Canadians in no rush to wage war on Iraq

The killing of four Canadian soldiers in Afghanistan by the pilot of an American F-16 fighter jet last week has set off a firestorm of anti-Americanism across Canada. People from British Columbia to Nova Scotia are seething.

They are angry that the U.S. military did not take enough care to prevent the accident. They are upset that President George W. Bush did not express his sorrow and sympathy about their loss in time. So they are using the hour of their grief to make a collective statement: that Canada, as much the immediate neighbour and close ally of the United States, is a distinct and separate entity, that Americans should not take for granted.

This point is being driven home to President Bush and the Washington establishment in so many ways. By questioning Canada 's participation in the war against terrorism. By urging caution against committing the country to any expansion of the war to Iraq.

By demanding Canada 's own separate investigation into the 'friendly fire ' incident. By insisting that their general sit in on the U.S. military investigation as well, and by calling on the Americans to pay compensation to the families of the dead.

This has not been an orchestrated reaction. No government or opposition leader is playing any overt role in it. Nor is it being driven by the local media. Yet the voices reverberating across the country they seem almost the same.

It is as if Canadians have all decided to use the occasion of their grief to speak up about fears which have been bubbling below the surface. Concerns about Canadian values, Canadian sovereignty, respect for Canadian independence.

This is unprecedented in Canada, and, as they have come together to honour their dead, they are questioning the wisdom of not only placing Canadian troops under U.S. command in Afghanistan, but also about Canada 's eroding sovereignty in the wake of measures adopted by Ottawa to demonstrate its solidarity with Washington in response to September 11.

Perhaps Canadians are reacting this way because no Canadian soldier has died 'on the front lines ' since the Korean War nearly half a century ago. Perhaps their displeasure stems from the fact that fighting is not what they wanted their soldiers to do in Afghanistan, but peace keeping.

But, when the Europeans could not accommodate Canadians as part of the peacekeeping mission, Ottawa opted to demonstrate its solidarity with Washington by sending the troops as a fighting unit under American command.

Now, when four Canadians in the prime of their youth have been struck down by a bomb dropped by the very friend they went to help, the friend 's insensitivity in not sharing their sorrow in public at the outset appears to them like disrespect. They feel they are being taken for granted. "Four dead Canadians may not seem like much to the commander-in-chief of the world 's most powerful military," says Toronto peace activist Neville David. "But for us, this represents a horrendous loss, especially given the circumstances of their deaths."

President Bush had actually called Prime Minister Jean Chretien to apologise for the deaths within hours of learning of the incident. So had other senior administration officials like Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, to offer their condolences to their counterparts in Canada.

But they had not expressed their sorrow in public until two days later. By the time Bush and Rumsfeld made public expressions of regret and sorrow - even paying homage to Canadian bravery and steadfastness - Canadians had already decided that the delay demonstrated indifference and an offhand attitude towards a close friend and ally whose young men and women had put their lives on the line for them.

Even now, nearly a week later, most Canadians remain unassuaged by American explanations that the bombing was an accident, caused by individual miscalculation - or fear or tiredness or stress, or similar human frailty. An opinion survey conducted as the bodies of the four soldiers were taken to their home towns, showed that the depth of feeling remained high.

As many as 85 per cent of Canadians demanded that Ottawa hold the U.S. government accountable if negligence is established as the cause of the accident in the investigation, according to the poll, conducted by Ipsos-Reid for the Canadian national daily, Globe and Mail and television network, CTV. They also wanted the United States to pay compensation to the families of the soldiers killed.

"People are not willing to brush this off," explained John Wright, Vice President of Polling at Ipsos-Reid. "Canadians are getting angry over what happened, but they are looking at recognition and compensation rather than retribution."

Clearly, their concern goes far beyond the raw emotions of the moment or the cold logic that war is a hazardous undertaking. The uproar reflects a deeper feeling of unease that has been taking root for months. In citizen forums on the Web, television and radio talk shows, in newspaper Letters to the Editor columns and in national and state assemblies, Canadians have taken to urging caution as never before.

They want the government in Ottawa to go slow on all future commitments on the war against terrorism and American defence arrangements that involves Canada.

It is plain to see that uppermost on their mind is possible Canadian involvement in three crucial U.S projects now on the table - the plan to take the terrorism war to Iraq with a view to ousting Saddam Hussein, the installation of a National Missile Defence (NMD) system designed to destroy ballistic missiles aimed at North American cities, and the move to create NORTHCOM - a new North American military command structure conceived by Washington for the purpose of pushing the perimeter of its defences to the Canadian Arctic in the north and the tropics of Mexico in the south.

With the pressure mounting on Ottawa to support these projects, Canadians seem to be telling their government in the wake of the deaths in Afghanistan to slow down and not be in a rush to make war on Iraq, or join the bandwagon in support of missile defence, or collaborate in NORTHCOM. Although Chretien said last week that Canada is staying out of the defence shield for now, indications are that Ottawa is still to make final decisions on all three.

For its part, the Bush administration has realized the public relations blunder caused by the delayed expression of public sympathy for the Canadian dead and is going out its way to make amends. After some initial hesitation, Pentagon has now agreed that a Canadian general will sit as an equal with his American counterpart atop the two-person U.S. military probe into the 'friendly fire incident.

The U.S. has also conceded that the Canadian general would have the right to ask questions of the F-16 pilot and other American personnel implicated in the accident.

That is not all. There is a good chance that Washington will find a way to pay compensation to the families of the soldiers killed if the investigation shows negligence on the part of the American military personnel. That would be a major concession as the U.S. law - specifically, the Foreign Claims Act and the Military Claims Act - makes it impossible for foreign citizens to win damages in court against the U.S. government f