Category Archives: Mission to Afghanistan

Two fallen soldiers headed back to Canada

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Maj. Yannick Pepin (left) and Cpl. Jean-Francois Drouin of the 5th Canadian Combat Engineers were killed in an IED strike south of Kandahar City on Sept. 6, 2009.

Maj. Yannick Pepin (left) and Cpl. Jean-Francois Drouin of the 5th Canadian Combat Engineers were killed in an IED strike south of Kandahar City on Sept. 6, 2009.

 KANDAHAR AIRFIELD, Afghanistan — The most senior Canadian to die in combat in Afghanistan and one of his combat engineers began their long journey back to Canada on Monday after their flag-draped caskets were slowly marched on to a CC-130 Hercules transport as a lone piper skirled a sad lament.

 Maj. Yannick Pepin, 36, of Victoriaville, Que., commander of the 51st Field Engineers Squadron of the 5th Combat Engineers, and Cpl. Jean-Francois Drouin, 31, of Quebec City, who served with the same unit, were killed and five other Canadians were injured Sunday when their armoured vehicle struck an improvised explosive device in Dand District, southwest of Kandahar City.

 Three of the five wounded soldiers were released from hospital by Monday. All were listed in good condition.

 Pepin and Drouin were the 128th and 129th Canadian soldiers to die in Afghanistan since the first Canadian troops came to this war-plagued nation early in 2002.

 “Our thoughts and prayers go out to their loved ones in this time of grief, and to the five other Canadian Forces members injured in this attack,” said Defence Minister Peter MacKay.

 Quebec Premier Jean Charest said: “News of the death of Yannick Pepin and Jean-Francois Drouin distresses us deeply and touches all Quebecers . . . In the name of all Quebecers I salute their courage and generosity.”

 Five weeks ago, after a ramp ceremony for two of his sappers, Pepin said: “Everybody has fear in a mission. If you don’t, you’re not normal.

 “My sappers go first ahead of everyone to save the lives of civilians and soldiers.”

 Despite the deaths on Aug. 1 of Sapper Matthieu Allard and Sapper Christian Bobbitt, Pepin, who joined the army in 1999, had said his unit would only take 12 hours to mourn before getting “back on the road.”

 Sapper Alexandre Beaudin-D’Anjou of Quebec City, his face swollen and bloodied from wounds he suffered in Sunday’s blast, and Sapper Junior Lecours of Victoriaville, whose right arm was in a huge cast, stood to attention with some difficulty beside the rear door to the aircraft as the caskets of their fallen comrades passed by.

 After the ceremony was completed, Beaudin-D’Anjou made an emotional appeal to his countrymen to try to understand the Afghan mission better.

“I want to say that part of the Canadian population negatively views the work that we do here, above all because they don’t understand what we do,” Beaudin-D’Anjou said, as Sapper Junior Lecours, of Victoriaville, whose arm was in a large cast, stood beside him.

 “In my opinion the majority of the Afghan population benefits from what we do. Sadly, there are dangers in this, as you saw in yesterday’s incident. All the soldiers feel deeply that we will finish this work for one another.” Continue Reading →

Canadians still split on Omar Khadr, poll shows

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Khadr Harper LawsuitThe Toronto Star… OTTAWA–Canadians remain deeply divided on what should happen to Omar Khadr, the Canadian jailed at Guantanamo Bay, but a growing number believe he will be treated fairly if a U.S. military trial goes ahead, a poll shows.

Conducted by Angus Reid Strategies for the Toronto Star, the survey shows 42 per cent of Canadians believe Khadr should be brought back to face “due process under Canadian law.” That’s up from 37 per cent of Canadians more than a year ago.

Almost an equal amount, 40 per cent, think Khadr should be left to face trial by military commission at Guantanamo Bay. About 19 per cent are unsure what the best option is.

Khadr, now 22, was 15 when he was arrested in the 2002 death of a U.S. soldier in Afghanistan.

When asked about the prospects for a fair trial if Khadr is left to face justice in Guantanamo, 40 per cent agreed he would be treated fairly, up from 32 per cent a year ago. The number of those who disagreed – 45 per cent – also grew, up from 41 per cent.

A similar split exists over how the Conservative government is handling the case. Ottawa announced last week it will challenge Khadr repatriation orders to the Supreme Court of Canada, and 41 per cent agree with that move, while 40 per cent disagree.

A slim majority – 52 per cent – do not have sympathy for Khadr’s plight. That’s up seven points from last January. Just 38 per cent continue to sympathize with Khadr. About 11 per cent were unsure.

The online survey of a randomized sample of 1,006 Canadians was conducted late last week.

Taliban cuts off fingers of those who vote.

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This story has a lot of meaning. I am pretty confident the Taliban would indeed allow a vote if they thought for a moment that they would win it. Chavez and Hamas for instance were OK with the election that got them in power. Not so much any subsequent one in a fair and democratic manner.

So what does this say? That contrary to many amateur analysts expounding, the Taliban are not popular amongst the Afghan people and that despite any Islamic issues we in the west may and do still have with the people of Afghanistan they do not like nor desire the Taliban as a political/criminal/political entity, nor could they be expected to, given how they treat the Afghans at every opportunity, when in a position to do so.

From CNN by way of TROP

KABUL, Afghanistan (CNN) — Making good on a threat of election day violence, the Taliban sliced off the index fingers of at least two people in Kandahar province, according to a vote monitoring group.

Electoral workers count votes at a school in Kabul.

Electoral workers count votes at a school in Kabul.

After they cast their ballots, the fingers of Afghan voters are stained with ink to prevent them from voting multiple times. The fingers of the two women in Kandahar, a stronghold of the Taliban, were cut off because they voted, said Nader Naderi of the Free and Fair Election Foundation.

The Taliban had vowed to disrupt Thursday’s election and the risk was too great for some Afghans to venture out, especially in the southern provinces that form the heartland of the radical Islamist group. Continue Reading →

Pakistani tribesmen rise up against Taleban.

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To my shock and amazement, there are depths of savagery and horror to which the Taliban will sink that is beyond what the average Muslim will tolerate. Read this story from The Times Online and rejoice. I believe this may be one of the more significant events in terms of the war with the Taliban in terms of how it may come out.

Eeyore for Vlad


Swat_577594a

It was the Taleban’s demand to take the women they had widowed that was the last straw for the residents of Upper Dir.

When the militants arrived in their mountainous corner of northwestern Pakistan in February the locals cautiously welcomed them, thinking they were waging jihad against foreign troops in neighbouring Afghanistan.

Some even joined them, attracted by the five or six pounds a day they paid. Over the next three months, however, Upper Dir’s residents were increasingly angered by the Taleban’s criminal activities and disrespect for local customs, according to residents and Pakistani officials.

In early June elders asked them to leave the five villages they had occupied. The Taleban responded on June 5 with a suicide attack on a local mosque that killed 39 people. The next day they told the elders to give them the women who had been widowed in the attack. Continue Reading →

Afghan Minister: Officials Assisting Taliban

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There’s some top-notch investigation. They also discovered that water is wet and fire is hot.

clouseau

 CBS NEWS      Afghan Interior Minister Muhammad Hanif Atmar on Sunday blamed government officials for assisting militant forces, as more than 78 civilians and policemen were killed and more than 172 wounded as a result of 126 incidents last week.

Talking to the media, Atmar claimed the attacks were planned and supported outside of Afghanistan’s borders. Some government officials were complicit in such strikes, he said, without giving further information.

He added that the fatal assault in which 176 fighters were killed and another 36 wounded, suggested a 70 percent surge in violence in 25 of Afghanistan’s 34 provinces.

Militant funding and weather changes were among the principal factors fuelling the unrest, argued the minister, who identified drug money and extortionist tactics as the Taliban’s key income sources.

Atmar said the fighters received more than 70 percent of their funds from international terrorist organizations and apparently non-military outfits based in Muslim countries.

However, he stopped short of naming the countries where he believes extremist groups backing the Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan were active.

Last week, Atmar said, police recovered 190 improvised explosive devices used in roadside bomb attacks and 111 pieces of heavy and light weapons in different parts of the war-torn country.

Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujaid told CBS News that the increase in Taliban activity is the result of pubic support; Mujaid said Afghans are fed up with “so-called U.S. and NATO-adopted corrupt regime and Americans’ democracy.”

“We Taliban are getting funds but not from individuals or organizations,” he said. “It’s donations from Afghan and the Muslim world.”

U.S. Lawmaker Says Obama Administration Ordered FBI to Read Rights to Detainees

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FOX NEWS  A senior Republican on the House Intelligence Committee is accusing the Obama administration of quietly ordering the FBI to start reading Miranda rights to suspected terrorists at U.S. military detention facilities in Afghanistan.

The move is reportedly creating chaos in the field among the CIA, FBI and military personnel, according to Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich. The soldiers, especially, he says, are frustrated that giving high value detainees Miranda rights — the right to remain silent, the right to an attorney — is impeding their ability to pursue intelligence on the battlefield, according to a story first reported by the Weekly Standard.

“What I found was lots of confusion and very frustrated people on the front lines who are trying to, well, make Afghanistan successful for the United States and its allies,” said Rogers, who serves on the House Intelligence Committee.

Rogers, a former FBI special agent who served in the U.S. Army, just returned from Afghanistan and a visit to Bagram Air Base, where he said the rights are being read. Continue Reading →

Al Qaeda Commander Strapped for Cash, Asks Turkish Muslims to Send Money

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They then asked if anyone had George Galloways home phone number.

I’m sure Turkey will respond generously

CAIRO  —  Al Qaeda’s top commander in Afghanistan urged Turkish Muslims in a new audio message Wednesday to send money to militants fighting coalition troops in the country, saying they are low on funds.

Mustafa Abu al-Yazeed said many militants in Afghanistan are unable to fight because they lack the necessary equipment.

“And we, here in Afghanistan, are needy of money,” said al-Yazeed. “And the reason for the weakness of the operations here is the inadequacy of equipment.”

The authenticity of the audio message could not be verified, but it appeared on Web sites often used by Al Qaeda.

Experts believe Islamic militants in Afghanistan receive most of their funding from wealthy donors and charities in the oil-rich Gulf and from the illegal drug trade inside the country.

The U.S. has tried to crack down on those funding sources by urging Gulf governments to better police the flows of money and by engaging in counter-narcotic operations inside Afghanistan.

President Barack Obama plans to send thousands of additional troops to Afghanistan this year in an effort to reverse the momentum of Al Qaeda and Taliban militants

Canadian hunger striker being force fed in U.S. prison

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Stewart Bell, National Post 

Mohammed Mansour Jabarah, of St. Catharine's, Ont. in a photo was taken at Niagara Falls in April, 2002, just before he went to the U.S. to cooperate with the FBI.
Mohammed Mansour Jabarah, of St. Catharine’s, Ont. in a photo was taken at Niagara Falls in April, 2002, just before he went to the U.S. to cooperate with the FBI.

A Canadian serving a life sentence in the United States for terrorism is being force-fed through the nose after going on a hunger strike, his lawyer said on Tuesday.

Mohammed Mansour Jabarah has refused to eat since mid-April and prison officials are allegedly pumping food into his stomach using a tube inserted in his nose.

The convicted al-Qaeda terrorist is protesting restrictions on his mail, his lawyer said, but his father said Jabarah and other Muslim inmates also want to pray together.

The U.S. Bureau of Prisons declined to comment for privacy reasons. Prison officials can intervene when a hunger striker’s life is at risk but the force-feeding of inmates is controversial.

“They shove a tube up your nose down into your throat,” said Kenneth Paul, the lawyer who represented Jabarah at his trial in New York. “It’s like torture.” Continue Reading →

The Taliban will ‘never be defeated’

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An interesting read from  The Times Online

Colonel Imam’, the Pakistani agent who trained Mullah Omar and the warlords to fight the Soviets, says the US must negotiate with its enemiestaleban_522659a1 

Christina Lamb in Rawalpindi

THE Pakistani intelligence agent who trained Mullah Omar, the Taliban leader, to fight has warned that Nato forces will never overpower their enemies in Afghanistan and should talk to them rather than sacrifice more lives.

“You can never win the war in Afghanistan,” said so-called “Colonel Imam”, who ran a training programme for the Afghan resistance to the Soviet Union’s occupation from 1979 to 1989, then helped to form the Taliban.

“I have worked with these people since the 1970s and I tell you they will never be defeated. Anyone who has come here has got stuck. The more you kill, the more they will expand.”

A tall, bearded figure, whose real name is Amir Sultan Tarar, he trained at Fort Bragg, the US army base where America’s special forces are stationed.

During the late 1970s and 1980s he controlled CIA-funded training camps for 95,000 Afghans and often accompanied his students on missions.

After the Soviet defeat and the collapse of communism, he was invited to the White House by the first President George Bush and was given a piece of the Berlin Wall with a brass plaque inscribed: “To the one who dealt the first blow.”

Today western intelligence agencies believe Imam is among a group of renegade officers from Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence agency (ISI) who continued to help the Taliban after Pakistan turned against them following the attacks of September 11, 2001. Continue Reading →

Richard Holbrooke asks the right question. Where is the OIC?

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Here is a Stratfor Sitrep on Holbrooke’s request for more international aid for those fleeing the Swat Valley:

holbrooke

June 4, 2009 From Stratfor.com
U.S. special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan, Richard Holbrooke, urged European and Muslim countries June 4 to assist refugees from Swat Valley, Reuters reported. Holbrooke, speaking from the Shah Mansoor Camp, 50 miles northwest of Islamabad, said the United States is providing almost half of all aid to Pakistan and asked, “Where are the Europeans? Where is the OIC [Organisation of the Islamic Conference]?” Holbrooke also said he will meet with Pakistani leaders, including the head of Pakistan’s army, General Ashfaq Kayani, in Islamabad on June 5 to discuss the next phase of the Swat Valley operation.

Where exactly is the OIC? We may remember them for such great public works as Durban conference I and II both of which where designed to demonize Israel while obliterating ‘Islamaphobia’ world wide and attempting to destroy meaningful freedom of speech all over the globe using the veneer of ‘religious tolerance’

The OIC is prepared to invest a great deal of resources into these two activities, demonizing Israel and destroying free speech except for Islam, but they seem to show a rather stunning disregard for the well being of actual Muslims. Pakistan is seeing a refugee crisis of staggering proportions. I mean real refugees not fake ones as in Gaza or West Bank where territorial wars occasionally see Muslims seeking refugee status within Israel to avoid the mercenaries from Hamas but actual refugees where hundreds of thousands of Muslim men women and children are fleeing parts of Pakistan where the Taliban and Al Queda are at war over control and implementation of sharia law. The OIC or indeed any Muslim state such as oil rich Saudi or Iran seems not be offering one farthing to the hungry and desperate who have fled their homes and traditional lands due to what is likely Saudi and Iranian funded terrorist activity in these areas.

(As a post script I linked above to a PressTV article about Holbrooke and the refugee crisis. Here is the link again. Read the article by all means but do stay for the comments and think those are the people we are importing in the hundreds of thousands even the millions to the western world. At least it answers the great question for me, ‘For whom was the caps lock invented’.)

‘Cause we’re evil.

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That would be the truthful answer if the Taliban were asked why they feel the best way to attack a government is through it’s civilian population. Since the 1000 or so hostages taken by Islamic militants are undoubtedly a Muslim majority, one can only assume they will be used as a mass human shield for the exodus of Mo’s minions. As to the number who will be made an example of is anyone’s morbid guess.  At the end of the day [or week] this story has the potential to be huge in scale of people and tragedy. Those points will make the news but how these events and others in the past relate to Islam will again be ignored.taliban-woman-running

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (CNN)

400 students and kin abducted by militants, Pakistan police say

 Militants in a Taliban-held area of Pakistan are believed to have abducted more than 400 students and their relatives Monday after a ceremony marking the last day of school, a police official told CNN.

The abduction took place in North Waziristan, located in Pakistan’s tribal region, where the military has waged a bloody battle against Taliban insurgents.

The militants seized more than 30 vehicles carrying 443 students and their relatives who were leaving the ceremony marking the last day of school at Razmak Cadet College, according to Iqbal Marwat, a police official in nearby Bannu District.

He said 22 students in two vehicles managed to escape; the remaining 421 students and their relatives are still missing. The students are between the ages of 9 and 22, Marwat said.

The reported abductions follow a series of attacks on civilians in northwest Pakistan.

An explosion struck a bus station in the city of Kohat on Monday, killing two civilians and wounding 18, a police official said. Kohat is in North West Frontier Province, where a string of militant attacks in Peshawar and Dera Ismail Khan killed 12 people last week.

Militants also struck the Pakistani city of Lahore last week, killing 27 people in a suicide attack on a building that housed police, intelligence, and emergency offices.

Pakistan’s Taliban claimed responsibility for the Lahore bombing, and threatened to continue attacking cities in Pakistan until the military ends its operations against Taliban militants.

As a result, Pakistani authorities increased security in Islamabad, Pakistan’s capital city.

The Pakistani military has been conducting a month-long offensive against the Taliban, centered in the Swat region of North West Frontier Province

Pajamas TV for June 1 well worth 9 mins 50 seconds of your time

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As usual PJTV does a good job of giving us the news the ah, news doesn’t seem to bother with anymore. I can’t help but notice that self funded groups like Pajamas Media and blogs seem to be the ones bringing important information to supposedly free nations while mass media news outlets are censored or self censor any news which may generate a complaint from groups which perpetrate the horrors being reported on. It’s also interesting that many groups are looking after their own security abandoning the notion that the state is using the tax money collected from us all for what it was intended. One begins to wonder of the writ of state itself is losing meaning as leftism and Islam subverts resources of the state leaving all basic requirements of civilization to the individual to fulfill. While the state achieves less and less of what the basic requirements are, the cost of operations continue to go up. There is no formula that can make this sustainable. I would watch the UK and parts of Scandinavia to see where this is likely to go.