Apparently I'm not the only one who's noticed that lately every time someone sticks a microphone in Rick Hillier's face he does his best impression of George Bush. The Globe and Mail today has a piece that demonstrates how politicians and defence analysts are jumping at the opportunity to back Hillier up even while others are criticizing his blunt talk.
One of Hillier's statements that's up for discussion is this:
We are the Canadian Forces, and our job is to be able to kill people.
I don't quarrel with that as far as it goes. If you're going to have a military then it seems to me that expertise in the application of lethal force is a desirable quality for them to have. Perhaps it's not the only one but it's pretty high up on the list.
But I'm a bit more concerned with the way Hillier seems to regurgitate the Bush administration's black and white view of the world.
These are detestable murderers and scumbags, I'll tell you that right up front. They detest our freedoms, they detest our society, they detest our liberties.
Understanding your enemy should be a part of preparing to engage them. The more you understand them, the better you'll be able to analyze and anticipate their strategy and thwart their goals. Parroting the Bushies' "they hate our freedoms" blather doesn't look to me like understanding. It looks like "kill them all and let God sort them out".
It's true that Canadian forces are about to deploy to an area where they'll meet some nasty people. They're also deploying to an area where it can be tough to tell the difference between friend and foe. Innocent Afghanis have already been detained, imprisoned, abused and even murdered while in custody and the Bush administration has been content to shrug it all off, point to a few bad apples and insist "But we're at war dammit! They hate our freedoms!".
Considering recent events, and the fact that almost four years after 9/11 Osama Bin Laden still hasn't been smoked out of his hole, it's by no means a given that Bush's conduct of his War on Terror™ has done more good than harm. I'm assuming that with their new mission, Canadian soldiers are about to start taking casualties in Afghanistan to a greater degree than they have up until this point and that part of the reason for Hillier's public comments is to prepare us for that fact. I'd like to think that sacrifice will have a purpose, that it will accomplish something constructive rather than making a bad situation worse. Having the supreme commander of our military adopt the swagger and simplistic view of a faux cowboy president who has repeatedly demonstrated that his mendacity far outweighs any real commitment to ending terrorism doesn't inspire a lot of confidence in me.
Good on General Hillier. I was just as surprised as you at his comments, and I support him 100%.
Thats the last thing we need. To barrel in there guns a blazin shootin every last nasty murderous scumbag we see.
You cannot stop violence with more violence. And you cannot stop terrorism using conventional methods, it will only make their (the terrorists)idealogical hatred more popular amongst the people that you are "fighting to save from terrorism".
Im all for peacekeeping. Even bustin a cap in some legitimately "evil people". But as Canadians i think it is our job to be on the forefront of progressive ideas on how to correctly deal with terrorism. We must reamin rational in an irrational world.
"For every complex problem there is a simple and easy solution. And its wrong."
-Unkown
Slim,
"You cannot stop violence with more violence."
Sure you can. Wanna play 'pick a war'?
"And you cannot stop terrorism using conventional methods..."
I'll agree to that though.
I think pogge makes a good point here.
I suspect they'd be less open to criticism if these sharp comments only implied, as Jack Layton suggested, 'the passion that underlies the mission that front-line personnel are going to be taking on.'
Yet, I think Hillier's explicit link between the terrible events in London and what his troops will be up against in Afghanistan raises questions about his analysis: "The London attack actually tells us once more: We can't let up," he told reporters on Thursday."
Now, is he just saying, 'We can't let up and have to keep working on all fronts, including the military, to reduce terrorism'? Or is he buying into some simplistic notion of a 'War on Terror,' as though some amount of military action in Afghanistan or Iraq could stop what happened in London.
I'm not doubting the General's motives or intentions, nor the valour of his troops, but I wonder if it's worth pointing out that 'War' was declared on 'terror' over two decades ago, during the Reagan administration.
Maybe it's time for a re-think.
"We are the Canadian Forces, and our job is to be able to kill people."
Wow. That was a pretty brutally honest comment. I don't think the number 1# job should be to kill people, but defend Canada. Obviously "kill[ing] people" might be part of that. Wow, i'm just amazed that he said it like that.
D
There was a lot of initial enthusiasm for Hillier from most quarters and it looks like some of the bloom is off the rose. Some honest talk about war is to be appreciated after the babbling buffoons from the south but I was surprised (and not pleasantly) at Hillier's parroting of those same buffoons. The cowboy mentality gets people killed - usually your own.
Good post pogge :)
I share your concerns but I worry that we are expecting a lot from a *soldier*. They're not politicians, intellectuals or historians. Its their job to talk the gruff talk, keep the morale high and depending on the person, to spout off about the necessity of deploying immediately.
I think that's where the saying, "war is too important to leave to the generals" come's in...
But that's what bothers me most, Peter: General Hillier is not supposed to be a politician; in his job he is surely supposed to be smart enough to grasp the dangers of politicizing the military, and yet he did it.
Layton's bland reaction bothered me too: the same day that the Globe reported his sleepy non-reaction, it ran seven (out of nine on the topic) letters opposing Hillier's macho posturing and his parroting of the Bush administration line on terrorism, and they were fine letters, witty, fact-filled, that left both Layton and Hillier in the dust.
The whole of Central Asia, all the Stans, including Afghanistan, are at the centre of a rising confrontation between superpowers, maybe a three-way confrontation this time. No one in the Bush administration has demonstrated the slightest grasp of how those societies work or the slightest interest in genuinely helping to stabilize them. And yet the Canadian government has decided to rubber-stamp its way into this cynical adventure.
It was Timmy the G who wrote the post on this blog about the Flypaper Strategy but he pretty much covered my sentiments.
Part of my concern with Hillier's comments is that he seems to be buying into that theory - that we're turning up the heat in Afghanistan as retribution for what 4 Brits of Pakistani heritage did in London. I have trouble thinking of a better way to convince Afghanis that this deployment has nothing to do with them and that their country has been turned into a battlefield for our own reasons.
Some of the enemy our troops will face will be al-Qaeda, whatever they are. But some will be Taliban and they don't give a damn about Canadian freedoms or Canadian society. They want control of Afghanistan and their strategy and tactics will be fixed on that goal. Pretending that this is all about London isn't just "gruff", it's either stupidity or conscious dishonesty.
Or does Hillier - and by extension our government - think that they have to misdirect in order to make Canadian casualties palatable to the folks at home?
Seems to me that some people in the Airborne had this kind of attitude, too. It didn't do us any particular good. The country and the army don't need another Somalia-style unit with attitude.
There is no army in the world which is smarter or better trained than our guys are. They don't need this boastful attitude to get the job done.
Hillier did not say that the, "number one job is killing people." He said that the, "number one job is to be able to kill people." That's a distinction I often see ignored. Even above.
I agree with this statement, and I admire the forthright honesty it takes to say it. That is what armed forces are for. The army is put in harms way to protect innocent citizens and to bring the ability to kill the enemy to the battlefield. Whatever form that enemy takes, and wherever that battlefield is, that is what they are for.
But I dont appreciate his statement, "They detest our freedoms, they detest our society, they detest our liberties." That is narrow minded and simplistic.
There are many poeple the world over who have freedom and liberty. To the terrorists who brought down the WTC, or the ones who bombed the London Transit, these are not their targets. To say that they merely, "hate our freedoms" is to ignore their true motives. It is a way of deliberately misunderstanding the enemy, and it is the path to failure.
"We are going to Afghanistan to actually take down the folks that are trying to blow up men and women," Gen. Hillier said.
That statement sounds like the kind of thing you say when you want to contextualize (and perhaps soften) your previous statement. Without going into the attack in London, remember that this sort of thing is happening in Afghanistan right now. The Taliban want back in in Kabul and are destabilizing the current UN-sanctioned government to undermine its credibility. I imagine (hope) Hillier is talking about attacks on Afghani civilians and police, and the stated mission of the UN force to thwart them from taking the country back.
As for the other thing he said about them hating our freedoms, that smells as bad coming out of Hillier's mouth as it does from a two-bit freeper.
Afghanistan and all the other 'Stans' are a crucial area for oil and access to the Caspian Sea--nothing to do with bin Laden, hating our 'freedoms'(when was the last time we were 'free')or anything else. The Liberals and their mouthpiece Hillier pretend to detest the Americans while emulating them and giving Canada to them on a platter. We are such pliable fools. But not to worry, once the Liberals ahve finished preparing us 'psychologically' we won't know any better than to follow Bush and Martin over the cliff--except they won't fall, just us and our children--they will be standing aside telling us how good we have it.
no kidding pogge! i had these very thoughts listening to him, myself. it's like a virus that just keeps mutating and circulating... the Bush Admin virus. how unfortunate....
detesting our freedoms... i would argue that this isn't a simpleton retort at all - man, its a packed statement. it is intended to distract, substantiate and mislead in the most complex manner. yes, if taken at face value as if devised conversationally it reflects an utter lack of intellectual capacity, but such a phrase is crafted to influence a specific sociological climate - not to explain or describe anything at all. it is highly politically motivated and constructed tactically.
the worst of it is, that among many of our western nations - the tactic is working.