Pte. Mackenzie Murphy, a survivor of the attack that killed four of his comrades, said nothing was suspicious about the smiling man on a bicycle who rode up to Canadian soldiers patrolling near Kandahar on Sept. 18.

How could they have known this man, who soldiers recall looked much older than a "typical" suicide bomber, had strapped on his body one of the most powerful bombs they've seen in this type of attack?

Packed with rocks and ball bearings, the bomb also wounded several soldiers and dozens of Afghanis, including two young girls. The blast tore off the bomber's leg, which struck Murphy and knocked him into a ditch.

Bombardier Daniel Mazurek gives backpacks, pencils and notepads to the Afghan children during a Village Medical Outreach. (Sgt. Carole Morissette / Canadian Forces Combat Camera)

Yet for all the horror that accompanies such deaths -- heightened by the fact they come not in combat but while engaged in so-called "military operations other-than-war" -- the military says it will not be changing its patrol tactics. To do so would mean losing the greater battle for the hearts and minds of the people they're tasked to protect.

"We're not going to win by stopping everybody 100 metres away on bikes and on foot," the 22-year-old Murphy said in an interview with the Canadian Press.

"It couldn't have been prevented."

Brig.-Gen. David Fraser, commander of NATO forces in southern Afghanistan, said there was no lapse in security when the man was allowed to walk up to the troops with his deadly hidden cache, and that this was simply Taliban-style warfare.

This cold reality is one many Canadians appear to find harder and harder to bear as the military death toll rises seemingly by the week.

Surveys suggest Canadians remain split on the mission. A Strategic Counsel poll conducted for CTV and The Globe and Mail just before the latest casualties found 49 per cent of Canadians are opposed to sending troops to Afghanistan -- compared with 42 per cent who are for it.

But experts say these for-or-against arguments fail to do justice to a complex issue with life-and-death repercussions for both Afghans and Canadians.

A young girl waits in line to see one of the Coalition Force medics on site in the Shah Wali Kot region in June 2006 (Photo: Corporal Robin Mugridge, Combat Camera)

Military might

"There is a real disconnect between what is happening on the ground and how it's being presented to the public," John Watson, president of CARE Canada, told CTV.ca.

"I really think the Canadian public doesn't understand that it is very unlikely we're going to be able to stabilize this region for the long term by applying military force."

Government and military officials admit they were surprised by the resilience of an insurgency that has endured five years beyond the ouster of the Taliban.

But on Sept. 20 NATO's supreme allied commander said large numbers of Taliban fighters have been expelled from their major stronghold in the lawless southern Panjwaii district.

Gen. James L. Jones said more than 1,000 insurgents in the region were killed in Operation Medusa, a two-week offensive led by Canadians and augmented by U.S., British and Dutch troops.

Jones added, however: "I don't think they've been totally defeated." This raises questions about the safety and efficacy of a rebuilding project begun by Canada's Provincial Reconstruction Team (PRT) in villages southwest of Kandahar city.

Critics question how any lasting rebuilding work can be accomplished in the midst of a savvy, unconventional enemy who hides and attacks from under civilian cover; whose roadside bombs are getting ever more sophisticated; and who tears down schools as soon they're built.

Three Block War

The military maintains that a successful war of attrition against the insurgency is crucial in order to create the necessary conditions for rebuilding and aid work.

But Watson suggests the concept of the Three Block War (military offensive, peacekeeping, humanitarian work) being used by the west in modern battles is being applied in an unbalanced way.

Using Afghanistan and Iraq as examples, Watson said coalition forces have been inadequate in fighting that crucial second block -- moving into stabilization operations and training local forces quickly to prevent security from disintegrating.

Canadian troops detain suspected Taliban insurgents in the combat zone in Panjwaii, Afghanistan, Sept. 5, 2006. (CP PHOTO, Les Perreaux)

"We don't have the military that is trained and equipped to do that kind of work effectively, and we should have, and that's going to take a long process to develop," said Watson.

"But we should get better at it because these type of wars are going to be more and more prevalent, and if we don't then what we're going to see is more and more Canadians going into battle, killing people, being killed and leaving chaos behind."

Canadian troops saw for themselves how Taliban fighters simply returned to the village of Pashmul which they were supposedly expelled from in fierce battles earlier this summer. This month, coalition forces had to fight for it once again, with the backing of heavy bombardment from the air.

But for the people in villages scattered in the battlegrounds of southern Afghanistan, victory by NATO forces have come at a heavy cost.

"The bombing and the fighting destroyed our mosque, our homes and our vineyards," one farmer told CTV News after the completion of Operation Medusa.

"The Taliban are gone, but so is most everything else."

And with NATO forces about to be bolstered with reinforcements and heavy Canadian Leopard tanks, there are concerns civilian casualties and damage to villages could get worse.

While Watson said it's far from intentional, soldiers are "killing a lot of people that aren't Taliban; and we can't help but do that given the current military tactics, the weapons they're using and the enemy they're facing."

Chief of defence staff Gen. Rick Hillier told CTV's Question Period the added firepower is needed to protect soldiers in their fight against an enemy that shifts in and out of conventional warfare tactics, who have dug themselves ins "tough country" where they're challenging Canadians to come to them.

"And the Taliban are taking down people's homes now. They're destroying people's homes," said Hillier.

He added that the people in the Panjwaii are "absolutely ecstatic" about the presence of soldiers in spite of the temporary violence.

"They're absolutely delighted that the Taliban have been pushed out. They're absolutely delighted to get back to their homes and, in fact, we see that on a daily basis there."

Hearts and Minds

NATO now says with the Taliban weakened significantly, the work of winning hearts and minds can begin in earnest.

It's time, said Gen. Jones on Sept. 20, to reach out to the 20,000 displaced Afghans, provide them with food and shelter, and "get them back to a better life than they had before, when the Taliban was controlling everything."

Sergeant Pete Maltais (right) of 1 Military Police platoon Edmonton, observes as an Afghan National Police Officer searches Corporal Ken Small, 1 MP detachment, during an exercise run by RCMP and MP in checkpoint management at the Canadian Forces Provincial Reconstruction Team (PRT) site in Kandahar. (Photo by MCpl Robert Bottrill, Canadian Forces Combat Camera)

But the Provincial Reconstruction Team, led by NATO forces, are having a tough time getting the job done, said Watson.

He said many aid workers are troubled by the military becoming increasingly involved in humanitarian work -- what Steve Staples, a defence analyst with the Polaris Institute, has described as "aid workers with guns."

Watson said major agencies including Save the Children and World Vision are staying out of the area out of fears they'll be targeted because of a perception they're siding with the military.

"When the military talks about humanitarian aid they're really not talking about humanitarian aid -- what they're talking about is hearts and minds," he added.

"From that point of view, if you build a school in the village the reason is not the school itself -- the reason is primarily that you want to win over the villagers to supporting you and not supporting the Taliban.

"Well, what would you do if that's why the school was being built if you were the Taliban? You'd blow it up, which is what's happening. . . . And what happens is (aid workers) end up getting attacked as a soft target because the military is doing this work."

In remote parts of Afghanistan, aid workers have been routinely targeted by militants trying to derail reconstruction efforts. Near Kabul earlier this month, gunmen kidnapped a Colombian and two Afghan aid workers with a French-funded non-governmental organization. There has been no news on their whereabouts.

In fact, workers in other parts of Afghanistan, especially the west, are under increasing danger as fighters fleeing NATO-led operations in the south are moving to areas with less security forces.

NATO commanders, meanwhile say it has been only six weeks since allied forces took over the south. They maintain they are winning the battle, and are asking the public for the chance to prove how effective their mission has been, and will be.