- Reaction score
- 1
- Points
- 210
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In true media fashion... this is on page A10 of the spectator... but the "DEATH IN THE DESERT" was the headlines the day before..... I'm with piper as far as getting really sick of the media sensationalizing on these issues.... we are at war, and people die in war.... these men's deaths are horrible and tragic, and we should remember them for the sacrifice they made, but we also accept the risks when we deploy.
The Reason Canada keeps loosing Good men over there is because some [modified for content] find a way to weasel out of the tour! but that's my opinion...
Regards
- Josh
http://www.hamiltonspectator.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=hamilton/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1145829010207&call_pageid=1020420665036&col=1112101662670
Cool the Rhetoric
Reaction to soldiers' deaths 'is really going over the top,' retired general says,
By Bruce Cheadle
The Canadian Press
OTTAWA (Apr 24, 2006)
The Maple Leaf is not flying at half-mast over Parliament Hill and Prime Minister Stephen Harper is unlikely to travel to CFB Trenton, Ont., to meet the latest war dead, as the Conservative government returns to past protocol in response to mounting casualties in Afghanistan.
Neither development is disrespectful, military analysts said yesterday and may, in fact, help cool what some seasoned soldiers are calling an "over the top" media and public reaction to the inevitable wages of war.
Lewis Mackenzie, the retired major general, a former member of the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry and one-time federal Conservative candidate, said he was taken aback by full-page newspaper accounts yesterday screaming Death in the Desert and Day of Death in Afghanistan.
"As a Patricia, you say to yourself, 'This is really going over the top,'" Mackenzie said from his central Ontario home.
"Those people who are sitting on the fence in their support for the mission -- which they don't really understand -- could well have their opinion affected by what's going on the last couple of days."
Canada's intermittent military casualties have generated wall-to-wall coverage on all-news TV networks and days of front-page newspaper treatment ever since the first four soldiers died in a friendly fire incident in Afghanistan four years ago.
Liberal prime minister Jean Chretien, opposition party leaders, the defence minister and the chief of defence staff all attended a sombre ceremony at Trenton when those first casualties returned in April 2002, a regimen that has been regularly followed since. The Peace Tower flag was lowered to half-mast, a new practice that stuck until last November.
Contrast that to the United States, where the Pentagon clamped down on all media coverage of war dead at the start of the Iraq war in 2003.
Yesterday, as Canadian media chronicled the ultimate sacrifice of Corporal Matthew Dinning, Bombardier Myles Mansell, Lieutenant William Turner and Corporal Randy Payne, the deaths of eight U.S. soldiers in Iraq on the weekend was a footnote in most U.S. media.
Cliff Chadderton, War Amps CEO and chair of the National Council of Veteran Associations, said the Bush administration has made the same mistake as an earlier White House with Vietnam, attempting to suppress information while it has brazened out the Iraq conflict at heavy public price.
"In the Canadian government, we have done the opposite," said the Second World War veteran.
"Let's OK sending troops to Afghanistan -- but if there are casualties, let's play it up as a national disaster. Well, it is a disaster, but it's not a national disaster.
"Just simply tell the public the truth, instead of all this play-acting and 'should we put the flag at half staff or not.'"
But scaling back official reaction to combat deaths is a sensitive subject.
Although no final decision has been made, the prime minister probably won't be in Trenton when the four bodies are returned for burial. Sources indicate Defence Minister Gordon O'Connor and General Rick Hillier, the chief of defence staff, will likely attend.
Critics have already pounced on the flag decision, even though there were four recent combat deaths that didn't get the Peace Tower salute prior to the latest group. All the formal protocols continue, including public statements of condolence and private contact with soldiers families.
"If you have a tragedy like this and the government reacts to it with a shrug -- saying, 'well, there's going to be more of that to come' -- that doesn't do much to solidify or maintain existing public support for the mission," said David Rudd of the Canadian Institute of Strategic Studies.
"But by the same token, you don't want to drift into a state of self-analysis or self-flagellation every time there's a casualty."
For people like Catherine Garrison of Halifax, whose 18-year-old son has volunteered to go to Afghanistan early next year, the issue strikes close to home.
She said she'd like to see the flags lowered across the country for combat casualties, but gave a more nuanced response to the saturated media coverage.
"The grieving process I think should be a private thing for the families of the individuals that have to suffer through it," said Garrison.
"It certainly makes others aware of what's going on, but these are people's loved ones and the media and politicians have to respect that it's a great loss."
In true media fashion... this is on page A10 of the spectator... but the "DEATH IN THE DESERT" was the headlines the day before..... I'm with piper as far as getting really sick of the media sensationalizing on these issues.... we are at war, and people die in war.... these men's deaths are horrible and tragic, and we should remember them for the sacrifice they made, but we also accept the risks when we deploy.
The Reason Canada keeps loosing Good men over there is because some [modified for content] find a way to weasel out of the tour! but that's my opinion...
Regards
- Josh