I am still against the Afghan Detainee issue with which our opposition parties are trying to smear our troops. This excerpt from a Patricia's Diary , shows the due care that Canadian Troops take when they are on the firing line: Courtesy the PPCLI Association ...... D.D. (Dell) Blakney, CD1
visit www.thepointsman.ca
The Western Sentinel, 1 Apr 2010:
Saving the enemy
Capt Mike MacKillop
The way an army treats the population, friend or foe, of the foreign country in which it operates is in many ways reflection of that armys professionalism. In my 13 years as a soldier, I have come to believe that my fellow soldiers are, with few exceptions, of the highest moral calibre. They are not only willing to sacrifice their life for their comrades as part of the duty they freely choose to accept, but capable of difficult decisions on a daily basis under stressful conditions in unclear situations.
I am telling this story, not because it is rare, because incidents like this have happened many times in the eight years we have been in Afghanistan. They have also occurred during many missions before Afghanistan. It isnt that, nor because I think weve done anything particularly special. I share this only because this is my personal example of how our soldiers live up to the expectations and standards set for us by the people of Canada.
On Jan. 7, while we were patrolling along the western edge of the battle groups area of operations, insurgent reconnaissance elements were observed paralleling our movement. They observed us with binoculars, recorded us with cameras and communicated via hand-held radios. We were warned that the messages that our base intercepted indicated that the Taliban were tracking our progress and were planning to either ambush us or setup IEDs along our assessed route.
We were in an area where IED emplacements were frequent, and other troops had been in contact only days earlier. This was where the population was so scared of Taliban abuse or abduction that they refused to give us any information. By noon, numerous confirmed enemy reconnaissance elements were spotted in the area. Despite a two man team being neutralized earlier in the day by our forces in the area, we continued to receive information that we were being watched and that the insurgents were preparing to engage us.
Our forces were unable to engage a second two-man reconnaissance team, as they travelled using children as a human shield, a Taliban tactic that is as common as it is reprehensible. One of our observation platforms observed an IED being emplaced on a nearby route that we had used the last time we had moved through the area.
At approximately 2:25 p.m., our forces engaged an insurgent who had been watching our advance and reporting via radio. The two men with him had fled the location, and no additional spotters were seen in the area and radio traffic ceased. I decided that we would move to the spotters last known location and conduct a battle damage assessment (BDA). Though this is standard practice moving to an area whenever tactically feasible and safe to do so, to confirm the results of ISAF engagements and assess whether or not the engagement was a success and determine if there was any collateral damage, we often cannot conduct BDAs due to the high IED threat and the possibility of a follow-on ambush.
I set up half of my platoon on a series of ruined, ground level buildings and moved the remainder across 500 metres of open field. En route to the scene, an additional insurgent moved into the area via motorbike and, without a thought for his fellow Taliban, recovered the radio he had been using and fled after being shot in the side. When we arrived, we found the first insurgent, wounded, having been shot in both legs, one leg almost completely severed, the other femur shattered. He was unconscious, near cardiac arrest, and within minutes of bleeding out.
The commander of one of my sections established a cordon around the area while the other section, under the supervision of my platoon second-in-command, oversaw the clearing, treatment and preparation of the casualty for evacuation. The work done by the platoons two integral medics was outstanding.
With the assistance of the section, particularly the diligent note-taking and delegation of tasks and the small hands of one soldierwhich allowed him to reach far enough into the wound cavity to find the main artery, they applied tourniquets and rescue flow, providing life saving medical assistance.
I have always had the highest faith in my medics. Their skills, their initiative and their knowledge are first-rate, coupled with a strong patrolling spirit and an outstanding level of physical fitness. That being said, actually watching the proficiency and effectiveness with which they worked that day reminded me of just how blessed the platoon is to have them attached. I know that this thought was shared by all of the other patrolmen that witnessed the calm and deliberate manner they employed as they brought back an enemy from certain death.
Photo by MCpl Matt McGregor, TFK Image
Task Force 3-09 soldiers are often engaged in intense combat and minutes later find themselves providing life saving medical treatment to wounded enemy. The ability to emotionally disengage and help save someone who minutes earlier was trying to kill you is a product of training and demonstrates incredible professionalism and restraint.
Within a few minutes of securing the landing site, an American medical helicopter touched down to receive the casualty, and delivered him to our hospitals at the Kandahar Airfield.
We tracked the blood trail of the second insurgent for a few hundred metres before I decided that we were getting too stretched out and collapsed back together to linkup with the remainder of the platoon.
Our assets identified a threat and neutralized it. This is a necessity in the work we do. We moved forward to determine the result and assessed the security in the area. As I said, this is a standard procedure. We saw a wounded human being and my soldiers used their skills to save him. Simply, it was our duty and the right thing to do.
Had it been the other way around, there can be no doubt that the Taliban would not have done the same for us. The only man of theirs who came forward came to recover a radio and made no efforts to save his wounded peer. As part of a terrorist organization that plants cowards bombs instead of fighting like soldiers, and who save themselves by hiding behind the innocent, we should never think that they will follow any respectable moral code. That is what separates the two sides of this war.
I serve with the code that one will take risks to save the wounded even the enemy and follow the laws of just war. Not because they are convenient, as they arent, not because they are practical, though they can be, but because they are right. They serve the ones that burn schools because they teach math instead of propaganda and place bombs on the roads that children play in.
No one in the platoon thinks that what we did was special; it wasnt. As I explained, this is not a story about a rare event, it is simply a single example of the professionalism and morality of Canadian soldiers, an example in a long line of like ones that have happened here over the past eight years and will, without a doubt, continue.
I certainly hope that the politicos in Ottawa read this issue. Canadians have a lot to be proud of.
A Hearty well done to the Patricias and to their field medics. I salute you and stand by you through thick and thin.
Please Show Support for our troops.
Nil Sine labore
Robby
