Lame ducks

In U.S. politics, the term “lame duck” refers to a president nearing the end of his second term in the Oval Office because he is unable, under the Constitution, to seek a third one. In other words, he’s merely a caretaker until the new president, whether from his party or the other, is sworn in.
Unfortunately, that’s the position Canadian soldiers in Afghanistan now find themselves in thanks to Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s stunning flip-flop on the mission while out on the campaign trail last Wednesday morning, which, ironically, came the day before the seventh anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks—the very reason why Canada sent troops there in the first place.
Mr. Harper had staunchly refused to give a so-called “end date” to our military deployment in Kandahar during his 30-month tenure as prime minister, even going so far as to suggest doing so would embolden the Taliban and al-Qaeda to continue fighting. “We can’t set arbitrary deadlines and simply wish for the best,” he had said as recently as May, 2007.
Yet that’s exactly what he’s done in suddenly announcing our role in the war would come to an end in 2011—whether the enemy was defeated or not.
The decision certainly didn’t sit well with Jim Davis, whose son was killed in Afghanistan. He said his son would have “died in vain” if the mission was ended before the Afghan government was able to take over control of its territory. No doubt other families who’ve had to bury a loved one feel much the same way.
Walking away from Afghanistan in two-plus years is a disservice to the 97 soldiers who already have made the ultimate sacrifice for their country. And what does it say to those currently putting their lives on the line in the desert and mountains around Kandahar who thought they were doing so to help win the war on terror; not to leave the job half-finished?
It would have been unthinkable if former Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King, in the heat of an election campaign, suddenly had told Winston Churchill and Franklin D. Roosevelt that, sorry, but Canada would be dropping out of World War II in 1943. Abandoning the war on terror, which clearly is far from over, is just as preposterous.
There’s no doubt the war in Afghanistan is far from popular among many Canadians, and yes there will be more casualties. But now is not the time to cut and run. Now certainly is not the time to treat our brave soldiers as lame ducks in order to win votes.