Opposition parties are accusing Prime Minister Stephen Harper of misleading Parliament and Canadians about Canadaâs mission in Iraq, after it was revealed that our troops were recently involved in a firefight with Islamic State militants.
âNow that we know Canadian soldiers are involved in combat in Iraq, (the government is) trying to say they might be involved in combat, but itâs still not a combat mission,â NDP Leader Thomas Mulcair told reporters Tuesday in Toronto.
âThatâs playing with words, and the brave women and men in uniform who are serving our country deserve better than word games from their prime minister.â
that he asked Harper âvery specificâ questions in the House of Commons last fall as Parliament debated Canadaâs involvement in the fight against ISIS. Each time, the prime minister answered that Canadians would not be engaging in ground combat, Mulcair said.
"Canadian soldiers are not accompanying the Iraqi forces into combat," Harper had said on Sept. 30.
But senior military officials revealed on Monday that Canadian special operations forces came under ISIS attack over the last week and returned fire to âneutralizeâ the threat.
Brig.-Gen. Michael Rouleau said the special ops had just completed a planning session with Iraqi forces several kilometres behind the front lines when they came under mortar and machine-gun fire.
âThis is the first time that this has happened since our arrival and our reaction is wholly consistent with the inherent right of self-defence,â he said of the roughly 69 special ops deployed to Iraq in an advisory and training role.
Rouleau also said that Canadians are âenabling airstrikes from the ground,â by actively finding targets with lasers for jets flying overhead.
But he said that does not mean Canadian ground troops are in a combat role.
âThis is very much within the advise-and-assist regime,â Rouleau said. âWe have the ability to help make the process involving the delivery of coalition aircraft kinetic effects better, safer, faster. We have those capabilities on the ground. Weâre assisting Iraqi security forces who own the combat mission against ISIS.â
However, Gen. Tom Lawson, chief of the defence staff, told CTVâs Question Period last October that Canadian special ops would not be on the ground, guiding air strikes with lasers. This is what he told Ottawa Bureau Chief Robert Fife:
Lawson: âFor our air crews to be more effective, they need to be guided to targets by those who are on the ground and thatâs something that will more and more come into force in coming months.â
Fife: âOK, so weâre going to have these people on the ground pinpointing but it wouldnât be Canadians, right? Because that would sort of end up being a semi-combat role?â
Lawson: âThatâs right.â
On Tuesday, Defence Minister Rob Nicholson told ŰÎŰ´ŤĂ˝ that special forces were only guiding air strikes to avoid civilian casualties, and had to defend themselves.
âWith respect to the firefights, these are Canadian soldiers who were fired upon,â he said. âAnd no matter where you are in the world, if you fire on Canadian soldiers, we will defend ourselves.â
âCombat is combatâ
Mulcair told CTVâs Power Play Tuesday that âtraining is trainingâ and âcombat is combat.â
âThe question is: Was Mr. Harper respecting his word to Parliament and to Canadians? And it clearly appears that the answer to that is no,â he said.
Senior military commander Lt.-Gen. Jonathan Vance also said it's not clear how long it will be before Iraqi forces are able to call in coalition airstrikes against Islamic State fighters without Canada's help.
The military briefings have raised concerns about Canadian troopsâ deeper involvement in Iraq as the threat of ISIS attacks intensifies.
Speaking to reporters in London, Ont., Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau said Harper made âgreat assurancesâ in the House about the âestablished perimeters for the mission.â
Those assurances âhave not been respected,â Trudeau said.
âI think the prime minister owes it to Canadians to be forthright and fulsome in his explanations.â
The Conservative government insists that Canadian troops are not getting involved in ground combat and that they simply had to defend themselves.
Retired Col. George Petrolekas, a former senior NATO advisor, told Power Play Tuesday that the facts, as they were presented by military officials on Monday, âdonât lend themselves to an interpretation of combat.â
Petrolekas said using lasers to point out ISIS targets is âenabling the air function but itâs not actually involved in ground combat."
âThe reaction by political leaders and some academics and other commentators have to be taken in the context of the fact that weâre in an election year so everything is politicized,â he said.
Defence Minister Rob Nicholson told ŰÎŰ´ŤĂ˝ that Canada will be providing more ânon-lethalâ assistance to Iraqi troops by sending 6,000 pieces of surplus winter equipment, such as coats, pants and boots.
With files from The Canadian Press