Deal With the Devil Collapses

5/8/2009

Posted by Patti under Afghanistan

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Less than a month after the signing of the regulation giving the Pakistan Taliban control over the Swat Valley and the ability to impose their form of Islam on the people, the deal has collapsed. What a non-surprise. Shortly after the Taliban moved their forces into Bruner and tried to take control there which would have placed their forces some scant 35km from the Pakistani capital Islamabad.

How many times are the Taliban, Pakistani or Afghani, going to have to demonstrate they can’t be trusted before the two governments are going to stand firm against them? It has taken 25 years for that conclusion to be reached in Sri Lanka in their fight against the Tamil Tigers. The Taliban, like the Tigers, will never be fully wiped out, that’s a given. With enough resolve and resources their ability to openly and freely regroup, train and finance their operations can be seriously restrained. That will not happen while the Pakistan government continues to waffle.

Pakistan is so busy being determined India is going to invade and occupy them that they are seemingly unaware and unwilling to look inward to the threat that grows in their very country. While the Taliban gain strength in Pakistan, they send that strength across the porous Afghanistan border and become a threat to the NATO troops struggling to bring that country to a point of some stability. Among those troops are the 2800 Canadian troops, so what happens in Pakistan impacts Canada.

Canada has battled in the Kandahar province of southern Afghanistan since 2006 to try to bring security to the province. We’ve lost 118 soldiers in that effort which is way too few boots on the ground for the job. The Americans under Obama are finally refocusing on the ball they dropped in Afghanistan in order to invade Iraq. About 21,000 American troops have started arriving in the south.

This will free up the overstretch Canadians to regroup into Kanadahar city to work with Afghan army and police to secure that vital city. It will also allow greater efforts to be undertaken to train Afghan security forces and to do more reconstruction.

As one who goes to the bridges on the Highway of Heroes, I’m hoping that the increased boots on the ground will slow the frequency of the trips to the bridges. Currently Canada has sustained over 10% of the deaths amongst coalition troops, that’s one statistic I’d like to see not grow.