Before I get into this letter, I will say that I’m a Conservative to some extent and not very supportive of the other parties.
Even so, I strongly disagree with several things that Prime Minister Stephen Harper has done in Canada and in foreign matters.
My letter is about the treatment of our fighting soldiers, men and women in Afghanistan.
Since the First World War, we have sent thousands of people to war to defend our rights and freedoms and our way of life. They have even defended the rights of idiots who don’t know what they are talking about.
We train these young men and women to represent us and basically their job is to go kill or capture as many of the enemy as they can.
War is ugly and war is hell.
The Liberals got us into this war without too much thought or preparation. They should have sent our soldiers to Afghanistan a few years earlier to build condominiums complete with satellite TV, Internet and all the furnishings required to make the prisoners comfortable so they would love us before they slit our throats.
We sent our soldiers into harm’s way, where the enemy doesn’t identify itself. Our soldiers have to fear for their lives 24 hours a day.
With the very loose fitting clothing worn by civilians in Afghanistan, our soldiers don’t know if the person coming toward them from any direction is a terrorist with a body bomb strapped on or a gun under the clothing.
Our soldiers don’t know if vehicles approaching them, from either direction, are loaded with explosives. Our soldiers don’t know if the people in the burkas are women or men disguised as women with explosives or guns under their garments.
Our soldiers don’t know if their next step will be on an IED, which could kill them or cripple them for life. And the final fear is hoping to complete their shift in a foreign hostile land so they can get home to their families with their bodies intact and properly functioning.
If we don’t fight these terrorists overseas, then we may be fighting them on our own land.
The next huge problem is the drug crops that are being grown in Afghanistan.
Why are those crops still being grown? The majority of money being made on those crops goes to the warlords, al-Qaida and the Taliban, with which they can buy more weapons to carry on this war and kill more of our soldiers.
Finally, we come to the pulling-out stage. How can we pull out of Afghanistan next year?
If we and other nations do, the Taliban and al-Qaida will take over and Afghanistan will be the biggest terrorist training ground in the world.
Along with this, the women and young girls of Afghanistan will be back to square one. They will be relegated to being uneducated and treated worse than cattle. Beaten and raped at someone’s will.
To the three Amigos: Is this what you want?
Quit playing politics with our soldiers’ lives and shut up. It is better to say nothing and look like an idiot than to say something and cast away all doubt.
I applaud Harper’s stand on this issue. There are other countries involved in this fiasco and there are sure to be some sensitive documents in the reports that other nations don’t want to see spread all over for security reasons.
Let the people Harper appointed to look into this.
May God bless and protect our troops.
Tom Skoreyko
Red Deer