Mark Collins – Afghanistan and Fact-Challenged Canadian Media

(2011 Story for photo at top of the post: “Canada Leaves Kandahar, Flag Lowered For The Last Time In Afghanistan“.)

A letter sent to the Ottawa Citizen and not published (link to story no longer works):

Re:Canada to honour Afghanistan war veterans in May, March 19

This story states that “Soldiers were involved in direct combat for a decade, and during the past two years served as military trainers…”  However neither timeline is accurate.

The Canadian Forces in Afghanistan had two separate combat missions, both at Kandahar.  The first was for six months at the start of 2002 (after which they were withdrawn from the country) and then for five and a half years from 2006 to 2011.  So they were engaged in combat for six years, not ten.

The other major missions were an essentially peacekeeping one at Kabul 2003 to 2005 and then the training one, mainly at Kabul, for almost three years–not two as the story says–from 2011 until a few days ago.

One is rather bemused that such recent history is so quickly recounted erroneously.

References:
http://www.forces.gc.ca/en/operations-abroad-current/op-attention.page
https://www.canada.ca/en/department-national-defence/services/operations/military-operations/recently-completed/operation-athena.html

Much related:

“Afghanistan: Our Longest War”: Only Just

Mark Collins, a prolific Ottawa blogger, is a Fellow at the Canadian Defence & Foreign Affairs Institute; he tweets @Mark3Ds