Thanks Canada....

Why rebels and insurgent groups the world over love the Toyota Hilux pickup as much as their AK-47s. - http://www.newsweek.com/2010/10/14/why-rebel-groups-love-the-toyota-hilux.html

Ravi Somaiya said: As the war in Afghanistan escalated several years ago, counterinsurgency expert David Kilcullen, a member of the team that designed the Iraq surge for Gen. David Petraeus, began to notice a new tattoo on some insurgent Afghan fighters. It wasn’t a Taliban tattoo. It wasn’t even Afghan. It was a Canadian maple leaf. When a perplexed Kilcullen began to investigate, he says, he discovered that the incongruous flags were linked to what he says is one of the most important, and unnoticed, weapons of guerrilla war in Afghanistan and across the world: the lightweight, virtually indestructible Toyota Hilux truck. “In Afghanistan in particular,” he says, “[the trucks are] incredibly well respected.” So well respected, in fact, that some enterprising fraudsters thought them worthy of ripping off. The imitations, Kilcullen says, had flooded the market, leaving disappointed fighters in their wake. But then “a shipment of high-quality [real] Hiluxes arrived, courtesy of the Canadian government,” he explains. “They had little Canadian flags on the back. Because they were the real deal, and because of how the Hilux is seen, over time, strangely, the Canadian flag has become a symbol of high quality across the country. Hence the tattoos.”

lol

Now that would make a fine ad.

I read that article before I saw this post, and you beat me to it. I love that they hotlink to the youtube version of the Top Gear HiLux episode and refer to it as a "review" as if it were a car magazine review of the latest Lexus.

Hmmm ... I sense a Top Gear special ...

The guys go to Afghanistan, buy trucks on a budget, and run the Khyber Pass to Pakistan, taking a series of challenges along the way.

Oh, and they need to paint some slogans on the trucks to really tick off the locals. Something about some prophet ought to do the trick.

Then we'll compare the Afghans and Pakis to Alabamans.

slantvaliant wrote: Hmmm ... I sense a Top Gear special ... The guys go to Afghanistan, buy trucks on a budget, and run the Khyber Pass to Pakistan, taking a series of challenges along the way. Oh, and they need to paint some slogans on the trucks to really tick off the locals. Something about some prophet ought to do the trick. Then we'll compare the Afghans and Pakis to Alabamans.

"This won't end well".....

A short jihad later...

...“In Afghanistan in particular,” he says, “[the trucks are] incredibly well respected.” So well respected, in fact, that some enterprising fraudsters thought them worthy of ripping off. The imitations, Kilcullen says, had flooded the market, leaving disappointed fighters in their wake....

This made me think of that counterfeit MINI spoof video from a few years back...

Having watched, up close & personal, the wacky stuff the Canadian government can come up with when it wants to, I hesitate to call BS on this, but I have to say it's the first I've heard of Our Beloved Leaders sending boatloads of pickups to Afghanistan. What would be the objective?

Now, the idea of the Maple Leaf standing for unquestioned quality, THAT I can understand.

Stealthtercel wrote: Having watched, up close & personal, the wacky stuff the Canadian government can come up with when it wants to, I hesitate to call BS on this, but I have to say it's the first I've heard of Our Beloved Leaders sending boatloads of pickups to Afghanistan. What would be the objective? Now, the idea of the Maple Leaf standing for unquestioned quality, THAT I can understand.

No idea. Sending trucks to the Taliban sounds like something they would do during the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, not the US invasion. (Did Canada support the Mujahadeen during the Soviet invasion?). It also sounds like Special Forces use HiLuxes as well, so maybe this was a deliver for them that ended up missing like the pallets of $100 bills that went missing from C-130 cargo planes in Iraq.

To clarify, all it says is that the trucks were shipped to Afghanistan -- likley for the governemnt, or use by local NGOs. We've been fighting the Taliban since 2003, at great cost to Canadian soldiers. Corruption and fraud probably saw some disappear from their intended destinations.

Like most other countries, Canada "brands" the fruits of its official development assistance monies.

I'm disappointed. I read the title and thought this would involve lots of Canadian awesomeness similar to what we saw on page 349 of the hotlinks thread.

Pickups, Maple leaf tattoos, can mullets be far behind?