NDDN Committee Report

GENERAL

Perhaps the most important lesson the Committee learned is that our Canadian Forces mission in Afghanistan is a highly complex and noble operation. It is extremely difficult and will not be ended by any quick fixes. It is also apparent that apart from those with a direct interest, ordinary Canadians have not heard enough about this mission. Consequently, we feel there is an incomplete understanding of what is really going on in Afghanistan and therefore some misperception of what our Canadian Forces are doing.

Along with this lack of information, the Committee has been surprised by the pessimism of many commentators who tend to think the Afghanistan problem is perhaps just too difficult. These adverse perceptions are, in part, aggravated by the absence of a coherent government communication plan that provides Parliamentarians with up-to-date information on the details of the many accomplishments of JTF-Afg. More transparency and clarity would go a long way to helping Canadians gain a better and more complete understanding of the Canadian military mission in Afghanistan.

Canadian troops fought alongside United States (US) forces and other coalition forces in Afghanistan in early 2002, against the remnants of Taliban and al-Qaeda fighters, as part of Canada’s contribution to the global war on terrorism. Four Canadian soldiers died in that campaign. Canadian Forces units returned to Afghanistan as part of the NATO-led ISAF in 2003, taking up security duties in Kabul and its surrounding area. Before they left in 2005, three more soldiers had been killed in action. The Canadian Forces took over leadership of a Provincial Reconstruction Team (PRT) in Kandahar in August 2005 and in early 2006 provided the command element and an infantry battle group for the Multinational Brigade in Regional Command South, as part of the US Operation Enduring Freedom. Spring and summer fighting was intense and before Canadian troops reverted to ISAF command at the end of July 2006, another 13 Canadian soldiers and one Canadian diplomat had been killed. For the rest of 2006, ISAF operations offered no respite for our troops. By the end of the year, a further 25 Canadian soldiers were killed in action, bringing the overall total of Canadian dead in Afghanistan since 2002, to 45. Another 13 soldiers have died in Afghanistan in 2007. Most Canadians know this much.

However, the Committee also heard that, since 2003, both the government and the media have offered neither the breadth nor depth of information about the Canadian Forces mission in Afghanistan, to the extent required by Canadians to fully understand why our troops are there and what they are doing.[1] In this regard, the Committee notes the government’s release of a report explaining the progress being made by the Canadian mission in Afghanistan.[2]

CANADA AND AFGHANISTAN

Officially known as the Agreement on Provisional Arrangements in Afghanistan Pending the Re-Establishment of Permanent Government Institutions, the Bonn Agreement was the initial series of agreements intended to re-create the State of Afghanistan, after the US invasion of Afghanistan in 2001. There had been no popularly-agreed government in Afghanistan since 1979, so it was felt necessary to have a transition period before a permanent government was established. In December 2001, a number of prominent Afghans[3] met under UN auspices in Bonn, Germany, to decide on a plan for governing the country; as a result, the Afghan Interim Authority was inaugurated on December 22, 2001 with a six-month mandate to be followed by a two-year Transitional Authority, after which elections are to be held.

Bonn Agreement conditions were met with the conclusion of the Presidential election in 2004 and national and parliamentary elections in 2005.

Following on from the Bonn Agreement, the Afghanistan Compact was developed during a conference held in London from January 31 to February 1, 2006. It provides the framework for international community engagement in Afghanistan for the period 2006‑2011. Representatives from the international community, including Canada, attended the conference, which was co-chaired by Afghanistan, the UN and the United Kingdom (UK). Canada pledged its full support.

The Compact sets out detailed outcomes and benchmarks, with timelines for their delivery. It also contains mutual obligations that aim to ensure greater coherence of efforts between the Afghan government and the international community.

The Compact is not a simple aid package. It seeks to build lasting Afghan capacity and effective state and civil society institutions, with particular emphasis on developing human capital. It identifies three critical and interdependent areas of activity:

a.      Security;

b.      Governance, the rule of law and human rights; and

c.      Economic and social development.

Afghanistan and the international community have clear interests in seeing the Afghanistan Compact succeed, but it will not be easy. We have come to the current situation because Afghanistan was a failing and failed state for over 30 years. A review of this tragic degeneration will help us understand the magnitude of the challenge that faces Afghanistan, and Canada, now.

ONCE A FAILING STATE …[4]

Afghanistan is a rugged, sparsely populated mountainous country of approximately 652,000 square kilometres (about the size of Manitoba). It shares borders with China, Iran, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and a sector of the disputed territory of Jammu and Kashmir that is controlled by Pakistan. About half of the country is more than 2,000 meters above sea level. A 2006 estimate puts the population of Afghanistan at about 31.1 million people.[5] The major languages are Pashto and Dari/Farsi.

The southern province of Kandahar, in which the Canadian Forces mission is based, is one of 34 provinces in Afghanistan. It has a population of about 1 million and an area over 54,000 square kilometres (about the size of Nova Scotia). According to a 2006 estimate, over 450,000 people live in Kandahar City, the provincial capital.

Afghanistan joined the UN in 1946. The country has rarely been controlled by an effective central government because the historical influence of tribal leaders and local warlords has thwarted centralized rule from Kabul.

In 1973, King Zahir Shah was overthrown in a coup by his cousin and former Prime Minister, Muhammad Daud. In April 1978, leftist military officers overthrew and killed Daud, and Noor Muhammad Taraki became President. In September 1979 after a long and bitter insurgency, Taraki was deposed and later killed. He was replaced by his deputy, Hafizullah Amin, who also failed to suppress the rebellion. Faced with instability on its southern border, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) sent military forces into Afghanistan on December 25, 1979 and took control of Kabul. Babrak Karmal, leader of a less hard-line faction, was installed as President, but the rebellion persisted. Insurgent mujahedeen fighters who, given the Cold War context of the time, were covertly funded and equipped by the US, battled Soviet troops throughout the country for the next decade.

In November 1987, Karmal was replaced by Mohammad Najibullah. Earlier that year, under the auspices of the UN, Afghanistan, Pakistan, the USSR and the US signed Agreements on the Settlement of the Situation Relating to Afghanistan. These agreements provided for an end to foreign intervention in Afghanistan, and the USSR began withdrawing its forces. The UN set up a mission to monitor the withdrawal of foreign forces — the United Nations Good Offices Mission in Afghanistan and Pakistan (UNGOMAP) — and made plans to support the anticipated repatriation of refugees. The Soviet withdrawal was completed in February 1989. The rebels who had not signed the agreements, however, continued fighting against Najibullah's government.

As civil war between various factions continued following the Soviet withdrawal, the number of civilians fleeing the country increased steadily, and Afghanistan suffered the world's leading refugee crisis. By 1990, there were 6.3 million civilians in exile — 3.3 million in Pakistan and 3 million in Iran.

Fighting intensified in 1992. Rebel forces closed in on Kabul and the Najibullah government collapsed. On April 24, 1992, the Peshawar Accord brought the agreement of leaders of the mujahedeen (guerrilla) forces — except one, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar — to form a government under Sigbatullah Mojaddedi. According to the agreement, Mojaddedi would head a Transitional Council for two months. He would then be replaced by a Leadership Council to last four months that would be headed by Burhannudin Rabbani.

Rabbani was declared President of the Islamic State in Afghanistan in July 1992. Under the Accord, he was to have relinquished power in October, but he didn't. By that time, Ahmad Shah Massoud, Rabbani’s Minister of Defense, was engaged in armed confrontation with Hekmatyar in Kabul.

In 1993, two peace accords — in Islamabad on March 7 and Jalalabad on 18 May — were negotiated between President Rabbani and eight other Afghan leaders. The parties agreed to form a government for 18 months, to set in motion an electoral process. In December 1993, the UN established the United Nations Special Mission to Afghanistan (UNSMA) to canvass a broad spectrum of Afghan leaders for their views on how the UN could best help with national reconciliation and reconstruction.

Despite these positive developments, Kabul was soon besieged again, first by various mujahedeen factions, and then by the Taliban, a movement with its foundations in Kandahar. The movement initially gained momentum as an opposition to the mujahedeen, whom the Taliban came to regard as having corrupted Afghan society.

In late 1994 and early 1995, the Taliban continued to grow in strength, and they took control of much of southern and western Afghanistan, including Kandahar and Herat. In September 1996, the Taliban took Kabul. The government retreated to Taloqan and Mazar-i-Sharif and formed a new coalition called the Northern Alliance.

Fighting between the Taliban and Northern Alliance groups continued between 1997 and 2000 with little change in military positions. In July and August 1998, the Taliban overran many northern provinces, as well as the cities of Mazar-i-Sharif and Taloqan, where the government had relocated. A major massacre of thousands of civilians took place in Mazar after the Taliban took the city.

Following the August 7, 1998 terrorist bomb attacks on US embassies in Nairobi, Kenya, and Tanzania, the UN Security Council adopted a resolution, expressing concern at the continuing presence of terrorists in the territory of Afghanistan. It condemned attacks on UN personnel in Taliban-held areas, including the killing of two Afghan staff members of the World Food Program (WFP) and the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Jalalabad, and of the Military Adviser to UNSMA in Kabul. It also condemned the capture of the Consulate-General of Iran in Mazar-i-Sharif.

On December 8, 1998, another UN Security Council resolution demanded that the Taliban stop providing sanctuary and training for international terrorists and that all Afghan factions cooperate in bringing indicted terrorists to justice. A week later, after the Taliban failed to respond to this demand, the UN Security Council applied broad sanctions under the UN Charter.

In early 1999, yet another UN Security Council resolution noted that Osama bin Laden had been indicted by the US for the August 1998 embassy bombings and demanded that the Taliban turn him over to the appropriate authorities to be brought to justice. This too was ignored and further sanctions were applied.

There had been other issues. In a statement on October 22, 1999, the UN Security Council also expressed profound distress over reports of involvement in the fighting, on the Taliban side, of thousands of non-Afghan nationals, some of whom were below the age of 14. It noted the seriously deteriorating humanitarian situation and the worsening human rights situation — including forced displacements of civilian populations, summary executions, abuse and arbitrary detention of civilians, violence against women and girls, and indiscriminate bombing. The capture of Iran's Consulate-General in Mazar-i-Sharif, along with the murder of Iranian diplomats and a journalist, were described as flagrant violations of international law. Deeply disturbed by a significant increase in the cultivation, production and trafficking of drugs, especially in Taliban-controlled areas, the UN Security Council demanded that such illegal activities be halted.

The conflict within Afghanistan continued through 2000 and 2001. Political and security problems, in the absence of an effective government, caused frequent interruptions in the flow of humanitarian assistance, and various crises required temporary departures of UN and non-governmental aid workers.

Already suffering from the devastating effects of civil war, in the late 1990s the people of Afghanistan also faced a series of natural disasters — starting with earthquakes in February and May 1998 that killed more than 7,000 and affected the livelihoods and shelter of a further 165,000. In June, some 6,000 people were killed in severe flooding. Also at that time, a severe and protracted drought began.

In the face of such a daunting situation, the UN delivered more than 94,000 tons of food aid to 1.13 million people in 2000 alone, while vaccinating some 5.3 million children against polio and providing support for non-discriminatory education to more than 300,000 children — including home schooling projects for girls. Nevertheless, one quarter of all children born in Afghanistan were dying of preventable diseases before the age of five. Afghan women were nearly five times more likely to die in childbirth than in other developing countries. Typhoid and cholera epidemics were rampant, and pneumonia and malaria had re-emerged as public health threats. The condition of women had deteriorated markedly, and only one in 20 girls received any kind of education.

To compound the problem, refugees were returning to what the UN Mine Clearance Program has called the most heavily mined country in the world, with a staggering 9.7 million land mines. As part of its efforts, the program cleared some 68 square kilometres of previously affected areas, but obviously much remained to be done.

On September 4, 2001, the UN issued a report entitled The Deepening Crisis, which highlighted the desperate and worsening humanitarian situation faced by Afghans. The crisis, however, would only get worse.

... THEN A FAILED STATE[6]

After the September 11, 2001 attacks on the US, the Taliban government of Afghanistan refused US demands to hand over Osama bin Laden and therefore became a target of US military might.

The US military response commenced on October 7, 2001. US objectives were to make clear to Taliban leaders that the harbouring of terrorists is unacceptable, to acquire intelligence on al Qaeda and Taliban resources, to develop relations with groups opposed to the Taliban, to prevent the use of Afghanistan as a safe haven for terrorists, and to destroy the Taliban military allowing opposition forces to succeed in their struggle.[7] Finally, military force would help facilitate the delivering of humanitarian supplies to the Afghan people.

In December 2001, major leaders from the Afghan opposition groups and diaspora met in Bonn, Germany, and agreed on a plan (the Bonn Agreement) for the formulation of a new democratic government. Hamid Karzai, a Pashtun from the southern city of Kandahar, was appointed Chairman of the Afghan Interim Authority. In January 2002, the first milestone of the Bonn Agreement was achieved with the announcement of the Special Independent Commission for the Convening of the Emergency Loya Jirga (Pashtun for “grand council” — a traditional forum in which tribal elders come together and settle affairs). An emergency Loya Jirga of some 1,500 delegates met in June 2002 to form the Transitional Administration of Interim President Hamid Karzai.

In 2004, the country convened a Constitutional Loya Jirga (Council of Elders) and ratified a new constitution the following year. Hamid Karzai also became the President of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan in 2004.

Legislative elections were held in September 2005. The National Assembly — the first freely elected legislature in Afghanistan since 1973 — sat in December 2005.

However, Afghanistan’s tenuous security situation continued to threaten the gains of the recent transition, with incidents caused by terrorist and criminal activities, as well as factional clashes. The increase in poppy cultivation and narcotics trafficking continued to be of particular concern, as they further eroded the security environment. Consequently, assistance and development programmes suffered, as deployment of the UN personnel, NGOs and other humanitarian agencies was restricted due to concerns for their safety.

THE CURRENT SITUATION

The government of Afghanistan is attempting to rebuild the country after over 30 years of conflict within its borders. It is also trying to establish a democratic government.

The current, democratically-elected Afghan government is weakened by endemic corruption, undermined by independent tribal warlords and opposed by the Taliban who are conducting an insurgency based in the southern and eastern provinces nearest the border with Pakistan. The insurgency has created a degree of insecurity that impedes reconstruction and development. While some successes have been enjoyed by international development efforts in the west and north, more remains to be done in the south and east.

The UN is coordinating humanitarian and development efforts within Afghanistan, including substantial development assistance from Canada. As well, Canada, along with other major NATO allies has contributed military forces to the UN-mandated, NATO-led ISAF that conducts military operations to neutralize Taliban forces, support the projection of Afghan government influence and protect development and reconstruction activity. While much remains to be done, considerable progress has been made.

During the summer and autumn of 2006, there were calls for an increase in NATO troop strength in the south. Canada, among others, expressed concern that not all NATO allies were sharing the combat burden equally. On the other hand, there has been criticism that what is needed is not more troops, but more development assistance. The way to ‘win the hearts and minds’ of Afghans, many say, is not with bullets or bombs, but with food and medicine. The Canadian mission is, in their view, unbalanced and needs more determined and robust diplomacy and development components.

On this issue, the Committee was constantly reminded that, for now at least, security trumps other concerns. In the end, among all the witnesses the Committee met, it found near unanimous agreement that additional development cannot happen without a commensurate increase in security and that security in the south was not yet adequate to permit widespread development assistance. However, the outlook is not entirely bleak. More Canadian reconstruction funds are now flowing into Kandahar.

Much like that which occurred in 2006, some sources expected another ‘spring offensive’ by the Taliban insurgents this year, but ISAF forces, Canadian troops among them, conducted pre-emptive operations to disrupt Taliban forces. In fact, in early 2007, NATO significantly increased its forces in the southern region and launched Operation Achilles against Taliban insurgents, mainly in neighbouring Helmand Province. James Appathurai, the NATO Spokesman explained that “since the Riga Summit (November 2006) […] [NATO] has added about 7,000 troops to its force levels.,“ In the south, the number of troops has gone up during the past 18 months, from 1,000 to about 12,500, of which 2500 are Canadian.[8]

Canadian troops have been clearing Taliban out of the Panjwayi and Zhari districts, claiming success in finding and killing key Taliban leaders. Improved security has encouraged civilians to start returning and this, coupled with the Canadian government’s February 2007 announcement of the allocation of an additional $200 million dollars[9] in reconstruction funds, over the next two years, makes for brighter days ahead in Kandahar Province.

Allied efforts must be recognized as well. The US is deploying another brigade into the eastern provinces of Afghanistan and has committed an additional $11.8 billion in military and civilian aid over two years, mostly to pay for the expansion and training of the Afghan army and police. Britain too has augmented its forces in the south by an additional 2,000 troops and additional special operating forces are being deployed.  The additional British forces have provided Regional Command South with a reserve battalion that can be deployed to address emergencies anywhere in Afghanistan.[10]

The Australian Provincial Reconstruction Team in Uruzgan Province have been working closely with Dutch forces. Despite the good reconstruction work being done, the Australian Minister of Defence noted recently in an Australian Ministry of Defence Newsletter^[11] that his Government is sending a 300-strong Special Operations Task Group, to work within ISAF in the southern province of Uruzgan, to enhance provincial security, disrupt Taliban extremists’ command and control and supply routes, support the development of the Afghan national security forces and help reinforce the legitimacy of the Afghan Government.

About 400 of a planned 1000 Polish troops have been operating in Afghanistan since early 2007. Poland has placed no caveats on their forces.[12] Germany is deploying an additional six reconnaissance aircraft and the Italians are sending surveillance drones and a transport plane.

“In the short term we will not remove the threat of the Taliban, but we will contain it,” said British General David Richards, who completed his tour as ISAF's commander in February 2007. The betting is that the Taliban will not attempt another conventional battle but will intensify ambushes and suicide-bombings[13] and, in fact, no Taliban ‘spring offensive’ has materialized this year.

Beyond the military sphere, signs of progress are apparent in many parts of the country, not the least of which is the growth in education and health care and the return of more than four million refugees. According to Christopher Alexander, the UN Deputy Special Representative of the Secretary General in Kabul, the health care system now allows 85% of Afghans to have access to primary health care (from virtually 0% under the previous Taliban regime); 7.3 million children have been vaccinated; 5.4 million children (34% of them girls) area attending schools; the national GDP was $4 billion in 2002, but has grew to $8.9 billion in 2006. Currency reform has taken hold and the national budget is balanced. [14]

So Canada and NATO entered the spring of 2007 with guarded optimism, better prepared than last year, but still facing the same melange of threats.

THREATS

The Taliban

Taliban and al Qaeda insurgencies, fuelled by drug traffickers, corrupt officials and common criminals, are equally active in Afghanistan and Pakistan.[15] The Taliban, along with elements led by Afghan Islamist Gulbuddin Hekmatyar’s[16] and foreign jihadi fighters[17] are the primary, direct military threat to the security of Afghanistan and the authority of the duly elected Afghan government in southern Afghanistan.[18] They are also the main military threat facing Canadian troops in Kandahar province.

Afghans are determined, brave fighters who have historically repelled invaders and occupiers by asymmetric insurgency warfare. They are not known for fighting pitched conventional battles in large numbers, but they will infest an area and wear down an enemy with vicious hit and run attacks. The Committee often heard people wondering how we could hope for any military success in Afghanistan, given Afghan success at defeating occupying armies of Alexander the Great, the British and the Soviet Union. Such questions greatly over-simplify the circumstances and are perhaps unrelated to current ISAF operations. Unlike its historical predecessors, ISAF is not an invading or occupation force. It is in Afghanistan at the request of the duly elected Afghan government and its mission is sanctioned by the UN.

The word Taliban is the Pashto plural form of the Arabic طالب Tālib, "student". The Taliban are a strict Sunni puritanical Islamist and Pashtun-nationalist movement that ruled most of Afghanistan from 1996 until 2001. They emerged from the ethnically Pashtun areas of Afghanistan. Many of the Taliban grew up in refugee camps in Pakistan and much of the current membership is drawn from the students of religious seminaries, or madrassas, in Pakistan.

The Taliban originated around 1993-1994. Pakistani military and intelligence authorities based in the city of Quetta, located near the border with Afghanistan, formed a militia movement consisting of religious students in Pakistani religious schools, to gain control of the Afghan mujahedeen government. The leader of the movement was Mullah Mohammed Omar. In early 1994, Omar gathered recruits from Islamic schools, and his movement gained momentum. In October 1994, about 200 Taliban seized the Afghan trading border town of Spin Boldak, thus opening a supply route for Pakistani aid to Afghan Taliban sympathizers, who were based in Kandahar.

The Afghan government refused to accept the presence of Pakistan-sponsored Taliban. Conflict escalated and a protracted battle ensued between Taliban and the government south of Kabul, eventually spreading to northern cities such as Herat and Kunduz. Pakistan began to aid, mobilize and expand the Taliban. A steady flow of graduates from Pakistani madrassas, gave the Taliban a reliable supply of new recruits.

The Taliban captured the Afghan capital of Kabul in 1996 and, by 1998, controlled over 90% of the country. Afghans then found themselves under the rule of an austere and puritanical regime that banned television, most forms of recreation, non-religious music and statues, such as the giant Buddhas in Bamiyan, which the Taliban destroyed in March 2001.

In 1996, Osama bin Laden moved to Afghanistan from Sudan. During Osama bin Laden's stay in Afghanistan, he had helped finance the Taliban. After al-Qaeda attacked US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998, the US began actively supporting the opposition Northern Alliance and demanding that the Taliban turn over Osama bin-Laden to the US government.[19] The Taliban protected bin Laden from extradition and continued to harbour him after the September 11, 2001 attacks on the US.

On October 7, 2001, the US, aided by the UK, Canada, and a coalition of other countries, initiated military actions in Afghanistan. The ground campaign was mainly fought by the Northern Alliance, the remaining elements of the anti-Taliban forces, which the Taliban had never been able to destroy. In early December, the Taliban gave up their last city stronghold of Kandahar and retired to the mountainous wilderness along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. They were not, however, idle.

The Taliban re-emerged to threaten the October 2004 presidential election, but despite sporadic attacks in the weeks leading up to the vote, the election went off relatively smoothly. In late 2005, the Taliban introduced new tactics against American, Canadian and allied forces in southern Afghanistan, including the suicide bomb and other measures adapted from the war in Iraq. Some intelligence sources indicated the presence of foreign fighters too.

The insurgency continues. Less than 100 kilometres from Kandahar, just over the Pakistan-Afghan border, are the tribal lands of Baluchistan Province. The major city in this area is the Pakistani city of Quetta, the provincial capital of Baluchistan. Some say the Taliban and al-Qaeda fighters can operate in this area with impunity.[20] Others believe that the presence of the Taliban is not only being tolerated by the Pakistani government, but that it is being actively supported especially by the Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) organization.[21]

To make matters worse, some experts think Afghanistan is just one step away from becoming a narco-state.[22] The mixture of corrupt warlords, illegal drug traders and a massive poppy crop that provided most of the world’s opium supply in 2006, operating in league with the Taliban, produces a formidable challenge.

The insurgency and the illicit drug trade cannot be controlled so long as the border with Pakistan remains uncontrolled. The Taliban still enjoy sanctuary in Pakistan, whether with the Pakistani government's approval (as President Karzai claims) or despite efforts to stop them (as President Musharraf insists). In the south-east, the Americans have reinforced their presence on the border with Pakistan. But in the Canadian and British sectors, the frontier is virtually unguarded. Despite NATO's planned reinforcements, there is unlikely to be more than a thin presence of special operations forces to watch over this part of the border.[23]

ISAF combat operations in southern Afghanistan during the past year highlighted the apparent ability of Pakistani-based Taliban fighters to cross undetected into Afghanistan and attack Afghan and ISAF (including Canadian) military forces. Often, these same Taliban forces, once defeated, were able to escape back across the border into Pakistan where they seem to have enjoyed a degree of save haven. Afghan and NATO political leaders have been diplomatically active in putting pressure on Pakistani President Musharraf to rein in Taliban insurgents living in Pakistan. Musharraf, for his part, claims he is doing what he can. Minister of Foreign Affairs The Honourable Peter Mackay told the Committee:

While many efforts are being made, there is one reality that can't be denied, and that is that 40 million Pashtuns are estimated to live along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. It is from this tribal group that the Taliban insurgents who are attacking our troops derive most of their support […] Moreover, it is estimated that some 30,000 Pashtuns move, effectively unhindered, back and forth across the Afghanistan border every day.[24]

Afghanistan-Pakistan border issues are covered more fully in Chapter 4.

The Taliban are not just attacking the ISAF forces. They have attacked mosques where moderate imams preach against them. They have attacked hospitals and other social services funded by the international community. They have murdered teachers who provide instruction to girls. One unidentified Taliban leader told al-Jazeera television, "By the will of God, we expect to gain the confidence and support of the Afghan people, especially their support for martyrdom operations, which will continue in the future. We already have a large group of Afghan freedom fighters who are waiting to volunteer in these martyrdom operations."[25]

On February 23, 2007, Radio Free Europe reported that groups of Taliban fighters had launched a series of attacks across western, southern, and eastern Afghanistan, beginning an expected spring offensive. NATO reported that Taliban forces were present in at least five southern and western provinces of Afghanistan — Helmand, Kandahar, Farah, Uruzgan, and Ghor. Earlier in the month, on February 2, 2007, Taliban elements seized the town of Musa Qala in Helmand Province and controlled the town about 25 kilometres from a key reconstruction project at the Kajaki hydroelectric dam. Meanwhile, correspondents at Kajaki reported that several hundred British Royal Marines had been fighting on a daily basis to keep the Taliban far enough from the dam so that reconstruction work could continue.

In the western Farah Province, several hundred Taliban fighters seized the remote district of Bakwa on February 19. However, within 24 hours, the Taliban vacated Bakwa and a day later 200 Afghan troops deployed to the town unopposed. Also on February 19, in the eastern Kunar Province, US troops engaged Taliban fighters near the border with Pakistan. That same day, militants in the southern part of Uruzgan Province ambushed Afghan and NATO forces as they tried to dismantle a roadside bomb. Then, on February 20, a Taliban suicide bomber disguised as a doctor injured seven US soldiers when he blew himself up at a hospital in southeastern Khost Province.

In 2007, as expected by ISAF, the Taliban has reverted to more ‘hit and run’ tactics and suicide bombings directed at Afghan civilians, in an effort to turn them against ISAF forces and foreigners generally. They have attacked and ‘retaken’ isolated towns, melting away before having to face superior ISAF firepower. Previously, in 2006, whenever Taliban forces massed to take on ISAF forces directly, they were decisively defeated, as they were by Canadian troops in Op Mountain Thrust, Op Medusa and Op Falcon Summit. The former Commander of ISAF, British General David Richards told the Committee during a meeting in Afghanistan, in January 2007, that he felt the Taliban were over-rated as a conventional fighting force, but that did not mean they were not dangerous. For its part, ISAF has learned from its 2006 experiences and has been conducting its own aggressive operations in southern Afghanistan, to disrupt anticipated Taliban operations.

Operation Achilles was NATO’s largest operation to date and it was launched in Helmand Province in March 2007, to establish a wide area of security around the Kajaki power dam, to enable needed repairs to take place and to ensure the dam would be able to function into the future, providing electric power to the region. A Canadian combat team under Major Alex Ruff was deployed to the Kandahar-Helmand provincial border area and conducted operations to block insurgents trying to escape from other allied NATO forces.

Other NATO operations were conducted throughout southern Afghanistan during the past three months and their collective effect has been to neutralize any significant insurgent spring offensive. By mid-April, US General Dan McNeill, the Commander of ISAF, said that an anticipated spring offensive by insurgents […] [had] not materialized on a large scale, although he warned that violence in the country could still reach last year’s levels.[26]

Corruption, Warlords and Opium

While the Taliban may be the most direct military threat to the national security of Afghanistan, the poisonous mixture of widespread, ingrained corruption; independent warlords and a burgeoning illegal drug trade constitutes the most dangerous domestic threat. Professor Janice Stein of the University of Toronto’s Munk Centre for International Studies has said President Karzai’s government has an endemic problem of corruption and that to eradicate it will be a long process, so we must be reasonable in our expectations about how long it will take.[27]

Another example of a challenge to political reform in Afghanistan has been the role of warlords who have risen to power with both the Afghan government and the international community’s apparent blessings. While various allegations of their involvement in crimes against humanity and war crimes persist, some remain notoriously corrupt. A great many warlords simultaneously work for government and rule almost independently of national strategies and priorities. This is one serious factor in the disillusionment of the population.[28]

The issue may linger a while. A revised version of a controversial bill granting amnesty to groups that allegedly committed war crimes was signed into law on March 10, 2007, by Afghan President Hamid Karzai after being approved by the Afghan parliament, which includes many former militia leaders. The resolution bars the state from independently prosecuting individuals for war crimes absent accusation from an alleged victim. It also extends immunity to all groups involved in pre-2002 conflicts, as opposed to only leaders of various factions alleged to have committed war crimes during the 1980s resistance against Soviet forces and war crimes committed during the country's civil war. The Taliban and other human rights violators active before the establishment of the December 2001 Interim Administration in Afghanistan are protected under the bill.[29] Critics say the law may violate Afghanistan's constitution as well as certain international human rights treaties.

There is also a strong perception amongst Afghans that external forces are using warlords, security force commanders and government officials for their own strategic purposes. Such manipulation seriously undermines both the rights and livelihoods of Afghans.[30]

Last, but certainly not least, the drug economy is booming, despite extensive attempts to wipe out opium production. International efforts to eradicate the poppy crop failed so far. According to the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNDOC), opium poppy production in the country reached a record 6,100 metric tons in 2006, beating the 2005 total by 49 percent. Poppy crop eradication programmes have tended to affect the poorest farmers who, in the absence of a viable alternative crop, are left with essentially two choices — continuing poverty or working for the Taliban.

Illicit drugs breed corruption. Counter-narcotics efforts provide leverage for corrupt officials to extract enormous bribes from traffickers. Such corruption has attracted former militia commanders who joined the Ministry of the Interior after being demobilized. Police chief posts in poppy-growing districts are reputedly sold to the highest bidder: as much as $100,000 is paid for a six-month appointment to a position with a monthly salary of $60. And while the Taliban have protected some small farmers against eradication efforts, not single high-ranking government official has been prosecuted for drug-related corruption.[31]

A detailed discussion of all these issues is beyond the mandate of our study and Canadian military forces do not have a direct role in any of these areas. They do not participate in poppy crop eradication, nor do they engage in any counter-narcotics operations. They may however, have some positive influence on Afghans as they work with and mentor them in various activities, from employing local Afghans to mentoring Afghan National Army (ANA) leaders. Beyond that, a full investigation of these troubling issues must be left to a future study.

Our Own Impatience

The Committee was not sure how to address this issue and it too may be outside our mandate, but it did strike us that much of the debate of Canada’s overall Afghanistan mission, and specifically of the military mission, seemed to be characterized by a certain impatience to ‘get it over with.’ This may be a manifestation of our tendency to look at the problem through Western eyes and, frankly, view it as somewhat of a distraction from what we should be doing with our lives here in Canada. Afghans do not have the luxury of looking at their predicament in such a detached way.

Viewed through a historian’s lens it might be noticed that since the Second World War, Western tolerance for protracted conflict has become quite limited. Public opinion at home, detached as it is from the reality of the battlefield, can turn on a dime and force governments to bring the troops home, just because citizens feel they have had enough.[32] In some ways, this sounds a little selfish, especially when such considerations do not include any attempt to understand what might happen to those we are trying to help if we pack up and go home.

Virtually all witnesses told the Committee that it will take decades to get Afghanistan back on its feet as a thriving member of the international community. “Balkan-like time”[33] is how Ambassador Christopher Alexander described the expected time-line.[34]

In the end, the Committee came to think that uninformed impatience at home might have some adverse impact on our national will and therefore have a negative influence on our determination to do what is required to achieve strategic objectives set by Government. We did not dwell on this point, but it did add to our consideration of the roles played by government and the media in exercising their responsibilities to keep Canadians informed of the mission.