Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to speak to this very complex issue, Afghanistan. I think most of us here visit our schools and speak to our students from time to time. Inevitably, I am asked the question whether Canada should be in Afghanistan. Unequivocally, my answer is yes. We have made the right decision to be there. I believe in multilateralism, as flawed as it may be. I believe in the UN and NATO. However, we need to maybe modify these structures somewhat as they are somewhat outdated.
It is important for some of the poorest countries in the world to know that there are organizations out there that can intervene on their behalf when they are stuck in very difficult situations. Canada is a very privileged nation. I tell the students this as well. We are G-7 country. We are privileged to be here. It would be very difficult for us to promote human rights at home but not do it in other countries where there are human rights abuses. It would be very easy for us to say that we are comfortable here, that nothing is happening and go on with our daily lives. However, as a responsible nation, as privileged nation, as one of the richest nations in the world, we need to intervene when the time comes.
I have already said this in the House. Probably the most difficult decision a member of Parliament has to make is whether we send our young men and women to war. In the case of Afghanistan, I am convinced it was a good cause. We joined our NATO allies in 2002. It was also a UN-mandated mission. I believe we are there for the right reasons, and two come to mind right now.
First, the Taliban regime was not only encouraging terrorists, it was helping train them. Some of my colleagues on the other side spoke about 9/11 and how it changed the world. I could not agree more. After 9/11 we realized that what was happening overseas, what was happening thousands of miles away, was having an impact on us. We realized that we had to act drastically to reduce the risks of this happening.
Second is the Taliban treatment of their people. Think of what Afghanis have been through over the last decades, with Russia being there and then the Taliban coming in. We have all seen pictures on TV of men throwing acid in women's faces if they are not wearing a veil or young school girls watching as their teacher's is being head cut off because he is teaching them. If they cannot count on a country like Canada to come in and defend their interests, on whom can they count?
Therefore, I believe that, in the first instance, we absolutely had a responsibility to be there.
One of my colleagues on the other side said that we should not question our decision to go there. We should always discuss and debate our role there. It is important for it not to become impersonal. As members of Parliament, this has to remain a personal thing for us. I think people in Afghanistan, our soldiers and our people working in the medical field expect us to continue discussing and debating this to see what changes should be made or if we should modify our position on things. I do not believe for a minute that we should be taking a position and saying that we are not going to modifying it, that we should not be discussing it and that we are supporting our troops and that is it. There has to be some flexibility.
It is easy when a conflict is happening thousands of miles away for it to become very impersonal. We see a clip on national TV for a few minutes and then we go on with our daily lives. As members of Parliament, we cannot let that happen. It has to be personal.
This does not mean for a second that we are not proud of our soldiers for the amazing work they do there. In fact, a young soldier in my riding did a six month stint in Afghanistan. I asked him to meet with me so he could tell me what he thought after his stint, what he had faced when he was there and whether he thought we made a difference there. Interestingly enough he told me that he had no intention of joining the military. It was not part of his plans. He decided after 9/11. It actually impressed upon him that he had a responsibility to get involved, which is interesting. Therefore, he went to Afghanistan for six months.
He told me they were making a substantial difference. He said that they would go into villages that had been raided by the Taliban and the people had left. They would secure the villages, bring in clinics, for instance, and people would come back. They were making a substantial difference. He was very proud of his role and very proud of Canada's role.
That is not to say there is not a dark side to any war. This young man's mother, whom I know very well, would get up in the morning and dread reading the paper in case she would see another young Canadian had lost his or her life. She said that her heart would skip a beat every time she opened a newspaper. We have to realize there is a personal impact to this as well.
The second personal impact is obviously the repercussions of post-traumatic stress disorder. I am sure most of us here have had young people come back from Afghanistan and speak to us. A few cases were absolutely devastating for them, obviously, and for me. These young people are 20 to 25 years old and their lives are essentially ruined. One person could not sleep at night for a year or two, no matter what medication he was given. He did not have access to a psychiatrist because there were not enough to deal with that type of post-traumatic stress. He tried to take on a few jobs, but had to quit because of the pressure and the panic. There are consequences. When we make these decisions, there are huge consequences for our young people. Although we support them wholeheartedly, I want people to know there is another side to this. We do not want to glorify war and we always want to avoid it at every cost.
The third issue was addressed on W-FIVE last night. It was an astonishing show. It featured a medical unit in Afghanistan and showed the number of people who went through it. We hear about Canadians being injured, but it was literally kept busy 24 hours a day with people going through it. What we do not realize is that for every Canadian, or American or Dutch troop going in, 20 civilians are going into those clinics. Young boys and girls with unbelievable injuries are in those clinics. I am very pleased our Canadians are there to look after them. Some of these injuries are caused by our people, and that is the price of war. However, they pay a huge price.
For every mother in Canada who is worried about her son or daughter, there are mothers in Afghanistan who are worried about the same thing. It is important to mention that when we make these decisions here for things that happen 2,000 miles away, there are consequences and we have to be aware of that.
One of the frustrating things for me was the unwillingness of NATO to rotate other troops. We have been in Kandahar province since February 2002, arguably the most dangerous province in Afghanistan. We have lost more soldiers proportionately than the U.S. soldiers in Iraq. No one can say Canada has not done its share. It is not unreasonable for us to ask NATO at this point to rotate other troops into the tough areas. Some countries do not want to fight at night. Some do not want to send their troops to hotspots. Others will not send soldiers at all. Most of these decisions are made for political reasons at home and, frankly, it is a sad thing.
NATO's reputation is being questioned right now. We have to look at the whole mandate of NATO and how we should be looking at it in the future in terms of sharing. The countries in which we are intervening should know that we are going in as a united force, as a team, not only two or three out of twenty-six countries carrying the weight. This is a huge issue.
I am very pleased the mission is changing in 2009. I am pleased it is ending in 2011. Our focus will be on renewed security, reconstruction, development, governance. There is a lot at stake. In the end we have to not only hope, but we have to do everything in our power to make Afghanistan a better place for its citizens to live in the long term, because the short term costs are enormous.
