Julia Gillard Visits Troops in Afghanistan

Julia Gillard and David Petraeus

There's an anti-war feeling sweeping Australia at the moment, just like there was way back when the Vietnam war was being fought. That same anti-war feeling finally ended the war but it had a profound affect on our diggers returning home - they were ashamed to admit they were over there. Our government commited our country to the war for what seemed a good idea at the time - it was thought that if Vietnam fell to the communists, there would be a domino effect and it was in Australia's best interests to be there.

Maybe she had this in mind when the Prime Minister made a surprise visit to Afghanistan yesterday and reassured our troops that we were "with them". But that isn't quite true because Bob Brown wants to bring the boys home and a large proportion of the population agree with him. In a gruelling 20 hour day she also travelled to Kabul for talks with NATO Commander General David Petraeus and President Hamid Karzai.

She addressed the troops: "I know it has been a really hard period, a really hard year, a really hard few months and we very much value what you are doing here..... because the mission is so important to our national interest, the mission is critical to making sure that this place does not again become the training ground and a place that sponsors violence and terrorism that is visited on innocent people around the world but particularly on innocent Australians.

She dismissed the Opposition's call for more troops and military hardware. So why did one of our men at the front leak an email saying that help is urgently needed? Someone is telling porkies.

Parliament is preparing for the first full Parliamentary debate on the Afghan war but Ms Gillard told the troops not to fear the debate which the government agreed to with the Greens. She wanted to reassure the troops that this debate would be a great opportunity to tell the people just what Australians were achieving in Afghanistan.

The Opposition is still standing by its claim that we are not adequately protecting our soldiers and more help and support is needed. The Australian death toll in Afghanistan now stands at 21.