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Old 05-29-2006, 10:22 PM   #2
octothorp
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"I can tell you that all of the circumstances that led to the London transit bombings, to take one example, are resident here now in Canada," he said.
And one of the most significant similarities would be the fact that we, like Britain (and unlike most nations with a substantial immigrant population), now have a military presence in the region. He's using circular reasoning there, essentially saying we should continue have a presence in Afghanistan because there's a threat of attack on Canadian soil because we have a presence in Afghanistan.

I'm not saying that there would be no threat of terrorism in Canada if we were to pull out of Afghanistan, and more to the point, I don't think that the threat of terrorism is just cause to pull out of Afghanistan. But the reality is that Canada is probably more at risk now--and will continue to be at risk in the future--as a result of our presence. Though I'm not really surprised that the head of CSIS would neglect to mention that.

The debate over whether we should continue to have a presence in Afghanistan should be centered around whether we have any sort of moral responsibility to continue, and whether we can effectively contribute to a positive outcome in the conflict. If the answer to both those questions is yes, then we should continue in Afghanistan. As far as I'm concerned, whether or not there's a threat of terrorist attacks here is irrelevant.
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