About those knives being drawn...

There are a few items from an informative Star report today of note. First off, we see how the Harper government's behaviour is coming back to haunt them. In the form of anonymous officials seeking to dump all over them:

"If I was aware, can you believe that he was not aware, the minister of national defence?" Dion asked. "Clearly, this government is in complete confusion, so much that they want to hide the truth from Canadians."

MacKay was in Kandahar handing out soccer balls to Afghan children on the very day the military opted to stop transfers.

"He gets briefed on everything," said a senior government official who works on the Afghan file and asked not to be identified. (emphasis added)

Yes, he gets briefed on everything. A lot of good it does him too, hey? Here's another anonymous quote achieving a similar effect:

Dion said it is up to Harper to decide what to do with his political staff, but one government official said Buckler is now a "huge liability" because the communications mix-up comes in the same week that the Tories were sharply criticized for casting a veil of secrecy over the Afghan mission.

The government official told the Star that the military had "immediately" informed other departments of the decision and that the Prime Minister's Office would have been in the loop. "Given their control and the micromanagement, there's not a damn thing they don't know," he said, speaking on background. (emphasis added)

Kind of get the feeling that Ms. Buckler has made a few enemies? I'd expect to see a lot more of this in coming months. Ms. Buckler's attempt to shift responsibility to the military for the lack of disclosure about the changed detainee policy, and Linda Keen's firing as well, may have freed up a few formerly shrinking violets among the government ranks who don't like what they're witnessing on the inside. A government concerned with its own skin above all else.

Given the reports that the military were livid about Ms. Buckler's recent public statements, it's going to be difficult for her to continue on in her post. She's earned significant enmity, apparently, and the Afghan file will not be getting any easier to handle.

The same Star report cited above quotes an expert with a theory on what's happening to detainees that are captured now:

One military expert suggested the most likely scenario is that Afghan National Army soldiers fighting along with Canadian soldiers are now taking prisoners and handing them over to local jails.

"That is probably the answer," said Alain Pellerin, head of the Conference of Defence Associations.

If that is the case, then it is a "step backward" from a May 2007 agreement between Ottawa and Kabul that allows Canadian officials to inspect Afghan jails and monitor those prisoners it has transferred.

Outsourcing the transfers to the ANA so we can keep our hands clean from handing over detainees to Afghan prisons where they might be tortured? Sounds like shirking to me. Turning a blind eye to the problem is not going to fix anything. If this is what is happening now, it's absolutely a step backward.

It might be the case that Junior signed off on the policy change, whatever it is, while in Afghanistan in early November around the time that the commander on the ground put a halt to the transfers. If it is the case that we're now handing responsibility for capture of detainees over to the ANA, and they're handing them over in turn to Afghan jails, it might be that the Harper government didn't want this fact to get out because it would appear that Canada was reneging on its recently updated agreement with the Afghan government on monitoring of detainees. You can't live up to an agreement and monitor the health of detainees if you never captured them in the first place. This would be an end run around the obligations just undertaken, if you will. Not the kind of thing you're eager to broadcast.

Quite the exemplary operation we're running over there, and here.