A debate on what? What kind of debate is this? How can we seriously debate this issue, when the government has not even taken stock of the situation over there, when there is no assessment, no information? All that we know, we have learned from reading the papers. The government never provided us with any significant, specific and clear information on anything that went on over there. It never told us how the operations were evaluated, or what it was prognosticating. We were never told whether our troops were there for the duration or only a certain length of time, and in which case, how long that would be. We know nothing. We are kept in the dark.
We are expected do drink in the words of the Minister of National Defence and take leaps of faith, sign blank cheques and continue to send troops who operate in total frustration over there, not knowing what their mandate is, not being authorized by military authorities to conduct the operations that need to be conducted. They are helpless witnesses to revolting situations: children being tortured and killed, people being blown to pieces, civilians becoming live targets for blind fire from the hills. We are despatching our troops under very poor conditions. Are they there for the duration and under what conditions?
I think that the position the government finds itself today is such that it does not have much of a choice. The only argument it has left is to say: "We do not have any choice; we have to maintain our presence over there". The worst of it is that they are right: we do not have a choice.
We do not have a choice because, by its failure to act, its negligence and its superficial commitments, the government has put itself in such a position that we do not have any choice any more. A government or state that bases its policies on arguments like: "We do not have a choice" is in big trouble.
I think that this is the kind of action that has to be decided as a matter of choice, deliberately, for humanitarian reasons, on compassionate grounds, as a show of solidarity. In this case, the decision is based on an absence of policy. This government does not have a policy.
I dare anyone to get a serious response from government to the questions: what is Canada's policy regarding peacekeeping missions, what are the guiding principles, on what basis are decisions made regarding these operations? These questions will remain unanswered because they do not know.
We know for a fact that the government, through its members on the foreign affairs committee which reviewed Canada's foreign policy, agreed with the opposition that some criteria and standards were now required, and that we could no longer make individual commitments on a case-by-case basis in operations such as this one, where people die and where incredible amounts of money are spent in vain, without making a difference. The fact is that we did not make any progress whatsoever since last year. On the contrary, the issue is becoming more and more insoluble and it is increasingly obvious that we have reached a deadlock.
We wanted to get information from the government. We wanted the government to table these documents and set up a House committee, but all we got was an advance notice of a few hours yesterday. Indeed, yesterday afternoon we suddenly received notice of a debate on Bosnia and Croatia. Earlier today, we managed to get a one-hour briefing from defence officials who were very co-operative in answering our questions. However, we did not get the necessary files, the basic information required.
If the government is serious about this issue, it should allow a House committee to review the situation and hear witnesses, and it should also make these documents available. If we have to respect parliamentary secrecy, if the members of such a committee have to work in secrecy, they will do it. We are all responsible people, whether we belong to the Reform Party, the Bloc Quebecois or the Liberal Party. We could conduct an in-depth review of the situation in Bosnia and Croatia, because right now we do not know what is going on.
Because the government let the events dictate its policy, we do have to remain there, since nothing was solved and the situation is still the same. From a humanitarian point of view, we are well aware that if, under the current conditions, UN troops were to withdraw, including the Canadian peacekeepers, the whole Sarajevo population could die of hunger.
All the food that enters the city is airlifted by UN forces, along with water, gas, medication and so on. People barely survive in extremely harsh conditions and almost unacceptable sanitary conditions, but they do survive thanks to the humanitarian assistance provided by peacekeeping forces in Bosnia.
We are well aware that the UN mission in Bosnia is essentially humanitarian in nature. It is a military one in Croatia, since there is a buffer zone that keeps the factions apart with, in the
middle, the UN forces. But in the case of Bosnia, it is far more than that. It is humanitarian. It is a matter of helping people to survive.
So can we just decide to withdraw? Of course not. We know perfectly well we cannot. The government knew this. The government thought that by starting this debate, it would necessarily get the support of the opposition.
However, although we cannot do otherwise, we are aware that the government has failed in several respects, in that it does not put its cards on the table and give us a chance to make informed decisions. In a democracy, people want to make informed decisions. They want to know why, because they want to choose the best option. In this case, we have no option.
From the military point of view, we know what would happen if we left right away. We know that in Croatia, it would be a signal for all-out war. People are just waiting for a chance to attack each other. And of course in Bosnia, the Serbs would try, and they would probably succeed in settling their differences with the Bosnians, in ways we can well imagine.
Without the presence of tv cameras and without UN forces, we can imagine the kind of atrocities that would take place. It would be total war, a war that would not be contained, that would spread to the Balkan powder keg towards Greece. We know that the Greeks sympathize with the Serbs and have done so for centuries, and that the Serbs might depend on the support that the Greeks might be tempted to give them. The Turks support the Bosnians.
Finally, there are any number of reasons why we would see an incredible explosion of hostilities with all the consequences this might have for relations between the major powers. What would be the position of the Soviet Union if there was an outbreak of armed conflict of this magnitude? We can assume this would make international tensions even worse tense. In other words, we are trapped.
What we would like to see is for the government to commit itself, with the help of the opposition who would be glad to oblige, to identifying certain criteria before getting into this kind of trap, and second, to setting conditions for the renewal of the mandate. I think the government should set certain conditions. It has already said that it would not agree to have the arms embargo withdrawn. I think the government has already adopted this as its policy, and we support that policy. I think one of the conditions would have to be that the embargo must be maintained, because on the American side, there is a strong movement in favour of lifting the embargo.
Second, it must ensure that ceasefires will last. Ceasefires tend to have a very short life expectancy in that part of the world. There have been dozens and dozens of cease-fire violations. We must be able to set certain conditions. The UN will have to agree to identify more specific mandates. We must have a better idea of what we are going to do. To what extent can we reciprocate and in what way?
We have to know more about this, especially in connection with air strikes. For instance, does General Smith have the authority to carry out the threat he made recently without any input from Canada? Can they go ahead with air strikes without consulting the Canadian government? The answer would seem to be yes, in certain instances. It appears that, for reasons of defence, for example, General Smith is at liberty to launch air strikes. This is less clear in the case of offensive action, in which Canada apparently has some say, if only for reasons of defence, which we understand, in order to protect the lives of the peacekeeping force.
This means that things can escalate. We know very well how the Serbs will react to air raids on their positions. It is the people in the area who will pay. Who is going to be there? Our soldiers. There is also the whole question of morale in the Canadian armed forces as a backdrop. We will talk about this again in the House.
It seems to me the Canadian forces are going through a crisis. It seems to me that these peace missions have severely taxed their ability to meet these challenges. We might be tempted to think that, for the military, these missions are exotic tours of duty in faraway lands. Some might think that since apparently they do not have to engage the enemy, it is not an unpleasant business. We realize, however, that these missions are very hard and, perhaps, harder psychologically than traditional missions, because there is no clear objective, because these people often do not know why they are there and because they must remain impassive in the face of totally incomprehensible, uncivilized and unacceptable behaviour.
I think the Minister of National Defence should say more in this respect to the House. I am sure he has reports on morale in the Canadian forces, and I believe it is in the interest of all of us in this House to be informed of the constraints and of the actions that need to be taken in this area.
Therefore, the opposition's response, the one the government expected, the one it forces us to give, is yes. A very conditional yes. A yes that comes with lots of questions and doubts. Not a very happy yes.