Canada’s days numbered in Afghanistan

JI said with today’s announcement, Prime Minister Harper is making his position clear: the opposition has tried to paint it that Harper would fudge the withdrawal issue, but now he’s making that clear that he won’t. (This is a very political issue in Canada and the U.S. Afghanistan itself seems to be quite a cauldron right now. why would he choose a time like this to announce the pull out of troops when the U.S. is sending more?) Perhaps one thing allows the other, so the idea is you’re not abandoning Afghanistan, and Harper said he still sees a role for Afghanistan in rebuilding and training. (What is the characterization of Canadian involvement in Afghanistan by voters there?) The polls move around but the majority back Canada’s military action, but they don’t want an open-ended commitment. They don’t want to go beyond 2011 though. Harper said Afghanistan was the hardest part of his job, he said the first time he had to phone a family to tell them of a dead soldier he was in tears.