Private Jonathan Couturier Comes Home

This blog is determined to note and honour each of Canada's soldiers to fall in Afghanistan. The latest, Private Jonathan Couturier, was killed by an IED strike in Afghanistan on Friday, September 17. His body returned home to Canada on Sunday, Sept 20th. The same explosion injured eleven of his comrades. Pte. Couturier served with the 2nd Battalion, Royal 22nd Regiment, based in Valcartier, Que. He becomes our 131st fatality since the mission started in 2002. Rest eternal grant to him, O Lord, and may light perpetual shine upon him.



CBC News reported that Pte. Couturier's family had doubts about the value of the mission, doubts that were echoed by the Bloc Quebecois party.

Today the Globe and Mail is reporting that Ottawa has received the report of US General McChrystall in a non-committal manner. The Canadian government is not making any predictions as to what its presence in Afghanistan will look like as of 2011. The Globe quoted "[n]ew Conservative Senator Pamela Wallin, a member of the Manley Task Force that helped chart the future of Canada's Afghan mission early last year, [as saying that] 'To try and predict where we're going to be in the summer of 2011 is foolhardy ... We have no idea'". In an oped piece in today's Globe, Jeffrey Simpson says that we can forget about the next phase in the Afghan war being a NATO effort: "The Americans alone must implement Gen. McChrystal's strategy, the outcome of a hard-nosed analysis of the challenge of winning in Afghanistan. However, executing even this refined strategy will be next to impossible."

General McChrystall's unclassified report to US Defence Secretary Gates may be found here.