I am absolutely disgusted with our Gov't - the Colvin Case

[sky's the limit]

Seems that a general consensus is building that the mission that the Liberals sent our soldiers on needs a serious change in direction.Proper equipment is too slow in coming.Spare parts are painfully slow in coming leaving gapping holes in the front line defences that i will discuss on a public forum.
Rather than continue to make the same mistakes that the Soviets made ,the Nato forces should stop trying the ineffective policing action .
I would say that Colvin is lucky he lives in a soft democracy. I wonder if an Afghanie diplomat had of made a similar statement against the Aghanie military would he may have found himself the victim of taliban violence.Instead Colvin can make those unsubstantiated claims based on taliban hearsay in the safety of a country that Nato treaty military has provided him.
Perhaps he is suffering some kind of post traumatic stress from hiding in those warm soft embassies.
It does seem that we are coming to the same point of consensus that the present clusterfuck has to change or we will not win.
The last few years should have made it perfectly clear it is not winnable under the present rules of engagement.
It is winnable but no present western politician has the stomach for such a fight.
The only present government that could win it would be the Chinese.And Afghanistan is right on their doorstep.The war that Eric Blair (George Orwell warned about)last century.the never ending war in Asia.

And who was the minister of defense that sent our people to this mess ?

Well said! Especialy the part about George Orwell.

Actually,

That wasn't very well said at all.

There will be no "winning" there regardless of the rules of engagement. That statement only serves to perpetuate the myth that Western firepower would prevail against these people - it won't. You can't "win" a fight like this not because "no present western politician has the stomach for it," but because there will NEVER be the same level of commitment to this fight on our side as there is on the other - it is their home, we are simply occupiers. There hasn't be a single case of a war like this succeeding, and there is good reason. Ask the Americans, the Russians, or the British... Unfortunately it's not that we don't learn from history, its that we aren't motivated by this principle at all.

The second issue with that statement is the presumption that "winning" is the goal. Cutting through all the PR leaves one with the unshakable fact that "winning" is not the real goal for us being there, never was. The fact of the matter is the strategic value of occupying Afghanistan is the main reason for our presence there, sold to the public under false guise of "if we don't fight them there we'll have to fight them here..." and "we're bringing democracy to Afghanistan," or "we're helping the plight of women and children." A group of statements that couldn't do a worse disservice to the reality of the conflict and who we are fighting and why. But, people will buy it if it's repeated enough, just look at what Bush accomplished in America post 9/11. Selling fear is easy, challenging what you hear is not.

You're also trying to turn this into a partisan issue - it is not. It's a systemic governmental issue.

"Unsubstantiated?" "Based on Taliban hearsay?" Really? You honestly believe that? Come on, I know you can think a bit harder than that. It's such an embarrassing stance that even McKay is starting to back off it as they've realized how juvenile they sound.

You are however correct in your assessment of the state of our Forces over there and the equipment being supplied. I found it embarrassing when I finally hooked up with the Canadians last year after time with forces from other nations.

Once again, this is an issue about process, not the individuals involved - from the soldiers to Colvin. That this accusation has come from a senior diplomat who knows things you and I can only imagine, and has been backed up already by several senior European counterparts is more than enough for the government to launch a full and transparent investigation. Unfortunately they are not, mainly I suspect because they are complicit. There is rarely this much smoke without fire... In time this will come out in full, I can only hope that it is sooner than later. It is the right thing to do.

I don't care what party is involved, in fact I'd like to see the investigation go right back to day one of the deployment under the Liberals. We are long overdue in so-called Democracies to start holding the leadership accountable for their actions. McKay and Harper are acting out some chapter in a lame CIA novel right now, and every Canadian citizen should be disgusted by it and demand answers. If there is nothing here, then let an investigation tell us that - it is the least we can do.

stl

[2R]

It is obvious we went to different schools and grew up in different times.
The school i went to we where taught that when all others had given up hope .When all others had stopped fighting ,surrendered,capitulated and collaborated with the enemy .We did not.We fought.We won.It is that simple.
The taliban cannot be defeated by peaceful discussions,they can only be killed .Defeating them would not be pretty and would require the co-operation of the Afghanistan government rather than their present betrayals.
Karzai is playing a dangerous game that will end when Chinese tanks roll in from the east down the old silk road to deal with those who are supplying the terrorists in the Urgir region of China .
Then the media gong show will end when that happens just as Eric blair had predicted.

[sky's the limit]

Ok.

You seem intent on sticking to ideas and concepts loosely based in fact, long on notions of patriotism, and fighting spirit - ones that are easily sold to those willing not to look too deeply or lacking an understanding of the greater geo-political situation, and I see nothing I'm going to say will change that. Go ahead and believe that our current predicament is everyone else's fault but our own, I guess you have to. And by that logic, of course you support inaction on the Colvin accusations.

You're right, killing all the Taliban will result in "victory...." Whatever that means, and for who I don't really know.

I'll say it again: The hardest thing in life is questioning what you've been taught and lead to believe is "right." You'll either take that step you or won't, nothing I'm going to say can make you.

stl

[North Shore]

2R, I can see where you are coming from, but I think that you are off base a little. I suppose that we could keep killing Taliban, but then we'd incur casualties as well, and I suspect that our stomach for death and maimed soldiers is less than theirs. Also, it seems, to me, that we are fighting an insurgency, in their own home - a la Vietnam. We'll pretty much have to kill the whole country before they give up - in the 60's, it cost the Americans ~55,000 men to figure that out, and the Russians learnt the same lesson in the same country in the 80's - how many did they lose (and they didn't have to worry about dissent on the home front!)

This is not to say that I have any idea of how to go about ending/fixing/solving the troubles in Afg - but I don't think that more of the same will work...

[The Old Fogducker]

Of all the rags to read in Canada, you can't do much worse than the Post.

I beg to differ! It makes fine reading - for my parrot. We put it at the bottom of his cage.

ps. Principles. ~pals run schools.

I'm not surprised you use these publications for the bird cage.

After all, I'm sure you want to preserve your subscription copies of "The People's Daily" to use for sermon material.

OFD

[North Shore]

http://tinyurl.com/ykh8orr

Torture in Afghanistan: The Coverup Continues

This is all very simple: if Peter MacKay wants to be believed when he says that no Afghan detainees handed over to Afghan authorities by the Canadian military were victims of torture, he needs to release all of the relevant documents to prove his assertion. As long as he refuses to do so, he and his Conservative government don't deserve the benefit of the doubt.

(And they certainly don't deserve to be cut any slack, no matter what Chantal Hebert thinks. Is anybody out there denying that this "mess" started with the Liberals? No. I didn't think so.)

Peter MacKay can't have it both ways - but he'll definitely keep trying. He and his Con buddies have spent days smearing Richard Colvin and insisting that he couldn't prove that there were any "credible" allegations of detainee abuse. Yet, here's what MacKay admitted today when his back was against the wall because of General Natynczyk's weekend revelations:

"Most recently the reason that the transfers stopped was that the Afghan officials were not living up to ... expectations," MacKay said during question period in the House of Commons.

He told Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff that the government acted as soon as "credible allegations came to our attention."
Meanwhile, Colvin is unable to properly defend himself.

As he stated during his opening statement last week:

In October 2007, I left Afghanistan and started a new job in Washington, D.C. In April 2009, I was subpoenaed by the Military Police Complaints Commission. In response, DFAIT, in collaboration with the Department of Justice, took three significant steps.

First, they’ve made it very difficult for me to access legal counsel. This ongoing problem has still not been resolved.

Second, DFAIT and the Department of Justice, again working together, blocked my access to my own reports from Afghanistan. I was told, “We will decide which of your reports you require.” I was given none of them.

Third, government lawyers have threatened me under section 38 of the Canada Evidence Act. This had the effect of placing me in an impossible position. If I refuse to co-operate with the MPCC subpoena, I could be jailed for up to six months, but I did co-operate under section 38 I could be jailed for up to five years.

When this warning was sent, DFAIT and the Department of Justice, again acting together, were still withholding approval for legal counsel, depriving me of legal advice and protections.
So, MacKay is free to strut and crow while Colvin remains under threat from a government that absolutely refuses to allow the man to back up his testimony with actual evidence.

This is democracy? This is Canada?

With General Hillier set to invoke the Alberto Gonzales "I don't recall" defense when he testifies this Wednesday, followed by an emergency damage control effort by David Mulroney who has requested to appear as well, the Cons will continue to dig in their obstructionist heels as they attempt to hide the truth.

The lingering question is why?

And the only obvious answer is that they can't afford to let that truth be known. And not for Canada's sake - as they continue to insist. This is all about politics. Human rights be damned.

[Rockie]

followed by an emergency damage control effort by David Mulroney who has requested to appear as well, the Cons will continue to dig in their obstructionist heels as they attempt to hide the truth.

Harper is saying all will be made clear when Mulroney gives evidence. But the government will not allow the committee to see any of the emails supporting Colvin's claims. And we're supposed to just believe whatever tripe comes out of Mulroney's mouth?

The government's behavior in this affair, and their eagerness to vilify a diplomat who is just doing his job sickens me.

[Siddley Hawker]

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2009/11/ ... inees.html

[sky's the limit]

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2009/11/ ... inees.html

Mmmm,

The old "nothing to see here folks, move right along." Whether there is or isn't, it's about the process - either way it's a win win for us, the citizens.

stl

[The Old Fogducker]

So what's the definition of torture this week?

Is it keeping someone awake for 7 hours past normal bedtime, or not feeding for more than 3 hours past normal meal time like the politically correct definition the Democrats suddenly developed when Barrack Hussein Obama the brain trust mastermind took office?

[Rockie]

So what's the definition of torture this week?

Is it keeping someone awake for 7 hours past normal bedtime, or not feeding for more than 3 hours past normal meal time like the politically correct definition the Democrats suddenly developed when Barrack Hussein Obama the brain trust mastermind took office?

What constitutes torture and physical abuse has been well established long before your irrational phobia took office. Bush/Cheney knew exactly what it was when they said they were going to approve it regardless of international law.

What Harper and MacKay don't understand is that it is Canada's reputation and respected standing on the world stage that is at stake here. That belongs to us, the citizens, not them. Americans failed to stand up for theirs and it will take a very long time before they raise themselves out of the muck Bush/Cheney sank them in. Nothing less than a full inquiry is called for here if for no other reason than to prove to the world Canadians will not stand for torture.

[Driving Rain]

Colvin may be mistaken on torture
By PETER WORTHINGTON

Last Updated: 26th November 2009, 8:20am

StoryCommentsEmail Story Print Size A A A Report Typo Share with:
Facebook Digg Del.icio.us Google Stumble Upon Newsvine Reddit Technorati Feed Me Yahoo Simpy Squidoo Spurl Blogmarks Netvouz Scuttle Sitejot + What are these? One wonders if Richard Colvin, the Canadian diplomat whose warnings about torture of Taliban prisoners by Afghans has created a firestorm of recriminations, had any idea of what he was unleashing when he compiled his report?

As an honest man, he might have been too prone to accept complaints by supposed victims. Taliban and al-Qaida prisoners routinely claim they were tortured, which some (media included) confuse with factual evidence.

A feeding frenzy is now underway with the federal government vulnerable.

The only ones not caught up in the frenzy are the public.

In the Toronto Star, Rosie DiManno blames Canada for choosing to use Afghans instead of Americans for holding prisoners. If true (which I hope it isn't) it verges on the irrelevant. Chantal Hebert, also in the Star, says Canada's "indifference" to prisoners' welfare started not with the Tories but with the Liberals. This, too, misses the essential point.

The Globe and Mail's Paul Koring documents the government's "deny, delay, disparage" strategy to refute torture allegations, which serves mostly to fuel criticism of the government and its hypocrisy.

The National Post quotes Canada's most senior military people saying the transfer of prisoners to Afghans was halted because of fear for their well-being. Yet the reliable Matthew Fisher reports that a Canadian correctional manager (Gail Latouche) of a Manitoba penitentiary made unannounced visits to Kandahar's Sapoza prison and found little evidence of torture.

Perhaps "torture" needs re-defining. What we call "torture" when Americans do it, may be routine interrogation when Afghans do it. Guantanamo Bay under the Americans bears no similarity to Abu Ghraib under Saddam Hussein.

Reality is we worry about human rights abuses and torture when they happen to someone else, and are done by someone else. Even then, we do little to curtail them.

As long as our guys -- our soldiers -- are not torturing or abusing, well, that's life. Not our concern. The Bible notwithstanding, we are not our neighbour's keeper.

In the Second World War all Canada was outraged -- and our soldiers steeped in vengeance -- when German SS troops under Maj. Gen. Kurt Meyer executed 18 captured North Nova Scotia Highlanders and Sherbrooke Fusiliers. Our troops exacted revenge, and Meyer was convicted as a war criminal.

Our troops have been known to shoot prisoners, but only anecdotally.

Until it happened to our guys, we didn't much care that the Germans pillaged and tortured through Ukraine, that they massacred civilians near the city of Kursk, that in winter they poured ice water on Russian PoWs until they were frozen statues.

We ignored the Soviets massacring 20,000 Polish officers at Katyn Forest because we preferred to think the Germans had done it, not our allies.

The torture and mass graves of Saddam Hussein raised murmurs but no punitive reaction among UN members because it wasn't being done to us or by us. The same with the Cambodian genocide.

Is Darfur very different from Rwanda where, after the genocide, the world vowed never to let it happen again -- and then did? Jews seem to take seriously the "never again" aspects of the Holocaust -- but largely when it applies to them, not to others.

Richard Colvin says many detainees were just farmers; Canadian soldiers know the Taliban better than he, and that after they are captured, they claim to be innocent farmers.
http://www.torontosun.com/news/columnis ... 1-sun.html

*kerpow*!

[sky's the limit]

Colvin may be mistaken on torture


*kerpow*!

Really....

You're article goes on about everyone missing the point - well he missed it too, beautifully...

I said to my wife before posting this thread that the responses would follow the predictable lines - I've not been disappointed. This in not about partisan politics, this is not about our soldiers or what they experience in Afghanistan (as it is but one part of the issue there), but you guys will post your politically motivated National Post and Sun articles, others will cry foul at the Conservative Government, and all the while avoid doing what really needs to be done.

One our close friends, who was Romeo Dallaire's right hand man in Rwanda and one of the world's foremost authorities on the African conflicts, stresses the point continually that the last people one should speak to about conflict issues in theater are the soldiers. Unfortunately parading an endless line of soldiers, soldiers grieving families, and ex-soldiers in front of the media is still seen as a valid counter point. It's not. I was party to this phenomenon last year in Afghanistan, it was fascinating.

I sometimes wonder why I bother hitting the keys on computer when issues of systemic change are brought forward. I truly wish I saw the world as many of you do, it would preclude much questioning, considerable anxiety, and the need to ask even more questions.

stl

[hz2p]

.

[The Old Fogducker]

Here's something from a friend of mine ....

Charles Adler: Canada's troops deserve honour, not criticism


The following is an edited version of a monologue delivered by radio host Charles Adler on a recent program, addressing criticism of Canada's treatment of detainees in Afghanistan.


There must be some days when you ask yourself the question, "Who stands up for Canada?" This is not so much a political question, as much as it is a moral question. Who talks back when all sorts of people go out of their way to trash the country? I have a feeling that when our country is run down over and over again by people looking for a cheap headline or a cheap political point, it's done by people who don't mind taking a piece out of our country's hide. For more than a week now, our country has been portrayed as one that doesn't care about the Afghan people, a country that turned a blind eye toward the torture of innocent Afghans.

The scenario is that our soldiers -- who have been in that hellish, brutish part of the world, where NONE of you want to spend one hour, never mind one year, two years, three years, how about the last eight years -- were just going into that wretchedly dangerous country and in a non-surgical way cleansing large parts of the country of innocent people hoping that in every stack of people there was a needle that would be a Taliban or Al Qaeda suspect, a bad guy.

The scenario is that our soldiers attacked these innocent people, rounded up these innocent people and then turned them over to barbarians working as Afghan security people, clumsy amateur sadistic mall cops who could hardly wait to beat and electrocute innocent Afghans. This is the scenario of what our military operation has been about in Afghanistan. And there are Canadians willing to believe that our forces are a bunch of unprofessional, cowardly doofuses who haven't got a clue as to who the enemy is, so they just hoover up everybody and then open the vacuum bag at some dilapidated, decrepit Afghan cop shop with a torture chamber in the basement, and that our Canadians just say to the Afghans, "Fill your boots, fellas. Go ahead and fry these freaks."

Now I do understand that the more refined among you, who loathe our military and loathe our foreign policy and loathe everything that Canada stands for, I understand that the nuanced among you who sit on your fat arses in upscale coffee shops sneering at people who you think of as low rent fools, think I am embellishing some serious issues in order to dismiss the issues. I am not here to dismiss anything except your so-called feigned interest in our country's place in the world.

I talked to Jimmy's mother this week. James Hayward Arnal loved this country more than any of you quiche-eating, latte-loving, armchair quarterbacks. And he was enthusiastically in Afghanistan to help people. His mother Wendy, who is the one behind the Carpe Diem 88 foundation, which organized efforts to get our troops a bomb-sniffing dog. They cost $10,000 dollars each. These well trained dogs sniff for the kinds of roadside explosives that killed Jimmy and hundreds of his mates over the years.

One of Jimmy's personal effects was sent home to Wendy last summer -- his pillow. There is a story behind the pillow and that wonderful story has turned into another campaign to give our troops some measure of peace comfort. Pillows for Troops is what the cause is called. Ordinary Canadians who stay silent despite the relentless pounding our country gets, can now put their name on a postcard for just five bucks and a pillow and card will get sent to one of our troops so they can be more comfortable in that Godforsaken country and they can know that ordinary Canadians aren't in front of TV cameras running them down. They are buying pillows for the troops as a way of saying thank you for your service and God Bless Canada.

As I go through the entrails of what is said about our mission in Afghanistan I think about Jimmy's mom Wendy and the other Wendys out there who have been muted while the memory of their fallen sons is corrupted and contaminated by the professional chatterboxes and political types who want to continue to dine on the idea that the Jimmies didn't do the right things in Afghanistan to win the hearts and minds of the Afghan people. The Jimmies were just dupes of the horrible colonialist imperialist American-led effort in Afghanistan. You talk about torture. It is psychological torture for the moms of our troops whether they are living in Alberta or B.C. or Saskatchewan or Ontario or Quebec or Atlantic Canada --They are being psychologically tortured by the slow-moving electrocution of the Canadian spirit. Ordinary Canadians in their homes at night watching the news are watching Canada being run down.

Is anybody saying on TV every night that no country in the world has put more skin in the game? On a per capita basis our little country, little in population, but still big of heart, has sacrificed more for the people of Afghanistan than any country in the world. Canada bled more and gave up more in World Wars One and Two than anyone else for the cause of freedom. Canada never asks for credit. Well I am one Canadian who isn't asking for credit. I am not asking. I am demanding that those who want to engage in torture, the torture of Canada's good name, stop it. At least balance the picture with the truth of what our troops have done for the men and women and children of Afghanistan. More than any other country per capita. When almost nobody in the world wanted to go to Kandahar province where the Taliban was born, where it was a festering sore, where it was torturing women and children -- when almost nobody from any country wanted to go to the most dangerous part of Afghanistan, Canadians went.

Our kids went in there and we did what we had to do to save lives and give people a chance at a better life. Most of our kids survived. But too many did not.

National Post

Charles Adler's daily talk show is broadcast on radio stations across Canada.

Photo: Members of 11 Field Squadron, 1 Combat Engineer Regiment put their berets on after carrying the casket of Sapper Steven Henry Marshall at the Centre Street Church in Calgary, Alberta, November 10, 2009. Marshall, a member of the Canadian Armed Forces, was killed in action in Kandahar, Afghanistan on October 30. (REUTERS/Todd Korol)

[sky's the limit]

Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel.


Samuel Johnson made this famous pronouncement that patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel on the evening of April 7, 1775.

Johnson was not indicting patriotism in general, only false patriotism.

Unfortunately Foggy, the monologue you posted is a prime example of not only the above, but also the usual obscuring of the issues at hand. By posting it, I would assume you agree with him? Well I don't, not for one minute as he only displays disdain for the Canadian public by diverting the conversation from the issue at hand to one of misguided patriotism.

I take particular offense to this:

The scenario is that our soldiers -- who have been in that hellish, brutish part of the world, where NONE of you want to spend one hour, never mind one year, two years, three years, how about the last eight years

"Hellish?" "Brutish?" "None of [us]?" Really, has he spent any time there, time with the people of Afghanistan learning about their culture and history, not to mention their current set of circumstances? I don't think so. I can assure you it is not "hellish" or "brutish," while it may be many things, it is not those. Perhaps for someone who is so quick with judgments of those who ask questions of our Government, he should start giving some respect to those who's country we occupy? Not likely however as he only views this issue as a soapbox through which he can further his own (and his paper's) agenda. I'm sure he cares not one bit about the regular Afghan, nor the moral and ethical implications of our involvement there.

James Hayward Arnal loved this country more than any of you quiche-eating, latte-loving, armchair quarterbacks.

This is the best he's got?

It's almost pathetic in its fallacious attacks on people he seems to despise while forgetting that he is precisely that - an "armchair quarterback." Does it really matter what a person who exercises their democratic rights to question the government drinks or eats? I think not, it is little more than vitriol designed to obscure the issues.

As I posted prior, this is NOT about our soldiers (as Colvin took great pains to establish in his testimony), it is not about a lack of patriotism, in fact it about quite the opposite. The national character assassination he speaks of is caused not by people who question our policies, or question the government for hiding facts, but by people like him who deflect the public attention from the real and pertinent issues at hand, motivated by little more than partisan politics. I remain disgusted, but this is standard fare for the National Post.

If you are a truly patriotic Canadian you will join with people from all spectrum's who are questioning the government on this issue among others. It demands questioning right, wrong, or otherwise. Once again, this is about process.

Trotting out the individual sufferings of soldiers or their lack of pillows does nothing to further their cause or aid them in their operations over there, it is instead insulting not only to them and their memories, but to the rest of us and our intelligence.

stl

[2R]

Colvin is just an office wallah
They should have a court of inquiry in Afghanistan in the line of fire,send what is left of the Liberals who sent the troops to that war without end and they can be used as human shields while colvin can call his witnesses
Last man standing rules apply

[Siddley Hawker]

Does anyone really think that once Colvin's accusations became the object of scrutiny by a Parliamentary committee in Ottawa it would not become a lesson in partisan politics?

[Rockie]

I cannot improve on STL's spot on post just above this one. But I will add that only unimaginative people could mistake our revulsion with torture and the government's cover up of the facts as criticism against our military. In a democracy the military is subordinate to, and compelled to comply with the legal authority of the civilian government in power. It is they who bear the ultimate responsiblity for what our nation's military forces do.

Our government's attempts to avoid that responsibility in this sorry affair makes me sick to my stomach, because we as Canadians will have to bear the shame long after those scumbags are gone.

[The Old Fogducker]

Well then, if it makes you sick ... puke away boys.

Our responsibility ends when we had 'em over to the people remaking the movie "Midnight Express."

OFD

[sky's the limit]

Our responsibility ends when we had 'em over to the people remaking the movie "Midnight Express."

Actually it doesn't Foggy, legally, morally, or ethically. Even the Gov't agrees on that one....

stl

[2R]

I thought you guys where smarter.Too smart to believe unproven unsubstantiated hearsay from a warzone.Oh well i am wrong again.
Enemy propaganda.
Good job that the enemy does not broadcast like Tokyo Rose or Lord Haw Haw or you guys would be surrendering to a bunch of taliban hearsay.Our soldiers are innocent.Their generals called bullshit on this guy and you still want to believe the unproven unsubstantiated hearsay from an office wallah .Rumours from dispatches.Unproven taliban complaints
I will give the benefit of the doubt to our troops until i see imperical evidence of any wrongdoing.I have more faith in our troops behaviour than the behaviour of a person who would offer unproven unsubstantiated enemy rumours as fact .
Rumours from a narco state run by drug warlords hiding behind a pious pretense of religious zeal.I am too stupid to believe the taliban lies.

[sky's the limit]

I thought you guys where smarter.Too smart to believe unproven unsubstantiated hearsay from a warzone.Oh well i am wrong again.
Enemy propaganda.
Good job that the enemy does not broadcast like Tokyo Rose or Lord Haw Haw or you guys would be surrendering to a bunch of taliban hearsay.Our soldiers are innocent.Their generals called bullshit on this guy and you still want to believe the unproven unsubstantiated hearsay from an office wallah .Rumours from dispatches.Unproven taliban complaints
I will give the benefit of the doubt to our troops until i see imperical evidence of any wrongdoing.I have more faith in our troops behaviour than the behaviour of a person who would offer unproven unsubstantiated enemy rumours as fact .
Rumours from a narco state run by drug warlords hiding behind a pious pretense of religious zeal.I am too stupid to believe the taliban lies.

2R,

If you have something valuable to contribute I'm more than willing to continue engaging in this discussion, but if you want to post things like that - which I can't even bring myself to respond to - then this is my last post addressing your comments.

It's all Taliban lies... right, you seem to miss the entire point as well.

stl

[2R]

The best debates are often where both sides are right.
I too would be disgusted at the allegations of torture where true.But they are not proven.
I have not seen ,nor has any hard evidence been presented .To allow the enemy to go on a fishing expedition through the intelligence files in HQ on the hearsay allegations would cost the lives of those in the field and would prolong the deployment.
Rumours are not enough ,consider the sources that where used in these allegations.
Would you buy a used car from such people ?

[JakeYYZ]

This hand wringing over alleged torture of captured terrorists has to be some of the most "culturalist" bigotry I've ever heard! These people are claiming that the Afghan culture isn't the equal of our own! Yet the same people are almost always cultural relativists, especially when members of a culture have immigrated to Canada.

Let me get this straight; a Muslim man from, say, Afghanistan, who honour kills his daughter while residing in Toronto is more morally correct than a soldier who turns an enemy combatant over to the legal authorities of his Country, because said EC MIGHT be mistreated by members of the same culture and religion as the father in Toronto.

I'm confused. Insensitive and confused.

Hope your eyeballs are not bleeding now from reading this, STL.