Kudos for decision to not send a Canadian mission to chaotic African nation

May 10, 2010

By PETER WORTHINGTON, QMI Agency

To the dismay of the UN, the NDP and the Toronto Star, Prime Minister Stephen Harper has categorically said “no” to Canada sending a mission and a top general to the Congo.

Is that a sigh of relief we hear from our military? If not, it’s what they should feel — even though Lt. Gen. Andrew Leslie may feel a surge of disappointment, since he was expected to head such a mission had the PM not had a surge of common sense.

Instead, Gen. Leslie assumes a new role — chief of transformation (whatever that is) to make the Canadian Forces more effective and efficient in the future.

The Toronto Star seems fixated on the Congo at the moment — as reflected in their front page headline: “UN to Ottawa: We need Canada’s help in the Congo.” This has been followed by painful stories about rape used as a weapon of war, and tribal warfare and such.

Anyway, the campaign to get Canadian troops into the cesspool of Congo after we withdraw from Afghanistan has so far failed. Anyone who thinks we could make a difference in Congo needs a saliva test.

This isn’t to say that things aren’t terrible there. They are, and they are not helped by Congo President Joseph Kabila, son of the former president and tyrant who was murdered. Kabila wants all foreign troops out of Congo.

As a former commander of child-soldiers, he is another in a long line of African despots.

Chaotic state

There’s not much the outside world can do about the Congo.

It’s been chaotic since independence from Belgium in 1960, when it boasted something like 15 individuals who had a post-secondary education.

Right now there are some 20,000 UN “peacekeeping” troops, police and UN civilian workers trying to bring civilization to the country.

Some 57 countries have missions involved in some capacity and there are troops from 19 countries — the smallest contingent is 66 from Jordan, the largest from India and Pakistan (4,300 and 3,500).

UN peacekeepers have been hopeless at curtailing violence. About the only positive that can be said is Congo would be worse without them.

No one wants to acknowledge it, but the fact that none of the UN troops is from countries that specialize in keeping peace (India and Pakistan don’t count) may be a reason why mayhem and murder flourish.

No British, Canadian, French, Australian, American, Scandinavian or German troops are involved, except as military observers, who just watch and report.

Varying numbers of troops supposedly keep the lid on anarchy — troops from countries like Benin, Bangladesh, Uruguay, Nepal, Malawai, Egypt, Ghana, Morocco, Senegal, Tunisia, South Africa, even a handful (200) from China.

On her recent foray into the Congo and Rwanda, Gov. Gen. Michaelle Jean seemed intent on preparing Canadians for sending troops there. She deplored the rape in Congo and in Rwanda seemed to apologize that “we (meaning Canada) could have prevented the magnitude of the horror of the genocide ...” Really?

Massacre

The UN’s military commander in Rwanda, Romeo Dallaire, tried to short-circuit the intended slaughter, but the UN in New York told him to forget it. So some 800,000 people were massacred in 100 days — an average of 8,000 a day.

Dallaire has acknowledged he had no “field command” experience when he went to Rwanda and was a failure.

Yet he has since urged Canada’s involvement in peacekeeping in the Congo ... and/or Darfur.

You’d think he’d have learned.