CANADIAN OFFICIALS AND 'MANLEY PANEL' CHART WAY

S E C R E T SECTION 01 OF 04 OTTAWA 002135

SIPDIS

NOFORN
SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/21/2017
TAGS: PREL MOPS NATO AF CA
SUBJECT: CANADIAN OFFICIALS AND 'MANLEY PANEL' CHART WAY
AHEAD IN AFGHANISTAN

REF: A. OTTAWA 2029


B. USDAO OTTAWA 052056Z NOV

Classified By: PolMinCouns Scott Bellard, reasons 1.4 (b) and (d)


1. (C/NF) Summary: Canada's Defense Minister believes
Canadian and Afghan forces are performing well in southern
Afghanistan but he and his colleagues are worried about the
minority Conservative government's ability to convince
Parliament to authorize an extension of the current mission
from 2009 to February of 2011. The government and the new
"Panel on the Future Role of Canada in Afghanistan" (known as
the Manley Panel) will work hard over the next three months
to "recast" the Afghan mission in a way that will permit
opposition Liberals to support it. European enablers and
maneuver forces would bolster support for the mission among
Canadians who feel they have borne an unfair burden in
restive Kandahar. Should under-performing Europeans fail to
help the Canadians, U.S. forces might have to fill the gap
under the auspices of ISAF if we hope to ensure the continued
deployment of Canadian Forces in RC-S. Panel members will
likely raise these issues, as well as a request for the
expedited delivery of MQ-9 Predator Bs and other systems,
when they meet senior U.S. officials in Washington on
December 10. End summary.


2. (C) Counselor of the Department of State Dr. Eliot Cohen
and Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense (DASD) for Central
Asia Mitch Shivers met senior Canadian officials in Ottawa
November 13 - 14. They heard a broad range of Canadian views
of the Afghanistan mission, and learned about the role of a
new panel that the Prime Minister has asked to review and
make recommendations on Canadian participation in NATO's
International Security Assistance Force (ISAF),to include
whether Canadian combat forces should remain in Kandahar
after February 2009. They also discussed NATO member
responses to Canadian requests for help with enablers and
additional maneuver forces, as well as the effectiveness of
NATO-ISAF planning and operations.


3. (SBU) Dr. Cohen's and DASD Shivers' program featured
meetings with Minister of Defence Peter MacKay, Foreign and
Defence Policy Adviser to the Prime Minister Susan
Cartwright, Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS)
Director Jim Judd, Former Regional Command - South (RC-S)
Commander General David Fraser, Foreign and National Security
Adviser to the Prime Minister Keith Fountain, Privy Council
Office (PCO) Assistant Secretary Jill Sinclair, and others.
They spoke to defense and security opinion leaders in Ottawa
and professors and students at the Royal Military College
(RMC) in Kingston, and met with the two most senior members
of the Panel on the Future Role of Canada in Afghanistan,
Chairman (and former Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign
Minister) John Manley and former Ambassador to the United
States Derek Burney.

Canada's Future in RC-S, Afghanistan
--------------


4. (C) Minister of Defence MacKay had just returned from
Kandahar, where Canadian troops and their Afghan National
Army (ANA) counterparts had distinguished themselves in
battle at Arghandab near Kandahar. The local population
warmly received the ANA and the Canadians in Arghandab;
MacKay commented that this indicated the deployment of
QMacKay commented that this indicated the deployment of
Canadian maneuver forces combined with their training and
mentoring of ANA troops was paying dividends. Such progress
is a "political enabler" of public support in Canada, MacKay
underscored. (Comment: This Canadian desire for explicit
progress was echoed by most of the Counselor's interlocutors.
End comment)


5. (C) While things are going well on the battle front,
according to MacKay, there is uncertainty at home. Indeed,
he added, if a vote were held tomorrow, Parliament would not
extend the Canadian Forces' (CF) combat mission beyond 2009.
This is why the Harper government created the "Manley Panel,"
he noted. The government hopes that the Panel will
"depoliticize" the issue and create a political space for the
government and sympathetic opposition members to "recast" the
mission in a way that the Liberal leadership, as well as its
rank-and-file, could accept. The Panel will issue its report
in the third week of January, followed by a debate and vote

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in Parliament -- probably in February but before NATO's
Bucharest Summit -- on whether to extend the mission and in
what capacity through February 2011.


6. (C) After the Panel submits it report, the government
will press hard in Parliament for language giving it "maximum
flexibility," MacKay emphasized, to include the continued
deployment of combat forces in ISAF. He highlighted that if
NATO partners want Canada to succeed in Parliament and remain
in theater, they should move quickly to find ways to deliver
enablers such as dedicated helicopters, UAVs, and other "tech
support" to RC-S. There is also a critical need for
additional maneuver forces in the south. MacKay indicated
that such deliverables would have a profound psychological
and practical effect on Canadians.


7. (C) MacKay revealed that Canada has been discussing the
provision of helicopters in RC-S with Germany and Poland.
Germany is still weighing options to deploy without breaking
its unhelpful caveats, he said, while Poland has "said all
the right things" but has not followed through.

The Panel
--------------


8. (C) Chairman Manley (a Liberal) and Ambassador Burney (a
Conservative) laid out their current thinking on the work of
the Panel (ref a). According to Manley, Liberal Leader
Stephane Dion had backed himself into a corner with his
strident demands that Canada end its combat role in February

2009. Even though many Liberals disagree with Dion on
Afghanistan, he said, it is currently impossible to know how
the Liberals would vote on the matter. Manley and
like-minded Liberals want to see the Panel "raise and
depoliticize" the discussion of Afghanistan, and for the
Panel to describe the next iteration of Canadian
participation in the mission in a way that Dion could
characterize as a "win" for the Liberals.

Predators
--------------


9. (C) Manley asked if the U.S. government would be able to
help Canada expedite the procurement of General Atomic MQ-9
Predators Bs. The forthcoming Panel report would likely
suggest specific enhancements before Canada commits to
extending its CF combat presence in RC-S. Among them -- if
General Atomic and the USG could assure Canada of early
delivery -- would be the MQ-9 Predator B, due in part to its
utility in detecting and destroying teams planting IEDs.
(Note: IEDs, mines, and roadside bombs have caused 24 of the
CFs 26 troop deaths this year. end note)


10. (C) Manley commented that the introduction of the
Predator would be good for the CF, and would also give
Liberal leader Dion some political cover. Dion could make
its procurement a condition for agreeing to the extension in
RC-S, and win points for protecting Canadian troops. "I need
something big" to garner Liberal votes, Manley said. The
Panel will probably include an additional NATO battle group
on the list of "requirements," he added. A French or other
capable European battle group would be politically more
useful than one from the U.S. but the bottom line is that
Canada needs to see more maneuver forces in RC-S, according
to MacKay.


11. (C) During a subsequent meeting, PMO adviser Keith
Fountain also raised the Predator, asking if delivery to the
CF would be "doable" before 2009. On both occasions, Dr.
QCF would be "doable" before 2009. On both occasions, Dr.
Cohen and DASD Shivers agreed to look into the issue, but
made no promises. Dr. Cohen emphasized that Canada would
need to make clear that it intends to remain in a combat role
in a sustained way.

The Allies
--------------


12. (C) Manley and Burney explained that, while they would
try to set conditions for success in Parliament, the
political window of opportunity was small and there was no
guarantee they would succeed. NATO allies could continue to
refuse Canadian requests for help in the south, the already
high Canadian casualty rate could spike, the current troubles

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in Pakistan could cause profoundly negative effects in RC-S,
or the United States could poison the regional political
environment by taking unilateral military action against
Iran, they commented. Any one or a combination of these
things could lead Dion to decide against seizing the very
opportunity the Panel was working to create.


13. (C) Assistant Secretary Sinclair and PMO Adviser
Fountain raised under-performing allies, strategic
communications, concerns about growing instability in
Pakistan, and the need to validate Canadian sacrifices to
date with success in Afghanistan. They expressed support for
"hardening" the Afghan border to keep the Pakistan conflict
from spilling over and underscored Canada's worry that the
U.S. might go it alone against Iran. Sinclair acknowledged
that ISAF members were coming up short, but stressed that the
legitimacy that came with UN-sanctioned NATO operations was
critically important to maintaining Canadian support for the
mission. In this context, Canada would prefer that any surge
in U.S troops or combat support to the region be under the
auspices of ISAF rather than Operation Enduring Freedom
(OEF),according to Fountain.


14. (C) MacKay, Cartwright, Sinclair, and Fountain
separately noted that it was impossible to have the
broad-based strategic discussion at NATO's NAC that the
mission necessitated, but expressed concern that a formal
meeting of countries that have actually deployed serious
combat forces to Afghanistan risked exacerbating cleavages
within NATO. Sinclair emphasized the Canadian preference for
operating with allies under UN mandates. Both Manley and
Burney were supportive of a senior "civilian gorilla," but
cautioned that Canada does not want to be left in the cold.
"If the Gorilla goes to a European, and the United States
continues to get the primary say in Afghanistan, then what
about Canada?" Burney urged the U.S. to consider a Canadian
deputy.

Effectiveness of NATO-ISAF
--------------


15. (C) At RMC, General Fraser spoke about the effectiveness
of NATO-ISAF in Afghanistan, noting that he had led troops in
Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF) before switching to
NATO-ISAF in RC-S, "the strategic center of gravity for the
region and the country." It was better under OEF, he said,
because commanders were able to understand the conflict in
regional terms and to fight across artificial,
Western-imposed geographical boundaries that later hardened
under ISAF due to harmful caveats and other impediments to
concerted action. These boundaries became seams for the
Taliban to exploit, he argued.


16. (C) Despite personal and institutional stresses on the
military and its 62,000 regular and 28,000 reserve troops,
Fraser said, the CF is committed to and capable of
maintaining the combat element of its mission in RC-S.
Canada and its allies must consider the second-order effects
if we fail, Fraser observed; "China, Russia, Iran, and the
rest of the world are watching."


17. (C) Fraser stressed the importance of a coordinated
information campaign if ISAF wishes to win public opinion in
the battle space and on the home front. From the time an
incident has occurred, it takes the Taliban only 60 minutes
Qincident has occurred, it takes the Taliban only 60 minutes
to get its side of the story to the international press.
ISAF must be as nimble, able to anticipate when possible or
to react within an hour with media points when caught by
surprise, he suggested.


18. (C) Fraser argued for broadening ISAF's use of specialty
policing (such as anti-gang officers) and other unique
non-military skill sets, deploying imams to take its message
to the mosques, and creating one schoolhouse for military
forces and civilian officials who work on insurgencies.
While his troops did "a lot of fighting," perhaps the most
effective element of his strategic plan was a jobs program
run by the Canadian PRT, he commented. Its primary goal was
to keep men of fighting age busy contributing to family
incomes in a way that was more attractive to most young men
than the options offered by the Taliban.


19. (C) Responding to a question about the negative trends

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appearing in intelligence products regarding Afghanistan,
Fraser said that "intel folks tend to paint worst case
scenarios to avoid being caught flat-footed...so I focus on
field reports and then temper them with intelligence
products." UN agencies and NGO's also exaggerate, he added,
for their own institutional reasons.


20. (C) Fraser asked if ISAF was building an ANA that could
persist after the West withdrew from Afghanistan. Do Western
high-tech solutions create unreasonable expectations and
demands? DASD Shivers noted that U.S. forces had taken up
the issue and were working to ensure that the ANA would be in
alignment with Afghan realities. Fraser, as well as other
senior officials, responded positively to Dr. Cohen's
suggestion that wealthier Arab states might see it in their
interests to underwrite ANA and policing costs over the
long-term to ensure greater regional stability.

Comment
--------------


21. (C) Canada's minority government, the Liberal and
Conservative members of the Manley Panel, and the
overwhelming majority of soldiers and officials working the
Afghanistan issue agree that Canada should extend its
deployment of combat forces to RC-S through 2011. We and our
interlocutors are guardedly optimistic about the government
and the Panel's ability to draw the Liberal leader to their
side or, barring that, hive-off enough Liberal votes to have
it their way without him. However, it remains possible the
government will lose the vote on extension in Parliament, and
will feel compelled to end kinetic operations in 2009. There
is only a two-to-three month window of opportunity before the
Panel completes its report and Parliament votes on whether to
extend the mission from 2009 to 2011, making the upcoming
December 10 visit to Washington by Panel members all the more
timely and important. Panel members will likely encourage
senior U.S. officials to help them shape the environment in
which Canada's Afghan extension debate will occur by:
-- assuring the Canadians that their continued commitment to
a combat role in Afghanistan would earn them a place at the
front of the line for delivery of MQ-9 Predator B UAVs;
-- supporting Canada's effort to get European allies to
provide dedicated combat helicopter support to Canadian
forces in RC-S;
-- should the Europeans fail to deliver, offering the
Canadians U.S. 101st Airborne Division dedicated helicopter
support when it deploys in January 2008;
-- offering political and, if required, materiel support to
the Canadians' ongoing effort to get European allies (Norway,
Poland, Georgia, etc.) to deploy a multinational maneuver
battalion under Canadian command in RC-S.

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