Learn both sides of Afghanistan story, Canadian general urges

Stationed in Afghanistan for one year, Maj.-Gen. Dennis C. Tabbernor wants Canadians to know the country’s not going down the tubes.

Major General Tabbernor says he’s optimistic for Afghanistan’s future, even though it’s a long-term commitment (Photo: Ruth Mestechkin).

Major General Dennis C. Tabbernor stands upright in a creaseless black suit with a poppy pinned to his collar. He’s in Dalhousie’s Weldon Law Building today to speak about his year in Afghanistan. He faces his audience of 12 people in a room that could fit roughly 60 guests. No one in the room is younger than 30 years old. And two of the attendees are soldiers.

Tabbernor thinks more students ought to know more about the mission in Afghanistan.

“We’ve done a very poor job of educating Canadians as to what is actually happening in Afghanistan and what good work Canadians are doing in Afghanistan,” says Tabbernor, who was stationed in the country from April 29, 2007 to April 27, 2008. He was involved in the Combined Security Transition Command, a mission to stabilize Afghanistan by training the Afghanistan National Security Forces.

We only hear one side of the story, says Tabbernor.

“We see the soldiers coming back after they’ve been killed,” he says. “If it doesn’t bleed, it doesn’t lead, it’s not a story.”

Tabbernor says there are 400 districts in Afghanistan. Last year the majority of incidents in the country occurred in 40 of these districts.

“We don’t hear that back here,” says Tabbernor. “‘Afghanistan is going down the toilet.’ No it’s not.”

He says the population of the country has grown from 400,000 in 2003 to more than four million today.

“What people have to understand is reconstruction only happens when there is security,” says Tabbernor. “If we build something and there’s no security, the Taliban and the bad guys will come back in and destroy it. To me, it’s a long-term commitment.”

The major-general says he’s optimistic for Afghanistan’s future — there are still enough Afghans who remember how the country used to be.

“No burkas, no headscarfs — nothing. That was Kabul before the trouble started,” he says. “They’ve got this vision in their mind of what their country can be and has been and they’re working very, very hard to get back there.”

Tabbernor flicks a key on his black laptop to a photo projected on the wall. There are three images of six Afghan children. In one picture, there are two small boys wearing baggy sweatshirts. One boy clutches a worn-out teddy bear.

“I put this up here because this to me is the future of Afghanistan,” he says. “I think you know that in the Taliban (times), very few people went to school and most of the people that went to school are boys. They weren’t necessarily being educated, they were being indoctrinated.”

Today, says Tabbernor, millions of young children go to school.

“These young kids are all going to school and they are the future of Afghanistan,” he says.

Tabbernor says he believes what Canada is doing in Afghanistan is very important to the future of its country. He remembers a conversation he had with an American public affairs officer after his time there.

“He said to me, ‘Is what you’re doing in Afghanistan worth the life of a Canadian soldier?’ At the end of the day I said, ‘nothing that we do is worth the life of a soldier,’” says Tabbernor, pausing. “But if you’re asking me are we having a benefit over here, and do I feel I am contributing to what is happening over there, and the answer is yes. I’ll go back tomorrow.”

The whites in Tabbernor’s eyes are tinged with red as his rough voice becomes quiet. He sighs.

“I just think they need our help. We don’t know what we have,” he says. “We do not, here in Canada, know how well off we are. A hundred dollars a month. Think about it. A hundred dollars a month is what an Afghan soldier gets paid. For going out there and putting his life on the line.”

Dalhousie student Matilka Krow says she thought Tabbernor was even-handed and thoughtful in his presentation.

“It was pretty encouraging to hear that it wasn’t as narrow or west-oriented a presentation as people might expect,” she says. “He seems to have a real genuine sympathy for the Afghan people and he seems to genuinely feel that he had a contribution to make and it was sort of an ethical obligation to be present.”

Shelly Whitman, the deputy director for the Centre for Foreign Policy Studies at Dalhousie, a section of the political science department, which organized Tabbernor’s presentation, says Tabbernor’s talk was important because she thinks the public is ill-informed. The centre organizes seminars regarding international policy dealing with political, economic and environmental issues.

“We saw in the election that it wasn’t even an issue for people in terms of how they voted. Why isn’t it a key issue?” she asks. “It’s money that’s being spent, our troops are getting sent, it’s our national pride as well in how you view what our role in the world should be.”

She says she thinks sometimes students make decisions irrationally.

“I know, I was a student too. All of us sitting here have (been students),” she explains. “The more that you have discussions and the more you understand why things happen, the better you can understand why you have the opinions you hold.”  

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