MILNEWS.ca News Highlights – 15 Jan 11

• Remember these guys Asian media sources say are training in Waziristan for attacks back in Canada? The Mounties say they’re looking into the report – more here and here.
• Tough love, CF style, in Afghanistan. “Months of sometimes tough and bloody fighting by Canadian, U.S. and Afghan forces over the summer and fall weren’t enough to pacify a village that remains a refuge for insurgents in southern Afghanistan.  That’s when the Canadians, with plenty of cash for “icebreaker” projects designed to get young men more interested in jobs than war, decided to just bypass Nakhonay and fund a flood of development projects for its closest neighbours.  Canada’s soldiers have taken on a newer, tough-love approach as two deadlines loom — their summer pullout from Kandahar, and, preceding that, the traditional spring start of another insurgent fighting season ….”
• We’re hearing some new messaging out of Jack Layton this week about his opposition to Canada’s coming mission in Afghanistan.  1)  Anyone Canada trains could end up on the bad guys side (more in same vein here).  2)  Why help a corrupt good guy? 3)  Even if we start training Afghan security forces, we’ll get incrementally sucked back into a combat role. Text to his Thursday speech here and his Friday speech here.
• How one recovering Canadian soldier uses music as therapy.
• “F-35 is Great – No It’s Not” Update (1): Canadian PM sells F-35 benefits at Montreal aerospace company visit – more here, here, here, here and here.
• “F-35 is Great – No It’s Not” Update (2):  Le Devior says Quebec won’t get its fair share of the contracts – original in French here, Google translation here.
• Speaking of aircraft, the PM calls a new deal with a company to maintain Canada’s Griffon helicopters “great news for Bell Helicopter Textron Canada Limited workers in Calgary, Mirabel”.
• “Previously secret documents released in the Mohamed Harkat terrorism case reveal that the judge wrestled in closed court with how to gauge the credibility of spy agency informants. Harkat, 42, has been declared a security threat and faces deportation to his native Algeria, where he says he will be tortured or killed. The Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) relied on at least two “human sources” in building its case against Harkat, a former Ottawa pizza delivery man. One of the sources failed a lie-detector test in 2002, a fact that was not disclosed in court until May 2009. Judge Simon Noel ultimately decided that the source’s information could only be relied upon if corroborated. Another CSIS source was deemed sincere and reliable after Noel reviewed his file. Noel relied on the source’s information in concluding last month that Harkat was a member of the Osama bin Laden terrorist network. He said Harkat remains a threat to national security ….” More from the Federal Court of Canada here, here and here (all PDFs).
• “The union representing thousands of national defence workers has launched an online campaign urging the government to reconsider outsourcing 91 national security jobs, a transfer current employees say would put the country’s safety at risk. As of Friday, each time anyone searches the names of certain government officials using Google — including that of Defence Minister Peter MacKay — a sponsored ad appears, pointing to Securityforsale.ca, said John MacLennan, national president of the Union of National Defence Employees. The ads and website are part of the “first phase” of a campaign aimed at grabbing the government’s attention and warning Canadians of a plan to outsource dozens of jobs at Communications Security Establishment Canada, the low-key federal agency responsible for monitoring foreign signals and military intelligence, MacLennan said ….”