Then they laugh at you,
Then they fight you,
Then you win." - Mohandas Ghandi
When we started this war against a nation that had never attacked us, and had only dubious connections to a force that had attacked one of our allies (most of the 9/11 hijackers came from Saudi Arabia which is also the source of most of their funding), we were told that it was for democracy and freedom and little girls going to school and rainbows and ponies.
Many of us were skeptical. Many of us pointed to repeated attempts by the U.S. government and multinational companies to build oil and natural gas pipelines from the north of Afghanistan, through the country and down to Pakistan and the Arabian Sea.
Recently, CTV published a graph showing that Canadian soldiers were doing a great amount of their dying where a pipeline was proposed to go from Turkmenistan, through Kandahar and on to Pakistan. Apparently this was sufficient that Canada's Defence Minister couldn't sit still. So it was important to say something.
Defence Minister Peter MacKay insisted Wednesday that Canadian troops are not in Afghanistan to guard a new natural gas pipeline being built through the southern part of the country.
He said fears that Canadian troops may end up paying a hefty price to protect the U.S.-backed project from insurgents are unfounded.
Unfounded, huh? Our soldiers dying along the pipeline route and you want to laugh off our fears as unfounded.
But even then, MacKay is forced to add:
“We're going to try and prevent chaos. If the Taliban are attacking certain places in the country or certain projects, then yes we will play a role.”
So, in conclusion, we can safely say that should the Taliban (for some unknown reason) decide to attack the oil pipeline running through their territory (would they even dare?) then, yes, Canadian soldiers would be fighting and dying to protect an oil pipeline.
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