Article content continued

Now, Trudeau has confirmed — or announced, depending on who you ask — that his government will increase the number of Canadian Armed Forces personnel on the ground in the war against ISIL.

“How many that will be, what form that will take, what kind of engagement we’re going to have, those are things we’re going to work out,” Trudeau said. “But I have reassured my allies and Canadians that yes, we will be doing more.”

Trudeau has not yet said why, exactly, this expanded mission necessitates the withdrawal of CF-18 fighter jets, which, on Tuesday, successfully struck three ISIL fighting positions near Ramadi, which came days after striking a fighting position near Haditha and an ISIL compound also near Ramadi, and five days after participating in coalition airstrikes that liberated the Iraqi town of Sinjar from ISIL forces, according to Kurdish leader Massoud Barzani.

The closest thing Trudeau has offered by way of an explanation is saying that Canadians expressed “within the election that they wanted to see a ceasing of the bombing mission,” which is nearly the same as saying “because I promised.”

There are very legitimate arguments to be made against continued airstrikes by Canadian forces in the Middle East — that they’re insignificant, ineffective, exacerbating, a waste of resources — but unfortunately, none of these points has been properly articulated by our Prime Minister. As such, a number of facts stand uncontested: that Canadian airstrikes have indeed made a difference, however modest, in the battle against ISIL; that while our allies amp up their bombing efforts, Canada is perceived to be in retreat; that greater numbers of Canadian troops near the front lines in Iraq and Syria will make our presence more visible, not less; and that an air campaign and a training mission are actually complementary, not mutually exclusive.