The Canadian military mission in Afghanistan was launched during the fevered weeks that followed the terror attacks on New York City and Washington DC on September 11, 2001. The government of Jean Chrétien took the decision that Canadians would fight in Afghanistan rather casually. The members of the Chrétien cabinet saw the commitment as a way to show solidarity with the Americans at a time when there was almost universal sympathy for the United States internationally and certainly in Canada.

The experts in the Canadian Forces were ignored when the commitment was made. The government had no real idea how many soldiers could be sent, equipped and sustained in the field in Afghanistan. The little advice the government did receive from the top soldiers was that anything beyond a token commitment would be very expensive and would soon strain the Canadian Forces, making it difficult to meet their existing commitments.

When politicians plunge their nations into war, they generally have their eye on recent conflicts as a guide to what can be expected. For Canada, the two most recent military outings prior to Afghanistan were the Kosovo conflict and the first Gulf War. Both were short affairs, decisively won by the side on which Canada fought. It was natural enough for Chrétien and his advisers to assume that the Afghanistan war would likely be over or nearly over before many Canadians saw action. During the weeks when Tony Blair emerged as the great friend of America and Jean Chrétien had not yet visited Ground Zero in New York, the gesture was the thing.

In the more than five years that have passed since the gesture was made, Canada’s Afghan mission has morphed into something its initiators never anticipated. For a time, this suited the Liberal government to a tee. When the Bush administration launched its invasion of Iraq in March 2003, Canada was locked into the Afghanistan operation. Jean Chrétien’s announcement in the House of Commons that Canada would not join the “coalition of the willing” in its assault on Iraq drew a sustained cheer from the Liberal caucus in Parliament.

That moment is now seen as a crucial juncture in the evolution of Canadian foreign policy. When Liberals are called upon to justify themselves to the nation, they point to the refusal to join the invasion of Iraq as their finest hour. Nonetheless, the Canadian Afghan operation could be presented to the Bush administration as proof of the devotion of the Chrétien government to the global War on Terror.

The election of Stephen Harper’s Conservative government in the winter of 2006 changed the tone of Canadian foreign policy. While the Liberals had found comfort in the ambiguity of their position — out of Iraq, but in Afghanistan — the Conservatives sought no such ambiguity. Well before becoming Prime Minister, Stephen Harper had served notice that if elected he would preside over the most pro-American government in Canadian history. While the Liberal government was refusing to join the coalition of the willing, Harper was attending pro-Iraq war rallies, making it clear that if he were Prime Minister he would join in the fight.

By the time Harper did become Prime Minister in the winter of 2006, as leader of a fragile minority government, he fully recognized that to advocate participation in the war in Iraq — a war, by then, highly unpopular in the U.S. — would be unthinkable in Canada. Instead Harper injected the pent up pro-war enthusiasm of his party into the Afghanistan mission. Far from being a Liberal alibi for non-involvement in Iraq, Afghanistan became the place where a neo-conservative Canada could leave its mark.

In the autumn of 2001, there was no parliamentary vote to authorize what turned out to be Canada’s bloodiest military engagement since Korea. In October 2001, Canadian parliamentarians engaged in a “take note” debate, a debate structured so as not to result in a vote in the House of Commons. During the debate, the Chrétien government declared that Canada would participate in Operation Apollo, the codename for the mission of Canadian military units in support of the American invasion of Afghanistan.

The technique of using a “take note” debate to commit Canada to a foreign operation was not a new one. This method, which provided a soupçon of parliamentary participation, left the real decision squarely in the hands of the Prime Minister and his cabinet. In 1994, the Chrétien government introduced the use of take note debates. Take note debates were held in 1998 and 1999 at the time of Canada’s commitment of fighter planes to participate in the Kosovo conflict.

Over many decades, Canada’s record of holding full debates about important military commitments has been shockingly poor. In the case of the Korean conflict in the early 1950s, the government of Louis St. Laurent simply announced that Canada would participate in what it called the “police action” in that country.

Having entered the First World War in 1914, with no parliamentary vote, on the ground that “when Britain is at war, Canada is at war,” Canada graduated to sovereignty in the Second World War. On September 10, 1939, a week after Britain’s declaration of war, Canada declared war on Nazi Germany following a debate and vote in Parliament. Since the end of the Second World War — which involved other Canadian declarations of war — Canada has not declared war when entering a conflict.

In May 2006, the Harper government marginally improved on this shoddy record when it held a debate that ended in a vote to extend the Afghan mission by two years. Despite the vote which passed by the narrow margin of 149 to 145, the debate was rushed and perfunctory without the benefit of serious parliamentary hearings and input. MPs were notified only two days prior to the debate that it would be held, and MPs addressed the issue for only six hours.

For decades, Canadians have been poorly served by successive governments when it comes to serious public dialogue on questions of war and peace. Decisions about foreign policy and war need to be thoroughly opened up and democratized. Centralized government by cabinet on these issues is not good enough.

Having had no real debate on Canada’s military mission in Afghanistan, Canadians have been left instead with the Harper government’s threadbare rationale for the war. The government justifies the Canadian military mission in Afghanistan with two basic arguments. The first is that unless Canada and its allies prevail there, the terrorists will regroup to carry out lethal attacks against targets in Western countries including Canada. Fight them there, so as to avoid having to fight them here, the logic goes.

The second argument is that the struggle is about the creation of a democracy in Afghanistan, a society that will be governed by the rule of law, in which human rights, in particular the rights of women, will be enshrined. Those who reject the government’s position are dismissed with the epithet that they would “cut and run.” Unwilling to defend the basic propositions on which the mission is based in a rational debate, Stephen Harper and Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay resort to questioning the courage of their opponents as though they lack manliness.

Both the propositions on which the government justifies Canada’s participation in the war in Afghanistan are, to put it politely, open to question. To put it less politely, very strong arguments can be made that they are the exact opposite of the truth.

On the first argument, a strong case can be made that it is precisely the presence of western armies, such as Canada’s, in the Middle East and Central Asia that is drawing recruits into networks whose purpose is to lash out at the West in terrorist attacks. The second argument, that this is a fight for democracy, the rule of law and women’s rights, quickly crumbles beneath any sustained look at what is actually going on in Afghanistan and how the West’s mission there was conceived in the first place.

As for the government’s dismissal of critics as cowards who would cut and run, this is nothing but the lowest form of wartime propaganda. The government’s argument is circular. We are in Afghanistan because we are in Afghanistan. Our soldiers are fighting and dying there. To question the mission and cast it into doubt lowers the morale of our fighting men and women and gives succour to the enemy. Having had no real debate, now that we are in the fight, it is unpatriotic to have a real debate.

Increasingly Canadians are insisting on an authentic national dialogue on the Afghanistan question. Many, if not most, Canadians are deeply troubled by our country’s military mission in that country. And just as Americans have brushed aside the argument that to debate the war in Iraq is unpatriotic, Canadians are not impressed by flag waving attempts to avoid debate on our Afghan mission.

Public hearings across the country and hearings before a parliamentary committee ought to precede the next vote in the House of Commons on the issue of Canada’s military mission in Afghanistan. Canadians have been subject to top-down decisions on their military and foreign policies throughout their history. In recent years, there has been considerable discussion about the functioning of Canadian democracy and the existence in the country of what can be called a “democratic deficit.”

The most eloquent testimony to the existence of a democratic deficit is the sharp decline of the proportion of Canadians who vote in federal and provincial elections. Increasingly, Canadians believe that their votes do not matter and that politicians are more concerned with themselves than with the well-being of Canadians. This sentiment is especially pronounced among young Canadians whose participation in elections is lower than is the case for older citizens.

Opening up the way Canada debates military missions and foreign policy can be efficacious in improving the functioning of our democracy. Decisions taken by those at the centre of government, with little or no consultation, can have an especially onerous impact on young Canadians. Public discourse about whether Canada ought to send troops to a country on the other side of the world rarely focuses on who will actually be sent to do the fighting and to stand in harm’s way.

It is, of course, the young, who are recruited by government advertising directed especially at those who have relatively few attractive economic options. While plenty of attention has been paid in the media to the troops already in Afghanistan or about to go to Afghanistan, and the risks they face, there is little discussion about how privileged people in an older generation make life and death decisions about the young we recruit into the Canadian Forces.

Here are some of the questions that need to be addressed in a national debate about the war in Afghanistan, among Canadians at large as well as in Parliament:

  • What is the purpose of the Canadian military mission in Afghanistan? How do we define success?
  • What is the balance in the mission between making war on the insurgents and aiding in the process of reconstructing a country that has been torn by war for decades?
  • Is a proportionate military effort being made by other NATO countries?
  • What role is Pakistan playing in the conflict?
  • Now that the United States is rethinking its mission in Iraq, is it likely to remain committed to a long-term military effort in Afghanistan?
  • How many Canadian lives are we prepared to sacrifice in this conflict?
  • Does the Canadian mission in Afghanistan make Canada a more or less likely target of terrorism?
  • Can foreign armies in Afghanistan advance the cause of democracy, the rule of law and human rights, or does their presence undermine these goals by drawing recruits, in the region as well as in the West, into the ranks of the Muslim fundamentalists?

Canadians need a wide ranging national dialogue — one we have not had to date — on whether our country’s military mission in Afghanistan is right for Canada. Politicians need to play a candid role in this dialogue. But so too does the general public. This is not a debate for the experts. We all have a stake in how it turns out.

Speaking of the experts, Canadians have, with a few notable exceptions, been ill-served by the mainstream media on the Afghanistan question. There has been shockingly little analytical journalism on this war, its origins and course, and the role Canada is playing in it. Too much of the reportage has come from journalists embedded with the Canadian forces whose stories are like those of sports writers embedded with the home team.

The national conversation should focus on the specifics of Canada’s Afghan mission. It must consider as well the wider military and political struggles that are unfolding in the Middle East and Central Asia. Afghanistan is but one theatre in that much larger struggle. What happens elsewhere, particularly in Iraq, is bound to have a significant impact on the fate of the NATO mission in Afghanistan, and therefore, on the Canadian mission in that country. Moreover, the debate will be incomplete unless it also considers the broad goals of Canadian foreign and military policy.

(To be continued.)