Proud vet joining fight against ISIS
After his return from NATO mission in Afghanistan, Canadian says it’s ‘the right thing to do’
Dillon Hillier was working construction in Alberta when Islamic State gunmen began their brutal push into Kurdish territory.
A veteran of the Canadian mission in Afghanistan, he decided he couldn’t just watch it happen.
Last weekend, the 26-year-old infantryman left Calgary and flew to northeastern Iraq to help Kurdish fighters fend off the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL.
“I just felt it was the right thing to do since (the Kurds are) facing some pretty tough times,” he said.
The first veteran of the Canadian military known to have joined Kurdish forces battling Islamic State, Hillier is part of a growing number of Western volunteers heading to the region to participate in the fight against the armed extremists.
“I look at what I’m doing as no different than when thousands of Canadians went to fight the Germans in (the Second World War),” said Hillier, who served in the Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry. “And I think ISIS is far more barbaric.”
Unlike the radicalized youths who have flocked to Syria and Iraq, Hillier is a military veteran and he is siding with Islamic State’s most formidable enemy, the peshmerga.
Hillier said he expected to be joined over the coming weeks by volunteers from Canada, the U.S. and Sweden.
To help Canadians eager to fight Islamic State, an Ottawa military veteran recently formed the 1st North American Expeditionary Force.
Ian Bradbury said former Canadian Forces members had launched the non-profit group to provide financial and logistical support to friends who felt compelled to volunteer.
“Each of them has to buy their own kit before they leave,” he said. “And that gets quite expensive.” He put the cost at about $3,500, but said he hoped the group would provide donated clothing and equipment as well as discount airfares.
On its Facebook page, it also offers “verified contacts” with peshmerga units.
Bradbury said he knew Hillier and had helped ensure his peshmerga contacts were genuine.
“We’re just kind of a central authority to help guys out,” he said.
The group was careful to ensure it was doing nothing illegal, he added.
“As long as nobody’s being trained here, as long as we’re not forming any militia, it’s all in bounds.”
Originally from Carleton Place, Ont., Hillier joined the military at age 20. (At his request, Postmedia News agreed not to identify his family for security reasons.)
In June 2013, he was sent to Kabul for six months as part of Operation Attention, a NATO mission that trained the Afghan security forces.
He left the military in March after five years of service and found construction work in Alberta.
As a student of history he was familiar with the long struggle for Kurdish independence, and he was troubled by the violent Islamic State challenge to the Kurds.
Because the semi-autonomous Iraqi-Kurdistan region centred north of Baghdad is secular, democratic and pro-Western, Islamic State views it as an obstacle.
“It’s absolutely disgusting,” Hillier said.