Mr. Speaker, I would first like to offer my most sincere sympathies to the family of Nichola Goddard, who died today in Afghanistan.
This tragic end of a woman who worked to build a better world should remind us that the debate we are undertaking today deals with a serious question. The question is actually to decide whether we should extend the presence of men and women who are risking their lives in Afghanistan. The real question deals with the renewal for two years of Canada’s military commitment in Afghanistan. The Bloc Québécois will vote against the extension of this mission.
Sending men and women to risk their lives is a decision laden with very heavy consequences, which cannot, and which should not, be taken lightly. This decision should be made in full knowledge of the facts. We should therefore be able to answer certain questions.
Is such an intervention justified, necessary and realistic? Do the people who will risk their lives have the necessary means to carry out the mission that we wish to assign them? What exactly is the nature of the Canadian military commitment? Is there a specific schedule and a withdrawal plan should the situation become uncontrollable?
In connection with Canada’s current commitment in Afghanistan, we did not get answers to all our questions. But we have enough knowledge and certainty to support it. That is what the Bloc Québécois is doing.
The intervention is justified, if for no other reason than to ensure the security of Afghans, those who have lived in insecurity for such a long time, and to rebuild this ravaged country and rebuild its government. The intervention is realistic since, to our knowledge, it has received the support of the Afghan people and government. The soldiers have the necessary means and there are enough troops to fulfill this mandate until February 2007. We know the nature of Canada’s commitment, and there is a specific deadline, that is, February 2007. All this enables us to support the current mission.
Do we have enough answers to support an additional two-year extension? Definitely not. For this reason, the Bloc Québécois has asked the Standing Committee on National Defence to study all these questions. Do we have an idea of the real duration of the mission in Afghanistan? Will it be 10 years, as the Chief of Staff has implied, or 20 years, as a former major-general affirms. Likewise, can we have an estimate of the cost of the mission? There is talk of $2 billion. Is this realistic? Does this figure include all the costs: premiums paid to the soldiers, the increased maintenance of equipment or the purchase of new equipment? What are the criteria used to measure the success of the mission?
Beyond the show of visits by the Prime Minister and the Minister of Foreign Affairs, this government has to be able to tell the public whether we are making progress or not. What is the strategy for achieving peace and for rebuilding in that country? What importance is being given to development assistance? How can we ensure that rebuilding activities in Afghanistan will not be marginalized by strictly military activities?
The answer to this crisis cannot and must not be strictly military. What about the treatment of civilians, the effectiveness of the convention on the treatment of prisoners signed with the Afghan government and the use of antipersonnel mines?
On November 15, 2005, the official opposition critic asked a series of questions that remain unanswered. One of those questions concerned an exit plan in case the mission takes a bad turn. Does the minister have such a plan? Under what circumstances, if any, would he consider withdrawing?
What guarantee do we have of avoiding a hard line approach to this issue?
The national defence critic who asked all those questions, which everyone felt were legitimate, was none other than the current Minister of National Defence. I believe it is legitimate for us to ask the very same questions without being considered disloyal to the soldiers in Afghanistan.
This minister who asked all those questions, a career soldier, is not answering his own questions today. As long as we do not get answers to our questions, the Bloc Québécois will not support a renewed military commitment by Canada in Afghanistan.
In his typical fashion, the Prime Minister has decided to call a rushed vote on extending Canada's military commitment. It was, “There will be a vote or I will decide without a vote”. That is why we agreed to have a vote. However, just because we agreed to have a vote does not mean we will vote absolutely in favour. That is not what democracy is all about.
By rushing matters, the Prime Minister is being irresponsible, in my opinion. This shows a lack of respect for the House of Commons, parliamentarians and the public. It is offensive.
I do not believe, and I have never believed, that issues of war and peace should be based on partisan or electioneering considerations. We do not send men and women to fight wars and risk their lives so lightly. To take such an approach to issues like these is petty politicking, very petty politicking. This is a serious matter, one that deserves our full attention, thorough debate and careful thought. Certainly, once the matter is resolved and a decision has been made, we must stand firm on that decision and live with it. That is what we did regarding Canada’s current presence in Afghanistan. Nonetheless, the Prime Minister has decided to rush things. He has placed his party politics ahead of government policy. That is unforgivable on the part of a prime minister.
Even worse, the Prime Minister is trying to use Parliament to endorse a decision about which the public has very serious reservations. The public cannot be accused of not understanding all the issues and opposing participation by Canada when it is not being offered clear and adequate answers.
Before seeking the support of Parliament, the support of the people must be sought, because members of Parliament express the will of the people. That is the primary role and duty of government. In rushing to a vote, the Prime Minister is refusing to explain himself and to persuade the public.
Demonstrating leadership does not just mean making decisions quickly, as the Prime Minister likes to do. It also means persuading and explaining. Any authoritarian leader can impose decisions.
The Prime Minister says that he wants members’ unflagging support for the men and women deployed in Afghanistan. I am convinced that all the elected members assembled here support the troops of Canada and Quebec and that they will do everything in their power to help them perform their duties. However, that is not what the government is asking us to do today. It is asking us to blindly give it a blank check for years to come.
The government wants us to be a rubber stamp. For the Bloc Québécois, rubber stamping, abstaining from doing its duty in the way it should be done, responsibly and carefully, is out of the question.
The Bloc Québécois will not write any blank check to the Prime Minister or the government. As you know, I myself was in favour of an intervention in Afghanistan. I was deeply disgusted by the atrocities committed against women by the Taliban, to cite one example. The dynamiting of the statues of Buddha, for those who remember, showed a very disturbing fanaticism. Afghanistan had become a place of chaos and terror where inhumanity was triumphing. Certainly the attacks of September 11 were the straw, in fact the bale, that broke the camel’s back. All of the western nations rallied to support the United States.
At that time the international community made a commitment to ousting the Taliban regime, guaranteeing security and helping to rebuild this country scarred by successive wars.
I am proud that the Bloc Québécois supported this international intervention, as I am proud of our support for the intervention in Kosovo which helped put an end to the Balkan war.
Many of my colleagues know my convictions on these matters. I am deeply convinced that, in certain situations, armed intervention is necessary. That was the case in Rwanda, in 1994, and we failed in our task. It was necessary in Kosovo, in 1998, and we assumed our responsibilities.
It is very difficult to make these sorts of decisions. Often it is unpopular, but unfortunately, sometimes it is necessary. As a parliamentarian and party leader, I have not hesitated, and will not hesitate in future, to make such decisions, even if they should prove unpopular. We in this House are politicians. We are very aware of public opinion, and it is healthy that we should be.
As I was saying a little earlier, however, one cannot make such a decision on partisan grounds. Of course, we represent the people—in the Bloc’s case, the people of Quebec. In a democracy, we have to take that into account; in fact, it is a democratic imperative. We are also responsible for making decisions that may be unpopular. There are certain fundamental issues which require us to do so. So we have to consider popular opinion, but cannot let our attitude be dictated by that alone. For it sometimes happens that, to serve the common good, we must act contrary to public opinion.
Neither should we forget the context of this intervention in Afghanistan. In the face of terrorism, a military response is neither sufficient nor satisfactory, but it is necessary. Destroying bin Laden and his confederates is one thing. Destroying terrorism is another. One has to go after its causes, which are poverty, the absence of democracy, dictatorship, and the abysmal ignorance that these things breed. These causes are no justification for the fanaticism we have witnessed. But we must realize that these causes are the fertile ground that permits fanaticism and terrorism to grow.
As for the military commitment, it was necessary to intervene and necessary to offer logistical support and, above all, humanitarian aid. We must be clear about the role of the Canadian army before making decisions that commit us for a number of years. Humanitarian aid, logistical support and intervention in peacekeeping missions seem to me the priorities that would permit the Canadian army to play a useful role, without ruling out purely military intervention.
It is the fate of the Afghan people that must guide our decision. It is also the nature of the role that Canada can and must play. It is also and above all the fate that awaits the men and women who will risk their lives in Afghanistan. We know that some will lose their lives there, that caskets will be coming back to Canada, that there will be funerals. So it is a serious decision that we will be making as we vote. There will be tearful mothers, widows and widowers, and orphans in our own constituencies.
We must and we will answer for our decisions. How can we be answerable if the decision is hasty and made without having answers to our questions?
Fortunately, the Bloc Québécois asked the Standing Committee on National Defence to take a good look at all these questions. The Prime Minister is rushing things, though, and requiring us to decide before we have the answers. How can we in all decency send people to risk their lives when we are not even sure that it will be for good reasons? What assurance is there that two or three years from now, the situation in Afghanistan will not have turned into a nightmare? If this happens, who can guarantee that this government will not decide to stay for purely strategic reasons and justify the war by this vote in the House? How can we decide to send young people to risk their lives when we do not know whether they will be sent in good conditions?
After such massive participation on Canada’s part, who can assure us that after another three years, there will be enough Canadian troops and they will not be exhausted, totally worn out? For the time being, the government is counting on a hypothetical increase in troop numbers. But what assurance is there that these objectives will be reached when only yesterday the Auditor General underlined the army’s chronic inability to reach its targets?
How can I, as a member of Parliament, ask someone to risk his life without knowing whether there is an exit plan if things take a serious turn for the worse? What will this government do if the people of Afghanistan turn against the international presence? We cannot ignore Afghan history. I cannot in all conscience ask someone to risk his life without a firm conviction based on specific answers and clear decisions.
We cannot agree to send human beings to risk their lives in this way just because our arms are being twisted and even though we are totally in the dark. We must act responsibly and refuse to blindly sign this blank cheque that the Prime Minister wants from us. I therefore ask the elected members of this House to vote against the Prime Minister’s motion.
When he was leader of the official opposition, the Prime Minister stated that governments should respect the decisions of the House of Commons. I ask him, therefore, to abide by his own principles and respect the decision that the House of Commons is going to make on the motion that he himself introduced and I encourage him to participate actively in the Standing Committee on National Defence so that we have the information we need to make a wise decision.