National Defence Committee on Dec. 4th, 2006

[BGen A. J. Howard]

I must address that issue. I don't think that's a big concern. The PRT is a professional force. They're watching closely what's going on. We'll go at the Afghans' pace. I'd have to check further to see the specifics of it.

I don't know whether you will be visiting Afghanistan, but you'll certainly be able to look at that issue when you go there. Ask them on the ground. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised by what they're doing. You'll see the frustration they have with the slowness by which this is occurring.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

Thank you very much.

Mrs. Gallant.

[Cheryl Gallant, Conservative, Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, ON]

I'll be sharing my time with Mr. Norlock.

It's well known to the Taliban that our troops are very much committed to their mission, which is to secure and provide stability for Afghanistan, creating an environment conducive to reconstruction and development. Recognizing that the Taliban know they won't cut and run on their own, and that the only way to get rid of our soldiers and the sense of security so they can take over is to provide false information to the public, so the public applies pressure to the politicians, so we are pressured into calling back our troops.... That's their plan.

Recognizing that, there is also a report, which I'm going to read to you, and I'll have the question at the end. This is extracted from an interview with the Taliban from a Canadian reporter. He says it was confirmed that ammunition shipped by the government to Ghorak, a remote district northwest of Kandahar, regularly ends up in the hands of Taliban. Many low-level administrators are willing to trade bullets for guarantees of protection against the insurgents, he said, and this is the quote:

The government officials give us ammunition and money (...)

Without them, the fight is not possible for us. They help us carry our wounded men back to Pakistan. They give us their own vehicles and uniforms. Nobody can catch us.

My question, General, is, does the Canadian military provide ammunition to the Afghan army? I want to know whether or not it's possible that our soldiers are being shot with our own ammunition.

[BGen A. J. Howard]

On the issue of Canada providing any equipment or ammunition to the Afghan National Army, the answer to that is no. They use different weapons; they use different calibres of ammunition to ours.

Where we do interact with the Afghan National Army is in their training. We work in Kabul to professionalize them, and we're also working with them in the field every day when they're operating in Kandahar province; 300 or 400 operate there. It's leadership by example, if I can use that term. They watch closely the professionalism of the Canadian soldiers operating there and they try to emulate that.

Our experience so far over the last few months is, when we're with them, that they can be quite a credible force. We have no concerns in Kandahar province. I don't think there are any concerns throughout the region, but I'll just stick to the Canadian piece. We don't supply them with any arms at this particular junction.

[Rick Norlock, Conservative, Northumberland—Quinte West, ON]

I have two quick questions, and I'll lead off with the first.

My background is in a uniform, but it was in policing in Ontario. One of the issues that followed me throughout my 30-year career, quite frankly, was one of morale. I've often said that more than pay and benefits, morale is affected by the quality of the equipment one uses. I was particularly...I'll leave my feelings out of it.

People use the word “tanks”. A tank is a mobile platform to which you attach different sizes of artillery and/or arms. I'm more interested in the morale effect—the morale effect not only on the men and women who serve with our forces, but if we have any knowledge of how it's affecting our enemy, and also the morale effect on the local citizenry. Can you address that?

[BGen A. J. Howard]

Certainly. Let me address the Canadian soldier, whom I know best. The improvement in his quality of personal equipment and the technology he has in his hands to prosecute the mission in Afghanistan is some of the best that can be had. One of the best equipped forces, bar none, is the Canadian Forces, with the light armoured vehicle, with the recent introduction of the Nyala mine-proof vehicle, the helmet, flap jacket, weaponry that the Canadian soldier has. We do as much as we possibly can to equip them.

Again, I encourage you to ask troops when you go on the visit. I think you'll get a sense of their confidence in the equipment. We're always listening to their feedback. Commanders have asked for different types of equipment. They asked for an additional infantry company to help with the reconstruction effort of the PRT, they asked for the tank, and the Canadian Forces were able to provide that to them, which really serves them well, and will in the future.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

Thank you, sir.

I have one question, if I can. We have just about a minute or two left. When we were in Edmonton and we had a lunch with some of the troops who'd been and come back, one of the issues they talked about was the slowness to respond to simple requests about infrastructure damage, that type of thing.

You mentioned today something about a quick response or quick-impact program. It was a simple thing. It was in a village where a culvert had been damaged. It was necessary for irrigation or drainage or whatever, and it was quite an issue to the locals. It took some time to replace that, and then it kind of soured the relationship.

Is this the type of thing that this quick-impact team is designed to do, to go and fix those types of issues?

[BGen A. J. Howard]

Yes. We have to respect the regulations that govern this type of activity, but this is exactly the type of thing we want to do. We've had a couple of examples where explosives have gone off in Kandahar city--IED and the like--taking out a shop, for example, and we've been quick to come in and help repair that particular shop.

I think we'll see more of this. We're trying to enable the soldiers operating within the field. They probably feel sometimes that they could use more, and perhaps over time we'll be able to see how that situation improves. But I think this is exactly the type of thing the quick-impact projects will be able to help with.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

Thank you very much. That concludes our time with you. We appreciate again your being here. We probably won't see you now for a while, because we have only a couple of weeks left.

We appreciate the information you've been able to bring us, and your answers to the questions--some of them a little loosely worded, but just the same you were able to answer them, and we appreciate that.

Thank you.

[BGen A. J. Howard]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

Committee, just before we adjourn, I'd like to bring you up to speed. We did have some other business scheduled for today, and it couldn't take place because the witness wasn't available.

There are two things we're trying to accomplish, which were asked in the steering committee. One was a debriefing by CIDA, and we're still pushing hard for that to happen in the next two weeks. The other was to deal with the women's issues in Afghanistan. We're trying to make that happen.

We do have a briefing by DND on Wednesday, and I think it will be important for you all to be here. We can't say who it is, but it might have to do with future travel.

Then next week we have the prisoner transfer agreement on Monday, with people from Foreign Affairs.

I'd like to call a steering committee meeting for Tuesday, if we can, and if I'd known this was going to happen, we could have scheduled it for right now. But I'd like to do that on Tuesday, so we can report back to the main committee on Wednesday and deal with future business, which will probably be the last meeting before the break and before any potential travel.

I'd like to ask the members on that steering committee to come to the meeting prepared to talk about the timing of the report that will come out of this series of meetings we've had, and then what we're going to move onto after we're finished with this Afghanistan report.

So if you can be thinking about those things, we'll be preparing ourselves and the staff to work over the time we're not here so that we can move forward come February and March.

[John Cannis, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Do you mean tomorrow, Mr. Chairman?

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

I apologize. It's Tuesday of next week. So it'll be Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. Tuesday will just be the steering committee for future business, so it won't involve us all, but we'll have everybody back on Wednesday to talk about what we want to do. Is that okay?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

The meeting is adjourned.