2 billion spent on afghan mission only 1/4 on humanitarian

[Researcher87]

From CTV it just said that 2 billion has been spent so far and another 3.5 at least on top of that a total of 5.5. billion, and so far in the 2 billion spent only 500 million has been humanitarian?

Shouldn't the Canadian mission be spending a little more on humanitarian aid because that is the only way to get them from fighting the foreigners.

Building them homes and creating jobs, not shooting them, as was shown that there is supposedly large civilian casualities from the latest operation at least 50 from two families alone.

 

[elevennevele]

Re: 2 billion spent on afghan mission only 1/4 on humanitari

Yes, any reasonable person would think so. But people are just going to tell you we are in a war. Honestly, a war I think of our own choosing at this point.

I feel the war objectives were completed some time ago. This period was suppose to be all about rebuilding objectives. If we really wish to have it as a war altogether then we are either going to fight endlessly with casualty after casualty in a war of attrition on Afghan soil, or we are going to be fighting on the Afghan front and on the Pakistan front.

I mean seriously, if you are going to fight a war then you have to fight your enemy wherever they are. Otherwise you'll never defeat them.

But that is how ridiculous this situation is. And Pakistan has nukes. And to destabilize Pakistan in anyway is to risk having the nukes fall from a dictator who we know isn’t crazy enough to use them because even with India he has been interested enough to pacify hostilities. Or we can weaken him and eventually a bullet is going to put those nukes into the hands of well, the fanatics of Pakistan who would be sympathetic to the Taliban and maybe more hostile to India.

But this is what happens with cowboy diplomacy. Is quite brainless, I assure you. It doesn’t take all the ramifications into account, but there is quite the show of love for the, “bring it on” attitude to war. The “mission at any cost” and if you don’t support it, well then you are for some reason not supporting the troops. And yet we are only able to go halfway with what is needed to win it in the context of it being a war.

I should remind some people. This is not a UN mission as Harper somewhat mislead in his speech. Rather, it’s a NATO mission that comes up for review of acceptance by the UN each year.

 

[elevennevele]

Re: 2 billion spent on afghan mission only 1/4 on humanitari

Anyone at this point should spare me on the idea of 2000 Canadian troops can also win the hearts and minds of the Pakistanis.

Oh and much of the lands of Afghanistan are made up of tribal Pashtuns who are Afghan that identify with the Taliban. Or sometimes it all becomes the same thing. In a sense, not fighting a distinctive political body that we can surgically separate from what sometimes is a lean to an identity.

In Afghanistan it's tribal and the borders between Afghanistan and Pakistan are quite nonexistent for people who can sometimes be quite nomadic as their way of life. Also nonexistent due to even the natural terrain itself.

http://www.crossroad.to/Quotes/Islam/Pashtun.html


"The warlike Pathans [or Pathan, Pukhtun or Pushtun] form one of the world's largest tribal societies (about 16 million) and are divided into numerous sub-tribes and clans.... The Pathan hill tribes all have a passion for freedom and independence, and defend their territory and honor against all invaders. They are fearless guerilla fighters who know the hills and valleys intimately, are crack shots and wear clothes that blend with their surroundings (khaki is a local word meaning 'dusty, and it was as a result of the wars in this region that the British army abandoned its bright red uniforms for the inconspicuous dust-colored khaki). No one has ever managed to subdue or unite them: the Mughals, Sikhs, British and Russians have all suffered defeat at their hands."

"The Pukhtunwali (the Way of the Pukhtuns) is an inflexible ethical code by which all true Pathans traditionally abide. Pukhtunwali requires that every insult be revenged and, conversely, every guest protected. To safeguard his honor, o the honor of his family or clan, a Pathan will sacrifice everything, including his money and his life. He will return even t he slightest insult with interest. According to a Pathan proverb, 'He is not a Pathan who does not give a blow for a pinch.'"

"The Pathans are notorious for the family feuds, often the result of disputes over zar, zan or zamin - gold, women or land."

"In Lords of the Khyber (1984), Andre Singer illustrates this by recounting the story of a man he interviewed 'who proudly declared that he had killed seven male members of a Mahsud family for having insulted his wife, and so far only his brother had been killed in the revenge.'"

"Tales of the dangers of the Khyber Pass and the legendary ferocity of the Pathans stirred the English imagination and evoked scenes of gallant soldier defending the might of the Raj against the equally gallant but merciless Pahatns.... Nonetheless, if the British exacted revenge by razing whole villages to the ground, the Pathans retaliated with ambushes and slaughter, and even mutilated wounded enemies.

 

[elevennevele]

Re: 2 billion spent on afghan mission only 1/4 on humanitari

"Taliban" is a sort of simplification by the politicians in trying to view the hostilities against us. If Kabul were it's own little island than this idea of bringing change to the society might have a chance at working. But it is not it's own little island.

http://www.afghan-network.net/Ethnic-Groups/pashtuns.html

The PATHAN (Pashtun) people form the dominant ethnic and linguistic community, accounting for just over half the population. Tribally organized, the Pathan are concentrated in the east and the south. As they gained control over the rest of the country in the 19th century, however, many of them settled in other areas too. The Pashtuns mostly speak Pashtu (although some residing in Kabul and other urban areas speak Dari) and are generally Sunni Muslims. They are divided into tribal and sub-tribal groups to which they remain loyal. These tribal divisions have been the source of conflict among Pashtuns throughout their history. Even today, the Pashtun parties are divided along tribal lines. The majority of Pashtuns make their living off of animal husbandry and agriculture as well as some trade. In Afghanistan, Pashtuns have traditionally resided in a large semi-circular area following the Afghan border form north of the Darya-e-Morgab east and southward to just north of the 35' latitude. Enclaves of Pashtuns live scattered among other ethnic groups in much of the rest of the country, especially in the northern regions and in the western interior due to the resettlement policies of Amir Abdul Rahman Khan, who ruled Afghanistan from 1880 to 1901.

From its founding in 1747 by Ahmad Shah Durrani, Afghanistan has traditionally been dominated by the Pashtuns, who before 1978 constituted a 51% minority in the country. However, as a result of the 1979 Soviet invasion the population distribution in Afghanistan has changed. About 85% of the 6.2 million Afghan refugees who fled to Iran and Pakistan and around the World due to the Russian invasion and the war that followed it are Pashtuns. This, accordingly, lowered the percentage of Pashtuns inside Afghanistan temporarily and raised the percentages of the country's other ethnic groups. By the mid-1990s many of the refugees returned restoring the Pashtuns to their status of the largest ethnic group in Afghanistan constituting about 45% of the population.

The Soviet invasion of December 1979 has been the major determining factor in Afghanistan's ethnic relations since that point in time. From that time Until mid-1991 the various factions of the People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan, all dominated by Pashtuns, controlled the country's government. All other factions either opposed or aligned themselves with the PDPA (with most in the opposition), including several Pashtun factions. It is not within the scope of this chronology to document the constant shifts in alliances between various factions, both between the opposition and government camps and within them. However, it should be noted that most of the factions were ethnically homogeneous and were engaging in a constant shifting of alliances worthy of traditional balance of power theory and continue to do so today. The Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan in 1989 has only affected the power relations among the country's various factions but has not changed the fact that they are in constant competition with each other.

Wikipedia & MSN Encarta:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taliban

The Taliban movement derived mainly from Pashtun of Afghanistan and North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) of Pakistan, but also included many non-Afghan volunteers from the Arab world, as well as Eurasia, and South Asia.

http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761569370_11/Afghanistan.html

A strong attempt was made to keep the Pashtun leaders, who traditionally held the power in Afghanistan, out of the most important government positions. Kabul was besieged beginning in 1992, first by various mujahideen groups and then by the Pashtun-dominated Taliban, which sought to reestablish Pashtun dominance in the capital.

 

[damngrumpy]

We can spend 2 billion dollars killing people and bringing people home in body bags but we can't afford healthcare.
We can spend up to five billion dollars killing people, and getting our young people killed for little reason, but we can't afford to spend five billion dollars to pay for post secondary education for the same folks we can afford to get killed.
We can spend billions on getting Canadian young people killed in war and on the Olympic games but we can't afford to find safe housing for the homeless, and we can't afford to feed the poor.
What the hell is going on in this country? We can't afford to spend a dime ensuring Canadians are safe, fed and housed, but we can afford to send troops around the world, to ensure they are safe, fed and properly housed?
Seems to me, if we can't afford to fix our own problems, we should keep our nose out of other peoples business.

 

[Zzarchov]

I think you all should take a closer thought about Canadian Economics.

We don't throw money at things because its "The right thing to do", we throw money at things that are good investments.

We don't have welfare because we care about the less fortunate, we have welfare because people aren't going to starve and die if they can't get a job, at best they become disorganized criminals (each costing 60K a year to jail not to mention damage they cause) at worst they form militant groups (like in every other country) causing untold damage to the economy.

Healthcare is similar, hell everything we do is because we have great bean counters in Ottawa.

Afghanistan is no different, we are there because its the best thing for our economy either directly or indirectly. Be it from fallout from abandoning NATO obligations to any number of other causes.

Canada has not done anything in the last 50+ years that hasn't in the end been the economically best choice.

 

[damngrumpy]

So what you're saying is, we should give our kids guns, send them overseas to fight and die, because it economically good for our pocket book. And after all its cheaper to have them killed than it is to educate them.
What a wonderful world we live in