I guess everything is planned. Canadians go in, Americans come out. Later on, Canadians come out saying “Americas problem, not ours”. America later too tired to go in and Americans by that time will not be listening to the drumbeat of “FREEDOM” and “LIBERTY”.
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By JEFF SALLOT
Wednesday, February 5, 2003 – Page A10
OTTAWA – Federal officials are developing a plan for Canada to contribute to a war with Iraq by providing soldiers to relieve U.S. troops in Afghanistan, far away from the political problems of the main conflict.
Prime Minister Jean Chrétien has been on the phone to allies in recent days to discuss the Iraq crisis. He has made no final decision on what role the Canadian Forces might play, sources said.
High on the list is sending ground troops back to Afghanistan, where they fought alongside Americans last year to root out al-Qaeda terrorists.
U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell will appear before the United Nations Security Council today to present evidence culled from classified material, trying to convince wavering allies and other nations that Iraq has defied calls to disarm.
If the Security Council authorizes a war to disarm Iraq, “we will be there as part of a coalition in one form or another,” a Canadian official said yesterday.
A military mission in Afghanistan might be appreciated in Washington, and would be relatively safe.
Canada faces practical difficulties in sending troops to Iraq. Cash-starved forces are spread so thin that the Senate defence committee said recently there should be a 12-month moratorium on overseas deployments so that exhausted troops can rest.
The military might be able to handle backfilling for American forces in Afghanistan, freeing the U.S. units for combat in Iraq, a military source said.
A crack Canadian infantry battalion wrapped up a six-month combat mission in Afghanistan last summer. Defence Minister John McCallum said at the time that Canadian ground troops might return to Afghanistan as part of the international security force supporting the interim government in Kabul.
That’s the kind of role Germany is now playing. The German government has said it will not send its troops to fight against Iraq. But more than a thousand German soldiers are part of the UN security force in Afghanistan.
Prime Minister Chrétien and German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder discussed the Afghan crisis yesterday.
Mr. Chrétien wanted to talk about diplomatic efforts to disarm Iraq without having to resort to war, an official said.
Germany will hold the rotating presidency of the Security Council for the remainder of February, a period that will include key debates about Iraq.
The key date is not today, but Feb. 14, when Hans Blix, the chief UN weapons inspector, is to make his next report to the council, Mr. Chrétien told reporters after a cabinet meeting. “We’ll see what Blix will say.”
On the possibility the United States might unilaterally use force to disarm Iraq, Mr. Chrétien said no legal requirement exists for the Security Council to pass a second resolution specifically authorizing the use of force. A second resolution would be “highly desirable,” he said.
Mr. Chrétien has spoken to U.S. President George W. Bush and Spanish and Italian leaders in the past few days to discuss Iraq.
Meanwhile, opposition parties taunted the government in the House yesterday for failing to promise a parliamentary vote before authorizing any military involvement in support of the United States in Iraq.
“People want to know where we stand,” Bloc Québécois MP Michel Gauthier said.
Progressive Conservative Leader Joe Clark said the Liberals are avoiding a vote because their lame-duck leader does not want the country to see how divided the government caucus really is on the Iraq issue.