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As well as appearing in Parliament, the first-term Vancouver South MP is scheduled to appear Wednesday at an event at Ottawa’s Chateau Laurier Hotel hosted by the Conference of Defence Associations regarding the government’s Defence Policy Review.

He lives in a different world now. Any good soldier would not try to steal another soldier’s honour

On Friday, Vance shut down questions about Sajjan’s comments, as he was providing an update on the military’s efforts to stamp out sexual misconduct.

Vance “will have no comment” regarding the claims that Sajjan made in India regarding his role in Op Medusa, Brig.-Gen. Marc Theriault, chief of public affairs for the Canadian Forces, said Sunday.

Although Vance served two combat tours in Kandahar himself, they began several years after Op Medusa took place. Vance was in Canada at the time of Medusa and had no role in it.

Medusa had had “many architects,” although Sajjan “was not one of them,” said Schreiber, who was involved in the hunt for Osama bin Laden during Canada’s first combat tour in Kandahar only months after the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the US. He left the Canadian Forces five years ago and now lives in northern Alberta.

“Harj probably realized it was wrong to take total credit,” Schreiber said, using the nickname that other soldiers in Afghanistan had for him. “I would say that he lives in a different world now. Any good soldier would not try to steal another soldier’s honour. But it is different when you are a politician.”

By all accounts, Sajjan was a remarkably well-liked officer and was respected for his work. That is why dozens of soldiers who served with him in Afghanistan said that they were baffled about why, having been part of such an honour-obsessed culture, he would not understand that it was wrong to claim a far bigger role for himself in the long battle during the late summer and fall of 2006.