Call it what you want — we’re still at war
Assuming Canada’s mili tary strategy in the conflict with t he Islamic State of Iraq & the Levant (ISIL) is fundamentally a choice between fighting a war and a non- combat training and humanitarian mission, creates a policy dilemma founded on a false dichotomy.
When the Trudeau government first considered the possibility that Canadian soldiers might remain in the theatre of combat, the “What to do and how much is enough?” policy debate invariably fluttered around the false assumption that the government could choose between a humanitarian and a combat mission. As Canada’s military experiences have demonstrated time and again, these two purposes in reality are simply aspects of the same phenomenon — warfare. They are set apart only by political decisions about means and methods — decisions, some often forget, in which the enemy always has a significant, and sometimes a final, say.
Scholars often define wars by their particular characteristics and place them along a low- high spectrum of violence. At the lowest end, one finds “unstable peace” or “civil strife” situations, in which a significant armed conflict might flare into open combat at any time, as occurred during Canadian military missions in Africa and Cyprus. In the middle range sits the oddly branded “limited wars” — limited for politicians, but deadly for soldiers — such as the one fought in Korea in the 1950s. At the dark, dreadful end of this spectrum lurks unrestrained international warfare.
The limited Korean War endured for several years, destroyed the Korean economy, killed tens of thousands of civilians and drew in Chinese troops in large numbers. The widening war against ISIL clearly falls within the category of a limited war and it must be fought under that assumption.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau made a fundamental error when he declared that Canadian military operations in the ever- evolving ISIL conflict can be stuffed into a low- end, non- combat “train, advise and assist” mission. He made a second more dangerous error when he assumed that ISIL would respect the humanitarian scenario behind his deployment strategy. Our diplomatic and military experiences over many years argue otherwise.
For example, Canada’s “stabilization-humanitarian” operations in Bosnia- Herzegovina in the 1990s ought to serve as a warning to Canadian politicians who today assume that they, not ISIL, will determine whether or not Canadian military units in the Middle East become engaged in a deadly, prolonged shooting war.
The first Canadian soldiers deployed in the Balkan operation were allocated a mere six rounds of rifle ammunition because, they were told, they were joining a “stabilization/peacekeeping operation.” To their surprise and alarm, these soldiers — mounted in their lightly armed, white-painted vehicles — came under fire from wellequipped local forces almost as soon as they entered the region.
For a decade, Canadian soldiers deployed there in an undeclared conventional war attempted to conduct operations in accord with the diktats of the politically preferred peacekeeping doctrine. Unfortunately, politicians’ hopes and the realities of the war killed 23 Canadian soldiers and left hundreds more seriously wounded.
Under Prime Minister Trudeau’s train, advice and assist strategy, members of the Canadian Forces will inevitably become engaged in the violent war being fought around them. Unfortunately, experience has taught Canada’s military officers that surrendering the operational initiative to an enemy means, in this case, that ISIL’s leadership will continue to determine how this conflict will evolve.
The lesson for Canadians today — drawn from the past 20 years of Canadian Forces combat and peacekeeping deployments, involving conflicts among the people of disintegrating communities, regions, and states — is that such conflicts cannot be redressed by training and humanitarian aid alone. Political decisions about what comes next for the Canadian Forces in this gathering war must stand on a clear-headed appreciation of this fact and an honest recognition of the operational realities in this disordered combat region.
Prime Minister Trudeau and other Canadian political leaders must avoid especially careless deployments of members of the Canadian Forces based on their false assumption that combat training and humanitarian interventions in an active war zone can be conducted safely and successfully outside the realities of warfare.
UNDER TRUDEAU’S STRATEGY, MEMBERS OF THE CANADIAN FORCES WILL INEVITABLY
BECOME ENGAGED IN THE VIOLENT WAR BEING FOUGHT AROUND THEM.