What we fought for at Vimy

I can't help but think that Stephen Harper is going to use Vimy as a platform to promote his open-ended, ill-defined committment in Afghanistan. One imagines - as J.D.M. Stewart does in the Globe today - that he will try to draw a parallel between Vimy and Kandahar. He'll talk about bringing freedom to people around the world.

How nice.

Let's be clear though about World War I was about. It was the collapse of a system of complex secret alliances that were designed to preserve and expand imperial holdings. Canada sent an expeditionary force to Europe not because we felt strongly about bringing "freedom" to Europe or something, we sent our forces because the British Empire made us. Canada did not have an independent foreign policy until 1931. We were ostensibly there to protect Belgian neutrality, but really, we were there because Britain felt threatened by the German Empire's growing navy.

At least in World War I we knew when it was over, the German government - at the behest of the general staff - sought an armistice. One doubts that the Taliban would ever seek such terms with NATO.