accurate as the polling firm advertises and was, almost certainly, carried out fairly and honestly;

• About 50% of Canadians are woefully ignorant about the world situation and the nature of keeping the peace. I am a wee bit surprised that the number is as low as it is;

• There is no going back to traditional (baby-blue beret style) peacekeeping because the laws of supply and demand are immutable and they apply to absolutely everything (including religion) and there is no demand for the baby-blue beret wearing, baby feeding peacekeepers of the ‘70s and ‘80s;

• That does not mean there is some shortage of or lessening in the supply of humanitarian disasters – many created by politicians and warlords; but

• It does mean that the international community, in which Canada plays a modest leadership role, no longer wants to address the political root causes of these disasters with military force.

 

[The Bread Guy]

• Despite what at least a large minority of Army.ca members appear to believe, polls are, broadly, well and “fairly” conducted. The major polling firms have no vested interests in the outcomes – they are not in the business of misleading their clients by providing situated data. Political polling firms are even more concerned to be “fair” and accurate. Their clients need to tune their message to public opinion; polling forms who provide inaccurate data go broke. Most of the big polling firms in Canada have been in business for a long time because they do their jobs properly. They do not ignore your opinion because you are pro-military; they do not hang up on you because they do not want your opinion; and they do not situate the appreciation. The poll, commissioned by DND for its own information, is probably exactly as accurate as the polling firm advertises and was, almost certainly, carried out fairly and honestly;

Related to that, my usual mini-rant:  I'm still searching (it's not on the Ipsos-Reid site), but do the reporters/editors/publications RARELY include a link to their source?  Is that too much to ask?  Or can't readers be trusted with the raw information?