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Walking Tall
When reputed TV channels like CBC
Television air stuff like "Samosa Politics", and slam the immigrant
communities by saying that "hatred is most certainly upheld as a
cultural value amongst the races that we welcome into this country
with open arms," it amounts to sheer insult to law abiding citizens.
While the Sikhs rightly feel distressed, those who see immigrants'
affairs through prisms like 'Samosa Politics' should hang their
heads in shame at reading about the contribution of men like Officer
Harjit Singh.
 With the blood of Canadians spilling once more in a far-away land,
we are a nation at war, peacekeepers no more. The ghosts from wars
past now have much younger company.
Those fallen soldiers who so recently walked among us will inhabit
the mind of Maj. Harjit Singh Sajjan as he marches with his fellow
soldiers on parade to remember the fallen.
Recently back from a perilous, eight-month tour in Afghanistan, the
soldier and Vancouver police officer carries memories of some of the
Canadians whose lives slipped away in the fight against the Taliban.
"It's not a perfect world," says Harjit Singh, 36, a British
Columbia Regiment reservist and Vancouver police detective. "That we
couldn't prevent all the deaths, that's something that a lot of us
will have to slowly deal with."
The marching soldiers who thus honour the sacrifices to date, give
Canadians an opportunity to consider the threads that run from
today's soldiers to the veterans of long ago.
"I'm hoping that they don't see it as Canadians in war, but more as
Canadians making a difference in another country, working to take
the personal risk and make sacrifices in another land, just like
Canadians in the past," Harjit says.
It's impossible to draw direct comparisons between the fighting in
the world wars and the battles of Afghanistan, but it's clear that
today's soldiers have faced, in southern Afghanistan, conflicts of
equivalent ferocity, he believes.
"With the amount of sustained fire and bombardment that they were
receiving, it was about as intense as it can get," states Harjit.
He, too, came under fire numerous times, as he travelled from hot
spot to hot spot on behalf of Canada's Brig.-Gen. David Fraser, the
then brigade commander in southern Afghanistan. As a special
projects officer, Harjit Singh was tasked with using his military
training and police expertise, particularly in the area of organized
crime, to aid war and development efforts in Kandahar Province.
"The security situation was deteriorating in that area, and we had
to figure out why that was so," he says.
Fraser wanted to know what was going on in the village centres, the
domestic compounds, the farmers' fields, and in the minds of
Afghans.
"He goes, 'Find me the ground truth.' I'd go out and find out the
ground truth from the people." The truth, Major Sajjan adds, was
that the people wanted peace and stability.
"They said, 'Will you please go in and kick the Taliban out of our
villages. We want to go back to our homes. We want to go back to our
fields.' "
As in his police work, Harjit found that treating people as equals
and listening to them drew the information most useful for winning
over the populace.
"They'll tell you what security means for them, what they really
want in terms of government, what they want from the police. In the
end, real security comes from the grassroots level.
"We tried to use every non-combat avenue to fix the problem first.
We only used combat when we had to. Security does not come from
having a person with a gun there. Security comes from a person who
is happily living in a village and does not support the insurgent
activity."
Harjit would take the citizens' responses to Fraser, who would then
meet with the provincial governor and raise issues identified by the
people.
Fraser was more than happy with the Major's work.
"Not only did he display a rare high level of intellect and
experience in his analysis, he also demonstrated remarkable personal
courage in his collection efforts, often working in the face of the
enemy to collect data and confirm his suspicions, and placing
himself almost daily in situations of grave personal risk," Fraser
says in a letter to Vancouver police Chief Jamie Graham.
"His hard work, personal bravery and dogged determination
undoubtedly saved a multitude of Coalition lives."
But it's not lives saved that Harjit will be thinking of in the days
to come. It's the lives lost, especially during Operation Medusa,
when he became involved in the fierce battle for control of the
Panjwayi area, and Canadians took heavy casualties.
"It just really made everybody work a lot harder to look out for one
another," he says. "You think you could've done more."
And he will be thinking of the Canadians who fought and survived in
Afghanistan, and those who fight there still.
"Our soldiers are second to none," he declares. "How fast and
quickly they moved without any regard to their own safety - you're
just in awe. You're just proud to wear the same uniform as them."
With public support faltering for Canada's mission in Afghanistan,
Harjit remains committed to the effort. The words of one man at a
meeting of local leaders, in a country tormented by three decades of
war, stick in his mind.
"It just comes back to that elderly gentleman saying, 'Don't we
deserve a chance for peace?'
"There are many academic reasons why we should or shouldn't be
there, but when it comes down to it, I just think about the local
people."
- by ETHAN BARON
[Courtesy: The Vancouver Province]
11 July, 2007
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