More involved than you think

It's time to turn over an old leaf; the maple leaf.

Too many people in Canada have had the wool pulled over their eyes when it comes to our government's foreign policy. Liberal-minded Canadians are quick to denounce American wars of aggression, but don't feel as though we are also part of the problem. We criticize the empire beneath us from a false pedestal of moral superiority and fail to make the connection. Wake up and smell the gunpowder.

Contrary to popular belief, Canada is one of the world's top military spenders and military exporters, and we are deeply integrated into the American military industrial complex's death machine. Hundreds of armoured American military vehicles destined for Iraq are being built right here, right now, on the same street as this college only a few blocks east of here at General Dynamics Land Systems. Not only does General Dynamics manufacture these vehicles, they also repair and upgrade damaged ones so that they can be redeployed in Iraq. A few blocks west of here on Oxford is the Wolseley barracks, a large military base where Canadian soldiers have been, and are currently being, trained to fight America's wars, which we regularly support and participate in.

Canada's multi-billion dollar navy ships are the only foreign vessels integrated into ‘U.S. Carrier Battle Groups,' and helped in the 1990s blockade which, according to the U.N., killed 1.5 million Iraqis (mostly kids). The Canadian Navy also escorted and led, the American coalition's ships into the Persian gulf to launch the ‘shock and awe' bombing campaign of Iraq. We continue to help the U.S. military in their ongoing pillaging of Iraq, so don't fall for our government's big lie that ‘we said no to the Iraq war.'

Like a classic politician, Chrétien said ‘yes' to Bush, then ‘no' to Canadians. The Conservative party, which was pressuring for more Canadian involvement in the Iraq war, called Chrétien on his lie, but we didn't want to pay attention. Pay attention to this, according to Conservative MP and former brigadier-general Gordon O'Conner, Canadian soldiers are serving with other allies in Iraq, some at the highest level of command (look up Brigadier-General Walt Natynczyk).

Canada also provided the use of its airspace for weapons testing and for the bombing of Iraq, and even refueled American fighter jets in Gander, Newfoundland. A few of our own Hercules CC-130s also participated in the war on Iraq. Canadian military personnel worked on surveillance, communication and control aboard U.S E-3 AWACS warplanes, and in 2003 at least 24 Canadian ‘war planners' planned the logistics of the Iraq war at the U.S. Central Command. Canada's top of the line, $620 million satellite, the RADARSAT-1, provided images of Iraq for the U.S. military to use for targeting at the beginning of the war.

Our own military-industrial complex is huge, and our government is investing in it. There are over 100 companies and contractors in Canada making parts for the weapons and weapons delivery systems being used in the war on Iraq, and the Canada Pension Plan (our pension fund) invests in ALL of them. The anti-personnel (anti-people) cluster bombs fired out of Apache helicopters in Iraqi cities are made in Winnipeg by Bristol Aerospace. Thousands of tonnes of depleted uranium now poisoning Iraq comes from Canada, which is the world's largest producer and exporter of Uranium. Just so you know, depleted uranium is nuclear waste that stays radioactive practically forever and can cause cancer, leukemia and birth defects. It is used in dozens of different varieties of missiles, bombs and bullets used by the U.S. military.

The Canadian military and the RCMP are training the new Iraqi counter-insurgency army and the Iraqi police. In 2004 Canada spent more doing this than the U.S. and a Canadian colonel was in command of the military-training mission in Baghdad. We also provide funding for Iraq's interior ministry, which has been caught running torture centres.

Then there's the fact that we sent thousands of troops into Afghanistan, freeing-up thousands of American troops to be sent into Iraq.

Seems like we do a lot of killing for a ‘peace-loving' nation. It's amazing that we can do so much to help the U.S. campaign of terror yet still maintain that we are ‘uninvolved'. What exactly did Chrétien mean when he told us ‘Canada will not participate'? What aren't we participating in? The last five years of America's ‘war of terror' has left several hundred thousand Iraqis dead, and our hands are just as bloody as Uncle Sam's.

Many of the facts in this article were exposed by the Coalition to Oppose the Arms Trade and I thank them for their extensive investigation of Canada's involvement in the Iraq war. Now it is up to us to act to stop it. March 19 is the fifth anniversary of the start of the Iraq war; there will be a rally and march starting at Richmond and Central Sunday, March 16 at 1 p.m. to call for an end to the war, and Canadian complicity.

Editorial opinions or comments expressed in this online edition of Interrobang newspaper reflect the views of the writer and are not those of the Interrobang or the Fanshawe Student Union. The Interrobang is published weekly by the Fanshawe Student Union at 1001 Fanshawe College Blvd., P.O. Box 7005, London, Ontario, N5Y 5R6 and distributed through the Fanshawe College community. Letters to the editor are welcome. All letters are subject to editing and should be emailed. All letters must be accompanied by contact information. Letters can also be submitted online by clicking here.