National Defence committee  It's going to take time. Everything takes time there and we have to be patient.

National Defence committee  I don't think I can, because this was unique. I mean, the only precedent I know of was the planners that General Hillier lent to Ashraf Ghani when he was Minister of Finance. There are no other countries in Kabul right now that are doing something similar, although both ISAF and the coalition have political-military integration sections, if you will, that deal with the government.

National Defence committee  I believe that's an accurate comment at this point. I believe the Minister of Defence, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, and the Prime Minister have done what they do at the political level to try to get more troops down there.

National Defence committee  These priorities are pretty recent. The London Conference and the presentation of the Afghanistan Compact and the interim Afghanistan national development strategy was the first common strategic framework in a common language ever used in Afghanistan development. This happened in February and since then there's been a big push to get that out there.

National Defence committee  There certainly is a difference. Is there enough money in Afghanistan? Academics who do development studies will be debating that one for fifty years. From this simple soldier's point of view, it doesn't look like it.

National Defence committee  It would be fair to say that the mission is more balanced than not. We have to be careful about our stove pipes. We tend to focus on the military side, on the International Security Assistance Force. That's only one organization in this process. The Afghan reconstruction process is being led by the Afghan government.

National Defence committee  I don't know if the Canadian contribution is sufficient. I know the international contribution needs to be accelerated and upgraded across the board.

National Defence committee  I'm not sure I really understand your question. Much work needs to be done in Afghanistan across the board. It will be a long time before the international community can collectively declare mission accomplished in Afghanistan. As I said, we are talking about a place that has been swept over by the forces of history, especially in the last three decades.

National Defence committee  To cease or stop combat operations in Afghanistan would mean moving out of Kandahar province. Somebody has to fight the counter-insurgency battle in Kandahar province. If there were no international troops today in Kandahar province where the Canadians are, in Helmand where the British are, and Oruzgan where the Dutch are, my personal prediction would be essentially that there would not be a Taliban government, but chaos would continue down there.

National Defence committee  The general capabilities of the Afghan National Army are small-unit combat operations, offensive and defensive. By small unit, I'm talking about the section, platoon, company level of operations, a couple of hundred troops at a time in a combat operation. They can conduct, as I just said, both offensive and defensive operations.

National Defence committee  I'll try to give you some context here. The Afghan National Police program is an international program. Germany is the lead nation on that program. Forty-some-odd German police officers in the Kabul area run the program, if you will. It was slow getting off the mark. The United States has put a lot of money into Afghan National Police reform, and there are a large number of international police officers and contractors from I don't know how many countries helping to train the ANP right now.

National Defence committee  I really can't answer how long the Canadian Forces will be there or how long Canada will be engaged there. What I can say is that the international community, if it's to be successful, is going to have to be involved for a long time. Define “a long time”. That's tough, but I know these kinds of institutions of government, these institutions of state, and even as a soldier, an army, are not built in one year, two years, four years, or a decade.

National Defence committee  I think they are, but you're just not seeing it because of our focus in one certain area. For the people in Kandahar, we need to be able to provide that basic security first so that they're confident enough to be able to do that. These are people who have been run over by the forces of history multiple times in the last 35 years.

National Defence committee  That's a tough one. The best we can do is to keep talking and keep trying to demonstrate these things. But it's natural. As I said in my statement, these are the most intense combat operations we've been in since the Korean War. I'd be concerned if Canadians weren't concerned, if Canadians weren't interested.

National Defence committee  I don't have the dates, but somebody can get the dates for you. The last operational task was the election in September, and then the focus through the fall and up until the new year was the move to Kandahar from Kabul. It was a pretty complicated exercise.