Canadian Defence Matters finds itself in receipt of
the latest newsletter from Randall Garrison, Member of Parliament for Esquimalt - Saanich – Sooke,
entitled “Spring
2017 Update”.
Under the heading “The Role of
NATO in Promoting Stability” he writes; “As defence critic for the NDP, monitoring and working with NATO is an
important part of my job.
I believe that Canada needs to be a
force for stability in this increasingly unstable international climate. This
role is especially important for Canada and NATO as a counterweight to the
erratic nature of the Trump administration’s policies.
In order to achieve stability, we
must protect the commitment to the defense (sic) of all NATO allies.
Stability also requires action to
deter proliferation of weapons and weapon systems. Nuclear proliferation poses
grave threats to us all. Canada should not join the US ballistic missile
program. We should also be working towards de-escalation of increasingly
hazardous weapons and weapon systems like depleted uranium.
New Democrats believe that Canada
needs to put forward adequate investments in National Defence, ensuring that we
can meet our international obligations and that the Canadian Forces have the
support, training and equipment they need.”
It is a short, seemingly innocuous, statement but
one that raises a number of questions.
For many years NDP was a consistent critic of
Canada’s involvement with NATO. In 1987 the NDP released
a white paper on defence. Entitled Canadian Sovereignty, Security and
Defence, it they confirmed the NDP's long standing intention to pull Canada
out of NATO. Although that declaration has disappeared from NDP position papers
in the intervening years this may be the first time that a member of the party
has moved all the way towards favouring the multi-national military
organization.
These
revelations of an apparently new NDP policy lead inevitably to a search of the
national party’s current position on defence which in turn leads to section 4.6
of the Policy of the New Democratic Party of Canada Effective April2016 which
is found on their web site.
Section 4.6, entitled Defence and sovereignty
starts
off with the phrase “New
Democrats believe in:” and then runs to some thirty points
from “a”
through to “z”
and on to “dd”.
One of the reasons that the NDP needs thirty points
to outline their defence policy is that at least twenty one of them deal with military
and RCMP veteran’s benefits. Another would be that at least some of the points
are simply repeated. It would seem that nobody on the committee that prepared
these talking points, for that is what this list appears to be rather than a
policy statement, even noticed that “responding
to the concerns” and “call for public inquiry” is essentially
the same thing.
It is equally possible that no one has ever
penetrated as far as points “w”
and “x”
of Section 4.6 of the “Policy
of the New Democratic Party” or at least not read far enough
to notice the typos. Unless of course “atomic trials” and “atomic trails”
really are two different things, in which case both ‘responding to concerns’
and calls for ‘public
inquiries’ are really quite restrained responses.
This same paper, in point’s c, “Affirming that the primary purpose
of the Canadian Forces is peace-keeping, defence and support during emergencies”
and
f “Prioritizing peace
operations for each of our armed forces” would not seem
to completely embrace NATO’s commitment to collective security through military
strength.
However, within the context of MP Garrison’s
comments on the importance of NATO in light of “erratic nature of the Trump
administration’s policies”, it is possible that the NDP’s new
found enthusiasm for NATO is based on a doctrine of automatically opposing
anything Donald Trump says. Given some of his musings on the efficacy of the
organization the NDP may have simply decided that if President Trump is against
NATO then, ipso facto, they must be for it.
The problem with using an anti-Trump stance as a
rule of thumb is that given what the party itself refers to as the
administrations “erratic nature”
it is quite possible that after a night of binge viewing vintage CBC documentaries
President Trump is quite capable of tweeting out “greatest politician of all
time!! #TommyDouglas”. Where would that
leave the party?
It might be pedantic to comment, upon reading
Garrison’s comments that “We should also be working towards
de-escalation of increasingly hazardous weapons and weapon systems like
depleted uranium.” that he probably means to say something like “weapons
and weapons systems that use materials like depleted uranium" as there is no
such thing as a depleted uranium weapons system.
One takeaway from the Spring 2017 update is the
continued belief that Canada “should not join the US ballistic
missile program”. This is certainly in accord with point
‘e’ of the policy paper “Standing
against nuclear arms build-up and rejecting any ballistic missile defence
program”. Unfortunately it is in stark contrast to NATO’s
declared policy which is “Nuclear
weapons are a core component of NATO’s overall capabilities for deterrence and
defence alongside conventional and missile defence forces.”
The divide between “rejecting any missile defence program” and reality has always been a
difficult one for its proponents to explain. Currently, because of Canada’s
refusal to join the U.S. program through NORAD or any other mechanism, we have
no way of being even consulted on, let alone having any control over, U.S. use of
their anti-missile defences.
Even if there were some way for Canadian authorities
to be appraised of U.S. intentions the reaction times involve minutes,
sometimes seconds, and there would be little point in contacting Canada to tell
them about battles taking place above Canadian territory that were already
over.
For an anti anti-missile policy to be effective it
would have to be made clear, ahead of time, that under no circumstances will we
permit the U.S. to use its defences to even try to shoot down nuclear armed
missiles aimed at Canada. Should a rogue state, such as North Korea, launch
atomic weapons which threaten Canada then it will have to be clear in advance that parties such as the NDP would not countenance the use of American missiles in our defence.
I am sure that NDP and the majority of Canadians who
oppose participation in the U.S. missile defence program would agree that it
would be hypocritical to suggest that these dangerous U.S. weapons should be used in any
circumstances. It is up to the NDP to articulate the concerns of these citizens and urge the Federal Government to clearly state that there are no circumstances
imaginable in which we will permit ourselves not to be nuked if it means the
use of these destabilizing and dangerous defensive weapons.
In fact, given the danger that the U.S. might be
tempted try to shoot down incoming missiles over Canada without Canada’s permission
it might be necessary to add another point to section 4.6 (that would be “ee”) which would urge that Canada immediately fund research and development of
anti anti-missile missiles.
Perhaps, in his capacity as defence critic for the
NDP, Randall Garrison, Member of Parliament for Esquimalt - Saanich – Sooke,
could work towards such an amendment.
Randall
Garrison, Member of Parliament for Esquimalt - Saanich - Sooke
Policy
of the New Democratic Party of Canada Effective April 2016
NATO’s
nuclear deterrence policy and forces
BALLISTIC
MISSILE DEFENCE.
