NATIONAL NEWS EXECUTIVE SUMMARY / SOMMAIRE DES NOUVELLES NATIONALES
ADM(PA) / SMA(AP)
July 6, 2011 / le 6 juillet 2011
MINISTER / LE MINISTRE
Operation Nanook: Comment
Sun chain editorial: Canada plans to lay out an unwelcome mat for the Russian contingent coming to the
High Arctic. Defence Minister Peter MacKay announced our quid-pro-quo to the Russian invasion of the
Arctic will be an enhanced one-month long Canadian military exercise involving 1,000 of our soldiers.
This is a must-do (TSun 20, OSun 8, WSun 12, CSun 14).
Toronto Maple Leafs GM’s Trip to Afghanistan: Comment
Steve Buffery: Many people misunderstand the point of Steve Simmons article criticizing Toronto Maple
Leafs GM Brian Burke for the timing of his trip to Afghanistan. He never wrote – as Jay Paxton, Director of
Communications to Mr. MacKay Peter MacKay suggested in an email – that he “values free agency more
than our Canadian troops.” That is just ridiculous. You should be able to question Mr. Burke’s decision as
Mr. Simmons did (OSun 52, TSun S2).
DND and Government Priorities: Comment
Paul Robinson, professor: When Mr. MacKay is praised for being popular with the troops, this is meant to
imply that he is therefore a good defence minister. In fact, this may merely show that he is a weak
defence minister, unable or unwilling to stand up to the military and prone to grant its every wish. Armed
forces have bureaucratic interests in the same way as every other organization, and firm control is
needed to hold them in check, even if this means becoming unpopular. The decision to purchase F-35
fighter planes is a case in point. The distorting pull of DND is also warping spending priorities elsewhere
in government. Foreign aid, for instance, has been increasingly militarized. However mythological
Canada's earlier peacekeeping image may have been, it was at least a noble myth to aspire to (Ctz A11).
Afghan Timeline
The National Post published a timeline of events related to Canada’s 2007 operations in Afghanistan. It
was noted that on August 14 Mr. MacKay replaced Gordon O’Connor as Minister of Defence (A.
Donnelly: NP A8).
ASSOCIATE MINISTER / MINISTRE ASSOCIÉ
No related coverage. / Aucune couverture pertinente.
CDS / CEM
End of Mission in Kandahar: Comment
Murray Brewster: Canada’s desert war effectively came to an end with the and over of the battlefield to
American units. Politicians, diplomats and bureaucrats routinely shied away from describing the mission
in Afghanistan as a “war.” CDS Gen Walt Natynczyk said: “The lawyers will get all over it and say you
can't call it war, but that it's an armed conflict. … For the young soldiers, sailors airmen and airwomen, it
feels like war because someone is shooting at them. Canadians had trouble with the war because they
pined for the days when their soldiers were peacekeepers. Gen Natynczyk said: “There is a
peacekeeping myth.” The opaque, vicious nature of the fighting in southern Afghanistan horrified the
Canadian public and soldiers alike. It is that sort of ambiguous war that troops are leaving behind (HCH
A1, SJT C10, HS A7).
MILITARY POLICE COMPLAINTS COMMISSION / COMMISSION D'EXAMEN DES PLAINTES
CONCERNANT LA POLICE MILITAIRE
No related coverage. / Aucune couverture pertinente.
CANADA IN AFGHANISTAN / LE CANADA EN AFGHANISTAN
End of Mission in Kandahar
Canadians transferred battle authority for the Panjwa’I District to the Americans. BGen Dean Milner said
that while the end of Canada’s combat role is close, “we’re not there yet.” He does not hand his command
over to a U.S. Stryker brigade for a few days. The turnover of FOB Ma’sum Ghar was a powerful symbol
of Canada’s march back home. This is where Canadian soldiers died during Operation Medusa. Afghan
BGen Ahmad Habibi said Canadian soldiers leave the battlefield with the enemy in tatters (T. Burnett:
LFP A1, KWS 14, WSun 16, TSun 10, ESun 18, CSun 20, OSun 4; M. Fisher: NP A1, Ctz A4, Gaz A14,
EJ A17, CH A8, VProv A26, WStar C1; S. Sachs: G&M A13; Staff: TStar A19; M. Brewster: CG A7, RDA
A1).
Three months from now, the soldiers in Afghanistan will be fully re-integrated into their families, but the
process is not always an easy one. The Kingston Military Family Resource Centre will help families deal
with the reunification. BGen Dean Milner said he believes Canadian troops have “set the Americans up
for success” (K. Fernandez: KWS 1).
A documentary, War in the Mind, will feature the stories of soldiers affected by post-traumatic stress. The
documentary is a timely reminder as the combat mission winds down for Canadian troops. For some, the
battle will just be beginning (O. Ward: TStar A18).
Fin de la mission en Kandahar
La mission de combat des soldats canadiens en Afghanistan s'est terminée officiellement hier alors que
des militaires du Royal 22e Régiment ont remis aux Forces américaines le territoire qu'ils ont arpenté
dans la province de Kandahar. La responsabilité canadienne du district de Panjwaii, dans l'ouest du pays,
se poursuivra cependant plusieurs jours encore d'un point de vue juridique, mais le brigadier-général
canadien Dean Milner commandera dorénavant des troupes de combat américaines. Presque tous les
militaires canadiens ont quitté le champ de bataille à Kandahar, sauf quelques soldats qui devraient
demeurer dans la région afin de donner un coup de main à des collègues américains. La cérémonie
visant à souligner le transfert des pouvoirs s'est déroulée près de la base de Ma'sum Ghar, où les
Canadiens ont livré leurs premiers combats en Afghanistan (Dv A1, Sol 20, Qt 22, Dr 18, AN 15, VE 23).
End of Mission in Kandahar: Comment
Edmonton Journal editorial: Our military mission in Afghanistan might have lacked the focus and drama of
a Vimy Ridge or a D-Day, but it was fought for many of the same reasons and by a new generation that is
as selfless as generations past. As the past nine years in Afghanistan have shown us, we don't lack for
brave men and women willing to put themselves in harm's way on our behalf (EJ A20).
National Post editorial: While Canadian troops will no longer patrol Panjwaii, our intelligence forces now
have a key role to play in rooting out the latest threat to global -and Canadian -security. The war on terror
has shifted -and Pakistan is its new front line (NP A10).
Halifax Chronicle-Herald editorial: Canada's troops performed their mission well, made a real difference in
their area of operation and leave having done their share – if not more. Though hopeful, we are under no
illusions the future will be easy in Afghanistan (HCH A8).
Heidi Kingston: The mania to build up the Afghan security forces, the effort with which Canada is
involved, has one fundamental flaw -there is no stable, central government, or even a coherent society,
for this powerful military force to protect. If the international troops leave, Afghanistan would likely fall into
civil war again (NP A12).
Eric Lewis: I rarely hear folks chit-chatting about wars overseas like they do weather, traffic and other
more local issues. We should all make more of an effort to be aware of the influence our countrymen and
women are having around the world (MTT D5).
Soldiers’ Stories
The National Post published a story by Captain Adam Siokalo about an experience in Afghanistan (NP
A9).
The National Post published a story by Master Bombardier Nicholas Gunton about an experience in
Afghanistan (NP A9).
CF Operations in Libya / Opérations des FC en Libye
No related coverage. / Aucune couverture pertinente.
PROCUREMENT / APPROVISIONNEMENT
F-35 Fighter Jet: Comment
Barbara Yaffe: The Council on Hemispheric Affairs, a prominent Washington, D.C.-based policy institute,
has published a report titled ‘F-35, An Expensive Mistake for Canadian Forces.’ The report argues: “The
F-35 is unsuitable for Canadian military operations and marks an unfortunate shift in Canadian foreign
policy toward single-mindedly backing the U.S. military.” It is particularly important that the public
familiarize itself with the ongoing debate over the purchase of the F-35s. With a Conservative majority the
only impediment to the purchase is a public groundswell against it (VSun B3).
OTHERS / AUTRES
Flood Relief
LCol Michael Wright said of the soldiers assisting with flood relief in Manitoba: “When the soldiers came
on Saturday afternoon, they were ready to get right at the job. … Frankly, they attacked the problem like
they would attack the Taliban overseas and luckily we were able to get it done before the crest came.”
The soldiers were thanked by area dignitaries (Staff: WFP A4).
Coverage noted the injuries sustained by CF members while assisting with flood relief in Manitoba. It was
suggested one soldier had hydraulic fluid sprayed in his eyes. A CF spokesperson did not have
information on the specific injuries (Staff: WStar D8).
Flood Relief: Comment
Lindor Reynolds: The soldiers who assisted with flood relief in Manitoba helped save the province.
Someone should strike up the band, grab a kielbasa and get this party started (WFP A4).
Disabled Soldier to Climb Kilimanjaro
Coverage noted the plan by Cpl Mark Fuchko to climb Mount Kilimanjaro despite having lost both legs in
Afghanistan (C. Zdeb: WStar D8).
Royal Visit
What the tour of Canada by the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge will cost DND, Parks Canada and
Heritage Canada has not yet been calculated as part of the estimated $1.2 million cost to the federal
government (D. Proussalidis: TSun 37, WSun 7, ESun 24, CSun 18, OSun 5).
Back to Top
Section: Editorial/Opinion
Lead: The Russians are coming! The Russians are coming!
Headline: let's flex our Arctic muscles
Page: 20
Outlet: The Toronto Sun
Date: Wednesday 06 July 2011
The Russians are coming! The Russians are coming!
And, no, we're not talking about Canadian director norman Jewison's 1966 movie about a Soviet
submarine accidentally running aground off the coast of new england.
We're talking, instead, about Russia's intentional plan to send a show of force of two army
brigades to the High Arctic this summer --a contingent of upwards of 5,000 soldiers --to
supposedly protect its vested interests in the contested, mineral-laden wasteland.
And it is Canada's plan to lay out an unwelcome mat.
As Canada's combat role in Afghanistan comes to an end--as is being ably reported by Sun
Media's Thane Burnett--Canada's Defence Minister Peter MacKay announced our quid-pro-quo
to the Russian invasion of the Arctic will be an enhanced one-monthlong Canadian military
exercise involving 1,000 of our soldiers.
This is a must-do.
Five against one may seem unfair but we see the other way around, particularly since our Far
north sovereignty exercise has been an annual event since Prime Minister Stephen Harper
mandated a strong Canadian footprint along our most inhospitable coastline.
in other words, what's ours is ours, and the message is clear. We won't back down.
Besides, Canada wasn't routed out of Afghanistan by the Taliban, but the then Soviet Union
certainly was back when those same Taliban were ironically backed by U.S.-provided firepower
and romantically called mujahideen.
So we like our odds if push comes to shove.
To do nothing beyond sticking to the status quo of a relatively minor military exercise would be
foolish with Russia so hopped up on establishing itself in our Arctic territory, so Canada's
announcement of a beefed-up presence in August will hopefully let the Russians know their plan
will not go down without push back.
Unfortunately for Canada, however, it's the United nations that will supposedly rule on the legal
claims of Canada, and other polar countries, over who actually holds title to the offshore Arctic
territory that supposedly holds 25% of the world's untapped oil and gas deposits.
The fact Canada rightfully sees the Un as a joke doesn't help the Canadian cause.
But no one is surrendering yet--not the Russians, and certainly not Canada.
August in the Arctic could be the hottest ever.
Back to Top
Section: Sports
Lead: When word leaked out that Brian Burke was spending free agent day in Afghanistan, my
BlackBerry started to shake, rattle and roll.
Headline: AND IN THIS CORNER... Leave it to Beezer With Brian Burke talking to other
papers to air his feelings on Steve Simmons, we decided to take the muzzle off Beezer!
Page: 52
Outlet: The Ottawa Sun
Date: Wednesday 06 July 2011
When word leaked out that Brian Burke was spending free agent day in Afghanistan, my
BlackBerry started to shake, rattle and roll.
Most were messages from buddies wondering if Burke's absence on free agent day-- when the
Leafs were trying to woo Brad Richards--would hamper the club's chances of landing the prized
UFA.
We're talking about diehard Leafs fans, guys who live, die and bleed blue and white, and they
were worried that Burke's trip to Afghanistan might hurt the club's chances of landing Richards.
Many felt he shouldn't have the made the trip.
My colleague Steve Simmons shared that opinion. And for writing as much, he hasbeen branded
the lowest form of life ... ever!
Some of the e-mails and twi tter messages Steve received are shockingly vile. And believe me, I
know vile. Try taking shot at Mike Weir sometime.
For questioning Burke's trip on free agent day, Simmons has been called every bad name
imaginable. And some you just could never imagine.
And for what? For doing his job and writing what many people were thinking.
That's the point. He wrote what many people, particularly Leafs fans, were thinking.
But here's the thing. Not once did Simmons write that visiting Canadian troops in Afghanistan is
not a noble endeavour.
What he tried to say was that the timing of this particular trip by the Leafs GM was wrong. The
optics were wrong. Burke's priority on free agent day, Simmons wrote, should have been signing
free agents, not visiting the troops in Afghanistan.
"You don't, if you're running the Leafs, if you're struggling to make a lousy team better, if you
haven't been in the playoffs yet under your watch -- even if it is a Canada Day trip for the
Canadian troops --go to Kandahar on July 1. You just don't."
That's the general point of Simmons' piece.
He never wrote -- as Jay Pax-ton, the Director of Communications to Canadian Defence Minister
Peter MacKay, suggested in an email-- that he "values free agency more than our Canadian
troops."
That's ridiculous.
Simmons wrote that it was Burke's job to stick around on free agent day and, by all means, go to
Afghanistan another time.
And I'll tell you what else he did.
He put his thoughts "out there" and he didn't hide behind a pseudonym, like many of those who
have accused him, quite ironically, of being a coward, or much worse.
Burke, for his part, told the Sun's Lance Hornby that he had no intention of "dignifying Steve
Simmons's garbage with a response."
It's funny, he responded to the article in the National Post.
Frankly, I wasn't shocked Simmons was one of the few, if not the only, writer or broadcaster in
Toronto to take a stand concerning the timing of Burke's trip-even though it was an action many
people questioned.
To me, it all comes down to this. For whatever reason, Burke's been given a pretty easy ride in
this town, by the fans and the media.
I don't know if that's because of his force of personality or for other, let's say, more practical
reasons. But he has been treated with kid's gloves and he's more often than not-despite his gripes
to the contrary -given the benefit of the doubt.
And believe me, that's been noticed in other markets.
Personally, I like Burke. It's hard not to like the dude, despite his grumpy outward demeanour.
Maybe that's what makes him likeable. He's gruff, but really smart, and witty. He's a man's man.
Even when he's mean-spirited, like when he famously said that "The Sun has great value if you
own a puppy or a parakeet", it's hard not to like the guy.
But you should be able to question his decision to fly to Afghanistan when his team is trying to
land the only real star free agent, without being threatened and ridiculed.
Simmons did question that. Most didn't.
One thing I do know about Burke, and I don't know him that well. I'm pretty certain he would
never stoop to the name-calling practised by his so-called supporters in messaging Simmons,
clever descriptions like "retard."
He's got too much class for that.
steve.buffery@sunmedia.c a@beezersun
Back to Top
Section: Arguments
Byline: Paul Robinson
Outlet: Ottawa Citizen
Illustrations:
 Shah Marai, AFP, Getty Images / Commander of Canadian forces in Afghanistan Brig.-Gen.
Dean Milner, right, receives a carpet from Haji Faluddin Agha, governor of Panjwaii district,
following a ceremony marking the Canadian handover of Forward Fire Base Masum Ghar to
U.S. forces Tuesday.
Headline: The Afghan warhas altered Canada's values; The elevation of the military into a moral
elite of super-citizens has damaged the structure of civil-military relations, writes Paul Robinson
Page: A11
Date: Wednesday 06 July 2011
Source: Ottawa Citizen
Our country is so much better because of your efforts," Defence Minister Peter MacKay told
Canadian troops in Kandahar in a speech marking the coming end of the combat mission in
Afghanistan. As the mission draws to a close, commentators are lining up to assess its success or
failure, measured in terms of its effect on Afghanistan. But it is worth considering also what
effect the Afghan campaign has had at home in Canada.
The most obvious impact has been the return of a militarism probably not seen in Canada in
peacetime since before the First World War. The government's announcement earlier this year
that the military should be present at future citizenship ceremonies because the armed forces are
one of Canada's most notable institutions typifies the new climate of opinion. One might imagine
that the ghost of Sam Hughes had returned to manage our military affairs a second time. The
days when Canada prided itself on an unguarded border and a peaceful reputation seem far away.
"You are the best citizens of our country," MacKay told the troops in Kandahar, tossing
democratic equality to the wind. This is, of course, nonsense; but it is pernicious nonsense, too.
Such militarism has highly undesirable consequences.
First, it helps to legitimize the waging of war and to militarize foreign policy. In two votes on the
war in Libya, after a minimum of discussion (less than one hour the first time around), Canada's
Parliament mustered all of one vote of dissent. This is both because war has become acceptable
in a manner which would have been inconceivable a few years ago and because it has become
near impossible to criticize any aspect of military operations without incurring shrieks of
"Support the Troops." Far from being something to avoid, war has become almost the option of
first resort.
Second, the elevation of the military into a moral elite of super-citizens has damaged the
structure of civil-military relations. Power in the Department of National Defence (DND) seems
to have shifted from the hands of civilians into those of the generals. At the same time, power
appears to have moved from the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade (DFAIT)
into the hands of DND. Democratic control of the military has suffered as a result. When Peter
MacKay is, as so often, praised for being popular with the troops, this is meant to imply that he is
therefore a good defence minister. In fact this may merely show that he is a weak defence
minister, unable or unwilling to stand up to the military and prone to grant its every wish. Armed
forces have bureaucratic interests in the same way as every other organization, and firm control
is needed to hold them in check, even if this means becoming unpopular.
The decision to purchase F-35 fighter planes is a case in point. F-35s are exactly the sort of toy
generals always love; given a choice, they will always opt for the fanciest, newest, most
expensive bit of equipment. It is the job of the civilian side of DND to restrain them. With the
generals largely in control, this does not happen and money is spent badly.
The distorting pull of DND is also warping spending priorities elsewhere in government. Foreign
aid, for instance, has been increasingly militarized, channelled away from long-term
development, which might do the recipient countries some lasting good, and into short-term
projects in war zones which are designed to support military operations - with, it must be said, a
prominent lack of success.
General Dwight D. Eisenhower once remarked that "Every gun that is made, every warship
launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are
not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed." Contrary to much popular opinion, in the 20
years since the end of the Cold War, the world has become a dramatically safer place. The
magnitude of wars worldwide has declined by 60 per cent, and there are few significant threats to
Canadian security. We have an opportunity finally to avoid the problem Eisenhower identified
and turn our resources to peaceful tasks.
However mythological Canada's earlier peacekeeping image may have been, it was at least a
noble myth to aspire to. The crass spectacle of the Canadian foreign minister, John Baird, writing
a message on a bomb is, by contrast, shameful. Regardless of what our war in Afghanistan may
have done for Afghans, it has eroded our civilized instincts. It has not left Canada a better place.
Paul Robinson is a professor in the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs at the
University of Ottawa, and the author of Military Honour in the Conduct of War: From Ancient
Greece to Iraq. He has served as an officer in both the British and Canadian armies.
Back to Top
Section: News
Byline: Compiled By Aileen Donnelly
Outlet: National Post
Illustrations:
 Brian Hutchinson, National Post / Thursday Aug. 19, 2010: Under a blazing midday sun, a
crew of Canadian soldiers walked me to a village called Nakhonay, in eastern Panjwaii district.
We turned into a small walled compound. Blind faith: As usual, I didn't really NP know where I
was being led. I had no idea who -or what -Iwould encounter. The compound was home to a
group of nine Canadians working as an Operational Mentor and Liaison Team, led by Captain
Pete Reintjes, pictured, at left, and his Sergeant Major, Darryl Chambers, right, both of whom
are army reservists. The team had already been all over the province, mentoring Afghan National
Army soldiers. They were dog tired and wary. In a few days, an improvised explosives device
would explode right outside the compound, wounding Corporal Brian Pinksen
Headline: The long road; Scenes from our war
Page: A8
Date: Wednesday 06 July 2011
Source: National Post
TIMELINE
2007
Jan. 2 Mullah Dadullah, a top commander in the Taliban, warns of a spring offensive and heavy
casualties.
Jan. 25 A Joint Intelligence Operations Centre opens at the International Security Assistance
Force headquarters. The centre will allow Afghan and Pakistani military officers to collaborate
on campaign planning for intelligence and information operations with the assistance of ISAF
personnel.
February Road access on Highway 1 is restored, allowing the safe flow of commercial traffic and
improving the flow of civilian traffic. University of Ottawa law professor Amir Attaran obtains
documents from the Department of National Defence through the Access to Information Act.
After reviewing them, he says they contain evidence of the abuse of detainees in the custody of
Canadian Forces.
Feb. 1 The Taliban take control of Musa Qala district in Helmand province, an area known to be
the biggest opium producer in the world.
March 6 About 5,500 NATO and Afghan troops position themselves in Northern Helmand
province under "Operation Achilles" to focus on violent districts controlled by the Taliban in this
region. Canada plays a supporting role in the operation, which is aimed at establishing security in
advance of an anticipated Taliban spring offensive.
April 6 A roadside bomb kills six Canadian soldiers west of Kandahar City, and injures two
others.
April 10 Defence Minister Gordon O'Connor says Canadian troops could withdraw from
Afghanistan by the end of 2010, so long as Afghan security forces meet their expansion targets.
"We don't want to be there forever. Our exit strategy is to try to get Afghan governance,
development and security to such a level that they can look after themselves," he said in an
interview with the National Post. "We will probably have to provide aid there for many, many
years, but that doesn't necessarily mean we have to keep large security forces there. If the Afghan
army and police can get to some reasonable level -in their value system, not ours -that will allow
NATO to withdraw."
April 11 Two Canadian soldiers die in a roadside bomb explosion west of Kandahar en route to
help three fellow soldiers injured by a roadside bomb an hour earlier.
April 18 A Canadian soldier falls from a communications tower in Kandahar and dies.
May 3 Canada signs a rewritten prisoner transfer agreement with Afghanistan that will allow
them more access to insurgents captured by Canadians and turned over to Afghan authorities.
May 12 Mullah Abdullah, the Taliban's second-in-command, dies during a clash with NATO,
ISAF and Afghan forces in Helmand province.
May 22 Prime Minister Stephen Harper visits Afghanistan to meet Afghan President Hamid
Karzai and review mission objectives. He also suggests Canada could extend its mission beyond
the February 2009 deadline. "You know that your work is not complete. You know that we
cannot just put down our arms and hope for peace. You know that we can't set arbitrary
deadlines and hope for the best," Mr. Harper said in a speech to Canadian troops.
May 30 A Canadian combat photographer and six other NATO troops die when a U.S. helicopter
is shot down in Helmand province. The Taliban claim responsibility.
June 18 ABC News obtains video footage of an alQaedaTaliban training camp graduation
ceremony, reportedly held on June 9, which was shot by a Pakistani journalist. The video shows
a group of about 300 men apparently being sent out on suicide missions across the West.
Canadian and U.S. officials downplay any potential danger. "While we're not immune from
threats and no system is 100% perfect, we feel confident that people coming from a group like
that would be detected," said Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day.
July 4 Six Canadian soldiers and an Afghan interpreter die when their armoured vehicle hits a
roadside bomb on their way back from combat in Panjwaii district.
Aug. 1 Canadian Forces Brigadier-General Guy LaRoche assumes command of Task Force
Afghanistan.
Aug. 14 Peter McKay replaces Mr. O'Connor as Minister of Defence. September The Canadian
Operational Mentor & Liaison Team based in Kandahar forms a sub-unit - a Police Operational
Mentor & Liaison Team - to "develop ANP [Afghan National Police] professionalism and
autonomy by providing training, assistance and expert advice." The operation also facilitates
liaisons between the ANP, the Afghan National Army and ISAF.
Oct. 12 The Independent Panel on Canada's Future Role in Afghanistan, chaired by former
Liberal deputy prime minister John Manley, is created to advise the government on mission
options after the February 2009 withdrawal date. "This is not an easy question," the Prime
Minister says at a news conference to announce the panel. "I think we would all be well advised
to take a deep breath and to take a look at the facts before we rush to judgment." The panel is due
to report back to Parliament before the end of January 2008.
Nov. 28 The Independent Panel on Canada's Future Role in Afghanistan leaves the wartorn
country after a week-long fact-finding visit.
FALLEN SOLDIERS
Corporal Kevin Megeney, 25, of the 1st Battalion, The Nova Scotia Highlanders, died in a
noncombat related incident March 6; Private Kevin Kennedy, 20, Private David Greenslade, 20,
Corporal Aaron Williams, 23, Corporal Brent Poland, 37, and Sergeant Donald Lucas, 31, all of
the 2nd Battalion, The Royal Canadian Regiment, and Corporal Christopher Stannix, 24, of the
Princess Louise Fusiliers, killed by a roadside bomb, April 8; Trooper Patrick Pentland, 23, and
Master Corporal Allan Stewart, 31, both of The Royal Canadian Dragoons, killed by a roadside
bomb, April 11; Master Corporal Anthony Klumpenhouwer, 25, of the Canadian Special
Operations Forces Command, died in a noncombat-related accident April 18; Corporal Matthew
Cully, 25, of the 2 Canadian Mechanized Brigade Group Headquarters & Signals Squadron, died
in an improvised explosives device blast, May 25; Master Corporal Darrell Priede, 30, of the
Army News Team, died in a U.S. Chinook helicopter crash in Afghanistan May 30; Trooper
Darryl Caswell, 25, of The Royal Canadian Dragoons, died in a roadside bomb, June 11; Private
Joel Wiebe, 22, Corporal Stephen Bouzane, 26, and Sergeant Christos Karigiannis, 31, all of the
3rd Battalion, Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry, died in an IED explosion, June 20;
Private Lane Watkins, 20, Corporal Cole Bartsch, 23, Captain Matthew Dawe, 27, and Corporal
Jordan Anderson, 25, all of the 3rd Battalion, Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry,
Captain Jefferson Francis, 37, of the 1 Royal Canadian Horse Artillery, and Master Corporal
Colin Bason, 28, of The Royal Westminster Regiment, were killed in an IED explosion, July 4;
Private Simon Longtin, 23, of the 3rd Battalion, Royal 22e Régiment, died in an IED explosion,
Aug. 19; Master Warrant Officer Mario Mercier, 43, of the 2nd Battalion, Royal 22e Régiment,
and Master Corporal Christian Duchesne, 34, of the 5th Field Ambulance, 5 Area Support
Group, died in a land mine explosion, and Major Raymond Mark Ruckpaul, 42, of the Armoured
Corps, The Royal Canadian Dragoons, died in a non-combat related death, Aug. 22; Corporal
Nathan Hornburg, 24, of The King's Own Calgary Regiment, died in a mortar attack, Sept. 24;
Corporal Nicolas Beauchamp, 28, of the 5 Field Ambulance, and Private Michel Jr. Lévesque,
25, from the 3 Battalion, Royal 22e Régiment, died in an IED explosion Nov. 17; Gunner
Jonathan Dion, 27, of the 5e Régiment d'artillerie légère du Canada, died in an IED explosion
Dec. 30.
Back to Top
Section: Front
Byline: Murray Brewster Of Reports From Ma'sum Ghar, Afghanistan, On The Transfer Of
Battle Group Command
Outlet: The Chronicle-Herald
Illustrations:
 Brig.-Gen. Dean Milner, commander of Canadian troops in Afghanistan, right, shares a smile
with Lt.-Col. Steve Miller, commander of the 3rd Battalion 21st U.S. Infantry Regiment, left, as
Lt.-Col. Michel-Henri St-Louis, the commander of the 1stBattalion Royal 22e Regiment battle
group, signs transfer of authority papers on Tuesday. (MURRAY BREWSTER / CP)
Headline: Canadian troops stand down; For first time, country's military leaves while a war
rages
Page: A1
Date: Wednesday 06 July 2011
Source: The Canadian Press
CANADA'S DESERT WAR effectively came to an end Tuesday when soldiers of the Royal 22e
Regiment formally handed over their battlefield to American units and began to take stock of
years of bloody combat.
The country's legal command responsibility for the western Kandahar district of Panjwaii will
continue for several days, but Brig.-Gen. Dean Milner's headquarters will be directing U.S.
combat units.
Almost all Canadian troops are now out of the killing fields of Kandahar, save for a handful of
soldiers who will serve for perhaps a few more weeks, attached to American platoons.
It has cost lives of 157 soldiers, one diplomat and one journalist. For more than five years,
Canada has made war in the wasted farmland and dust-choked villages of this brutal, backward
country. Yet rarely did those in authority use the "W" word to describe what happened here.
Politicians, diplomats and bureaucrats routinely shied away from describing it in comfortless
terms, especially in the beginning when former defence minister Gordon O'Connor was chided
for refusing to say the word "war."
"The lawyers will get all over it and say you can't call it war, but that it's an armed conflict,"
Gen. Walt Natynczyk, the chief of defence staff, said in a recent interview with The Canadian
Press.
"For the young soldiers, sailors airmen and airwomen, it feels like war because someone is
shooting at them."
Parliament ordered an end to the Canadian combat mission in southern Afghanistan back in
2008, setting July 2011 as the deadline.
The Conservative government has since announced that 950 soldiers and support staff will carry
out a training mission in the Afghan capital until 2014.
The transfer of battle group command took place at Ma'sum Ghar, the crusted, petrified volcanic
mountain soaked in Canadian blood, much of it shed at the onset of Canada's fight in Kandahar
province in 2006.
The ceremony was an almost understated ending to a war that mesmerized and horrified the
country in equal measure but has now largely fallen off the public agenda.
If Kandahar was a national trauma, Ma'sum Ghar was at its epicentre - a base that's become a
symbol of the Canadian struggle over the last 5 1/2 years, said Lt.-Col. Michel-Henri St-Louis,
the Van Doo battle group commander.
"Everywhere in battle where Canadian soldiers have sacrificed their lives, we have examples of
similar places in a number of our conflicts," St-Louis said.
"Ma'sum Ghar is symbolic and had been at the centre of our deployment and was witness to
much of our sacrifices."
Ma'sum Ghar is not Passchendaele, Dieppe, Ortona, Monte Casino, Juno Beach - or even
Kapyong from the Korean War.
The sheer scale of slaughter in those battles makes a pale comparison, but Ma'sum Ghar has
seared itself into the consciousness of a whole generation of young soldiers who will, for the rest
of lives, remember Afghanistan as their war.
The mountain was first captured by troops in the summer of 2006 as fighting raged throughout
the districts of Panjwaii and Zhari.
It was used as the launching point for the landmark autumn battle known as Operation Medusa,
soon turning into a bustling hub that fed the burgeoning counter-insurgency war.
Most major Canadian combat operations in the region jumped off from Ma'sum Ghar, a popular
target for the enemy's 107-millimetre rockets and mortars. So common were the attacks, soldiers
a few years ago erected a mock industrial workplace sign counting the number of days the place
went rocket-free.
The formal signing ceremony took place in the corner of the base that now serves as a compound
for Afghan National Army troops, whom Canadians have trained and mentored throughout the
war.
Brig.-Gen. Ahmad Habibi, commander of the ANA's 1st Brigade, 205 Corps, was full of praise
and said Canadians "would be remembered forever in the hearts of the Afghan people for helping
our country." It was that sort of altruism that the Harper government tried to convince Canadians
was at the heart of the war.
Yet, almost from the moment the first battle group under Lt.-Col. Ian Hope deployed in February
2006, public opinion polls consistently suggested Canadians were pining for the days when their
soldiers were peacekeepers, not warriors.
To listen to focus group comments in Defence Department surveys, the idea of standing between
two warring parties had a nobility and an irresistible romanticism for Canadians. It was almost
gravity defying, even in the face of a pitiless counter-insurgency.
There was no peace to keep in Kandahar, which is why some back home wanted no part of it.
While he doesn't declare traditional UN peacekeeping dead, Canada's top soldier considers it part
of a simpler, bygone era.
"There is a peacekeeping myth," said Natynczyk.
"The peacekeeping myth is that you have a very controlled environment where two consenting
states come up with a peace agreement and invite United Nations or another coalition force to
interposition and help them monitor that peace. That kind of situation is a rarity, and I'm not sure
it'll ever happen again."
The opaque, vicious nature of the fighting in southern Afghanistan horrified the Canadian public
and soldiers alike.
It is that sort of ambiguous war that troops are leaving behind.
With Tuesday's handover, the Canadian army stepped away from the battlefield for the first time
in its history while a war still rages.
Back to Top
Section: News
Lead: MA'SUM GHAR, Afghanistan
Headline: Like a piece of Canada KANDAHAR: CANADIAN SOLDIERS TURN OVER AN
AREA FOR WHICH THEY FOUGHT AND DIED
Page: A1
Byline: THANE BURNETT
Outlet: The London Free Press
Illustrations:
 photo by PHILIPPE-OLIVIER CONTANT QMI Agency The transfer-of-authority ceremony
takes place at the Ma'sum Ghar forward operating base in the Panjwa'idistrict in the province of
Kandahar, in Afghanistan, Tuesday.
Date: Wednesday 06 July 2011
MA'SUM GHAR, Afghanistan
This is a god-awful piece of Afghan real estate to have fought over, but precious to leave behind.
Brown and jagged, small mountains rise like scarred knuckles from the bedrock.
Afghan National Army soldiers scan the heat ripples on the horizon, to the edge of the Rigestan
Desert, to the Arghandab River and Pashmul further still.
Canadian troops paid for and owned all this. They treated it like it was Calgary, Toronto or
Ottawa.
And they died to take it from an enemy who controlled much of it back in 2006 -- the Taliban
that at that time moved and operated with ease among local communities.
So arguably, more than any other place in Afghanistan, this is Canadian soil.
On Tuesday, the Canadians transferred battle authority for this base and Panjwa'i District to the
Americans' 3rd Battalion, 21st Infantry.
Canada's combat role here nears its end although Brig.-Gen Dean Milner, commander of Task
Force Kandahar, said, "While we're very close, we're not there yet."
Milner still commands U.S. troops across southern Afghanistan, and he won't hand over the
entire battle space to a U.S. Stryker brigade for a few days.
More than any other hand-over ceremony the parade and document-signing at forward operating
base (FOB) Ma'sum Ghar was a powerful symbol of Canada's march back home.
This is the same ground where Canadian soldiers died during the battle of Pashmul, which most
know as Operation Medusa.
That battlefield stretches out from the fortified walls, into countryside that's much less dangerous
for the Canadians' sacrifice.
Dozens of soldiers who operated out of this base died fighting for Canadian duty and
Afghanistan's future. Memorial stones representing their sacrifice have been buried in the dusty
ground of Ma'sum Ghar.
Most of their Canadian brothers and sisters have moved from the battle space, though Milner
says some are still in harm's way as they remain to help the Americans.
Van Doos battle group commander Lt.-Col Michel-Henry St.-Louis says since the difficult early
days of Canadian operations here, Ma'sum Ghar has served as the centre of command and
control for Canadian efforts in southern Afghanistan.
"It's huge," he said of its significance to the Canadian contribution. "This FOB has been at the
centre of (Canadian) operations outside the wire."
He told his troops, "a page in Canadian history turns today."
The Van Doos colours then were replaced with the American regimental flag.
Afghan National Army Brig.- Gen. Ahmad Habibi, who rose up the ranks as he fought beside the
Canadians for this corner of his country, said Canadian forces leave this battlefield with the
enemy in tatters.
"They are on their knees and very weak," he said with assurance. "Our Canadian friends have
played a major role in that."
Since they arrived, 1 Royal 22e Regiment battle group has been on 3,200 patrols and 130
operations, uncovered almost 300 weapons caches and taken part in 950 shuras, or local
meetings.
As Canadian and American forces stood on parade in the hot sun Tuesday -- Habibi's men
watching their backs from the walls -- a minute of silence was marked for the fallen.
When St.-Louis was asked whether the Canadians are leaving behind holy ground -- for the price
soldiers paid -- he hesitated.
Every patch of soil in Afghanistan where a Canadian fell in battle is as precious, he answered.
"Ma'sum Ghar is symbolic," he It was a witness to a lot of that sacrifice."
And after the words and the parade, the Canadians leave behind a difficult and hard place that
should always be remembered, if only in the spirit in which Canada looked after it, as Canadian
soil.
Back to Top
Section: News
Byline: Matthew Fisher
Outlet: National Post
Headline: Turning the page on symbol of sacrifice; Canada hands over Masum Ghar to U.S.
military
Page: A1 / Front
Date: Wednesday 06 July 2011
Dateline: MASUM GHAR, Afghanistan
Source: Postmedia News
MASUM GHAR, AFGHANISTAN . For Canada, Masum Ghar was the epicentre of a deadly
place. Looking south is Panjwaii district, west is Panjwaii town and the Arghandab River, north
goes to Kandahar city and there are farmlands to the east.
Canadian troops first arrived in 2006 and what followed in Panjwaii that summer was arguably
the bloodiest fighting of the West's nearly 10-year war against the Taliban and al-Qaeda.
Lieutenant-Colonel MichelHenri St-Louis, the commander of this country's last battle group in
Kandahar, called Masum Ghar a symbol of Canada's sacrifices.
But Masum Ghar, a place once held by the Taliban, is safer now. It was fitting, therefore, that on
Tuesday it was the place for the start of the of-ficial ceremonies that will end Canada's war.
"A page in Canadian history turns today," Lt.-Col. St-Louis, the Van Doo battle group
commander, told about 20 of his troops on parade and an audience of several hundred senior
officers and dignitaries.
"It was a privilege to be part of our team," he said before the Van Doo colours were lowered and
a U.S. regimental flag was raised.
A minute's silence was observed to remember the 154 Canadian men and three Canadian women
who have died in Afghanistan. The toll includes dozens of soldiers who were killed within a
couple of kilometres of Masum Ghar.
The Royal 22e Regiment battle group handed over responsibility for Panjwaii to a U.S. infantry
battalion from Alaska during a modest ceremony at this austere forwardoperating base.
The transfer of Canada's entire battle space is to take place Thursday when Brigadier-General
Dean Milner passes "command authority" to a U.S. brigade commander.
Until then, he continues to be in charge of several thousand U.S. combat forces and a much
smaller number of Canadian combat troops still deployed in Panjwaii and Dand.
Some infantrymen from Quebec's storied infantry regiment will remain in the field for several
more weeks to advise incoming U.S. forces. Others are still mentoring Afghan forces in Dand.
However, the bulk of the Canadian Forces has already returned to Kandahar Airfield or Canada.
All of them will be gone from Kandahar well before the end of July, beating a deadline set by the
House of Commons three years ago.
During their eight months in Panjwaii, the Van Doo conducted 3,200 patrols and 130 deliberate
operations, found nearly 300 weapons caches and 250 improvised explosive devices and
conducted 950 shuras (meetings with Afghan elders), Brig.-Gen. Milner said.
It is a very different landscape in Panjwaii today than it was during the early days of the mission.
Canada had combat responsibility not just for Panjwaii, but the entire province beginning in
2006. Trying to secure an area the size of New Brunswick with about 1,500 combat troops left
them badly overstretched.
After several years of bloody stalemate, Canada's area of operations rapidly shrank until it only
included Panjwaii when U.S. forces flooded into the south in 2009-10. This quickly resulted in a
string of battlefield successes across the south, including Panjwaii, which is about the same size
as Metropolitan Toronto, as well as a sharp increase in the number of roads built and schools
opened.
Marked differences in how the Americans will deal with the district are already obvious. Putting
into question the positive effects of the U.S. surge, the Arctic Wolves, as the troops from Alaska
call themselves, will not be nearly as numerous as the Canadians.
Nor will any of the Americans mentor Afghan security forces, as the Canadians have done for
several years. However, like the Canadians, the Americans will partner with Afghans on joint
operations.
Asked about the stark difference in Canadian and U.S. troop numbers in Panjwaii, BrigadierGeneral Ahmed Habibi, the Afghan troop commander, said, "God willing, the Afghan army will
make up the difference."
The issue of troop strength is of great concern to Afghans. Their forces are expanding rapidly,
but they are already fretting about plans by Barack Obama, the U.S. President, to slash U.S.
troop numbers by 30,000 by next September.
General David Petraeus, the outgoing U.S. commander of NATO forces in Afghanistan, has also
indicated there would be a shift in emphasis from the south to the east, to deal with growing
Taliban incursions from Pakistan.
Kandak (Afghan battalion) commanders were on hand Tuesday to give the Canadians parting
gifts of scarves and nuts. The Canadian in turn presented their Afghan allies with fine
embroidered linen.
Canada's focus in Afghanistan began to shift to a training mission in the north in May. Scores of
trainers from Alberta are already on the job at Afghan military academies in Kabul.
Back to Top
Section: International News
Outlet: The Globe And Mail
Byline: SUSAN SACHS
Headline: In Panjwai, another farewell ritual as Canadian troops pack up
Page: A13
Date: Wednesday 06 July 2011
It was a muted ceremony, filled with expressions of mutual admiration and attended by Afghan
military officers and Panjwai district notables who have been dealing with Canadians soldiers for
more than five years.
It was also one of the last rituals of Canada's long goodbye to Kandahar province, still one of the
most volatile places in the country.
In contrast, the Panjwai district, where the Canadian battalion was concentrated, has become one
of the least lethal patches of the province so far this summer.
Attacks on foreign forces have fallen off since a joint Afghan, American and Canadian push to
drive Taliban fighters away from Kandahar city last year. U.S. Lieutenant-Colonel Steve Miller,
leader of the 3rd Battalion 21st U.S. Infantry Regiment, the unit that is replacing the Canada's
battle group, said he could feel the difference.
``As I travel this district,'' he told the assembled soldiers at the transfer ceremony, ``it is hard to
believe this is the same district I visited eight short months ago.''
The Americans already have 30,000 soldiers in Kandahar province, spread across areas laced
with explosives. In just the past two months, they suffered 16 casualties. Nine American soldiers
died in Kandahar in the space of just two days.
Nearly all the soldiers of the 1st Battalion 22nd Regiment, the last Canadian battle group to serve
here, have already left for home, with a stopover in Cyprus to decompress from eight months of
nerve-jangling patrols in search of explosives buried in the fields and mud compounds of
Panjwai.
The Canadian civilian operation in Kandahar was relinquished to American control months ago.
Its last staff members, already far outnumbered by American aid and governance specialists, left
with no fanfare last week.
The final ceremonial moment will come Thursday, when Brigadier-General Dean Milner will
sign the papers in another ceremony to formally hand over his command of NATO troops in
Panjwai and Dand districts to his American counterpart.
Canada's soldiers spent nearly 10 years in Afghanistan, first as partners in the American effort to
topple the Taliban and hunt for Osama bin Laden after the Sept. 11 attacks and then as part of a
NATO contingent to secure Kabul for the first days of the provisional post-Taliban government.
But it was in Kandahar, the last place that Taliban leaders fled after the 2001 American assault
and one of the first places they tried to recapture five years later, that Canadian soldiers fought
the deadliest years of their war in Afghanistan.
That war also gave a generation of young military officers a chance to apply Canada's
counterinsurgency doctrine in the field. The ``lessons learned'' from that brief experience of the
last eight months are already being incorporated into Canadian Forces military thinking, said
Lieutenant-Colonel Michel-Henri St-Louis, the battalion commander.
Canada lost 150 of its 157 military casualties in Afghanistan while hunkered down in Kandahar
since 2006.
The military officers from all three armies - Canadian, American and Afghan - sought to portray
the Canadian contribution as worthy of the soldiers' sacrifices.
They said Panjwai is now a less violent place - at least for NATO and Afghan troops - than at
any other time during the 62 months of Canada's fight in Kandahar.
``I remember well when our Canadian friends first arrived,'' said Afghan Brigadier-General
Ahmad Habibi, head of the army battalion that operates in Kandahar. ``This area where you are
standing right now was in the hands of the Taliban and people were living under the control of
the Taliban.''
Now, he added, ``the enemy is on its knees and very weak.''
Canada's departure, leaving the fight to the Americans and their still uneven Afghan army
partners, could bring a change in style as well as personalities, a prospect that has some local
officials unsettled.
``Canadian Forces have stayed here for a long time,'' said an Afghan-Canadian who works as one
of the cultural advisers to the Canadian battle group. He cannot be identified by name according
to the military's rules.
``It came gradually but they adapted to the culture - how to organize a shura [local consultation],
how to resolve a land dispute, how to speak to an elder, how to react when a woman appears,''
the adviser added. ``Their way of working is different from our Canadians, and some Afghans
are concerned and wondering how it will be [with] the Americans in charge.''
Back to Top
Section: News
Headline: Leaving is hard to do, even here
Page: A19
Outlet: Toronto Star
Illustrations:
 U.S. Lt.-Col. Steve Miller, left, Canada's Brig.-Gen. Dean Milner and Lt.-Col. Michel-Henri
St-Louis, seated, at the transfer of authority ceremony. MURRAY BREWSTER/THE
CANADIAN PRESS
Date: Wednesday 06 July 2011
"We started our involvement on a political decision. So we also end it on a political decision. It
is not for me to second-guess that.'' - Lt.-Col. Michel-Henri St-Louis, commander, Canadian
battle group
MA'SUM GHAR, PANJWAII
For the first time in our history, Canada is leaving the battlefield of a war still raging.
Oh, not here, precisely, in the sun-baked desert of Panjwaii or the fertile floodplain of the
Arghandab River. There's no flame of insurgency licking at the little villages that dot this
relatively quiet patch of southern Afghanistan, far from the madding combat clamour both east
and west. That has been doused, starved of oxygen, smothered, flattened. For that, Canadian
troops - under the leadership of St-Louis - can take credit, with full acknowledgment of those
who came before.
But no Canadians will come after, not to Kandahar.
The Conservatives have plucked that thorn from their finger. The Liberals have removed that
splinter from their arse.
We are packing up our dolls and dishes, exchanging gifts with our hosts - embroidered bolts of
cloth for them, traditional Afghan man-shawls for us, awkward embraces all round - and heading
home, putting the best face possible on an about-face that allows us to not lose face.
As of Tuesday, July 5, 2011, after 62 months and 157 lives lost, we're done here.
At ease, Canada.
On a hot morning, the air speckled with dust, an emotional St-Louis - he wears his feelings on
his arm, just beneath the regimental badge and Maple Leaf and even admits to reading (at his
wife's insistence) Eat, Pray, Love - formally ended Canada's military mission in Afghanistan,
passing "command authority" from his 1 Royal 22e Regiment, the Van Doos, to his U.S. Stryker
Brigade counterpart.
For all the satisfaction in an assignment commendably executed - nothing to regret - surely it
must have galled a bit, too, for a soldier.
"We came with a clear tactical mission," St-Louis said afterward, once the Canadian flag came
down and the American flag went up at Forward Operating Base Ma'sum Ghar. "Canada's
contribution in a military sense will continue . . . in a different way. It ends with the government
making a decision that it's now time to evolve or change the mission."
That decision was actually made three years ago, when this swath of Kandahar was roiling.
Ma'sum Ghar will be forever associated with Operation Medusa: Canada's crucible.
A fitting place - specifically chosen by St-Louis for that reason - to conduct the parade transfer
and, even more symbolically, to do so in the base's Afghan National Army compound.
The grace notes were sweet, the tableau poignant. Modest, the ritual may have been, but there's
something prototypically Canadian about that, too.
As St-Louis reminded those assembled - troops American and Canadian and Afghan, district
governor, police chief, regional national security director - MSG had been the launching pad for
Medusa in 2006: 16 weeks of pitched battles and airstrikes, in and around Pashmul, on the north
side of the river, the first and last occasion that Canadians fought a "conventional" war against
insurgents on Afghan soil. Eleven of our solders died as a result of direct enemy fire over that
span - not from IEDs or suicide bombs or shoot-and-scoot sorties.
Medusa has taken its place alongside other landmark Canadian battles. It didn't win the war for
Kandahar, of course, but it was a seminal clash for our country's modern military.
"It's a place that has captured and represents all of the 10 previous battle groups. We drew from
that legacy. It's the culmination from a country that sent soldiers to do a job here."
The tactics changed dramatically from then to now, from combat to a counter-insurgency
(COIN) doctrine, the effects of which cannot be measured for quite a while to come. But the
Canadians have witnessed, and facilitated, something approaching limited success. With a
deadline imposed by politicians rather than generals, they'll have to settle for that.
"This battle group, given the task in the rotation cycle, knowing when we were going to be here,
made a conscious effort to study the Canadian COIN doctrine. I mandated all my officers to read
it and disseminate it through the troops. That document illuminated the way this battle group has
tackled the problem of the District of Panjwaii. I was able to devise a concept of operations that
tried to use some of these COIN principles and we were able to apply them in this district with
great effect."
Simple, really - separate the population from the insurgents. Protect the former and marginalize
the latter. Buttress redevelopment with improved security.
"If an insurgency is a political struggle, this will play a role in the satisfaction or dissatisfaction
of people who are in the middle of that political struggle."
Yet from the beginning of Roto 10, even before these Van Doos - four infantry companies, with
"enabler" assets of recce squadron, engineers, tanks, artillery and an attached American company
- arrived in theatre last October, they knew, St-Louis most keenly, that theirs would be a defining
deployment, authors of Canada's legacy in Afghanistan.
"I came here with an extremely robust unit that followed a road to war.
"We tried, some days, some weeks, in training, to say we're just the next battle group, a (link) in
the chain. Other days, there was a clear sense of understanding of where we fit in, at least in
Canadian military history. As a student of history, some days that was very clear to me."
Panjwaii - Canada's narrowed field of operations with the surge of American troops that began in
2009 - is now in the custodianship of U.S. forces, 3rd battalion, 21st infantry, and God speed to
them, inheriting a chunk of Kandahar that can teeter from stable to seething in an Afghan minute.
There is still a Canadian platoon out in the field, conducting joint patrols with Americans and the
Afghan National Army, but this is a segue presence and will conclude shortly. A training team,
of course, remains in Kabul, expanding in months to come - the oar that Prime Minister Stephen
Harper will allow to keep paddling against the current of Afghanistan destabilizing further,
possibly reversing into chaos, anarchy and civil war anew.
But Canadians are now out of harm's way, released from the badlands of Kandahar, even if that's
not what Canadian soldiers wanted.
"It is with honour and pride that we will complete the transfer of authority between Canadians
and the 3rd of the 21st," St-Louis said at the ceremony. "A page in Canadian history turns
today."
Addressing his American successor, Lt.-Col. Steve Miller, St-Louis added: "I have nothing but
the confidence that you will continue with our success in writing the book on security.
"Canada's efforts in Afghanistan will continue. But our combat operation in southern
Afghanistan finishes today."
On a day of conflicting emotions, St-Louis was asked directly, was this the right thing to do, the
leaving?
"If it was up to me? One day, if I'm in a position to make those types of calls, we can talk."
Back to Top
Section: Canada
Outlet: The Guardian (Charlottetown)
Illustrations:
 York Regional Police, accompanied by Greater Toronto Area Police, OPP and fire and
emergency medical service workers are seen on Yonge Street in Newmarket, Ont., during the
funeral procession for Const. Garrett Styles on Tuesday. Styles died recently in the line of duty
in the town of East Gwillimbury.
Headline: Confusion, comedyhighlight ceremony to mark end of Canadian combat in Kandahar
Page: A7
Date: Wednesday 06 July 2011
Dateline: MA'SUM GHAR, Afghanistan
Source: The Canadian Press
History can unfold in the strangest little nooks and crannies of the world, especially when a war
is winding down.
The end of Canada's combat mission in Kandahar on Tuesday was no exception.
The ceremony marking the 1st Battalion Royal 22e Regiment's handover of the Kandahar
battlefield took place in the Afghan National Army compound of Forward Operating Base
Ma'sum Ghar, amid the smell of wood fires and stacked sewer pipes.
In some respects, it had all the charm and historic heft of a lumber yard.
Saying goodbye to Kandahar among Afghan troops was a sentimental, oddly appropriate choice
for the Canadian army, which has for years worked with the country's soldiers in hopes of
training itself out of a job in Afghanistan.
The base, along the withered banks of the Arghandab River, is steeped in significance.
A generation of Canadian troops have been propelled into combat from its gates, but it is truly
home to a kandak (battalion) of Afghan soldiers, who've spent the last seven years fighting in
this stiff-necked corner of the province.
Lt.-Col. Michel-Henri St-Louis, the outgoing battle group commander, delivered his farewell
speech beside a crisp Canadian flag while laundry dangled on lines outside an observation post
on the hillside above him.
Unlike the Canadians they call "brothers," the Afghans don't get to leave.
"I remember very well when our Canadian brothers arrived, this place where you are standing
right now was in the hands of the insurgents," said Brig.-Gen Ahmad Habibi, commander of the
ANA's 1st Brigade, 205 Corps.
His speech was accompanied by the melodic ring of a cellphone among the seats where the local
dignitaries sat. Afghans love their cellphones and etiquette isn't word that's easily translated into
Pashtu.
"All of our accomplishments today, our Canadian friends have played a major role," said Habibi,
who fought alongside Canadians in the milestone battles of Operation Medusa.
As he spoke, invited guests sat sweating underneath two canvas tents, with the sides rolled up, in
front of a line of grey portable toilets.
A handful of Habibi's troops watched from the sidelines, some with looks of bewilderment on
their faces, not quite sure what to make of it all.
The general's address was delivered from a makeshift, plywood lectern facing down a slope
towards a collection of sea containers heaped with scrap metal and other refuse. The microphone
worked only intermittently.
It all felt hastily assembled, but Afghan-style authentic.
After the speeches and handshakes, when it really came time to say goodbye, Haji Fazluddin
Agha - the rotund, fierce-looking, ex-mujahedeen commander and Panjwaii district governor broke into a beaming smile.
Agha had something for St-Louis, his regimental sergeant-major and battle group deputy
commander. The Afghans are big on certificates - they enjoy giving them almost as much as
receiving them. Each of the Canadians received a framed certificate, one of which was flaming
pink, plus scarves and a bag of nuts - a popular Afghan treat.
Back to Top
Section: News
Lead: Though it's 8:30 p.m. in Kandahar, the desert air still registers a typical 44 C.
Headline: The home stretch
Page: 1
Byline: KATHERINE FERNANDEZ-BLANCE FOR THE WHIG-STANDARD
Outlet: The Kingston Whig-Standard
Illustrations:
 COREY LABLANS For The Whig-Standard Dana Pardy, manager of family support at the
Batoche Community Centre, helps out military families. With thewithdrawl of Canadian Forces
troops from their Afghanistan deployment, Pardy has been keeping busy.
Date: Wednesday 06 July 2011
Though it's 8:30 p.m. in Kandahar, the desert air still registers a typical 44 C.
"It's generally hot here through the night ... it's getting warmer by the day," Brig.-Gen. Dean
Milner said from his Kandahar base.
That oppressive heat is something Canadian soldiers, returning this month from their
Afghanistan deployment, won't miss.
But, as the trickle-back process continues, those returning will have more than temperature
changes to get used to when they land on Canadian soil.
Three months from now, these soldiers will likely be fully re-integrated into their families, but
the process isn't al-w ay s an easy one.
Dana Pardy, a family support manager at the Kingston Military Family Resource Centre, will
help families of the estimated 100 Kings - ton soldiers coming home this month with the
reunification process.
Jet lag, boredom, stress and sleeping issues are just some of the things those who have served
abroad typically experience upon return, he said.
"They're obviously not at home (overseas)," Pardy said. "They're in a war zone."
To make the return home easier, those returning from overseas take part in a five-day
decompression session run through the Canadian Forces.
"The focus is on giving the tools (for) seamlessly integrating them back into the home," Pardy
said.
In Kingston, the resource centre helps prepare families for what to expect when a member comes
home.
"We try to normalize a lot of what they're going to be experiencing," he said.
Though deployment can often bring stress to a relationship, Pardy said it can also allow it to
grow and develop.
"We tell our spouses to be equally proud of what they've accomplished during their partner's
absence," he said.
"Our families are very resilient."
Lt.-Cmdr. Mark Shepherd is familiar with the realities of the mission.
He's spent 18 months serving in Afghanistan, but in three weeks, his 12-to 16-hour work days
will be replaced with some favourite creature comforts.
"I'm going to have a good Canadian breakfast, I'm going to go sailing on the lake, and I'm going
to appreciate a cold beer," he said from Kandahar.
"I will probably have an apple fritter upon my return."
The Kingston resident will also visit his family in Prince Edward Island, but he won't leave
Afghan - istan regret-free.
"In a lot of ways, you feel like you're leaving and there is unfinished business," Shepherd said.
"What the Canadian public should have realized is that ... this type of a mission is something a
lot longer than five or 10 years."
While safety for foreign forces has increased in the past three years, Shepherd's Kandahar base
still gets hit up to seven times a day.
"I'll be very honest with you, that doesn't bother me, it never has," the Kingston resident said
while still in Kandahar.
What does churn his stomach is a fear for the safety of Afghan civilians. Those who have spoken
with Canadian forces often become victims of insurgent attacks.
"The way people should look at this place is a society that's pretty much starting from scratch,"
he said.
One of the mission's main focuses was to improve literacy rates in Kandahar.
"In the part of the country that Canada operates, the literacy rate is (still) less than 7%," he said.
"How long does it take to educate 93% of the area?"
Canada's mission began in 2001 when former prime minister Jean Chretien pledged support for
the American-branded war against terror.
Ten years later, more than $18 billion has been spent and at least 161 Canadian lives lost.
Milner left his hometown in Kingston 10 months ago to head Canada's Forces in Kandahar. He
commanded almost 3,000 Canadian and American troops in the region, and unwaveringly said
the mission has been a success.
"I think that we've definitely left a very positive legacy," he said. "I think the Afghans feel the
momentum as well."
Milner has overseen the development of schools and roads in Kandahar. He said one of his goals
for the past 10 months was to curb Taliban activity during the summer.
"They reconstitute during the wintertime, so we worked extremely hard ... to continue to disrupt
their capabilities," he said. "As a result, we've had a flat fighting season."
Though Canadian troops are pulling out of Kandahar, American ones will immediately take over
Canada's duties.
"We can go out ... feeling quite happy that we've set the Americans up for success," Milner said.
A large part of the mission has been training and mentoring Afghanistan's national army and
police forces, something that will continue as 950 Canadians participate in NATO's training
mission in Kabul.
While Milner won't have involvement in this mission, he will be making some big changes of his
own. In August, he'll leave Kingston for Texas to become the deputy commanding general for a
large American corps of 60,000 troops.
Until then, he'll be spending time with his wife, two children, dog and cat, and brushing up on
his swimming.
At the end of the month, Milner has signed up to compete in a triathlon with his daughter.
"It won't be easy," he said. "(She's) competitive, so she'll probably make me work for it."
news3@thewhig.com
Back to Top
Section: News
Headline: Troops home but battle just beginning; Afghanistan has left many with wounds that
won't easily heal
Page: A18
Byline: Olivia Ward Toronto Star
Outlet: Toronto Star
Illustrations:
 Combat veteran Wayne McInnis, 24, attends a veterans' program at UBC.
Date: Wednesday 06 July 2011
The pain in his voice cuts through the stark words.
"My three colleagues were hit by an IED. The vehicle was on fire, the driver was still trapped
inside.
"So basically we had to sit there and watch a friend burn to death and not be able to do anything .
...
"Instantly I felt myself die. That's when everything changed for me."
Wayne McInnis, a 24-year-old combat engineer in Afghanistan's lethal Panjwaii district, is back
in Canada now, one of thousands of NATO troops to depart the modern world's longest conflict.
But like countless others, he felt the stranglehold of a war whose tentacles never loosed their
grip, long after leaving the battlefield.
The stories of McInnis and his colleagues are featured in the documentary, War in the Mind, to
be aired Wednesday on TV Ontario.
It explores the post-traumatic stress that leads some veterans to contemplate, or even commit
suicide. And as Canadian troops prepare to withdraw from Afghanistan, it's a timely reminder
that for some the battle is only beginning.
"We've just had the second (suspected suicide) incident in a month," says veteran filmmaker
Judy Jackson, who has won 60 international awards for documenting war crimes and human
rights abuses.
"The government says there is no cause for alarm. But it's very tough to get any statistics."
Master Cpl. Francis Roy was found dead in Afghanistan last week of "non-combat-related
wounds." And on May 28, Bombardier Karl Manning died at a remote base near Zangabad, in
the Panjwaii, in circumstances that are under investigation. His family denies it was suicide.
In the U.S., thousands of military suicides have been recorded since the Vietnam War. But
Canada's department of defence says the rate here is no higher than that of the general
population.
However, experts say, suicide is only the extreme manifestation of post-traumatic stress that may
go undetected for years after soldiers return from combat missions.
"There are a number of ways for people to kill themselves, and not all of them are violent," says
Marvin Westwood, a University of British Columbia psychology professor, and founder of a
program that has helped dozens of traumatized former soldiers by allowing them to share
experiences with their peers.
"I think there are a number of unreported suicides," Westwood says. "They may use meds, drugs,
alcohol or descend into a high-risk lifestyle and eventually die from it. Some end their lives in
ways that wouldn't be detected, because they want to spare their families."
Most famously, retired general Roméo Dallaire recounts his own battle with depression and
thoughts of suicide after leading the disastrous UN mission in Rwanda during the 1994 genocide.
"I would argue that every one of those soldiers who have come back diagnosed with any level of
operational stress injury and has committed suicide is just as much a casualty . . . as a person
who has been killed in the field," he says in the film.
For soldiers who have struggled under the crushing burden of post-traumatic stress, finding help
has its own difficulties. But the first step - admitting the symptoms - is often the hardest in a
"suck-it-up" military culture of toughness that stigmatizes men for the "weakness" of feeling
devastating emotions.
"I came home, I thought I was fine, I had a girlfriend," says Tim Laidler, a convoy escort, then
trainer, for the Afghan army who now lives in Vancouver.
"I thought what I went through was normal."
But after returning to university and taking a job with the police, the once-energetic 25-year-old
developed nightmares and lethargy so profound he couldn't get out of bed in the morning.
When a friend introduced him to the UBC veterans' transitional program, called "Drop the
Baggage," he began to understand the depth of his own trauma and the effect of the incidents that
caused it.
"At the time, you never speak about it. You can't slow down or shed tears," he said in a phone
interview.
The Drop the Baggage program was developed from work done by Westwood 13 years ago for
older veterans who were nearing the end of their lives without being able to speak of their
trauma.
UBC doctoral student David Kuhl, now an associate professor of family practice, joined him,
and with funding from the Royal Canadian Legion they expanded the program to young exsoldiers who suffered the same emotional wounds as their forebears.
"There's a sense of desperation for all the things you're holding inside," said Dan Patterson, a 28year-old former combat engineer in the U.S. Marines who returned to his home in London, Ont.
A dual citizen, Patterson had deployed to Iraq at the height of the 2003 invasion. But after
leaving the service in 2004, he no longer recognized his earlier self.
"I've seen and done things that rest heavily on my soul," he told fellow soldiers in the program,
after months of anguish that took him to the edge of self-destruction.
"I moved away from home. I had trouble sleeping, flashbacks, crying. I spent time alone
travelling and binge drinking. I didn't care about myself any longer. A big part of me died over
there."
Back to Top
Section: Actualités
Byline: La Presse canadienne; Murray Brewster
Outlet: Le Devoir
Illustrations:
 Le gouverneur du district de Panjwaii, Haji Faluddin Agha, a fait cadeau d'un tapis au brigadier-général
canadien Dean Milner (à gauche), au cours de la cérémonie qui a marqué hier la fin de la mission de
combat canadienne dans la province de Kandahar, en Afghanistan.
Headline: Le Canada enAfghanistan - Point final à neuf ans de combats; Les Forces américaines ont
officiellement pris le relais d'une mission qui aura coûté la vie à 157 soldats canadiens depuis 2002
Page: A1
Date: Wednesday 06 July 2011
Ma'sum Ghar, Afghanistan -- La mission de combat des soldats canadiens en Afghanistan s'est terminée
officiellement hier alors que des militaires du Royal 22e Régiment ont remis aux Forces américaines le
territoire qu'ils ont arpenté dans la province de Kandahar.
La responsabilité canadienne du district de Panjwaii, dans l'ouest du pays, se poursuivra cependant
plusieurs jours encore d'un point de vue juridique, mais le brigadier-général canadien Dean Milner
commandera dorénavant des troupes de combat américaines.
Presque tous les militaires canadiens ont quitté le champ de bataille à Kandahar, sauf quelques soldats
qui devraient demeurer dans la région afin de donner un coup de main à des collègues américains.
Depuis le début de la mission en 2002, 157 soldats canadiens ont trouvé la mort en Afghanistan, tandis
que 600 autres ont été blessés. Le caporal-chef Francis Roy est la plus récente victime. L'homme de 32
ans est décédé des suites de blessures non liées au combat, la semaine dernière. Ses funérailles auront
lieu aujourd'hui à Saint-Joseph de Lepage dans le Bas-Saint-Laurent.
La journaliste du Calgary Herald Michelle Lang, le diplomate Glyn Berry, qui était le directeur politique de
l'Équipe de reconstruction provinciale du Canada à Kandahar, ainsi que deux travailleuses humanitaires
ont aussi perdu la vie durant cette mission.
«Ça ressemble à une guerre»
Pendant plus de cinq ans, le Canada a fait la guerre en sol afghan, mais les politiciens, les diplomates et
les fonctionnaires ont systématiquement évité d'utiliser ce mot lourd de sens pour décrire ce qui se
passait là-bas, surtout au début, lorsque l'ancien ministre canadien de la Défense Gordon O'Connor avait
été critiqué pour avoir refusé de parler de guerre.
«Les avocats vous diront que vous ne pouvez pas appeler ça une guerre, mais c'est un conflit armé, a
déclaré le chef d'état-major de la Défense, le général Walt Natynczyk, dans une récente entrevue à La
Presse canadienne. Pour les jeunes soldats, marins et pilotes, ça ressemble à une guerre parce qu'il y a
des gens qui leur tirent dessus.»
En 2008, le Parlement avait voté la fin de la mission de combat canadienne en Afghanistan, qui devait
ainsi se terminer en juillet 2011. Le gouvernement conservateur a depuis annoncé que 950 militaires
canadiens et employés de soutien allaient demeurer à Kandahar jusqu'en 2014 afin de former des
soldats afghans.
La cérémonie visant à souligner le transfert des pouvoirs s'est déroulée près de la base de Ma'sum Ghar,
où les Canadiens ont livré leurs premiers combats en Afghanistan.
Si Kandahar était un traumatisme national, cette base en serait le coeur, elle qui est devenue un symbole
de la lutte du Canada en sol afghan, a affirmé le lieutenant-colonel Michel-Henri Saint-Louis, qui dirige
depuis 2009 le 1er bataillon du Royal 22e Régiment de Valcartier.
Le lieutenant-colonel a raconté qu'il existait des lieux semblables pour de nombreux conflits durant
lesquels les soldats canadiens s'étaient battus. «Ma'sum Ghar est symbolique, a été au centre de notre
déploiement, et témoin de beaucoup de nos sacrifices», a-t-il indiqué.
Les militaires canadiens ont chassé les insurgés de l'endroit en 2006 à la suite de dures batailles dans
les districts de Panjwaii et Zharey.
Ma'sum Ghar a ensuite été utilisée comme point de départ pour les affrontements de l'automne 2006,
connus sous le nom d'opération Méduse, devenant bientôt une base active qui a nourri la guerre contre
l'insurrection.
La plupart des opérations de combat importantes du Canada dans la région sont parties de Ma'sum
Ghar, une cible populaire pour les roquettes et les mortiers de l'ennemi. Les attaques étaient si
fréquentes que les soldats ont érigé il y a quelques années une pancarte pour indiquer le nombre de
jours sans assaut.
La base accueille maintenant des troupes de l'Armée nationale afghane (ANA) que les militaires du
Canada ont formées et guidées tout au long du conflit.
Le brigadier-général Ahmad Habibi, qui commande la 1re Brigade du 205e Corps de l'ANA, n'a que des
éloges à faire au sujet des Canadiens, soutenant que le peuple afghan se souviendra d'eux pour toujours
parce qu'ils avaient aidé leur pays.
C'est la première fois depuis sa création que l'armée canadienne se retire d'un conflit avant qu'il soit
terminé.
Le lieutenant-colonel Steve Miller, qui dirige le 3e Bataillon du 21e Régiment d'infanterie de l'armée
américaine, a déclaré qu'il héritait d'une région beaucoup plus tranquille qu'il le croyait. «Nous nous
attendions à ce que ce champ de bataille soit plus animé qu'il l'a été durant les 30 derniers jours, a-t-il
révélé. Cette zone n'a pas connu la recrudescence de la violence qui s'y produit habituellement durant le
printemps après la récolte du pavot.» Selon le lieutenant-colonel Miller, le Royal 22e Régiment est
largement responsable de cette accalmie, lui qui a découvert d'importantes caches d'armes lourdes
depuis six mois.
Sixième contributeur de la force de l'OTAN en Afghanistan (ISAF), derrière les États-Unis, le RoyaumeUni, l'Allemagne, la France et l'Italie, le Canada est jusqu'ici le pays le plus important à retirer l'ensemble
de ses troupes de combat, bien avant le terme prévu de la mission de combat de l'OTAN, fin 2014.
L'OTAN prévoit avoir progressivement transmis à cette date aux forces afghanes la responsabilité de la
sécurité de l'ensemble du territoire, un processus qui doit commencer cet été.
A l'été 2010, après quatre ans de présence en Afghanistan, les Pays-Bas avaient déjà retiré leurs 1950
soldats, remplacés par 545 policiers néerlandais chargés de former la police afghane. Washington a de
son côté annoncé en juin le retrait d'ici fin 2012 du tiers de ses forces déployées en Afghanistan, soit 33
000 hommes, la totalité des renforts envoyés depuis fin 2009. Paris, Londres et Bruxelles lui ont
immédiatement emboîté le pas en annonçant un début de retrait plus ou moins important, alors que la
guerre devient de plus en plus impopulaire dans les pays fournisseurs de troupes.
«Ce n'est pas terminé avant que tout soit fini. Quand vous passez le témoin, dans une course de relais,
vous ne ralentissez pas», a expliqué à l'AFP le chef adjoint de la force opérationnelle canadienne, le
colonel Richard Giguère, aux derniers jours de présence canadienne. Le colonel Giguère s'est dit «fier de
ce que les Canadiens ont accompli» dans la province de Kandahar, l'une des zones les plus meurtrières
du conflit.
Avec l'AFP
Back to Top
Section: Opinion
Outlet: Edmonton Journal
Headline: Real progress bravely won in Afghanistan
Page: A20
Date: Wednesday 06 July 2011
Source: Edmonton Journal
Except to the Canadian soldiers who served there, Forward Operating Base Ma'sum Ghar will
probably never evoke the same emotion and patriotic nostalgia as Vimy Ridge or Juno Beach.
Ma'sum Ghar -or as the soldiers dubbed it, "MSG" -was never itself the objective of a major
battle and about the only time it made major news in Canada was in 2006 when an American
aircraft mistakenly opened fire on Canadians troops, killing one and wounding 38.
Yet located on the banks of the Arghandab River at the border between the notoriously
dangerous districts of Panjwaii and Zhari, MSG was at the epicentre of Canada's combat mission
in Afghanistan. Setting out from MSG daily, Canadians had the most deadly region of
Afghanistan to deal with, proudly upholding a Canadian Forces tradition of tackling the toughest
and often thankless assignments dating back to Vimy in the First World War and the Battle of
the Scheldt in the Second.
Our combat mission in Afghanistan formally came to an end on Tuesday when Canadians
handed over responsibility to U.S. troops. Fittingly, the ceremony took place at Ma'sum Ghar.
The Canadian flag came down, the American flag went up -but at least one reminder of Canada's
presence remains at the base: a giant red maple leaf that was painted on Ma'sum Ghar's craggy
hillside after the friendly-fire incident five years ago as a tribute to Canadian soldiers and a
visual aid for coalition pilots.
Other reminders of Canada's presence are scattered throughout Kandahar province and include
paved roads, irrigation projects, thriving local markets and thousands of children immunized
from disease.
Canada's goal in Afghanistan wasn't simply combat even though at its core the mission was
designed to protect our national interests by keeping Afghanistan from being a base for
international terrorism. By that measure, the mission has been a success.
As for paving roads and building schools, those are ancillary objectives -icing on the cake, really
-to the main goal of protecting Canadians and our allies. But even by that measure, Canada's
efforts have not been wasted.
We have paid a steep price in money spent but more importantly in the lives of 157 soldiers
killed and approximately 2,000 wounded. The combat mission was the right thing to do when we
first set foot in Afghanistan almost a decade ago and the transition to training the Afghan
National Army is the right thing to do now.
Afghanistan is certainly not out of the woods yet. It will take a generation to get the country
solidly on its feet. There are no easy answers or no quick solutions, no matter how frustrating
that is for Canadians back home. Pick a problem, whether it's economic reconstruction or poppy
eradication, and the results will be measured in decades, not months or even years.
To abandon Afghanistan now would be to turn our backs on our NATO allies and undermine the
work and sacrifice of so many of our fellow Canadians, not to mention failing in our official aim
to help the people of Afghanistan build a "viable country that is better governed, more peaceful
and more secure."
Our military mission in Afghanistan might have lacked the focus and drama of a Vimy Ridge or
a D-Day, but it was fought for many of the same reasons and by a new generation that is as
selfless as generations past.
Our mission is now moving from Kandahar to Kabul, from the battlefield to the training field.
Instead of 2,500 soldiers deployed, we'll have 950. We are staying in Afghanistan but in a much
reduced role in terms of size, cost and danger.
It won't be without risk but as the past nine years in Afghanistan have shown us, we don't lack
for brave men and women willing to put themselves in harm's way on our behalf.
Back to Top
Section: Editorials
Outlet: National Post
Illustrations:
 / Mumtaz Qadri, assassin of Salman Taseer
Headline: The new face of terror
Page: A10
Date: Wednesday 06 July 2011
Source: National Post
On Tuesday, Canada closed one chapter in the war on terror and opened another. First, in
Afghanistan, the Canadian 1st Battalion, Royal 22nd Regiment, handed over responsibility for
the Panjwaii District to the U.S. 3rd Battalion 21st Regiment, marking the end of Canada's
combat role in the region. Later that day, in Ottawa, the federal government formally listed the
Pakistani Taliban as a terrorist organization. According to news reports, the "stated goals" of the
Tehrik-e-Taliban, the Pakistani offshoot of the Taliban, include resistance to the country's
government, the draconian imposition of Sharia law and the waging of war against NATO forces
in Afghanistan.
These two events encapsulate a shift, not only for Canada, but for all other nations on the front
lines of the war on terror. For a number of years, those lines have been shifting southeast, from
Afghanistan to Pakistan. The country appears to have become the main staging area for terrorist
plots around the world and -despite the United States' assassination of Osama bin Laden in
Abbotabad -a new safe-haven for al-Qaeda.
According to a study released by the New America Foundation (reported in these pages today),
since 2004, 53% of terror plots worldwide involved jihadists trained in Pakistan, compared to 6%
in Yemen and 3% in Iraq. Pakistani jihadi groups directed 44% of the plots, while 6% were
directed from Yemen and 3% from Iraq.
And those plots may not just involve conventional weapons. On June 7, 2011, the Stockholm
International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) labelled Pakistan's nuclear program among the
fastest growing in the world and warned that part of the country's nuclear stockpile could well
fall into the hands of terrorist groups. It estimated that Pakistan has increased its stockpile of
weapons from 70 to 80 in 2010 to between 90 and 110 today, putting it on par with India and
escalating what amounts to a local arms race in the region.
SIPRI's concerns echo earlier warnings about the threat posed by Pakistan's nuclear program,
including fears expressed following the assassination of Punjab governor Salman Taseer by an
Islamic extremist in January 2011. On the New Yorker website, New America Foundation
president and CEO Steve Coll blogged: "Taseer's betrayal should give pause to those officials in
Washington who seem regularly to express complacency, or at least satisfaction, about the
security of Pakistan's arsenal."
Meanwhile, in April of this year, the Associated Press reported the rise of a new threat: the
Pakistani Lashkar-e-Taiba terror organization. According to the sources, the LeT has the
potential to outstrip al-Qaeda and, while it has focussed its efforts in South Asia, it appears
poised to expand is operations. According to Christine Fair, assistant professor at the Center for
Peace and Strategic Studies at Georgetown University in Washington, "Its literature has always
been about attacking the West. It is building the network that allows them to attack."
Pakistan-based terrorism has several Canadian connections. National Post journalist Stewart Bell
reports that Momin Khawaja, a Canadian convicted for his role in a terrorist group that plotted
attacks in the United Kingdom, travelled to Pakistan for training, as did one of the Toronto 18.
Last year the RCMP broke up an alleged terrorist plot with suspected links to the AfghanistanPakistan border region. On March 15, 2011, police charged two Winnipeg men with travelling to
Pakistan for terrorist training in 2007. And on June 10, a Chicago court found PakistaniCanadian Tawwahur Rana guilty of fomenting a terror plot against the Danish newspaper that
published cartoons of the prophet Muhammad -while acquitting him of participation in the 26/11
terror attacks in Mumbai, which killed 164 people in 2008.
While Canadian troops will no longer patrol Panjwaii, our intelligence forces now have a key
role to play in rooting out the latest threat to global -and Canadian -security. The war on terror
has shifted -and Pakistan is its new front line.
Back to Top
Section: Editorial
Outlet: The Chronicle-Herald
Headline: COMBAT MISSION ENDS; Canada did its duty
Page: A8
Date: Wednesday 06 July 2011
CANADA'S military involvement in Afghanistan didn't start five years ago and it doesn't stop
this week.
What Tuesday's handover ceremony at the base in Ma'sum Ghar - which formally passed
responsibility for the Kandahar battlefield from Canadian to U.S. forces - signified, however,
was the end of this country's five-year combat mission in the dangerous Taliban heartland.
Debate over whether the mission - and most hauntingly, the cost, in terms of the more than 150
soldiers' lives lost - was "worth it" will no doubt rage on for years.
One thing is certain. The men and women wearing the Maple Leaf who fought - knowing the
dangers - believed in the mission.
No one, moreover, knows how Afghanistan's story will yet end.
Can the Afghan government, weakened by corruption and infighting, stand on its own once
NATO countries pull out their troops? Will NATO-trained Afghan army and security forces be
able to keep the Taliban at bay on their own? Will the next phase in the West's plan to rescue
Afghanistan from failed-state status - building infrastructure, both human and material succeed?
The answers to such questions will take years to determine. And even then, they will inevitably
spawn more questions.
What can be said with certainty, however, is that Canada's troops performed their mission well,
made a real difference in their area of operation and leave having done their share - if not more as part of the NATO alliance called upon to confront the scourge of terrorism in the wake of 911.
The response of countries like Canada to that outrage, the boots on the ground in the dust of
Kandahar province, have shaped, while being a part of, the history of this conflict between
civilization and extremism.
Our troops served with distinction, earning praise from both coalition partners and the people
whose lives they were trying to improve.
Over the next three years, this country's commitment to Afghanistan will continue. About 950
troops, based in Kabul, are to help train Afghan military and security forces.
Though hopeful, we are under no illusions the future will be easy in that war-torn land.
Back to Top
Section: Issues & Ideas
Byline: Heidi Kingstone
Outlet: National Post
Illustrations:
 Paula Bronstein, Getty Images / Girls reading at the Markaz high school in Bamiyan,
Afghanistan, a region where both sexes can safely attend classes.
Headline: In Afghanistan, optimism in short supply
Page: A12
Date: Wednesday 06 July 2011
Source: National Post
At the same time that President Obama was announcing the drawdown of U.S. roops from
Afghanistan, I was aking my own personal drawown. After a year of living in abul I was moving
back to Lonon, U.K. My personal mission in fghanistan was accomplished. ime will tell if
NATO can eventully claim the same.
A popular route out of Kabul is through Dubai. At lunch the day after I arrived I met with two
prominent Afghans, one of whom had served as an advisor to the Foreign Ministry, the other a
successful businessman. Over the two hours we sat together in airconditioned bliss, and our
conversation centred on the future of Afghanistan. One was an eternal optimist, the other a
pessimist. In the complex jungle that is Afghan politics, the optimists are a more elusive breed.
There are some small glimmers of hope to be found: A select few major corporations are
investing in the country's mineral reserves, and new businesses are popping up all around Kabul.
But for too many leaders and ordinary people, both in Afghanistan and abroad, it is a country of
whatifs and disillusionment. Endless strategies are written, then buried amidst heaps of other
forgotten visions for success. Most are written by advisors who live cocooned in "poppy palace"
isolation, so far removed from the day-to-day reality of life in Afghanistan that they could be
writing their reports from almost anywhere.
The issues that plague Afghanistan -corruption, drugs, insecurity, unemployment, meddling
neighbours -are the same ones that have dogged the land-locked country for years. While there is
much excitement about talking to the Taliban, who will they talk to? The central Afghan
government has very little power, and is notoriously corrupt (the streets of Kabul are abuzz with
the latest scandal, which saw members of Karzai's inner circle pocket $900-million dollars). The
Taliban is strong and confident, and in large parts of the country instability has increased. They
run shadow governments in provinces where they had no presence only a few years ago. While a
"ring of steel" protects the reasonably safe capital, it is not immune from attack, as the recent
incursion at the Intercontinental Hotel proved. The city is not as secure and free as it was only a
few years ago.
Pakistan, of course, continues to hope for a Taliban victory, and expects that they will get it. This
will keep Afghanistan weak and isolated, which suits Pakistan's desire for a compliant
neighbour. This is opposed by the numerous Afghans, including many women, who hope to see
their country progress into a modern society, and fear the Taliban's brutal tactics.
What would make Afghanistan better? The belief is now that what the country needs is an
Afghan-led agenda. Afghans need to take charge of their affairs, with no interference from
regional and great powers trying to capitalize on Afghanistan's position as a transit country. The
focus is to find a political not military solution. This isn't exactly a new idea. When I interviewed
the head of the NATO forces, General Dan McNeill, in 2007, that was exactly what he said.
The mania to build up the Afghan security forces, the effort with which Canada is involved, has
one fundamental flaw -there is no stable, central government, or even a coherent society, for this
powerful military force to protect. If the international troops leave, Afghanistan would likely fall
into civil war again. Some experts can now foresee another solution: a contained stalemate,
where the strength of the local power brokers or warlords would remain undiminished to prevent
one ethnic or local group from seizing control of the state. It would be a well calibrated balance
of divide and rule, which is already in effect.
The outgoing U.S. ambassador, Karl Eikenberry, said recently that the Afghan situation was
fragile and reversible. He's more right than many want to admit. As my own plane took off from
Kabul, I recalled the famous war photograph of the last helicopter to leave Saigon as the city fell
to the North Vietnamese. Flying back into the 21st century, I had a sense that the people of the
country I was privileged to spend a year in had had the same thought, and were just waiting for
the end.
Back to Top
Section: Opinion
Headline: Afghanistan: first-hand reports say Canada has achieved a lot
Page: D5
Outlet: Times & Transcript (Moncton)
Date: Wednesday 06 July 2011
As Canadian troops' duties were further scaled back in Afghanistan this week, I read an
interesting interview with Dr. Toryalai Wisa, an Afghan-Canadian academic who oversees the
area our combat soldiers are pulling out of.
While Mr. Wisa said Afghan citizens are well aware of the work Canadians have done and the
sacrifices they've made, Canadian citizens at home have little sense of what their countrymen
and women have accomplished.
Mr. Wisa took part in an international conference in Montreal last month, only to discover that,
"The Canadians were not aware of what is (happening in Afghanistan) . . . The only news the
Canadians were getting was just explosions, death, killings, assassinations."
He told QMI Agency that Canadians have built and refurbished schools, paved roads and been
involved in irrigation and dam projects.
Mr. Wisa makes a good point.
I can't speak for everyone, of course, but I rarely hear folks chit-chatting about wars overseas like
they do weather, traffic and other more local issues. It's easy to get wrapped up in our own
worlds. And personally, I find it easy to gloss over news from Afghanistan, as it blends with
headlines from other war-torn countries and never seems to end. But there are positive nuggets to
be found here and there.
While I certainly don't support war, I've found it interesting that the few times I've spoken with
people who've visited with troops in Afghanistan, they held the unshakeable belief that Canadian
troops were leaving behind a positive legacy.
In 2007, I spoke with two Nova Scotia musicians who had visited Canadian soldiers to entertain
them and both expressed essentially the same sentiments. In fact, both said the experience was
life-changing.
Cape Breton multi-instrumentalist J.P. Cormier visited Afghanistan in 2007 as part of a tour
organized by Garrison Hill Entertainment, a company owned by Great Big Sea's Bob Hallett and
former Moncton resident Shelley Chase (now living in Newfoundland). The group was sent over
to entertain Canadian troops in the country.
"It was a life-altering experience," Mr. Cormier told me. "It's something I would suggest for just
about everybody. We should all be able to see what our troops are doing on the ground when
they're working. It would probably put a stop to all the naysaying that they shouldn't be there."
After seeing what the Armed Forces were doing in Afghanistan, J.P. said there was no question
in his mind that "they should be there."
"If we're not there, we're going to have trouble here down the road. We are saving lives there
daily. And those poor people, it's unbelievable how they have to live."
Another time, I spoke with Matt Minglewood, who had just released a new song titled Kandahar,
written after his own performance for Canadian troops in Afghanistan in 2005.
"That was kind of a life-changing experience," he said. "You read in the news and watch in the
news how people live in other parts of the world. But you don't really get it until you're there. No
matter what your beliefs about whether they should be there or not there, it's the fact that they are
there. And the attitude that they have is very special. They really do want to help these people."
This week, Canadian troops' duties in Afghanistan were scaled back as Royal 22e Regiment
battle group handed over responsibility for the Panjwaii region to a U.S. infantry battalion from
Alaska.
While some of our soldiers remain for now, the bulk of the Canadian Armed Forces have
apparently already returned to Kandahar Airfield or Canada, and all of them will be gone from
Kandahar before the end of the month, ahead of a deadline set by the government three years
ago.
A Postmedia News story described the landscape in Panjwaii as "very different" than the early
days of the mission. Canada had combat responsibility not just for Panjwaii, which is to the west
of Kandahar City, but the entire Kandahar province beginning in 2006, trying to secure an area
described as "the size of New Brunswick" with about 1,500 combat troops.
Over time, Canada's area of operations rapidly shrunk until it only included Panjwaii, when U.S.
forces flooded into the south in 2009 and 2010. This resulted in a string of battlefield successes
across the south, including Panjwaii, as well as a sharp increase in the number of roads built and
schools opened.
The transfer of Canada's entire battle space is scheduled to take place tomorrow and Canada's
focus in Afghanistan will continue to shift to a training mission that will last until 2014.
Meanwhile, stories continue to trickle out, reflecting back on Canadian influence on the land the battles held and lives lost, but also the positive stories, such as infrastructure built and
anecdotes about Canadian soldiers mentoring Afghan troops.
We should all make more of an effort to be aware of the influence our countrymen and women
are having around the world.
n City Views appears daily, written by various members of our staff. Eric Lewis is a reporter
with the Times &Transcript. His column appears every Wednesday.
Back to Top
Section: News
Outlet: National Post
Illustrations:
 Richard Johnson, National Post / Captain Adam Siokalo and his squadron were focused on
building a new road through the Horn of Panjwaii, but also conducted operations against
insurgents.
Headline: 'They asked us to remove he insurgents - so we did'
Page: A9
Date: Wednesday 06 July 2011
Source: National Post
ADAM SIOKALO, 30, CAPTAIN, 12TH ARMOURED REGIMENT, CFB VALCARTIER.
FIRST DEPLOYMENT TO AFGHANISTAN.
My squadron has conducted many operations throughout Panjwaii but we were mostly focused
on building the new road through the Horn of Panjwaii. We were the command-and-control
element for this operation as well as the protection and strike capability for the construction of
the route itself for five months.
When the rains came in mid-February, most wheeled vehicles were bogged down by the thick
mud and flooding. The fact our Leopard 2 A4M and A6M tanks are tracked allowed us to
continue operating on and off road.
We used the occasional pause in construction to further influence the surrounding population and
villages. We conducted operations in which we would follow in the insurgents' lines of
communications to their safe houses, caches and meeting points.
One such operation took place on Feb. 17 in the village of Koshkak.
The new road ran a few hundred metres south of the village and in the weeks prior, numerous
improvised explosive devices (IEDs) had been planted on the road. Civilian contractors' trucks
were also coming under small arms fire east of the village.
We learned from Afghan National Army (ANA) patrols that defensive IED belts had been placed
on roads outside several compounds in the village to protect them.
Residents also told us insurgents had forcibly evicted several families from these compounds and
were using them as an operations base.
They asked us to remove the insurgents -so we did.
At sunrise on Feb. 17, our combat team left the forward operating base at Masum Ghar and
headed west toward Koshkak. We split into two forces to surround the village.
The main force -Canadian tanks, infantry, combat engineers and Afghan National Police (ANP) would approach from the north via the Arghandab riverbed.
The second force, of which I was a part -ANA infantry, Canadian tanks and an artillery forward
observation party -came by road to the southern portion of the village. We established fire and
blocking positions facing the insurgent compound so we could respond if the main force was
attacked.
Within five minutes of the main force entering the village, it discovered an IED on the road and
several IED components in a small abandoned hut close by.
Most of the village was cleared without incident. Residents told us the insurgents had left.
When the two forces met up at the south end of the village, a tank with mine-rollers was sent to
roll and prove the terrain around the insurgent compound.
On one pass, it struck an IED 10 metres from my position. The explosion was so violent it blew
the track off the tank, sending pieces flying in every direction.
Because I was so close, I wasn't sure whether an IED or anti-tank weapon had caused the
damage, but seeing the yellow and black smoke billowing beneath the vehicle I quickly realized
it was an IED and sent a situation report over the radio to the rest of the combat team.
Everyone was quick to respond and the training took over.
Another tank cleared a safe path for our counter-IED team to the damaged tank, while the rest of
the combat team adopted an all-round defence.
Our ambulance crew and armoured recovery vehicle sprang into action as they extracted the
injured driver from the tank. A medevac was called and he was quickly flown to the hospital at
Kandahar Airfield.
The mission continued, with the ANP supported by engineers entering the insurgent compound
complex to clear it.
The insurgents had left as reported, but without all the weapons and equipment they had been
using against us.
We found lots of weapons, along with a cache of illegal fertilizer and several blocks of
explosives, mines, grenades, assault rifles, anti-tank weapons, rockets, thousands of rounds of
ammunition and IED components.
The compound later became the site of an ANP checkpoint. The insurgents were driven out of
the village and there were no incidents along what had been a dangerous stretch of road.
This may not have been one of the times where we rushed in a blaze of glory and tank fire to the
aid of coalition forces pinned down by the enemy or took a large group of insurgents prisoners,
but it will be a day that stands out in my mind as a day our entire combat team effortlessly
worked as one to complete a mission, a day that we forever disrupted insurgent operations in that
area and a day that we brought peace and security to a small village in the Horn of Panjwaii.
Back to Top
Section: News
Outlet: National Post
Illustrations:
 Richard Johnson, National Post / Master Bombadier Nicholas Gunton separated a shoulder,
broke a thumb, fractured three ribs and sprained a knee when a Chinook helicopter crashed.
Headline: 'Crash got me a ticket home'
Page: A9
Date: Wednesday 06 July 2011
Source: National Post
NICHOLAS GUNTON, 28, MASTER BOMBARDIER, CFB VALCARTIER
If I had to recall a difficult day in Afghanistan, it would be the Chinook crash that got me a ticket
home recently.
I am a forward air controller, so it is my job to guide and control everything that flies, whether it
be movement or strike on targets.
We were going on a mission in the southwest tip of the Horn of Panjwaii. Our small unit was
being flown in at night, but as everyone on the choppers had already done this type of mission,
we weren't too nervous.
On the approach to the LZ [landing zone], we dropped down to follow the contours of the earth
to avoid enemy detection. As we approached, I felt a large bump and impact that threw me
forward.
Suddenly, there was a loud noise and we were thrown around the inside of the Chinook like rag
dolls. Keep in mind, when going on a mission, we are loaded up to 80 to 100 pounds more than
our body weight.
I was knocked out. After I came to, I realized we had crashed. There was a lot of yelling and
cries for help. I was trapped and could not move, and the smell of gas filled the chopper.
I tried to pull myself up with my left arm, but I had no strength. Finally, I gave it another shot
and was able to bring myself up to my knees, stand up and get out.
Then, I dropped my backpack and started helping others. We regrouped 100 metres behind the
chopper.
I knew right away that we were in a bad place for an ambush, so I started talking on the radio to
the choppers and jets that were overhead. I gave all the aircraft a specific task and sector to
observe for the enemy.
Later on, I guided all the medevac landings, as well as reinforcements from Kandahar Airfield
[KAF], a small American force in two Black Hawks.
I was controlling 18 different planes flying overhead, and the whole time, I had a lot of pain in
my left shoulder, left knee and left thumb.
I did this for 16 hours, keeping the exterior cordon 360 degrees around us safe from ambush.
When it was time to get out, I was lucky to get a ride in a vehicle to a small position northwest of
the crash site. There I was looked over by their medic and later hopped into another vehicle to
take us to another position for extraction. On the way there, the vehicle in front of us hit an
improvised explosive device, but luckily the IED did not function the way intended.
When I finally arrived at my forward operating base, the medics looked at me and called for a
medevac. At KAF, they found my shoulder was separated, I'd broken my left thumb, fractured
three ribs and sprained my knee -not bad for one day.
Two days after this, I was repatriated to Canada. Now I have lots of physiotherapy to do, but at
least I am here to tell one hell of a story.
Back to Top
Section: Canada & World
Byline: Barbara Yaffe
Outlet: Vancouver Sun
Headline: The F-35 is the wrong plane for the job in Canada, Washington think-tank says
Page: B3
Date: Wednesday 06 July 2011
Source: Vancouver Sun
Stephen Harper's new majority government is now free to proceed with the purchase of a fleet of
costly new fighter jets.
Since the May 2 election the topic has been all but dropped by both New Democrat and Liberal
opponents of the extravagant F-35s.
But a prominent Washington, D.C.-based policy institute has reignited the issue this week by
releasing a paper that argues the jets are impractical for Canada.
The Council on Hemispheric Affairs' paper -titled F-35, An Expensive Mistake for Canadian
Forces -argues: "The F-35 is unsuitable for Canadian military operations and marks an
unfortunate shift in Canadian foreign policy toward single-mindedly backing the U.S. military."
We've all seen this movie before. Back in 1993, then Opposition leader Jean Chretien criticized
the Brian Mulroney government for a plan to purchase EH-101 helicopters to replace Canada's
aging Sea Kings.
Chretien asserted the EH-101s were Cadillacs when Canada required only Chevrolets and, after
winning power, cancelled the deal.
The deluxe choppers were to cost $4.8 billion, a tab that now appears modest as Conservatives
prepare to replace the country's CF-18s with 65 fighter jets carrying a price tag of between $14.7
billion and $29.3 billion.
That cost range is cited by the Council on Hemispheric Affairs as being disturbing, reflecting a
difference between a higher estimate provided by Canada's parliamentary budget officer and a
lower one cited by the Defence Department.
"Is the glamour of the F-35 worth the expense?" asks the council, a non-profit, non-partisan
research organization.
Make no mistake, the new planes reflect "the next generation in technological advancement in
avionics and stealth fighter capability" and they'd be "an amazing piece of engineering
technology."
Harper has insisted the F-35 is the only fighter available that serves the purposes that Canada's
military requires and would allow this country to enjoy interoperability with the Americans and
NATO allies.
But is it the right aircraft for Canada?
Council research associate Ivan Ho contends that, unless the Conservatives plan to shift to an
interventionist foreign policy similar to the U.S., it is not.
Canada simply does not require stealth jets, generally deployed in the first stages of an air
campaign to neutralize an enemy's air-defence system.
"The F-35 was built to fulfil a niche role in the American military to conduct first strike
capability."
With a less sexy aircraft, Canada could still be fully capable of helping NATO with subsequent
non-stealth bombing, the paper states.
Another Canadian task of the new fighter jets would to safeguard Arctic territory from Russian
attack.
But, realistically, "the fear that Russia would launch an aerial attack on North America is an
outdated [Cold War] notion." More likely, any attacking Russians would deploy intercontinental
and submarinelaunched ballistic missiles.
The question arises from any debate about fighter jets as to whether Canada is blindly following
the Yanks or carving out its own relevance in the world.
The Council on Hemispheric Affairs argues that, with its limited defence budget, Canada would
be better off choosing less militaristic missions, focusing on disaster and humanitarian relief,
peacekeeping missions, search and rescue activity and patrols along Canada's three coasts.
It's particularly important that the public familiarize itself with the ongoing debate over the
purchase of the F-35s.
With a majority in Parliament, the Conservatives cannot be thwarted by their political opposition
and now are entirely free to spend the money.
The only impediment that could get in their way at this point is a public groundswell against the
purchase.
byaffe@vancouversun.com
Back to Top
Section: none
Outlet: WINNIPEG FREE PRESS
Headline: Dikes withstand latest crest on Souris - Soldiers saluted for; last-minute building blitz
Page: A4
Date: Wednesday 06 July 2011
SOURIS -- As the latest Souris River crest passed through Souris overnight, it appeared the dikes
would hold after all. "We're feeling pretty comfortable that we have done what we set out to do,
which is fight the flood," Souris Mayor Darryl Jackson said.
"The forecast was downgraded so the two feet of freeboard we had became four feet. Had we
gotten an inch of rain, one inch of rain turns into one inch of water in the river because of
saturation."
"After all the surprises we've had since April 9, this was a really good surprise to get," Jackson
said.
That's still enough water to cause problems, but given the hard work of volunteers, the military
and civic and provincial staff, the dikes have been built high enough to protect the town. That
said, the normally lazy Souris River has a record 27 feet of water in -- and out -- of its banks in
July, when the previous 1976 record was set during spring runoff.
"We're going to have high water for some time," Jackson said. The news that Souris is likely to
remain dry came as a comfort to military personnel who finished building large earth dikes along
the Plum Creek and the Souris River on Monday.
"When the soldiers came on Saturday afternoon, they were ready to get right at the job," said Lt.Col. Michael Wright, commanding officer of the 2nd Battalion, Princess Patricia's Canadian
Light Infantry.
"Frankly, they attacked the problem like they would attack the Taliban overseas and luckily we
were able to get it done before the crest came."
Wright said the experience also helped his men develop relationships with Canada's civilian
population by showing them the work they do.
"Here, people can see the tangible benefits," Brandon-Souris Conservative MP Merv Tweed said.
"We don't see what happens in Afghanistan but a lot of good is being done. Here, we see our
men and women in women in uniform making a difference in communities."
The soldiers were officially thanked by area dignitaries, which included Brandon East NDP
MLA Drew Caldwell.
"On behalf of a grateful province, thank you," Caldwell told Wright at the ceremony.
Other good news on Tuesday came when the Souris Health Centre returned to full operation,
including its emergency room.
A steady stream of volunteers who worked to shore up dikes in advance of the crest headed to
the Souris fire hall for lunch provided by the community on Tuesday.
"It's been a long, hard process but I think it's gone well," said Todd Walker, an evacuee who
donned an orange vest and helped with the flood fight.
"We are fortunate because our residence is higher up and I can help out with the ones in greater
need. I haven't had any water in my basement, so I've been very lucky."
Once the Souris River crests, a sustained period of high water is expected for about a week
before the river will start to drop.
As the situation came under control in Souris, officials turned back to the Red River.
Infrastructure Minister Steve Ashton said officials will raise the gates of the Red River Floodway
on Thursday in a bid to lower the Red River in Winnipeg by 0.7 feet.
"We will perform a minor operation of the floodway to alleviate water levels in the city," Ashton
said Tuesday.
"This will not have any negative impacts on upstream communities and it's expected to be short
in duration."
The Red River is at higher levels than usual within Winnipeg for this time of year and there is
concern that heavy rainfall could cause sewer backups and flooded basements.
The Red River at James Avenue is at 17.5 feet, with a flow of 50,000 cfs, said Steve Topping,
executive director of Manitoba Water Stewardship.
-- Brandon Sun, with staff files
c_
{Souris MB}
Back to Top
Section: News
Outlet: Windsor Star
Headline: Six injured fighting flood
Page: D8
Date: Wednesday 06 July 2011
Dateline: SOURIS, MAN.
Source: Postmedia News
Six people, including five soldiers, who were injured when a hydraulic line on a dump truck
blew during efforts to fight flooding in Manitoba this week have been released from hospital.
The soldiers, plus a volunteer, were sent to hospital Monday after being sprayed with hydraulic
fluid when a mechanism on a dump truck blew while unloading sandbags. They were released
within hours.
It's believed that one soldier, who was transported by air ambulance, had the potentially toxic
fluid sprayed in his eyes. Canadian Forces spokesman Fraser Logan said he did not have
information on the specific injures suffered, other than they were not deemed serious. He added
all those affected were back to helping out in the flood-fighting mission.
"I think it was just precautions more than anything else," he said of the injured being rushed to
hospital.
The Souris River in southwestern Manitoba is overflowing its banks for the third time this year.
It's expected to crest within the next two days. About 190 people in Souris, Man., a town of
1,800, have been forced to leave their homes.
The cost of fighting floods in Manitoba this year is expected to surpass $550 million.
Back to Top
Section: Columns
Outlet: WINNIPEG FREE PRESS
Headline: Let's throw a party to show troops how thankful we are Page: A4
Date: Wednesday 06 July 2011
What's the best way to thank a bunch of people who broke their backs to save your province? Do
you hold a parade? Organize a street party? Treat them to a good meal or a weekend at the
Winnipeg Folk Festival? Do you give them the key to the city or the Order of the Buffalo Hunt?
Or do you let them slide out of town without making a big noise?
For the soldiers who worked through countless cool nights and muggy days, who sandbagged at
Hoop and Holler, in Souris and points between, the answer is obvious. Other than a token thanks,
these men and women are returning to their bases without much fuss.
That's not to say the communities they helped haven't loved them up. They have. They worked
side by side with the soldiers. They cooked them wonderful meals and toasted them with bottles
of cold beer.
Brig.-Gen. Paul Wynnyk, the commanding officer of Joint Task Force West, joked that the early
wave of troops had been too well-treated during their stay.
"Wherever they went they were warmly received, warmly greeted and quite frankly, overfed," he
said.
On May 20, Premier Greg Selinger held a small ceremony outside the Manitoba legislature.
"Without the additional support we had from the troops, it's quite likely that we would have seen
a good chunk of southern Manitoba under water," he said.
About 1,700 troops and seven aircraft were deployed to Manitoba in early May. Most left, but
some stayed to sandbag or shore up dikes.
Another 400 soldiers were called in to Souris on the weekend, working desperately to save the
town. Their efforts ended successfully on Tuesday, although the town doesn't consider itself out
of the woods. Selinger visited Souris Tuesday afternoon to offer more thanks.
"Flood-fighting is difficult and dangerous work," he said. "Yesterday, we were reminded of that
when several soldiers and one volunteer were injured while working to protect Manitobans from
the rising Souris River. To those injured, our thoughts are with you and your families as we wish
you a full and speedy recovery.
"To everyone who has worked so hard to protect the community of Souris from this
unprecedented natural disaster, thank you on behalf of all Manitobans."
Good for Selinger. He needed to step up and express gratitude on behalf of all of us. But it still
seems small.
During the 1997 Flood of the Century, more than 8,500 military personnel came to Manitoba to
save us from the water. They protected us, something they have sworn to do. There was a keen
comfort in seeing them ably at work.
Susan Thompson, mayor at the time, held a parade for them. So why not hold another one?
Yes, they are just doing their jobs. Yes, they are paid and those are your tax dollars at work. And,
yes, there were hundreds of civilians who also sandbagged. So what?
Why can't we properly salute our military? Is part of it the Canadian discomfort with most things
military? Is it because we expect this from them?
We're Manitobans. We know how to party. We also know how to say thank you. We owe them
this much.
They have done a tremendous service over this difficult flood season.
They helped save the province. Someone should strike up the band, grab a kielbasa and get this
party started.
lindor.reynolds@freepress.mb.ca
Back to Top
Section: News
Byline: Chris Zdeb
Outlet: Windsor Star
Illustrations:
 Postmedia Files / Cpl. Mark Fuchko, who lost both of his legs while fighting in Afghanistan, is
going to attempt to climb Mount Kilimanjaro.
Headline: War amputee to climb Kilimanjaro; Climbers raising money for hospital
Page: D8
Date: Wednesday 06 July 2011
Dateline: EDMONTON
Source: PostmediaNews
When he lost both legs below the knee in an explosion while on duty in Afghanistan, Cpl. Mark
Fuchko thought his life was over and there would be no more "cool things" he could do.
Three years later, the Calgary soldier is getting ready to climb Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania on
two artificial limbs.
"I'm extremely stubborn," he said in an interview Monday at Edmonton Garrison. "I want to
make it to the top of this mountain and I don't care if I have to climb on all fours, with two
broken artificial limbs, I will make it to the top."
Fuchko, 27, is one of four wounded soldiers and 34 doctors, professionals and business leaders
who will be in Tanzania from Aug. 8 to 19 to climb the highest mountain in Africa at 19,340 feet
and raise more than $575,000 for the new state-of-the-art Orthopedic Surgery Centre at the
Royal Alexandra Hospital in Edmonton. "The centre rebuilds knees and hips and I'm going to
require new hips in future," he said. "I just jumped at the chance (to be part of the climb), I
couldn't say no."
The other soldiers climbing Kilimanjaro are Warrant Officer Quinn Beggs, Cpl. Lucas Mullens,
26, and Cpl. Dallas White, 22, who have all suffered series leg injuries in blasts while patrolling
in Kandahar province, Afghanistan.
All climbers must pay their own costs of the trip plus each raise at least $5,000. The soldiers'
costs were covered by the Soldier On Fund, which provides financial sports grants to injured or
ill Canadian Forces personnel or former personnel.
Back to Top
Section: News
Lead: OTTAWA -- The price of giving regular shlubs the chance to catch a glimpse of Will and
Kate on Canada Day accounts for a full third of the estimated $1.2-million Canadian tour cost.
Headline: Tab fit for a king
Page: 37
Byline: DANIEL PROUSSALIDIS, PARLIAMENTARY BUREAU
Outlet: The Toronto Sun
Date: Wednesday 06 July 2011
OTTAWA -- The price of giving regular shlubs the chance to catch a glimpse of Will and Kate
on Canada Day accounts for a full third of the estimated $1.2-million Canadian tour cost.
Canada Day events for the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge amounted to $400,000, according to
a newly revealed line-by-line cost estimate.
A Calgary reception for about 800 guests is expected to cost $150,000.
Photography, videography and translation for the tour add more than $75,000 to the bill
Canadian taxpayers will have to cover.
In documents obtained under the Access to Information Act by researcher Ken Rubin, flowers
for the royal couple ring in at an estimated $775, while Prince William's personal Canadian flag
carries a $3,400 price tag.
The Prince Edward Island, Quebec, Alberta and Northwest Territories governments will help
cover the costs associated with the portions of the tour in their jurisdictions.
Still, the federal government's $1.2-million estimate doesn't cover all the tour costs.
What the tour will cost the Department of National Defence, Parks Canada and Heritage Canada
hasn't been calculated yet.
The RCMP is accompanying Will and Kate everywhere across Canada, but says it has no cost
estimate and won't know the final bill until after the royals have left.
--Royal tour's royal price tagQMI AGENCYTotal cost:
$1.2M
Dry Run of Royal Visit:
$53,334
Calgary Reception with 800 guests: $150,000
Personal Canadian Flag for Duke of Cambridge: $3,400
Canada Day events: $400,000
Official photographer: $25,000
Videographer: $25,000
Public Works Event Management Services: $300,000
Hospitality flowers for arrival and departure: $775
Back to Top
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