What is it with Steven Harper and war? What’s his fixation with getting Canada to go along with all of America’s and NATO’s wars? It seems like every time someone contemplates the idea of a military action in the international scene, Harper is half way to the podium talking about how “Canada” is considering following suit. It seems like he’s got a hard-on for war. An adequate term, it’s a military euphemism for being “excited for”. Is it just the usual right wing’s war mongering ways? Or is it Harper’s attempt to get Canada a better role in world affairs by playing tag-a-long little brother of the US?

However you view the situation, one thing is for sure, the drive for war has been coming out of Ottawa lately. Harper and his regime have been using quite the strong language. Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird said that “Canada will continue to work with its like-minded allies to take the necessary action for Iran to abandon its nuclear program… It’s not a question of it, but to what extent, we will act.” This comes on the heels of a leak telling how Israel is planning to strike at Iran’s nuclear facilities.

Steven Harper didn’t hesitate a second to get us involved in the US/NATO invasion of Libya. The consequences of which we are now beginning to learn about: slaughter of migrant workers, civilian casualties greater than the number of people supposedly killed by Gaddafi and the establishment of Islamic fundamentalist Shari’a law. When Harper first came to power he spoke of how he would have sent Canadian troops to Iraq. I can’t imagine the damage that would have been done to this country had we gone along with it. The damage financially, physically, and the damage to our reputation.

This is Canada, we’re not known for our imperialist invasions. Mind you we have done them, we’re just not known for it. Two good examples would be the invasion of Afghanistan after the events of 9/11 and the overthrow Jean-Bertrand Aristide in Haiti in 2004. We are supposed to have this image of being peacekeepers not policemen. He is ruining even our cover story to hide our imperialism.

Harper (along with anyone else in government, from anywhere in the spectrum) may attack people who don’t support the war, but he forgets why we fought one of those wars. He gets angry when anyone says they don’t support the mission in Afghanistan, let alone the troops themselves. He’ll claim they forget why those people fought “for our freedoms”. Of course this is depending on which war they’re talking about. But he will forget one group of people who died for this country. A group of people who actually were defending it along with those in World War 2. The men that died in the War of 1812.

Perhaps he should remember them the next time he cozies up to Barack Obama trying to get us to go along with the new wars the US proposes. Maybe he should remember those who died so that we wouldn’t be Americans. Remember that the next time you try to imitate US policy Mr. Harper.