David Bruser
Nicole Baute
STAFF REPORTERS
With a nephew killed in Afghanistan and a son headed for the same war zone, a grieving and frustrated Russell Higgins says Canadian soldiers are being wasted on a foolish mission.
Reached at his home yesterday in Upper Musquodoboit, N.S., Higgins said, "I don't figure our boys should be over there to start with. It's a fight that can't be won. They have been doing the same thing over there since the Crusades. You can't win a war against people that don't mind dying."
Higgins' nephew Cpl. Thomas James Hamilton, 26, was one of three Canadian soldiers killed Saturday by a roadside bomb. Pte. John Michael Roy Curwin and Pte. Justin Peter Jones, 21, also died.
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punditman says...I wonder how many relatives of soldiers killed or wounded in Afghanistan feel the same way but are afraid to express themselves? I wonder how many Canadians are weary of watching Don Cherry's jingoism on display on Saturday nights as he shows the faces of the fallen on Hockey Night in Canada? There is now a pullout date of 2011 for this combat mission--contingent on another NATO country putting more than 1,000 soldiers into the southern province of Kandahar, by no means a guarantee.
Nevertheless, one gets the feeling from those who support the mission that they inhabit a certain obedient personality type; they will support the war from now until hell freezes over, or at least until the government tells them it is over. Call it deference to authority in the face of a very authoritarian Prime Minister.
Speaking of whom, Prime Minister Stephen Harper said, "This tragic incident demonstrates the considerable risk faced by the exceptional men and women of the Canadian Forces as they work to promote freedom, security and democracy in Afghanistan."
Glowing words of liberty from the man who just prorogued Parliament.
Nicole Baute
STAFF REPORTERS
With a nephew killed in Afghanistan and a son headed for the same war zone, a grieving and frustrated Russell Higgins says Canadian soldiers are being wasted on a foolish mission.
Reached at his home yesterday in Upper Musquodoboit, N.S., Higgins said, "I don't figure our boys should be over there to start with. It's a fight that can't be won. They have been doing the same thing over there since the Crusades. You can't win a war against people that don't mind dying."
Higgins' nephew Cpl. Thomas James Hamilton, 26, was one of three Canadian soldiers killed Saturday by a roadside bomb. Pte. John Michael Roy Curwin and Pte. Justin Peter Jones, 21, also died.
Keep Reading...
punditman says...I wonder how many relatives of soldiers killed or wounded in Afghanistan feel the same way but are afraid to express themselves? I wonder how many Canadians are weary of watching Don Cherry's jingoism on display on Saturday nights as he shows the faces of the fallen on Hockey Night in Canada? There is now a pullout date of 2011 for this combat mission--contingent on another NATO country putting more than 1,000 soldiers into the southern province of Kandahar, by no means a guarantee.
Nevertheless, one gets the feeling from those who support the mission that they inhabit a certain obedient personality type; they will support the war from now until hell freezes over, or at least until the government tells them it is over. Call it deference to authority in the face of a very authoritarian Prime Minister.
Speaking of whom, Prime Minister Stephen Harper said, "This tragic incident demonstrates the considerable risk faced by the exceptional men and women of the Canadian Forces as they work to promote freedom, security and democracy in Afghanistan."
Glowing words of liberty from the man who just prorogued Parliament.
