Mr. Speaker, I would like to split my time with the member for Victoria.
As we stand on this particular issue of Afghanistan, and it is not the first time that I have spoken on it, I note that it has been an ongoing difficult issue for this Parliament. It is difficult to debate, because so many times the rhetoric has focused around supporting our troops rather than examining the mission that we are asking those brave troops to carry out for us, far away from their homes in another land.
It is difficult, too, because midway through the time we were in Afghanistan, the reassignment in 2005 had no direction from Parliament. It had no debate in Parliament.
The book written by Janice Gross Stein and Eugene Lang, The Unexpected War: Canada in Kandahar, sums up this situation very well. It brings out how important the debate in Parliament is, how important it is to come to grips with an issue like this in a public forum, with the attendant details of what we are doing in our foreign policy and our military policy.
Our engagement in Kandahar province in southern Afghanistan was ill-conceived, it was not debated, and it was led by a chief of staff seemingly motivated to show his friends in the U.S. military how tough he was. This type of leadership has been very difficult for us. It has also shown up in many other ways.
General Hillier's role in the making of this situation cannot be understated. In many ways, we have allowed the military to run the engagement. He continues to try to usurp the real democratic responsibility of this House and of the members in this House with his comments of February 22, when he suggested in his approach to this debate that somehow the suicide bombings of the previous week might well be the result of this debate in Parliament, somehow making the Taliban ready to tip the balance by engaging in that type of activity. This is patently unbelievable but has cast General Hillier further as one who would interfere at will in the serious debate that must take place on this further deployment.
In reality, the two suicide bombings in that period suggest something quite different. They are tragic and horrible events.
The first targeted the police force in Kandahar and, quite honestly, was most likely coming out of the local situation within that province, one that has been constantly cited as a real problem by most independent witnesses: a corrupt, duplicitous police force. If members have the opportunity, they can read a very good account of this in a book by Sarah Chayes, The Punishment of Virtue: Inside Afghanistan After the Taliban. She describes the process by which the police force in Kandahar was corrupted very badly through the early part of this decade.
The second incident, which took place in Spin Buldak against a Canadian armoured patrol, represents a failure of the Canadian command to heed the advice of their local allies, the Afghan authorities. How can we consider the direction of negotiation and settlement when we are not yet ready to listen to what we consider the legitimate authority in this volatile country?
We have seen that as well with the kinds of things that come out of the assembly in Afghanistan, where they are asking for the cessation of bombing of civilians and calling for more active engagement in diplomacy with the insurgent forces.
The only way that we as Canadians will be able to move toward promoting negotiation, dialogue and ceasefires is to completely change the way we are doing business in Afghanistan, including getting a change in leadership, relieving our brave combat troops of their unfair burden, and appealing to the United Nations to take over the complete responsibility for an ongoing peacemaking effort in this war-torn country, one that has been war torn over many decades.
This debate has been made more difficult by ongoing and relentless name-calling and accusations hurled by members in the House in our direction, especially now that we, along with the Bloc, are standing up to this motion.
How have we reached this point where a large majority of the House appears on the verge of extending the mission to 2011 when the same individuals, who were here a scant 20 months ago, made a decision, which was very close, to extend the mission to 2009?
I want to review that direction that has taken place. In August 2007, in Montebello, the Prime Minister served notice to U.S. President George W. Bush that Canadian troops would be pulled out of Afghanistan in February 2009 unless he was able to get a political endorsement to extend their mission. At the same time, we heard Canadians officials saying that we would be in Afghanistan until 2011. This has moved the direction and, thanks to the Liberals, it now looks like the Prime Minister will get his endorsement.
In 2001, the Liberals first sent troops to Afghanistan with the understanding that they would not be there very long. Early in, early out was the cry from the Liberals. However, that cry was forgotten as the Liberals moved inch by inch to having the same position as the Conservatives.
In 2005, the former Liberal government deployed 2,400 troops to a combat mission in the Kandahar province of Afghanistan with no end date for the mission.
On November 22, 2006, the Leader of the Liberal Party told the Victoria Times Colonist:
Canada should withdraw its troops "with honour" from Afghanistan before 2009 because their current mission is misguided.
That was the position then. On April 24, 2007, the Leader of the Liberal Party moved a motion stating that he was against the mission but that he did not want it to end until after 2009. Six days later, the Liberals voted in favour of continuing the mission by voting against an NDP motion for the immediate withdrawal of Canadian Forces from combat.
A month later, the Liberal position again moved closer to the Conservatives when the leader of the party told the Globe and Mail that he was open to keeping Canadian troops in Afghanistan after February 2009.
We then had the development of the Manley report which brought us to this point. It calls for an extension of two more years in Afghanistan. On February 12, 2008, a Liberal press release stated:
The Liberal Party will support a continuation of the military presence in Kandahar until February 2011....
The same release states that the Liberals are still firmly committed to withdrawing troops by 2011, just as they had been committed to withdrawing them by 2009, just like they had been committed in the beginning to early in, early out.
Day by day, month by month, the Liberals have moved closer to the Conservative position. What is that position? It is really a blank cheque commitment to the United States to keep our young men and women in a combat situation in Afghanistan, unlike many of our NATO allies, in the midst of combat, in the dangerous areas of combat and with a projection of an end by 2011 but no sense that there is a progress point that they can go to.
This wrong-headed approach is focused only on a military solution, a military solution that will do nothing but create more enemies and a position at odds with what Canadians want.
In July 2007, an Angus Reid poll showed that nearly 50% of Canadians supported withdrawal before 2009 and 16% supported an extension. In an Angus Reid poll in August 2007, 49% of Canadians saw the mission as futile. In September 2007, a Globe and Mail Labour Day poll showed that 85% of Canadians did not want the mission extended past February 2009. However, here we are today moving in that direction, it appears, by the large majority of members in this House.