Defending Bernier

Well, a limited defence. I don’t believe I’ve read anywhere that when Bernier was musing about replacing the governor of Kandahar, he was only disccussing something the Brits and Americans have already done in Helmand: told Hamid Karzai that the governor in place would have to go, as the price of sending Western soldiers.

Bernier’s two crimes, it seems, are to say aloud what the other ISAF forces merely said in private; and, well, to not notice that the governor-replacement manoeuvre in Helmand didn’t result in significant improvements, to say the least.