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U.S. Commander Sure of NATO in Afghanistan U.S. Commander Confident NATO Will Be Aggressive in Fighting Insurgency in Southern Afghanistan The Associated Press By Kim Gamel January 3, 2006 KANDAHAR, Afghanistan - A U.S. commander expressed confidence Friday that NATO-led peacekeeping troops will aggressively keep up the fight against insurgents when they take over control of southern Afghanistan from American troops in the spring. Maj. Gen. Jason Kamiya, the U.S.-led coalition's operational commander, also called a recent rise in suicide bombings a sign of the insurgency's increasing desperation over Afghanistan's successful parliamentary elections in September and other democratic advances. "As...

Elite troops bound for Afghanistan Allies consider backing out of dangerous mission Chris Wattie National Post January 04, 2006 The Canadian Forces is sending up to 100 commandos from its elite Joint Task Force 2 to Afghanistan this month, the largest contingent of special forces Canada has ever sent overseas, the National Post has learned. Between 75 and 100 soldiers of JTF-2 will arrive just ahead of a 2,000-member Canadian battle group that is deploying to the restive southern province of Kandahar amid growing warnings of high casualties and a looming enemy offensive in the region. Defence sources familiar with...

KABUL, Afghanistan (CP) - A car driven by an apparent suicide car bomber swerved into a Canadian military convoy and exploded Sunday in the southern city of Kandahar, witnesses said. Three coalition soldiers were wounded in the attack that also killed two civilians and injured 10, according to officials. Shopkeeper Rahim Gul, who saw the incident, said a sedan vehicle blew up as it was passing the convoy. "The explosion was so big: it destroyed one jeep and blew it totally to the other side of the road," he said, adding he saw three soldiers among the casualties. U.S. military...

OTTAWA (CP) - A suicide attacker detonated a car bomb in the middle of a Canadian military convoy in Afghanistan on Sunday, killing the region's senior Foreign Affairs officer and wounding three Canadian soliders. Defence Department officials identified the dead man as Glyn Berry, 59, a political director posted with the 250-member provincial reconstruction team which is conducting liaison and humanitarian work around Kandahar. Three Canadian soldiers were wounded in the blast - Pte. William Edward Salikin of 3rd Battalion Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry, Cpl. Jeffrey Bailey of 1 Combat Engineer Regiment and Master Cpl. Paul Franklin of 1...

EDMONTON - With part of his leg blown off, Master Cpl. Paul Franklin wrapped a tourniquet around his thigh, then went to help three other wounded passengers after a suicide bomber destroyed the military vehicle he was driving. "He's a medic, so he had the wherewithal to do that," Audra Franklin said from her home in Edmonton, proudly describing her husband's heroic actions yesterday in Kandahar. From her composure as she sat watching replays of the footage on TV, it was hard to tell her husband had just lost his lower left leg and had his right leg shattered. "I...

OTTAWA (CP) - A fresh battalion of Canadian troops head to some of the harshest climes of Afghanistan next month in the midst of an escalating insurgency to face an enemy they will see but will not know. Sunday's attack that killed Canadian diplomat Glyn Berry and wounded three Canadian soldiers brought home with cold clarity the realities of a war that has evolved and shifted since Canada first joined the fight four years ago. Canadians chased an elusive enemy in the months after Afghan-trained terrorists attacked New York and Washington. The Canucks were often targeted by wildly inaccurate rockets...

Canada's soldiers in Afghanistan are getting 43 new armoured patrol vehicles with improved protection from ground-level mine blasts but they may not be a panacea for the type of suicide attack that killed a Canadian diplomat and injured three soldiers in Kandahar. The new armoured patrol vehicles (APVs), based on the South African Nyala anti-mine vehicle, will be used mainly for patrols and route reconnaissance. They are designed to "resist under-wheel and under-belly mine strikes to enhance crew survivability" and to protect occupants "from small arms, hand grenades and anti-tank mines." That description comes from a Canadian Forces background and...

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan - Canadian troops and Afghan police averted a potentially deadly car bomb yesterday, working through the night to defuse a vehicle packed with enough explosives to cause what a military spokesman called "a catastrophe." The small car, filled with 120-millimetre mortar shells and dozens of smaller explosives, was found abandoned on a street in Kandahar by the Afghan National Police on Wednesday afternoon. They called the Canadian Provincial Reconstruction Team, based less than 10 kilometres away, and a squad of soldiers was dispatched to clear the area along with a team of combat engineers. Captain Francois Giroux, a...

Every time anything happens to Canadian soldiers in Afghanistan, everyone with a beef against the current federal government seems to feel the need to ratchet-jaw on about the poor, wretchedly equipped Canadian military. As someone who’s been issued all the kit, and who has had access to the stuff other countries are using, I find this tendency extremely irritating. Canada doesn’t have a big navy. We don’t have guided missile cruisers, (working) submarines, or aircraft carriers. Our air force is suffering from decades of neglect, and we are stretched mighty thin just sustaining our forces in Afghanistan with our brace...