Q & R : Desmond Morton et la situation de la mission canadienne en Afghanistan

McGill professor emeritus of history Desmond Morton is a military historian and author of more than 40 books on politics, industrial relations and military history. A Rhodes Scholar, he is a graduate of the Collège Militaire Royal de St-Jean, the Royal Military College of Canada, the University of Oxford (where he received his PhD) and the London School of Economics. He spent ten years in the Canadian Army prior to beginning his teaching career.

Q. There were eight Canadian soldiers killed by roadside bombs in Afghanistan in one recent week, making it the deadliest for Canadian Forces in more than 50 years. NATO is now admitting that we’re seeing a Taliban spring offensive. How serious is this?

A. There never was any doubt that the Taliban would return from their safe base in Pakistan, exploiting the widespread resentment of a violent foreign presence, a corruptible and ineffective imported Afghan National Police and their own terror-spreading reputation.

Q. General Romeo Dallaire said recently that international responsibility is no longer just about foreign aid and missionaries, that it demands “sweat, gritted teeth, and sometimes the blood of our young people.” Do you agree that Canada’s notion of its role in the world has yet to catch up with reality?

A. Having been a personal victim of the unrealism of Canadians and their leaders about so-called peacekeeping, General Dallaire speaks with knowledge and feeling. The notion that Canada was a peacekeeping neutral was exploded by Sean Mahoney's book on Canada's peacekeeping role during the Cold War. As an historian, I believe that we should understand our links to 19th century European colonizers, bringing our ideas and our "civilization" to a seemingly benighted world. Our ancestors set us an example of arrogant benevolence. We follow the practice and forget the source.

Q. In a world of non-state actors, insurgencies, warlords, corruption and civil wars, what are our options?

A. Yes, the world seems different but none of these phenomena is at all new. Afghanistan embodies all of them and has for centuries. What is new is electronic media which bring news and images from anywhere in the world to our bedrooms in real time. It took a month for British audiences in 1841 to know that their army of 20,000 soldiers, their families and camp followers had been destroyed between Kabul and Jellalabad. Our direct, immediate involvement in the issues and catastrophes of the world is the biggest change, and its most obvious consequences are the participation of vastly more people in policy decisions they, like the much smaller number of 19th century politicians, seldom studied or understood.

Q. NATO’s mixed mission of reconstruction and security has led to confusion among Afghanis; when Canadian troops show up, are they there to deliver flour or engage Taliban? Is part of the problem that military strategy hasn’t evolved?

A. Politicians in Ottawa insist that aid and defence be intertwined, creating confusion and limiting aid in areas that tribal patterns, distance or terrain render inaccessible to the Taliban. Southern border provinces have little chance to see that peace brings benefits. The U.S doctrine of “Three Block War,” near-simultaneous delivery of fighting, recuperation and reconstruction, may be impossible even if it sounds appealing. Those who are “reconstructed” become Quislings when the Taliban reappear. Do we have to remember how the French Resistance treated collaborators in 1944-45? And how far can NATO troops win hearts and minds unless they really understand the culture and even the language of the people they are trying to win over? How can the best CIMIC (Civil-Military Cooperation) team perform if a related agency is destroying a peasant economy based on poppy production? Imagine your feelings when your little son comes home with a bright new Canadian schoolbag and some candy, having toddled past some of your pro-Taliban neighbours. Will you be punished as a collaborator or will they kill your son? Can any Canadian soldier tell pro- from anti-Taliban Afghans?

Q. We hear very little about 9/11 anymore as the justification for both of these operations...

A. As a Canadian, I am more conscious of 9/12, when we woke up to find our southern border slammed shut, closing down 80% of our foreign trade and 42% of our Gross Domestic Product. When people ask me why we were prompt and dutiful allies, I point to 9/12 while politicians, politer than I have to be, flutter the tragic images of 9/11. If historians still care about 9/11 a century from now except as a date for schoolchildren to forget, they should remember that Al Qaeda had been fighting and killing Americans for years — but under President Clinton’s regime, they were helping elect George Bush, not starting a war on Iraq.