Minister of National Defence Harjit S. Sajjan has announced the extension of Operation IMPACT, committing one more year in Canada’s fight against the terrorist organization known as ad-Dawlah al-Islāmiyah fī ‘l-ʿIrāq wa-sh-Shām (DAESH).
The stated purpose of Operation IMPACT since its inception in 2014 is to “build the military capabilities of Iraq, Jordan, and Lebanon” and to “help set the conditions for security and stability” in the area.
“[Essentially] it’s a training mission [but] this is the problem, and this is an issue that I’ve always had with national defense, is that for them training and assisting people is actually sending special force operators who will maybe engage in combat.
[So] they’re embedded with these units, they actually go and have engagements with the enemy,” said Jean-Christophe Boucher, an assistant professor at the University of Calgary who specializes in Canadian and foreign defence policy.
Boucher also mentioned how when the Liberal government took control in 2015, there was debate about shifting Canada’s policy in the Middle East from a combat role into more of a support one. This resulted into Trudeau’s much discussed decision to halt air strikes against DAESH, and instead focus on training and assisting allied forces.
According to Boucher, a veteran himself, a lot of activities conducted by Canadian Special Forces such as “engaging the enemy with snipers” and “painting targets so to facilitate bombing” do not neatly fit into the definition of “training”. Boucher would like to see more transparency in relation to operations like IMPACT.
“I think it’s in the interest of the public to know where our government is sending Special Forces and what they’re doing. [At least] then we can have an educated debate on whether or not that’s a thing that we want.”
The release put out by Minister Sajjan concerning Operation IMPACT makes no mention of special force operations in Iraq and yet as it was being announced, Operation Ready Lion was commencing- a two-week campaign considered to be a major assault against DAESH forces. James Bezan, acting Shadow Minister for Canadian National Defence, considers this not to be atypical in regard to the Liberal government.
“Ready Lion is Operation IMPACT,” said Bezan.
“One of the problems with the current government position is that they have not been transparent at all with what we’re doing on the ground under Operation IMPACT.
The lack of transparency flies in the face of keeping Canadians informed as well as parliamentarians properly briefed on the operation itself.
I can tell you that leading up to the change of government in 2015, as conservatives we were providing technical briefings to the media and to the public, as well as the parliamentarians, on a regular basis.
I believe we held something like 17 Technical briefings in the first several months of Operation IMPACT. [As] parliamentary secretary at that time, we were always providing information and for the Liberals to try to hide behind the veil of secrecy, claiming that it’s in the interest of national security, it’s a bogus argument at best.”
Paul Maillet, a retired Colonel of the of the Royal Canadian Air Force and founder of the Paul Maillet Center for Ethics, had a different issue with Liberal policy in the Middle East.
“I don’t feel that Operation IMPACT is consistent with the foreign policy goals and Justin Trudeau as he articulated them. [He said] international peace and stability was going to be the main driver of foreign policy,” said Maillet.
“They brought the F-18’s back [to Canada], but I don’t think they honoured the spirit of what international peace and stability does. The last thing you need in that area is teaching people how to kill people.”
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