An L.A. Times article quotes U.S. Defence Secretary Robert Gates expressing doubts about NATO countries that have sent large numbers of combat troops to fight in the south.
"I'm worried we have some military forces that don't know how to do counterinsurgency operations,'' the article quoted Gates as saying. "Most of the European forces, NATO forces, are not trained in counterinsurgency."
Uh-huh - like the US Army has some kind of amazing track record dealing with insurgencies in countries they occupy. (anybody else noting the irony of the US bitching about how others deal with an insurgency when Iraq keeps going from bad to worse?)
Of course, instead of standing up for Canada's troops as they keep telling us to do, Mackay rolls over for his masters in Washington:
"His comments were certainly not directed at Canada,'" MacKay told reporters in Ottawa, recounting the conversation he'd had with Gates five minutes earlier.
"He said, 'I specifically made no reference to any country and Canada is the last country I'd make those comments about.'"
Yeah, right. Let me give you a little hint, Peter - snuggling up with BushCo is not something most Canadians are overly thrilled with. Taking your orders so blatantly from the Whitehouse doesn't help much either.
1 comment:
Well, any respect I had for MacKay has now been stripped away. Maybe the Bush administration's idea of doing 'counterinsurgency' is rounding up non-combatants and treating them to a one way ticket to Guantanamo and showing them how 'waterboarding' isn't torture. Regardless, the 'thug' Gates probably wouldn't know a real stand up fight from gas he vents , from either orifice.
Maybe his idea of a real fight is something written up in Hollywood and presented to the gullible public; run in, fire shots into the air, wave the American flag and everyone will have peace and start buying American consumer products.
As for MacKay's comments that Robert Gates was taken out of context, whether Gates' comments were aimed at Canada or all of NATO, one does not openly criticize allies in the field and not expect fallout. If the Americans think things are hard now, just wait til the other troops pull out and then have to take up the slack, with the reputations that already precede the Americans.
E.
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