In October of 2014, when I reluctantly voted in favour of a six-month air combat mission in Iraq, I thought the Liberal party was being too dovish in its opposition.

That ISIS was evil was beyond debate. But while I supported the initial engagement, I was very worried about “mission creep” — the possibility that this was not going to be a simple six-month commitment.

In March of 2015, when I voted against a twelve-month extension of the mission (which would include Syria as well), I thought the Conservative government was being too hawkish — that it was taking an awful risk in getting involved in a bloody sectarian civil war with multiple factions and ever-changing allegiances. My worries about mission creep seemed to have been validated.

After watching Monday’s incomprehensible press conferences on the Trudeau government’s re-tooled ISIS mission, I’m starting to wonder if I ever really understood the parties’ original positions.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau seems determined to withhold his real reason for withdrawing the six CF-18s, beyond citing the commitment he made during the October election. Fulfilling an election promise would be a valid reason for doing what he did, except … he never said anything during the campaign about increasing Canada’s commitment to the mission.

Although he voted against it while in opposition, Trudeau apparently now supports the concept of an anti-ISIS air war — as long as Canadian pilots aren’t the ones dropping the bombs. So Canada’s refuelling plane will remain active in the mission, as will our surveillance assets. If the prime minister sees nothing wrong with providing logistical support to the air war, it follows that his decision to pull the CF-18s wasn’t based on any moral objection to bombing.

Meanwhile, the scope and length of this mission have expanded dramatically — along with the risk to Canadian soldiers. A two-year commitment means this mission has gone from six months to eighteen to forty-two and counting. Rather than bombing from a safe distance, most of Canada’s mission assets now move to the ground. The PM was at pains to insist Canadian trainers will not be directly involved in combat — but they will be engaged in identifying targets as they work with Kurdish forces. Chief of Defence Staff Jonathan Vance confirmed that, as a result of Monday’s mission re-set, more Canadian soldiers will be put at risk.

The irony here is that the Conservatives’ ISIS mission was the safe one — the one that involved bombing from a distance. The Liberals, who objected to the bombing, have changed the mission in a way that places more Canadians at greater risk. The irony here is that the Conservatives’ ISIS mission was theone — the one that involved bombing from a distance. The Liberals, who objected to the bombing, have changed the mission in a way that places more Canadians at greater risk.

To present the new ISIS mission to Canadians as a ‘non-combat’ operation defies common sense. We’re sending armed troops into harm’s way, to paint targets for our allies and retrieve casualties. The brass hats have been forced to twist logic like a pretzel to explain why Canadian military advisers who get drawn into firefights on the ground aren’t actually engaged in ‘combat’ because they’re acting in self-defence. Calling an “advise and assist mission” non-combat does not make it so. The words mean what they mean — even in politics.

The number of Canadian security advisors will be tripled; total personnel will increase from 650 to 830. Canada will spend $1.6 billion on security, humanitarian aid and development assistance in the region.

The prime minister may believe that training local security forces to defend their own country is the best way to degrade ISIS, but it pays to remember that we tried the same strategy in Afghanistan — where it failed, dismally. The staged NATO and U.S. withdrawal there was accompanied by a rising insurgency and more suicide bombings. The longest war in American history has not resulted in peace and security. The Afghan security forces continue to be plagued by incompetence and endemic corruption.

Moreover, the members of the Kurdish Peshmerga are not terribly interested in Iraq’s security; their goal is to defend Iraqi Kurdistan and promote an autonomous Kurdish state.

It’s a complicated mess — and it’s our mess, until 2018 at least. Syria is a convoluted nightmare of a war, involving hundreds of militia groups following capricious allegiances. Now the Russians are involved, adding one more loose grenade to the pile — and we can never lose sight of the fact that defeating ISIS means propping up the butcher Bashar al-Assad.

But if the Liberals’ position is irrational, the Conservative approach under interim leader Rona Ambrose has been simply indecipherable. At her Monday press conference responding to the Liberals’ mission announcement, Ambrose seemed quite confused about the difference between combat and non-combat — claiming that Trudeau’s changes to the previous government’s mission amounted to abandoning a combat role.

Maybe she knows better than U.S. Defence Secretary Ashton Carter, who — according to the Pentagon — thanked Canada for increasing its commitment to the mission; his spokesman actually described it as Canada “stepping up”. Putting more troops on the ground is not de-escalation. The Liberals are dedicating more money and more personnel to this fight than their predecessors did — and yet, according to Ambrose, that amounts to stepping back and leaving the “heavy lifting” to our allies.

The irony here is that the Conservatives’ ISIS mission was the safe one — the one that involved bombing from a distance. The Liberals, who objected to the bombing, have changed the mission in a way that places more Canadians at greater risk.

The Harper government’s mission was largely symbolic — just six planes, making less than three per cent of the air strikes. Still, the Conservatives say they want it to continue. Trudeau voted against the bombing and promised to end Canada’s combat mission. Still, he has committed more personnel and money to a more dangerous mission.

The parties’ positions are as muddled and mystifying as the war itself.

Brent Rathgeber was the Conservative MP for the riding of Edmonton—St. Albert from 2008 to 2013, when he resigned from the Conservative caucus to protest the Harper government’s lack of commitment to transparency and open government. He ran and lost in the 2015 federal election to a Conservative candidate. He is the author of Irresponsible Government: The Decline of Parliamentary Democracy in Canada.

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