As much flak as Canada does get, I just wanted to give all y'all a bit of a perspective.
Gratned, they haven't done much at all in Iraq, but they are busting their butts to the best of their 1.1% of GNP expenditure in Afghanistan.
To wit - Canada has about 59,000 men under arms - 12,000 of which are land combat forces (the sort most needed in peacekeeping).
Overall, Canada has about 3,800 men deployed overseas in peacekeeping operations (2,000 in Afghanistan). Now, keep in mind that for every soldier deployed overseas, 6 soldiers are tied up at home ither in support or training rotations. So, keeping 3,800 overseas taps out 26,600 of their 59,000 troops. Moreover, the amount of ground combat troops deployed means that they are deploying roughly a third of their ground troops at any one time.
This isn't a huge amount, but hey, its worth something. And it's a damn sight better than some of our other allies have attempted.
Launched by Bravo Romeo Delta at July 13, 2004 11:49 PM