By Scott Taylor
The war in Ukraine has certainly served to highlight the emotional hypocrisy that exists among Canadians.
Russia was wrong to invade Ukraine, Putin lied to the Russian people and the world by claiming that Ukrainians would greet his soldiers as liberators.
The Canadian government has soundly denounced Putin’s aggression through the provision of lethal aid to Ukraine, enforcing crippling sanctions on Russia and throwing open our doors to Ukrainian refugees fleeing from the war.
Canada is not officially in this war, as Ukraine is not a member of NATO, but in spirit the Canadian people are standing firmly with Ukraine.
We are told by exasperated pundits that Putin’s actions are ‘unprecedented’ and his military tactics of bombing civilians is “barbaric.”
Where were these same experts in 2003 when U.S. President George W. Bush lied to the American people and the world before illegally invading Iraq.
Saddam Hussein never possessed the Weapons of Mass Destruction that served as Bush’s excuse for acting in self defence.
As the U.S. invaders soon discovered they too would not be greeted as liberators by a defiant Iraqi population.
As for targeting civilians deliberately, the U.S. Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld openly bragged about it. The initial mass bombing of Baghdad was described by Rumsfeld as his ‘Shock and Awe’ campaign to demoralize Iraqi civilians.
Did Canada denounce the U.S. blatant aggression, supply the Iraqi insurgents with lethal aid, sanction the U.S. economy and call for war crime charges against Bush and Rumsfeld? Hell no.
Did we offer to accommodate the thousands of Iraqi civilians who were displaced during the U.S. invasion and subsequent occupation? Hell no.
While officially refraining from joining the U.S. invasion in 2003, Canada covertly supported our American ally in their quest. Even after the WMD self defence claim was proven to be a big lie, there was no official chastising of the U.S. regime by the Canadian government. An estimated one million Iraqis have perished during the U.S. invasion and the violent unrest which ensued, and continues to this day. Yet no one dares to level the word ‘genocide’ at the American aggressors.
On the subject of Putin’s troops shelling Ukrainian cities, again pundits are quick to denounce such a heartless act as ‘demonic.’
Did no one take notice of the U.S. led coalition attack on Daesh (aka ISIS or ISIL) held Iraqi city of Mosul in 2017? There were Canadian troops and aircraft mashed in that operation which reduced a city of one million inhabitants to a smoking pile of rubble.
We defeated the evil Daesh, but what about the plight of those Iraqis who simply were in the wrong place at the wrong time?
What about the lack of collective outrage over U.S. President Donald Trump announcing he had used a mother-of-all-bombs (MOAB) against Afghan’s in 2017. The MOAB is described as the most powerful explosive short of a nuclear bomb. There is no way an explosion of that magnitude did not kill innocent civilians as well as Daesh fighters.
Instead of moral outrage, most Canadians viewed the use of MOAB as something of a scientific curiosity - “wow that really was a big explosion.” Did Canada open its door to those Afghans fleeing from the war? Hell no.
Even after the Taliban defeated the U.S. in the summer of 2021, the Canadian government was still reluctant to grant asylum to those Afghans who had worked with our soldiers during the occupation.
To this day, many of those former Afghan translators are waiting in other countries and watching as the Ukrainian refugees get fast-tracked access into Canada.
On the subject of bombing civilians it was Canadian Lieutenant-General Charles Bouchard who commanded the 10-month long NATO air campaign in Libya in 2011. The genesis for this operation was to enforce the UN approved ‘No-Fly-Zone’ over Libya to prevent President Moammar Gadhaffi from bombing the Libyan rebels. From the outset, the NATO leadership laughingly changed their authorized mandate to what they described as ‘No-Drive-Zone’ and promptly bombed the bejeezus out of Gadhaffi’s loyalists.
Unfortunately the NATO assisted overthrow of Gadhaffi resulted in widespread violent anarchy in Libya which continues to this day. Did Canada throw open the doors to Libyans freeing the chaos and bloodshed which we helped thrust upon them? Hell no.
We held a victory parade for ourselves on Parliament Hill.
Putin is wrong to invade Ukraine, but we do not have the moral authority to be righteous about barbarity.
