A Canadian's View of the Iraq War

The war in Iraq has created a lot of speculation about America's allies and their contributions to the war on terror. Canadian writer/journalist Mike Gagnon feels that the opinions of his country have been misrepresented and wants to set the record straight.

Since the first bombing of Baghdad in March of 2003 there has been a lot of talk in the media about U.S. foreign policy and how the U.S. is perceived, often negatively, by other countries, including Canada.

"I feel the media has portrayed a real misrepresentation of Canada's stand on Iraq." Gagnon explains. "There seems to be this false image of Canada being against the war on terror and failing to support their closest friend and ally, the U.S. This simply isn't true."

Many U.S. newscasts started sensationalizing what they saw as a lack of support for the war on terror and a betrayal from Canada in 2004 when Paul Martin, Canada's leader at that time, publicly questioned Canada's continued support in the war.

"These types of things are individual views expressed by individual politicians and don't reflect the overall sentiments of our government or the average Canadian citizen" explains Gagnon. "In reality our leaders have been supportive and involved since the onset of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. There are many Canadian soldiers deployed in the Middle East, representing both Canada and the U.N. and we are suffering the same casualties as our U.S. counterparts."

According to the Canadian Forces recruiting website at www.recruiting.forces.gc.ca the CF has engaged in over 72 international peacekeeping and conflict operations since 1947, not including the current operations they are involved in the Middle East. Over three thousand Canadian Forces troops are currently deployed overseas, with over 8,000 engaged in or preparing to engage in operations on any given day. These figures do not include other divisions of Canada's military forces or those deployed under U.N. jurisdiction.