Syndicate content

Canada

Task Forces in Afghanistan



[More analysis of Wikileaks Afghan War Diary]. Looking through the 200- entries in the Afghan War Diary that specifically mention Canada, I noticed that most of them mention one of three task forces: TF Aegis, TF Paladin, and TF Kandahar. Searching for each of those terms gives a 1000-3000 hits each. It seems that these task forces are multinational NATO efforts with regional commands. From some quick searching, Task Force Aegis seems to have been under the command of a Canadian general. Task Force Paladin seems to be a specific anti-IED unit.

Corrected Canada in Afghanistan - a map



Searching on CDN in Afghanistan instead of CF, which means Coalition Forces, gives a much more modest picture of Canadian Forces around Kandahar. Apologies for the error. Incidents are in red, roads in grey.

NATO deaths in Afghanistan



[More analysis of the Afghan War Diary]

Analyzing NATO/US casualties ("Friendly Killed In Action" or FriendlyKIA) by type of unit gives the following. Coalition Forces (CF) casualties have more wounded than killed.

TypeOfUnit Data

(empty) Sum - FriendlyKIA 28
Sum - FriendlyWIA 29

ACM Sum - FriendlyKIA 6
Sum - FriendlyWIA 15

ANSF Sum - FriendlyKIA 20
Sum - FriendlyWIA 23

ANSF / CF Sum - FriendlyKIA 1
Sum - FriendlyWIA 0

CF Sum - FriendlyKIA 782
Sum - FriendlyWIA 983

CF / ANSF Sum - FriendlyKIA 17
Sum - FriendlyWIA 15

CIV Sum - FriendlyKIA 14

At least 15219 Afghans killed in combat



[More analysis of the Wikileaks Afghan War Diary]

I was looking at situations where Enemy Killed in Action was greater than 0, which gave 3729 incidents. I expect that if there are more civilian deaths than are encoded in the database, they are here, as armed people tend to classify those they kill as combatants, sometimes when they are not. But let's take the data for what it says, and say that who they say were combatants are, for now.

CF in Afghanistan - a map



[ERROR - THIS MAP SHOWS CF OR COALITION FORCES. A MAP OF CANADIAN FORCES ENGAGEMENTS WILL FOLLOW... APOLOGIES FOR THE FAILURE TO CHECK THE ACRONYMS]

I've started to analyze the incredible Afghan War Diary that was published by Wikileaks.

What follows is a bit of nerdiness, in case you want to try this at home.

The G20 Debacle



Written for viewpointonline.net (Pakistan)

What it might have looked like inside the fence

Manuel Rozental on Haiti



The crack reporter and the mystery phone



"And yet, for all my fulminating, one fact is uncontested: I am writing about Naomi Klein. She isn’t writing about me."

--Jonathan Kay, September 12, 2007

I have to admit I stay away from Jonathan Kay's writing as much as I can (a stomach can only take so much, even though I've had two doses of Ducoral now). I can honestly say that I have never encountered a piece of writing of Kay's that doesn't mention Naomi. It's vaguely creepy for me as a reader, and I can only imagine how creepy it must be for her.

Congo Briefing at Tinto in Toronto on July 29/09



Report Back: Congo Briefing
A report from the Eastern DRC by Justin Podur

Wednesday July 29, 2009, 7pm Tinto Coffee House
89 Roncesvalles Ave, Toronto
(416) 530-5885

Writer Justin Podur visited Bukavu in South Kivu in the eastern DRC in June/July 2009 and interviewed human rights defenders, mining researchers, and medical and legal experts on sexual violence.

The Canadian FARC cell that never left Colombia



Colombia's president, Alvaro Uribe Velez, actually presented a dossier from his intelligence agencies when he visited Canada. The intelligence agencies were claiming, based on a magic laptop, that there were FARC guerrilla cells operating in Canada, masterminded by the cousin of the assassinated guerrilla leader Raul Reyes.