Photographed by Michael CullenBdr. Karl Manning
Photographed by Michael CullenMCpl. Francis RoyClick here to view the full gallery of Joanne Tod’s “Portraits of the War,” from the July/August issue of The Walrus magazine.
© Tim HetheringtonLast week I saw Restrepo, the Sebastian Junger/Tim Hetherington fly-on-the-wall documentary about a US infantry unit stationed in Afghanistan’s Korengal Valley, a.k.a. “the most dangerous place on Earth.” Junger and Hetherington follow the troops as they exchange fire with and call in airstrikes on the omnipresent Taliban, try to justify civilian deaths (a.k.a. collateral damage) to the locals, and suffer tragic deaths themselves.
Desperate for any claim to accomplishment, the unit’s commanding officer talks proudly about OP Restrepo, the new outpost his men built on high ground less than a kilometre away from their main base, as a strategic masterstroke that changed the whole dynamic of the war in the valley. I almost believed him, too — until the punch line subtitle at the very end: The US Army withdrew from the Korengal Valley in April 2010.
Meanwhile, a shadowy and fascinating organization called Wikileaks, about which little is known other than that it is headed by a shadowy and fascinating Australian hacker named Julian Assange, has ignited a political firestorm by releasing more than 90,000 secret military documents from Afghanistan which reveal that, according to the Guardian, “coalition forces have killed hundreds of civilians in reported incidents, Taliban attacks have soared, and NATO commanders fear neighbouring Pakistan and Iran are fuelling the insurgency.” (more…)
Canada is defined by the maple leaf, the beaver, hockey, and our peace-keeping military, of which Canadians are especially proud of. We justify our missions through jus in bello, a set of criteria that describes a just war as one that has a just cause, legitimate authority, the right intentions, reasonable hope of success, and necessity. We are guardians of peace, democracy, and freedom — an image so ingrained in our national identity that the 1993 Somali scandal came as a big shock. Instead of learning from the affair however, we have yet to address the human rights issues that are deeply intertwined with war and prisoners of war.
When the United Nations resolved to launch Operation “Restore Hope” in war-torn Somalia in 1992, 900 soldiers from the Canadian Airborne Regiment joined the mission. Canada’s most elite unit [landed] in Belet Huen, which was just one of the many towns ripped apart by civil war, anarchy, and thieving gangs. Many Somalis were hungry, homeless, and mourning the loss of loved ones. In the face of such a crisis, troops from all around the world participated to secure major relief centers and important transportation routes, stop terrorizing forces as was necessary, and provide food for the innocent civilians. Because the gangs could no longer intercept food packages while the troops were around, the situation was initially ameliorated.
However, after a few months, Canadians began to engage in violent practices that included beatings, torture, public humiliation, rape, and murder. At first, Canadian soldiers often punished Somalis who attempted or were accused of stealing food by tying a group of them to a pole and erecting “thief” signs beside them. Sadly, the victims of these acts were primarily children, who were impoverished and desperate. In the February of 1993, a considerable increase in the number of thefts on the Canadian camp exacerbated the tension between the Somali civilians and the troops. In response, soldiers were now authorized to shoot anyone seen trespassing. (more…)
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