Trudeau to rebut Trump’s charge of defence-spending lag with Latvia visit

STEVEN CHASE

Canadian Army soldiers attack during Silver Arrow 2017, the multinational military drills involving eleven NATO member countries in Adazi, Latvia on Oct 29, 2017.

The Canadian government is defending itself against accusations from U.S. President Donald Trump that Canada is falling short on defence spending, saying there are big military expenditure increases planned in future years and that this country always contributes to NATO deployments.

This rejoinder from Canada comes as Prime Minister Justin Trudeau heads to the Baltic country of Latvia to showcase a Canadian military deployment aimed at deterring Russian aggression.

One military analyst, however, says Canada is dodging, rather than answering, justified criticism by changing the subject to deployments from funding levels.

The Prime Minister will visit Latvia for two days, starting on July 9, before proceeding to a NATO meeting of heads of state and government in Belgium on July 11 and 12 – a gathering that promises to be fraught with tension over Russia.

Mr. Trudeau’s Baltic visit comes after Canada, and several other NATO allies, received letters from the Trump administration complaining they are not meeting a NATO commitment to undertake military spending equivalent to 2 per cent of annual economic output.

The Globe and Mail confirmed that Mr. Trudeau received a letter from Mr. Trump. Letters were also sent to Germany, according to The New York Times, and Reuters confirmed letters were sent to Britain, Belgium and Norway.

In the letter to Britain – the Americans’ staunch partner in Iraq and Afghanistan – the Trump administration went further. U.S. Defence Secretary James Mattis, the author of this letter, warned London it risks losing the ability to project power worldwide if it doesn’t boost military spending – despite the fact Britain already meets the 2 per cent target.

Russia’s 2014 annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula and its support for pro-Moscow separatists in the war in eastern Ukraine have disrupted relations between Moscow and the West and have revitalized the NATO military alliance.

For the past year, Canada has been leading a NATO battle group in Latvia that includes 450 Canadian soldiers, part of a significant buildup of troops and assets on the easternmost flank of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization to counter Russian expansionism. Canada’s leadership of the battle group represents Canada’s largest sustained military presence in Europe in over a decade.

After the annexation of Crimea, NATO allies agreed that year to end defence-budget cuts, to start spending more as their economies grew and move toward a goal of 2 per cent of GDP for defence spending within a decade.

A spokesman for Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan defended Canada’s military commitment in the face of this latest criticism from the Trump administration, noting that the Trudeau government has promised to boost spending.

“In 2017, as part of a comprehensive review of Canadian defence spending, the Government of Canada committed to increasing [the Department of National Defence]’s funding by more than 70 per cent over the next decade,” Renée Filiatrault, director of communications to Mr. Sajjan, said in a statement.

“This plan has been rigorously costed, is fully funded, and serves Canada’s defence needs. It also upholds our long-standing role as an active contributor to global peace and security,” she said.

The Sajjan spokeswoman also underlined Canada’s long-standing contributions.

“The Canadian Army, Royal Canadian Navy and Royal Canadian Air Force are among the most engaged, agile, deployable and responsive armed forces within NATO. Canada is proud to have contributed to every NATO operation since the founding of the Alliance more than six decades ago,” Ms. Filiatrault said.

However, Charles Davies, a research fellow at the Conference of Defence Associations Institute, said that even with new budgetary commitments made in recent years, Canada is still not on track to hit the 2 per cent defence-spending target.

“The Canadian government obviously sees itself being on the wrong side of this discussion … because it refuses to engage in a direct conversation about the issue,” Mr. Davies said. “Instead, it continues to play bait-and-switch, trying to divert attention towards the entirely different subject of the politics around the commitment of forces to NATO operations. This is an intellectually dishonest response to valid criticism.”

This week, other NATO allies also pushed back at U.S. criticism.

In an e-mail on July 3 to the Associated Press, Norwegian Defence Minister Frank Bakke-Jensen said, “Norway stands by its decision of the NATO Summit in 2014 and is following up on this.”

Norway has spent “far beyond” NATO’s target on new military equipment, he added.

German Defence Minister Ursula von der Leyen said on Tuesday, “We stand by the 2-per cent-goal we’ve set.” She added that “we’re on the path there. And we’re prepared … to take substantial responsibility within the alliance.”

When faced with the suggestion that such German explanations for not spending 2 per cent of GDP yet might not make an impression on Mr. Trump, she retorted: “We don’t want to impress anyone.”

Mr. Trump’s pre-NATO meeting letter-writing campaign is further ratcheting up geopoliticial tensions in the 69-year-old NATO alliance. The U.S. President is planning a controversial summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin for immediately after the NATO meeting. Mr. Trump, who has previously defended Russia’s annexation of Crimea, in recent days has left the door open to recognizing this land seizure.

Mr. Trudeau’s visit to Latvia follows a January, 2018, trip by Governor-General Julie Payette. He will be accompanied by Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland, Mr. Sajjan and General Jonathan Vance, Chief of the Defence Staff.

With files from Reuters and Associated Press

Bids for Future RCN Warships Don't Meet Many of the Requirements

By: David Pugliese, The National Post 

Canada’s quest for a new fleet of warships is off to a rocky start with all bidders failing to meet some of the federal government’s requirements.

Procurement officials are now trying to regroup on the $60-billion project and figure out ways that bidders might be able to change their proposals to make them acceptable, a number of defence industry executives pointed out.

The problems centre around technical issues. Some are minor but in other cases there is a view among defence industry officials that Canada is asking for too much in some areas such as radar, which may be causing problems with meeting requirements.

Public Services and Procurement Canada spokeswoman Michèle LaRose said the bids received for the Canadian Surface Combatant project have not been disqualified. Three bids have been received. The federal government and Irving Shipbuilding are still evaluating the proposals, she added. LaRose pointed out that the evaluation is at the second stage in the process.

Government officials say that involves what is known as “the cure process” in which bidders will be given details of how their proposals have failed to meet the stated criteria. They will then be given only one opportunity to fix issues with their bids.

HMCS St. John’s, one of Canada’s Halifax-class frigates, undergoes a mid-life refit at the Irving Shipbuilding facility in Halifax on Thursday, July 3, 2014. Andrew Vaughan/Canadian Press

If they are still considered “non-compliant” after the cure period they “will be eliminated from the competition,” according to the federal government.

Technical specifications are now being evaluated by the government. Later this year, the companies will provide the financial information related to their bids.

Warship builders submitted their bids on Nov. 30. A winning bid is expected to be selected sometime this year.

Irving Shipbuilding will begin construction of the first ship in the early 2020s and delivery of the first vessel is expected in the mid-2020s, according to the federal government.

But the project has been plagued with delays and controversy.

Approximately one-half of the CSC build cost is comprised of labour in the (Irving’s) Halifax yard and materials

The final cost of the ships is still unknown. In 2008 the government estimated the total cost of the project to be about $26 billion.

But in 2015 navy commander Vice Admiral Mark Norman voiced concern that taxpayers may not have been given all relevant information, and publicly predicted the cost for the ships alone would be around $30 billion.

Cost estimates for the project are now between $55 billion and $60 billion.

About half of the cost is for systems and equipment that will go on the 15 ships, according to federal documents obtained by Postmedia through the Access to Information law. “Approximately one-half of the CSC build cost is comprised of labour in the (Irving’s) Halifax yard and materials,” the documents added.

HMCS Iroquois arrives in Halifax on Oct. 23, 2008 after a six-month deployment to the Persian Gulf and Arabian Sea. Andrew Vaughan/Canadian Press

Last year, Jean-Denis Fréchette, the parliamentary budget officer, estimated the CSC program would cost $61.82 billion. He also warned that every year the awarding of the contract is delayed beyond 2018, taxpayers will spend an extra $3 billion because of inflation.

The surface combatant will be the backbone of the future Royal Canadian Navy.

In November in a surprise twist a French-Italian consortium declined to formally submit a bid and instead offered Canada a fleet of vessels at half the price.

Officials with Fincantieri of Italy and Naval Group of France said they don’t believe the procurement process as it is currently designed will be successful.

Instead they provided the Canadian government with a direct proposal that Irving Shipbuilding on the east coast construct 15 ships based on the consortium’s FREMM frigate design, which is proven and is currently in operation with the French and Italian navies. They are guaranteeing the cost of the ships at a fixed price of $30 billion.

The deal would have also focused on using Canadian technology on board the ships and included technology transfer to Canadian firms, so they could be involved in future sales of the FREMM vessels on the international market.

FREMM ships are operated by the Italian, French, Moroccan and Egyptian navies.

Under that plan, Irving could start building the warships almost immediately.

The Liberal government, however, rejected the deal.

On Target: Expanded role in Iraq doesn’t make sense for Canada

By: Scott Taylor, The Chronicle Herald

Last Thursday Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan emerged from a NATO conference in Brussels and hinted that Canada would be willing to support the Alliance’s request for an expanded training role in Iraq.

Sajjan could offer no specifics on how many Canadian soldiers would be involved or what their role would be, but somehow he remains confident that this time around the training of the Iraqi Security Forces will be successful.

What makes Sajjan’s broad comments laughable is that we still do not know which faction in this complex conflict our soldiers will be training. We presently have a few hundred elite commandos sitting idle in Iraq because their training missions in support of both Kurdish militia and Iraqi government troops were suspended after these two groups began fighting each other.
There is also a handful of Canadian combat engineers in Iraq conducting training in regard to the clearing of booby traps and unexploded munitions.

However, in a bizarre move last June, the Trudeau Liberals promised to keep our military in Iraq until the summer of 2019. At the time this arbitrary mission extension was announced, Daesh (a.k.a. ISIS or ISIL) was already reduced to a handful of diehard zealots fighting in the rubble of Mosul.
As expected, the last of the Daesh evildoers were eliminated just a few weeks later, and equally predictable was the fact that the diverse factions of the U.S.-led, anti-Daesh coalition began to fight among themselves.

Now NATO wants to bring in more elite trainers to train more young Iraqi men how to fire weapons and drive tanks. With Canada having pledged our military support for another 18 months at least, the decision for Sajjan to join this new training mission was a no-brainer. We are there anyway, doing nothing until the summer of 2019, so why not?

However, for Sajjan to think this is a successful strategy is sheer folly.

Albert Einstein’s definition of insanity is doing the same thing repeatedly and expecting a different result. This is exactly what the West continues to do in conflict after conflict, with the same failed result of increased violence and instability instead of the desired end-state of a secure environment.

In Afghanistan in 2001, after the U.S.-led invasion toppled the Taliban, NATO members including Canada contributed troops to the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF). As the name implies, ISAF was to assist the Afghans in achieving a secure environment.

The plan from the outset was for NATO to train and equip a self-sufficient Afghan Security Force. Seventeen years later, the alliance has trained hundreds of thousands of young Afghan males how to kill, and poured in massive arsenals of weaponry in the name of security.

The result has been a steady increase in factional violence and a free-fall descent into violent anarchy. The proposed solution by NATO generals? More training and more weapons for Afghans.

In 2003, following the U.S. invasion of Iraq, the decision was made by the administration of President George W. Bush to immediately disband all of Saddam’s security forces — army, police, border guards, the lot.

This resulted in months of absolute anarchy, looting and factional bloodletting. As the Iraqi insurgency grew around them, the Americans began recruiting, training and equipping a new Iraqi security force.

By the time President Barrack Obama withdrew U.S. troops from Iraq in 2011, the Americans had trained and equipped hundreds of thousands of Iraqi soldiers.

However, when Daesh spilled into Iraq from Syria in the summer of 2014, this U.S.-trained force collapsed like a cheap suitcase. The huge, U.S.-supplied arsenal of modern weapons and armoured vehicles were abandoned to Daesh with hardly a shot fired.

Now that Daesh has finally been defeated in Iraq, NATO’s answer is to train more Iraqis how to kill and to bring in more weapons. Sajjan agrees to send Canadians and he assures reporters that this time it will work.

By Einstein’s reckoning, our defence minister is completely insane. And he is not alone.

Arrival of Used F-18s Delayed until Late 2019; 2022 before all Delivered

By: Murray Brewster, CBC News 

It will be 2022 before the Royal Canadian Air Force receives all of the used Australian fighter jets the Liberal government intends to purchase, says senior defence official.

Royal Australian Air Force FA-18 Hornets fly over the Australian Formula One Grand Prix race track located at Albert Park in Melbourne Feb. 28, 2002. Canada has agreed to buy 18 of the jets from Australia. (Reuters)

The plan was rolled out with much fanfare at the end of last year because the air force has faced — in the words of Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan — an "urgent capability gap" and is not able to meet its NATO and Norad commitments at the same time.

Pat Finn, who is in charge of the materiale branch of National Defence, told CBC News in a recent interview a final agreement is still months away.

He is confident, however, everything will come together.

Delivery is "staggered over three years," Finn said.

The Trudeau government announced in December it would buy 18 used Australian "classic" FA-18s as an interim measure to bolster the air force until the entire Canadian fleet of CF-18s is replaced, beginning in the mid-2020s.

It had wanted to buy brand new Boeing Super Hornets, the newer, bigger, more advanced version of the FA-18 and CF-18. The plan was scuttled when the manufacturer, Chicago-based Boeing, filed a trade complaint against Canadian aerospace giant Bombardier.

No price tag for the Australian deal was released at the time of the formal announcement, which was made by Sajjan and Public Works Minister Carla Qualtrough.
Ongoing discussions

Finn said those details are still being worked out.

The Liberal government said in December the first used fighters, which were purchased by Australia around the same Canada bought its CF-18s, would arrive by January 2019.

Finn said the delivery schedule is being finalized, but he anticipates receiving the first two warplanes by the summer of that year.

Another one would follow by the end of the year, but much depends on the Royal Australian Air Force and how quickly it retires the fighters and the age of what's being offered.

"They, of course, release aircraft as they get aircraft," Finn said. "We do not necessarily want the oldest aircraft, so we would like to have an ongoing discussion."

He said there is some flexibility and if "summer '19 turns into" something a few months later because they can get a better jet, then it's something that can be negotiated.

The Australian government is in the process of seeking permission to sell the planes because they were originally manufactured in the U.S.

Once the Australian warplanes arrive in Canada, they will need to be given life-extension modifications that will bring them up to the standard of the CF-18s, which have been modified to continuing flying until 2025.

It stands in stark contrast to the urgency with which the Liberals initially painted the shortage of fighter aircraft.

Minister of National Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan has said Canada has an 'urgent capability gap' and can't meet its NATO and Norad commitments, yet the timeline for new jets keeps being moved back. (Adrian Wyld/Canadian Press)

"In 2025, the CF-18s will not be able to fly, and it is important that we move very quickly in filling this capability gap." said Sajjan in June 2016.

Finn said the air force is managing the capability gap by making more CF-18s available for operations on a daily basis.

"We're basically working right now to increase the availability of our current airplanes," he said.

Experts say that would mean pouring more than expected into the maintenance budget in order to keep fighters on the flight line.
Urgent purchase?

One defence analyst said the government has a strange definition of urgent.

"Nothing about the handling of this file lines up with the identification of it as an urgent need, either the interim or the permanent purchase," said Dave Perry, an expert in procurement at the Canadian Global Affairs Institute.

He said he believes it will present a political headache for the Liberals come the next election.

"The fact that this government may, at best, have a couple of second-hand aircraft before the next election after having identified an urgent need to acquire new fighter aircraft is just incredible," he said.

When the Australian deal was announced, the government also laid out a timeline for the full replacement of the CF-18s, which were purchased in the 1980s, but extensively modified and upgraded in the early 2000s.

Public Works recently held a consultation day with defence contractors, but Perry says no one seems to understand why it will take until the early 2020s to launch the competition.

When the former Conservative government was struggling over whether to buy the F-35 stealth fighter, it conducted extensive research on the alternatives and possible types of warplanes Canada would need.

That research, which conceivable could move things along faster, was largely discarded by the Liberals and is gathering dust on a shelf, Perry says.

Canada's CF-18s were purchased in the 1980s and upgraded in the 2000s. (CBC)

Canada Closes Out 2017 with Reduced Peacekeeping Numbers

By: Lee Berthiaume, The Canadian Press 


OTTAWA—Only weeks after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Canada was prepared to offer helicopters, aircraft and hundreds of troops to peacekeeping, the number of Canadians on UN missions reached a new low, new figures indicate.
Canada had a total of 43 peacekeepers deployed around the world at the end of December 2017, according to the most recent UN numbers, down from 62 in November of the same year.

The decline, largely the result of a reduction in the number of Canadian police officers deployed to Haiti, means Canada has fewer peacekeepers in the field than at any point since the 1950s.

That’s despite the Liberals having repeatedly promised to ramp up Canada’s contributions to UN missions — most recently by pledging equipment, troops and trainers at a peacekeeping summit that Canada hosted in November.

Canadian and UN officials say the two sides are working to identify when and where those pledges will be utilized, but they have declined to provide any timeline for when a decision will come.

Walter Dorn, an expert on peacekeeping at the Canadian Forces College in Toronto who has been tracking the numbers, said the current situation is shameful given the Trudeau government’s repeated promises.

“Canada is at its lowest level since Lester B. Pearson proposed the first peacekeeping force in 1956,” Dorn said. “This is hypocrisy, coming after the promises and lofty rhetoric of the Vancouver ministerial.”

The Liberals promised during the last federal election to renew Canada’s commitment to peacekeeping, and pledged in August 2016 to make up to 600 troops and 150 police officers available for future missions.

Canada had 112 peacekeepers in the field at the time of that promise.

Trudeau announced in Vancouver in November that Canada was offering helicopters, a transport aircraft and a 200-member rapid reaction force for use on UN missions, as well as trainers to help other countries with peacekeeping.

But aside from planning to base the transport aircraft in Uganda, the commitments did not come with any specifics.

Canadian and UN officials sat down to discuss specifics in December, sources have told The Canadian Press, but no decisions were made and Global Affairs Canada and the Department of National Defence are still weighing options.

Chief of defence staff Gen. Jonathan Vance told The Canadian Press in November that the military and government would take their time identifying the right missions for Canada.

Vance compared the process of analyzing missions to building a puzzle, as military planners seek to match the troops and equipment Canada has on offer with the UN’s needs and any potential threats.

The 43 Canadian peacekeepers include 20 police officers, 14 military officers and nine “experts on mission,” which can include police officers, military personnel and civilians.

Six of those peacekeepers are women, including five police officers and one military officer — a problem, said Dorn, considering the government’s rhetoric on pushing other countries to deploy more women peacekeepers.

Canada’s Contribution to UN Peacekeeping Reaches New Low

By: Lee Berthiaume, The Canadian Press

OTTAWA—The Trudeau Liberals may have promised to ramp up Canada’s role in peacekeeping, but new UN figures show there were fewer Canadian peacekeepers in the field last month than at any point in recent memory.

The revelation comes as Canada prepares to host a major peacekeeping summit in Vancouver next month, raising fears the country will be badly embarrassed unless the numbers start rising — and fast.

The Liberals promised last summer to make up to 600 soldiers and 150 police officers available to the UN for future peacekeeping missions, but have yet to make any concrete commitments.

The intervening year has instead seen a steady decrease in the number of Canadian blue helmets and blue berets deployed around the world, from 112 peacekeepers in August 2016 to 68 last month.

The decline is largely attributed to 44 fewer Canadian police officers being deployed to Haiti, where the UN is closing down its 13-year stabilization mission in favour of a much smaller effort.

Walter Dorn, an expert on peacekeeping at the Canadian Forces College in Toronto who has studied the numbers, says the result is the smallest Canadian contribution to peacekeeping since at least 1990.

By comparison, Canada’s smallest contribution to peacekeeping under Stephen Harper, who made no secret of his dislike for the UN, was 88 soldiers and police officers in October 2014.

“The government is at an all-time low while saying that it wants to re-engage in peacekeeping,” Dorn said. “Its numbers are lower than the Conservatives ever were.”

Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland’s spokesperson, Adam Austen, said the government remains convinced that Canada has an important role to play in peacekeeping and that it is committed to do more.

Defence Department officials have drawn up a list of possible missions for the government to review, sources have told The Canadian Press, one of which would involve sending transport helicopters to Mali.

While the Liberals reportedly hope to make a decision before the upcoming peacekeeping summit in Vancouver on Nov. 14-15, there is no certainty they will.

The government has repeatedly said it will not be rushed into a mission, which Austen repeated on Monday, saying in an email: “We are doing this carefully and thoughtfully, as Canadians expect.”

But the UN expected last year when it agreed to let Canada host the peacekeeping meeting that Canadian troops would already be on the ground.

The summit, to be hosted by Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan, is only supposed to be open to officials from countries that have made concrete pledges to peacekeeping missions.

UN officials and foreign diplomats have expressed varying degrees of frustration and disappointment with the Liberal indecision over the last year, which Dorn echoed on Monday.

“Not only has Canada not lived up to its promises, it has actually decreased its contribution,” he said. “Canada is setting a poor example as the host for a pledging conference.”

The fact there are any Canadian peacekeepers in the field may come as a surprise to many people.

While the Liberals promised a return to peacekeeping during the last election campaign and again last year Canada has, in fact, continued to contribute soldiers and police officers to UN missions for decades.

But last month’s numbers continue a trend of declining participation that has seen Canada move from being one of the largest contributors to peacekeeping in the 1990s to the bottom half of the pack today.

There has also been a gradual shift from deploying Canadian military personnel to police officers; of the 68 Canadian peacekeepers in the field last month, 40 were police.

Ottawa Weighing UN Peace-Support Operation and Child Soldier Risks for Mali Mission

By: Robert Fife and Steven Chase, Globe and Mail

The Trump administration has given the green light to Canada to dispatch up to 600 soldiers on a United Nations peacekeeping mission to Mali, but Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is holding back approval as he assesses the volatile risks of fighting Islamist rebels who use child soldiers.

Peacekeepers stand guard at the entrance to the Minusma peacekeeping base in Kidal, Mali, July 22, 2015.
(© Adama Diarra / Reuters/REUTERS)

A new Canadian Armed Forces directive, published last week, warns troops that child soldiers are likely to be encountered “on an increasing basis” in future UN or NATO-led missions and cautions them if they are not sufficiently armed they could be vulnerable to “human wave attacks” employed by child soldiers – frontal assaults where the target is overrun.

Canada does not require U.S. approval to deploy troops, but in late 2016, the Trudeau government paused a decision, originally expected by December, on where it would deploy peacekeeping troops. The Liberals wanted to obtain a better sense of what the Trump administration expects of allies and ensure it wasn’t offside with the new President who has repeatedly accused Western countries of falling short on basic defence commitments and has said he wants the NATO military alliance to focus more on counterterrorism.

Related:
Campbell Clark: A Canadian peacekeeping mission in Mali could be most dangerous choice
Related: Canadian troops could face wide range of heavy weapons if deployed to Mali
Globe editorial: On Mali, proceed with maximum caution

A senior Canadian official, however, told the The Globe and Mail that U.S. Defence Secretary James Mattis raised no objections to a Mali peace mission during recent talks with Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan.

But the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the Trudeau cabinet is still mulling the pros and cons of committing Canadian troops to a dangerous UN peace-support operation, which defies the traditional label of peacekeeping.

While Mali might appear remote to Canadians, this West African country is on the front lines of the fight against terrorism, including al-Qaeda in the Maghreb. It’s a safe haven for terror groups despite French military intervention and a UN stabilization mission. Mali has, at times, served as a base for Mokhtar Belmokhtar, a terrorist leader who is the target of an RCMP arrest warrant for holding two Canadian diplomats hostage in Mali in 2008 and 2009; his extremist group also claimed responsibility for the deadly assault on the Radisson Blu hotel in Bamako in November, 2015. In 2013, he spearheaded an attack on an Algerian gas plant that killed at least 39 foreign hostages.

More than 110 peacekeepers have been killed over the last four years in Mali; the location has become the deadliest ongoing UN peace operation today. UN records say 72 of these deaths were attributed to “malicious acts.” The security environment in that country sharply deteriorated in 2013, but French and African Union forces pushed back Islamist rebels who had taken control of the country’s north.

“It is the most dangerous UN mission but at this juncture … it is way, way less dangerous than any phase we were in in Afghanistan,” a second senior official said. “If you look at the 114 casualties, a majority of them came from very poor tactics, very poorly trained troops and really crappy equipment that ran over clearly visible road mines.”

The first government official said the Trudeau cabinet will not commit unless there is a carefully laid-out plan to explain to Canadians why such a peacekeeping mission is in the country’s national interest. The official said there needs to be “Canadian buy-in” before approval is granted and that may be months away.

Uppermost in the minds of federal policy-makers is the disturbing likelihood that Canadian troops would encounter battle-hardened Islamist militants including child soldiers, who are recruited as suicide bombers, fighters and spies.

Canadian Military to Become First to Issue Guidelines on Child Soldiers

The Canadian Press 

The Canadian military is poised to become the first in the world to issue guidelines for dealing with child soldiers, which could be put to the test immediately in Africa.

The guidelines are intended to ensure Canadian troops are properly trained and emotionally prepared for situations involving child soldiers — including where they may have to shoot to kill.

“If a child has a gun pointed at you and they have the intent, they have the capability, and they have the means by which to conduct harm on you or your partners, you have to use force as necessary to neutralize that,” said Cmdr. Rory McLay, who is overseeing development of the guidelines.

“That is a tough reality, but we cannot afford to have our folks harmed because they hesitated.”

The guidelines are also intended to make sure Canadian soldiers deal appropriately with a child soldier who isn’t a threat.

“If you’re talking about detainees, for example, once it’s suspected or proven that the individual is a minor then they are immediately removed from the adult population,” said McLay. “The real push there is separation and rehabilitation. That’s what you want to do with child soldiers...to try to get these kids into a rehabilitated state and back to their families.”

The guidelines were ordered by defence chief Gen. Jonathan Vance last March after a meeting with retired senator Romeo Dallaire, who has championed the fight against using children in conflict.

While a variety of rules and policies on how to deal with child soldiers already exist, McLay said the new guidelines will be the first to gather everything into one place for Canadian military personnel.

Vance is expected to sign off on them in the coming days, after which they will be distributed to commanders across the Canadian Armed Forces to be included in training and other mission preparation.

“Training is one of the best ways to mentally prepare them to deal with the sights and sounds that they’re going to encounter,” McLay said.

“So if you can specifically guide the training to deal with a specific issue, you are better preparing your team to react appropriately and to be able to deal with their own actions during and down the road.”

Such direction is timely given the Liberal government is expected to greenlight the deployment of hundreds of Canadian soldiers to Mali in the coming weeks.

The UN and human rights groups say armed groups in Mali have intentionally recruited and are using child soldiers in a number of capacities.

The presence of child soldiers on the battlefield is a potential minefield for militaries like Canada, as the French learned the hard way last month when they came under fire for killing a 10-year-old boy.

While the French military says the boy was acting as a lookout for one armed group suspected of planting improvised-explosive devices, the killing has marred its counter-terrorism mission in Mali.

The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, which Canadian troops are fighting in Iraq, has also made extensive use of child soldiers.

While the British are developing similar guidelines, Shelly Whitman, executive director of the Romeo Dallaire Child Soldiers Initiative, said they aren’t as far along as the Canadian military.

Preparing Canadian soldiers for dealing with child soldiers in the field is critical for a number of reasons, Whitman said, which includes ensuring they are properly treated.

But it is also important to consider the impact of child soldiers on the battlefield when planning missions from a legal perspective and in terms of making sure Canadian soldiers don’t hesitate when threatened.

“A lot of soldiers would tell you they didn’t have any preparation for how to handle children in these contexts until they saw it in the battlefield,” she said.

“And that’s where the emotional part of your brain kicks in instead of the cognitive part of your brain. Which means you’ll make decisions based on emotion and not on what’s the best professional decision on that matter.”

Harper government ‘messed up’ jet-replacement process: Sajjan

By CHRISTOPHER GULY, and RACHEL AIELLO, The Hill Times

Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan says he’s moving as fast as a he can on finalizing a plan to replace Canada’s fighter jets but that the previous Conservative government “messed up” the process and that’s why things are taking so long,

“We’ve been moving on that as quickly as possible, but this file is extremely complex and it had been thoroughly, if I can say, messed up from the previous government and it has slowed things down,” Mr. Sajjan (Vancouver South. B.C.) said in an interview with The Hill Times last week. “We should have replaced our fighters a long time ago, and now we’re dealing with another potential capability gap for our Air Force.”

He said something would happen on this file “sooner rather than later” in terms of deciding on a process for picking a replacement to Canada's aging fleet of CF-18s.

Last week, the House of Commons National Defence Committee recommended that the government decide on a CF-18 replacement within the next 12 months.

Mr. Sajjan the government has to “make sure we have the right aircraft for our men and women. And it was only last November since we formed government, but replacement of the fighters was something we knew is a necessity.”

Meanwhile, man who once saw oversaw the lifecycle management of Canada’s CF-18 fighter jets says the Liberals should stick to their 2015 campaign commitment and not purchase the F-35 stealth fighters the former Conservative government wanted.

“We do not need the F-35,” said Paul Maillet, a retired Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) colonel who as an aerospace engineering officer was responsible for the military’s fleet of CF-18 Hornets.

He said that Canada would “pay far too much and get far too little” for Lockheed Martin’s F-35A Lightning II at a time when Justin Trudeau’s government is shifting the country’s military focus to peace operations.

The results of an independent audit by accounting firm KPMG, released in late 2012, pegged the cost of buying and maintaining 65 F-35s at $45.8-billion over a 42-year period. Mr. Maillet said the price tag is a lot higher in the U.S., which now considers the F-35 the standard for fighter jets.

“It will cost the Americans more than a trillion dollars, and it’s the most expensive military project ever,” he explained. “Yet we’re nearing the end of an era of manned fighter aircraft, and there’s a lot of overlap going on with unmanned drones right now.”

Mr. Maillet, who before his 2001 retirement from the military served as director of defence ethics at DND, said Canada doesn’t need stealth fighter jets to protect national sovereignty or contribute to United Nations or NATO peace missions.

“If we are no longer doing bombing campaigns in the Middle East, our money should be better spent elsewhere.”

Canada Ready to Re-Engage in UN: Trudeau

By: John Ivision, National Post 

UNITED NATIONS — “We’re Canadians. And we’re here to help.”

Justin Trudeau concluded his strange little speech to the United Nations General Assembly with a line that veered dangerously close to satirical fodder. As Ronald Reagan once noted, the most dangerous words in the English language are: “I’m from the government and I’m here to help.”

But the UN is not a hotbed of satire. The line may have reinforced every goofy stereotype about Canadian boy scouts but the audience loved it.

Trudeau was welcomed by cheers; his George Bailey-style aw-shucks earnestness persuaded the audience to pay attention — no small feat in a hall that is all but deserted when the undercard is playing.

That was just as well because the speech was as thin as soup made from the carcass of a starving pigeon.

Trudeau’s pitch about focusing on what brings us together, rather than on what divides us, is yesterday’s news in Canada.

But for a General Assembly audience, from whom Trudeau hopes to extricate a Security Council seat, it is fresh fare.

The Canadian prime minister took advantage of having a star-struck crowd by piling on the homilies about Canada being strong not in spite of its differences but because of them.

The target was the rising nativism in the U.S. and Europe, where anxieties about differences in society are being exploited by manipulative politicians.

“We believe we should confront anxiety with a clear plan to deal with its root cause,” Trudeau said.

It was too bad the prime minister was 17th on the list of speakers to the General Assembly. It meant President Barack Obama stole all his best lines.

The morning started off with Italian opera singer Andrea Bocelli wowing the crowd with a sparkling version of Nessun Dorma.

Obama was late — presumably stuck in Manhattan’s vehicular quagmire, which doesn’t even respect the pointless extravagance of a presidential motorcade.

When he finally arrived, he plunged into the same sea of liberal platitudes that Trudeau swims in.

You can almost imagine the prime minister’s team being forced into an 11th hour re-write.

“Obama’s just said we can all press forward with a better model of integration and co-operation or regress into a world divided by age-old divisions of race and religion. Crap — strike that section.”


So we were left with a modest speech — and it had much to be modest about

The lesson from both Obama and Trudeau is that if everyone just did more nice things, and not so many awful things, things would be much nicer.

Apart from that, it was thin gruel. Canada is re-engaging in global affairs through institutions like the UN, the prime minister said.

But there was no mention of the deployment of Canadian troops in Africa, for which 600 or so soldiers have been earmarked, even if the government says it doesn’t yet know where they are going.

You might have thought this was the perfect opportunity for Trudeau to have sealed the deal on the Security Council seat. Nothing says “we’re back” like the promise of hard power — as British Prime Minister Theresa May proved by mentioning deployments in South Sudan and Somalia.

But, having made the commitment, the government seems to be getting cold feet, particularly after the defence minister’s fact-finding trip to Africa revealed conditions in countries like Mali are precisely as helter-skelter as everyone said they are.

In his closing press conference, Trudeau is making “careful deliberations” about where Canada can make the most impact.

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Good idea. The utility of winning a seat on the Security Council is much reduced if the government’s popularity is plunging because of an ill-fated foreign adventure.

So we were left with a modest speech — and it had much to be modest about.

Yet it hardly mattered — the General Assembly appearance wasn’t about what Justin Trudeau said; it was about how he made the UN delegates feel.

As Trudeau put it: “There is an appetite for Canada’s approach and Canada’s solutions, promoting diversity as a strength. … Canada has a narrative the world needs — we’re happy to share.”

Nobody in the audience was any the wiser about how, in fact, Canada might make progress on the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals, or what it might do with a Security Council seat.

All they learned was the pleasant-looking young man now running Canada has a nice smile and promises that his country will help to make the world a better place.

For Trudeau, it was mission accomplished.

F-35 exit strategy: Canada could pay about $313M to pull out of jet program

By: David Pugliese, The Ottawa Citizen

Canada could withdraw from the F-35 stealth fighter jet program on short notice by paying a little more than $300 million U.S., according to an analysis prepared by the defence department soon after the Liberals won the federal election.


The government could leave after only 90 days’ notice, although it would still need to pay the remaining fees the previous Conservative government committed to the F-35 program, according to the Department of National Defence documents obtained by Postmedia.

The analysis was produced four days after the election.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau came to power, pledging the Liberals would not buy the F-35, an aircraft he said was unnecessary for Canada’s needs and too expensive.

Although a Liberal government originally signed on to a research and development program for the plane, the Conservatives significantly expanded that commitment.

In 2006, Canada agreed to participate as a partner at a cost of US$551 million, according to the DND analysis. That did not commit the government to buying the aircraft, although it provided inside data about the project and a chance for domestic aerospace firms to bid on F-35 work.

“Canada has not signed a contract and can pull out by providing a 90-day written notification to other participating nations,” the analysis prepared for Deputy Minister John Forster pointed out.

“Canada’s liability would be no greater than US$346.7 million” – the difference between what it had already contributed and what was remaining of the original US$551 million commitment.

Since the analysis was produced, the Liberal government has paid another US$33 million.


The analysis noted Ottawa had also signed a separate memorandum of understanding with F-35 builder Lockheed Martin.

Under that commitment, Lockheed Martin provided F-35 work to Canadian firms on the understanding the Canadian government would eventually buy 65 of the jets.

If Canada decided not to proceed with the purchase, Lockheed Martin would not be obliged to employ domestic firms, the DND analysis noted.

“There is a risk that some contacts would not be renewed,” it added.

The Liberal government is expected to decide within months how to replace Canada’s aging fleet of CF-18 aircraft.

Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan has talked about a fair and open competition for a new fighter jet. Despite Trudeau’s pledge that Canada will not buy the F-35, Lockheed Martin, with other aircraft firms, recently submitted information about their planes to the government.

“It looks like we’re being included so we look forward to competing on that basis,” Jack Crisler, one of Lockheed Martin’s senior F35 officials, recently told Postmedia.

The stealth fighter became a political nightmare for the Conservative government after it agreed to buy the planes. The F-35 has been plagued with technology problems and U.S. lawmakers have complained about its cost.

In 2012, Auditor General Michael Ferguson issued a report that concluded Canadian defence officials withheld key information from Parliament about the proposed purchase, underestimated costs and did not follow proper procurement rules.

In June, Lockheed Martin almost saw its hopes of selling planes to Canada evaporate. Ottawa was close to moving on an interim purchase of Super Hornet jets from Boeing and Trudeau claimed the F-35 “does not work and is far from working.”

In response, Lockheed Martin warned Canadian companies who had F-35 contracts would suffer. After that, plans for a Super Hornet interim deal seemed to disappear.

The U.S. Air Force says the F-35 is combat ready although critics say much work still needs to be done on the aircraft. Two F-35s recently visited Canada for the first time at the airshow in Abbotsford, B.C.

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PM won't say if Canada to keep sending troops to Ukraine

By: Lee Berthiaume, The Canadian Press

KYIV, Ukraine -- Prime Minister Justin Trudeau wrapped up his latest overseas travels Tuesday with a visit to western Ukraine, where he will greet the Canadian Forces soldiers who have been training their Ukrainian counterparts since last summer.

Whether those troops will still be there next summer, however, was both an open question and a central issue Monday as Trudeau met with Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko.

The previous Conservative government deployed 200 Canadian military trainers to a base near the Ukrainian city of Lviv last year in response to Russia's annexation of Crimea and support for separatist rebels in eastern Ukraine.

The Canadians, alongside British and American troops, have been teaching the basics of soldiering, such as how to use their weapons and move as a unit, as well as more advanced skills such bomb disposal and medical training.

"We are giving significant support to the Ukrainian military to be able to be more effective in defending and reclaiming Ukrainian territory," Trudeau told a news conference where the two countries announced a new Canada-Ukraine free trade deal.

"We are very happy to be involved in and to be supporting the people of Ukraine."

Trudeau wouldn't say, however, whether the Liberal government -- fresh from committing hundreds of troops to form the core of a NATO battalion in Latvia -- will extend the training mission past its current expiry date in March.

Poroshenko said a professional military is essential for protecting his country's sovereignty and territorial integrity. "I have asked the prime minister to prolong the mandate of the mission," he said through an interpreter.

Asked to respond, Trudeau said Canada would co-ordinate with its international partners and allies on how best to help Ukraine in the future.

"We are right now focused on the training mission that is going so well for both Canadians and especially for the Ukrainian military," he said. "As the situation evolves, we will continue to monitor and look at the best way we can continue to support and help Ukraine."

Trudeau did promise more observers for a mission by the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe monitoring ceasefire violations between Ukrainian and Russian-backed separatist forces in the country's east. Canada will increase its complement to the 700-strong OSCE mission from 25 to 50.

Canada will also send more police officers to help train the Ukrainian police.

Russia loomed large as Trudeau met with Poroshenko and other Ukrainian officials throughout the day. Some European allies are impatient that Ukraine is not doing enough to implement its commitments in the Minsk peace deal with the rebels and Russia, but Trudeau pointed the finger at Moscow.

"Russia has not been a positive partner," he said. "They have not been moving responsibly or appropriately on things like ceasefires or international observers."

For his part, Poroshenko said Ukraine has fulfilled 95 per cent of its political obligations and all of its security requirements under the agreement. He went on to accuse Russian "troops and mercenaries" of having launched an attack against Ukrainian positions earlier in the day.

Solidarity was a central theme to Trudeau's visit to Kyiv, where he met with Ukrainian leaders and civil society groups and paid homage to Ukrainians killed in mass atrocities by the Nazis and Soviets in the 20th century, and more recently in the country's 2014 revolution.

A key moment came when Trudeau and Ukrainian Prime Minister Volodymyr Groysman visited a memorial to those killed in the Euromaidan, an uprising that ousted the pro-Russian president in the name of democracy. Surrounded by pictures of the dead, the two placed rose bouquets before a wooden cross bearing the image of Jesus before a moment of silence.

A short time later, in a meeting with Ukrainian parliamentarians, Trudeau talked about the importance of fighting for democracy.

"Many of us in the West have gone a long time without having to fight for democracy," he said. "Ukrainians reminded us how important democracy is, and how we can't take it for granted."

In a meeting with Groysman and his cabinet, Trudeau praised the Ukrainian government's progress towards democracy. In meetings with Ukrainian leaders and civil society representatives, however, he also emphasized the importance of championing the hopes and aspirations of average Ukrainians wanting a better future.

"Reforms never happen as quickly as everyone would like," Trudeau told the civil society roundtable session.

"But your job is not to make everything happen overnight, as you well know. Your job is to make sure that everything keeps moving forward as responsibly and as quickly as you can."

Trudeau and his oldest son Xavier also paid their respects to Ukrainians killed in past atrocities. They laid a bouquet of flowers at a memorial to tens of thousands of Ukrainians, many of them Jews, killed by the Nazis in Kyiv during he Second World War.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau visits Canadian troops in Ukraine

By: Lee Berthiaume, The Canadian Press

LVIV, Ukraine — Prime Minister Justin Trudeau thanked Canadian soldiers on Tuesday for their role in training the Ukrainian army, before getting a demonstration of their work firsthand.

Speaking to some of the 200 soldiers who have been based near the western city of Lviv since January, Trudeau emphasized the importance of continuing to support Ukraine in its struggle with Russia.

"It has been a long time since Canada had to defend our valour and defend our territory," he said in French to the soldiers, who are members of the Valcartier-based Royal 22e Regiment, better known as the Vandoos. "But we need to continue to work with those who are fighting for democracy and their territorial integrity. It is essential."

Trudeau didn't say anything, however, about whether the training mission will be extended. It is due to end next March, though Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko made a personal request to Trudeau on Monday to extend it.

The previous Conservative government sent the Canadian military trainers to Ukraine last year in response to Russia's annexation of Crimea and support for separatist rebels in eastern Ukraine.

The Canadians, alongside British and American troops, have been teaching the Ukrainian army the basics of soldiering, such as how to use weapons and move as a unit, as well as more advanced skills such bomb disposal and medical training.

"You are really a source of extraordinary pride for all Canadians," Trudeau said. "And this is an opportunity for me to thank you in person."

After speaking to the troops, Trudeau was joined by his son Xavier and defence chief Gen. Jonathan Vance to watch a military exercise involving a group of Canadian and Ukrainian soldiers.

As the Trudeaus and Vance watched through binoculars, a Soviet-era armoured personnel carrier led the soldiers toward a wooden building. The air shook as its cannon fired several rounds in quick succession.

The troops then moved away from the vehicle and spread out in a line facing the building. Four Canadians followed close behind as the eight Ukrainians slowly closed on the building, firing all the way, before placing an explosive inside and setting it off.

The exercise was designed to show how Canadian troops have been helping bring the Ukrainians up to a level where they can push back against Russian-backed rebels in eastern Ukraine.

It came at the end of a six-day trip through Eastern Europe for Trudeau in which Russia loomed large.

Trudeau flies home from Lviv later today after having pledged troops to Latvia while attending the NATO summit in Poland, paying an emotional visit to the infamous Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp, and signing a free trade agreement in Ukraine's capital, Kyiv.

Ivison: Trudeau Should Not Rule out F-35

While I may disagree with Ivision's statement that purchasing a European jet would hinder Canada's commitment to NORAD, here is his artictle from today's National Post about why Canada should still consider the F-35; my vote still rests with the Dassault Rafale.

By: John Ivision, National Post 

OTTAWA — One of the first lessons a president learns is that every word he says weighs a ton, Calvin Coolidge once said.

The same is true of Canadian prime ministers, which is perhaps why you haven’t heard Justin Trudeau talk recently about blocking Lockheed Martin’s F-35 fighter jet from the competition to replace the venerable CF-18s.

During the election, he vowed a Liberal government would not buy the F-35 stealth fighter, freeing up “tens of billions of dollars” to spend on the navy.

Opposition leaders don’t have access to the classified information available to prime ministers and that may explain why, once in power, his defence minister was markedly less enthusiastic about ruling out the F-35 when he launched his defence review earlier this month. Harjit Sajjan said the process will be open and transparent, suggesting the new statement of requirement that will outline the parameters of the tender process will not be written to exclude the stealth fighter.

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Privately, Liberal sources suggest the prime minister has spoken and the defence department will take the hint unless told otherwise. Sajjan launched the first public roundtable of the defence review in Vancouver Wednesday but the suspicion among many observers is that the government has already decided it just needs a lovely little runaround jet, to surveil our northern fringes, rather than a top-of-the-range air-to-ground combat aircraft that could support an expeditionary force.

Charlie Bouchard, the retired air force general and former commander of the NATO mission in Libya, is now Lockheed’s man in Canada.

Not surprisingly, he makes a passionate case about why the F-35 should be given a fair shake in any beauty parade of new jets.

The F-35 has been selected in every instance where it was an option, with 10 other countries already having placed firm orders; more than 650 aircraft will be flying before the first Canadian F-35 could arrive; it would be inter-operable with NATO allies; every F-35 produced to date has Canadian components, produced by 110 companies; and the price is projected to fall to less than $85 million per plane by the time Canada receives its first aircraft.

Jeff McIntosh/The Canadian PressPrime Minister Justin Trudeau, centre, arrives with Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan, left, and Foreign Affairs Minister Stéphane Dion, for a cabinet retreat in Kananaskis, Alta., on April 25.

“This airplane will still be flying in 2060,” he said. “It’s the best for Canada, the best for the Royal Canadian Air Force and the best for Canadian industry.”

The Conservatives originally chose the F-35 as the replacement for the CF-18 but the ham-fisted way it was chosen drew the opprobrium of the opposition parties and the auditor general.

There were sound reasons to criticize the process under the Tories, a comedy of errors where the uniforms in the Department of National Defence decided they wanted the shiniest toy in the store and skewed the process to ensure it won the competition.

It would be inglorious if defence and security strategy was devised on the hustings

But it would be equally inglorious if defence and security strategy was devised on the hustings because the F-35 had become an F-word for voters.

Trudeau has promised evidence-based policy; indeed, in his mandate letter to Sajjan, he said: “Canadians need to have faith in the government’s honesty and willingness to listen.”

It’s by no means clear that Canadians should share Bouchard’s passion and optimism for the F-35. The Senate Armed Defence Committee in Washington heard this week that the F-35B cannot land in heavy winds.

J. Michael Gilmore, the Pentagon’s director of operational tests, said that the F-35 program had 1,165 documented deficiencies, 151 of which were Category 1 — defined as deficiencies that could cause death or severe injury. Who’d be a fighter jet test pilot?

Postmedia NewsCanadian Forces members look at the Lockheed Martin Joint Strike Fighter, F-35 Lighting II in a hanger in Ottawa in 2010.

Data from February suggests that only 30 per cent of the F-35 fleet is fully mission-capable. Committee chair Sen. John McCain said the F-35 program has “been a scandal and the cost overruns have been disgraceful.”

But Canada is three years away from receiving any new planes. The reliability of the jet is likely to improve — the program manager told the committee they are making “solid progress” — and the cost is predicted to come down (it has fallen 57 per cent since 2010).
Canada will choose an American-built plane — no one inside the Twin Towers of the Department of National Defence is under any illusion that the European options are feasible, given the realpolitik of Canada’s position in NORAD and NATO.

That leaves Boeing’s Super Hornet, or perhaps Lockheed’s F-16. Neither are likely to be exempt the 10- to 15-per-cent foreign military sales surcharge levied by the U.S. government. Lockheed claims the F-35’s exemption makes the price per plane comparable to less capable fourth-generation fighters.

Partner countries like Australia will demand this country forfeit its right to high-tech jobs

It’s also clear that if Canada pulls out of the F-35 program, partner countries like Australia will demand this country forfeit its right to high-tech jobs, such as the 400 people employed by Magellan Aerospace in Winnipeg making wing parts for every F-35 that comes off the production line.

One of the more interesting characteristics of this new prime minister is his flexibility and lack of fear in making bold policy shifts, if the circumstances warrant.

In this case, Trudeau should not rule out the F-35 just because he once said he would.

jivison@nationalpost.com
Twitter.com/IvisonJ

Trudeau downplays threat of Nuclear Terror Attack

Josh Dehaas, CTVNews.ca
Published Saturday, April 2, 2016 10:58AM EDT
Last Updated Saturday, April 2, 2016 10:02PM EDT

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says the threat of a nuclear terror attack on Canada is lower than it was five or six years ago, and that he sees it as a “modest success” that groups like ISIS haven’t gotten their hands on more dangerous weapons.

In an interview with CTV Atlantic’s Steve Murphy, the prime minister said the “concern level” of a nuclear attack remains high “because the consequences would be so devastating,” but that the threat level is “certainly lower than it has been in past years, because we’ve taken significant measures to secure dangerous materials.”

Trudeau just returned to Canada from a nuclear-safety summit hosted by U.S. President Barack Obama, who warned that al Qaeda has been actively pursuing nuclear material.

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Prime Minister Justin Trudeau talks with children as he visits the Seaport Farmers' Market in Halifax on Saturday, April 2, 2016. (THE CANADIAN PRESS/Andrew Vaughan)

Canada committed on Friday to spend $42 million to reduce the risk of nuclear terrorism, in part by protecting materials in Peru, Jordan, Colombia, Ukraine, Thailand and Egypt.

“Because of meetings like the one we had in Washington,” Trudeau said Saturday, “it’s less of a threat than it was five or six years ago.”

Asked whether Canada is safer from terrorism in general than it was five years ago -- a time before ISIS’ devastating attacks – Trudeau noted that recent attacks have been “very conventional” using “pipe bombs” and “Kalashnikovs,” the Russian rifle used in the Paris attacks.

Trudeau added that such weapons had killed “dozens and even hundreds of people … but with how much they want to be able to do more, and how hard they’ve been trying to get their hands on more dangerous materials, the fact that they haven’t is a modest success.”

Peggy Mason, Canada’s former ambassador for nuclear disbarment, said she was stunned by Trudeau’s comments about the nuclear threat.

“I find it hard that we could say it has gone down,” she said, pointing to Pakistan and North Korea as sources of concern

“We have huge numbers of weapons still on hair-trigger alert,” she added.

Conservative MP Michelle Rempel called the prime minister’s comments startling. “I think he’s being very uniformed and naïve about the situation,” she said.

Gordon Edwards, president of the Canadian Coalition for Nuclear Responsibility, told CTV News Channel that he believes agreements made in Washington to better safeguard nuclear materials are a “good sign.”

However, he said Canada still has “quite a substantial amount of weapons-grade uranium here in Canada, mostly connected with isotope production, and it is a security risk.”

Part of the risk is transportation, he said. For example, Edwards said Canada is expected to send “hundreds of truckloads of liquid radioactive waste containing weapons-grade radioactive uranium down to the (U.S. government’s) Savannah River Site in South Carolina,” rather than dealing with it on-site in Chalk River, Ont.

Edwards added that, “if we really want to be serious, we have to stop producing these materials in the first place.”

The Prime Minister spoke to Steve Murphy at a farmer's market in Halifax, ahead of a meeting with Liberal Premier Stephen McNeil and an appearance at the Nova Scotia Liberal Party's annual general meeting.

With a report from CTV’s Richard Madan

Trudeau To Discuss Possibility Of Terrorists Using Nuclear Weapons

CP | By Alexander Panetta, The Canadian Press

WASHINGTON — Justin Trudeau will be among the world leaders gathering to contemplate the spine-tingling scenario of terrorists getting hold of nuclear weapons.

The prime minister will be in Washington this week at the last of the nuclear-safety summits organized by President Barack Obama.

The leaders will close out the two-day event with a session that discusses a hypothetical nuclear-terrorism scenario.

But that imaginary case study will be happening amid unnerving real-life events.

Belgium has just deployed soldiers to defend its nuclear facilities — after terrorist attacks in that country, and several incidents involving site personnel.

Analysts believe al-Qaida and Japan's Aum Shinrikyo have actively pursued nuclear weapons and they've begun expressing concern the so-called Islamic State might have similar designs.

"A terrorist attack with an improvised nuclear device would create political, economic, social, psychological and environmental havoc," said Laura Holgate, a White House aide who oversees efforts to limit the threat from weapons of mass destruction.

"The impact of a nuclear terrorist attack would be global, and the solutions must therefore also be global."

It's the fourth such summit and flows from a speech President Barack Obama gave in Prague soon after he took office.

He expressed hope for a world without nuclear weapons — which he conceded might not be achievable in his lifetime.

But the 2009 speech set shorter-term targets. One was securing the existing nuclear material around the world; he convened international leaders' meetings to make it a high-level priority.

The mixed results will be underscored by some glaring absences this week.

The Pakistani and Belgian leaders will be home dealing with the after-effects of terrorist attacks.

Putin to skip the summit

Russia's Vladimir Putin is skipping the summit — he'll be represented by observers. Russia says the U.S.-led process has run its course, and the issue should be left to the five international organizations working on it, including the UN, Interpol and the International Atomic Energy Agency.

As Obama leaves office, U.S. officials said the final summit communique will announce next steps leaders intend to take within those five organizations.

The Obama administration points to several successes these last few years:
Enough fissile material to make 130 nuclear weapons has been removed or downgraded from 50 facilities in 30 countries.

Fourteen countries and Taiwan have eliminated all nuclear material from their territory.

Twenty countries have increased co-operation to counter nuclear smuggling.

But 2,000 metric tons of weapons-usable material remain in civilian and military programs, says the White House.

It would require 25 kilograms of highly enriched uranium to produce a nuclear bomb, former State Department official Sharon Squassoni told a briefing at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

Numerous incidents involving nuclear-plant-staff have been reported just in Belgium.

A guard at one facility was shot dead in his home last week — although authorities say it wasn't terrorism-related.

Security badges were just stripped from workers at a Belgian plant.

Video footage of an official at a Belgian facility was discovered in the home of a suspected militant linked to killers from the Nov. 13 Paris attacks.

Belgium's nuclear agency had its computer system hacked and briefly shut down this year.

Two employees at a plant near Brussels reportedly joined jihadists in Syria. One was killed, another arrested.

A new study cites three potential ways terrorists could launch a nuclear attack.

They could attack facilities — perhaps by hacking their computers, says the study for the Harvard Kennedy School.

They could explode a so-called dirty bomb involving radioactive waste, which might not kill anyone but, the study says, could cause billions in damage.

"The consequences of detonation of even a crude terrorist nuclear bomb would be severe, turning the heart of a modern city into a smoldering radioactive ruin..."

The hardest to pull off would be the most devastating: an actual nuclear weapon in the hands of terrorists.

"The consequences of detonation of even a crude terrorist nuclear bomb would be severe, turning the heart of a modern city into a smoldering radioactive ruin and sending reverberating economic and political aftershocks around the world," said the study.

Canada is deemed to have a better-than-average track record on nuclear safety.

Canada is third among 24 countries for the safety of its materials, according to an international non-profit organization that tracks nuclear-security trends.

It scored above-average in 18 different categories, like on-site protection and cyber security, according to the 2016 Nuclear Threat Initiative's security index.

But it was middle-of-the-pack in two categories: dispersal of quantities and sites, and in potential terrorist presence.

"We are committed to working with the international community to prevent nuclear terrorism — a very real social, political, economic, and environmental threat," Trudeau said in a statement.

Brean: War, Declare Yourself

Written by: Joseph Brean, National Post 

The immediate aftermath of a terrorist attack seems an odd time for a civics lesson. But that is just what Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his Foreign Affairs Minister, Stéphane Dion, seemed to offer in response to French Prime Minister Manuel Valls’ announcement that his country is at war with ISIL, whose terrorists targeted Brussels this week after Paris last year.

Speak for yourself, said the Canadians. Canadian warplanes may have been bombing ISIL targets until last month, and Canadian special forces are indeed in the northern Iraq war zone today, but what they are engaged in is a “fight,” according to Canada’s government, not a war.

“A war is something that can be won by one side or the other and there is no path for ISIL to actually win against the West,” Trudeau said. “They want to destabilize, they want to strike fear. They need to be stamped out.”

THE CANADIAN PRESS/The National Archives of Canada, Claude P. DettloffThe photo "Wait for me, Daddy" shows Private Jack Bernard, B.C. Regiment (Duke of Connaught's Own Rifles) saying goodbye to his five-year-old son Warren Bernard as he leaves for the Second World War in New Westminster, B.C., 1940.

“If you use the terminology ‘war,’ in international law it will mean two armies with respecting rules and it’s not the case at all,” added Dion. “You have terrorist groups that respect nothing. So we prefer to say that it’s a fight.”

They are technically correct, says Jack Granatstein, a military historian and fellow of the Canadian Global Affairs Institute, but the curiosity of their comments reflects a major historical trend, away from wars that begin with legal agreements between sovereign states, toward the modern scenario of military conflict among non-state actors like terrorist groups, insurgencies, and subnational ethnic groups.

“I don’t think people do it anymore,” Granatstein said of the formal declaration of war, pointing to recent military conflicts such as Russia’s annexation of Crimea.

In Canada, he notes, only one war has ever been formally declared, the Second World War. More commonly, war has been justified either by Canada’s colonial duties, or by a simple vote of Parliament to send troops somewhere.

In Canada’s first military action, against the Red River Rebellion a few years after Confederation, troops were dispatched by a vote of Parliament, just as they were in the North-West Rebellion of 1885.

Canada went to the Boer War without a formal declaration, and joined the Great War in 1914 as a colony of Britain. It was not until war broke out against the German Reich that Canada passed a throne speech and had King George VI formally declare war on its behalf, first against Germany, later against Finland, Hungary, Romania and Japan.


STF/AFP/Getty ImagesCanadian soldiers land on Courseulles beach in Normandy, 06 June 1944 as Allied forces storm the Normandy beaches on D-Day.

“To my mind that suggests what a colonial remnant this country is, that we couldn’t even go to war on our own,” said Granatstein. “That’s our last declaration of war in the formal sense.”

But of course Canada has fought in many wars, no less real for having never been declared. Korea, for example, was famously described by U.S. President Harry S. Truman as a “police action.” Afghanistan was always a security mission, not a war.

One of the best illustrations of the legalities of declaring war in Canada, and how it relates to the Charter and international law, came in 2003, when Canada was caught by the dilemma of Iraq and whether to join the looming American invasion.

Lt. H.G. Aikman/DND/Library and Archives Canada/PA-129128Ranville France, 18 July 1944 -- Personnel of the 8th Canadian Infantry Brigade taking part in advance around Caen.

Several people brought legal action in an attempt to block a Canadian declaration of war, which in the end was made moot by Jean Chrétien’s decision not to join. In court, Canada argued that any decision to declare war “arises from the prerogative powers of the Crown and is not justiciable in any event,” according to one ruling. In siding with Canada and dismissing the action, a judge found that declaring war, like signing a treaty, is a matter of “high policy,” quite different from the kind of government action that can be rightly reviewed by a court, such as refusal of a passport.

“Where matters of high policy are concerned, public policy and public interest considerations far outweigh the rights of individuals or their legitimate expectations. In my view, apart from Charter claims, these decisions are not judicially reviewable.”

War is as old as society, and the question of when it formally begins has changed in lockstep with history. One constant theme has been a sense of chivalry and honour, in which sneak attacks are frowned on, and noble victory is possible only by declaring one’s intentions and fighting in the clear light of day.

Homer’s epic poetry, for example, is at root a series of tales about how the heroic ideal is expressed in war. Heraclitus, the ancient Greek philosopher, thought the true nature of the universe is war and strife, and that justice arose from the equilibrium in this turmoil. “War is father and kin of all,” he wrote, an idea that simmered in the background of philosophy and showed itself centuries later in Friedrich Nietzsche’s famous quip: “Out of life’s school of war: Whatever does not destroy me, makes me stronger.”

The themes are timeless. The Peloponnesian War, which started without a formal declaration, influenced Plato’s low opinion of Athenian democracy, just as the English Civil War inspired Thomas Hobbes’ dismal view of the state of nature — “a war of all against all” — and the need for a strong social contract under a powerful state.

Saint Augustine was one of the first thinkers to write about the idea of a just war, partly in response to the sacking of Rome by Alaric the Visigoth. His ideas guided Christianity as it came to dominate Europe, and the Christian reluctance to fight gave way to the pressures of statecraft and crusade. From his writings grew the legal doctrine of jus ad bellum, or when it is right to go to war, with typical criteria including a formal declaration by a legitimate authority, for a just cause, as a last resort, with a reasonable prospect of success.

Ken Bell / Canada. Dept. of National Defence / Library and Archives Canada / PA-162651Canadian infantry walking through rubble

Modern versions of this thinking have focused on war as a response to aggression, which gave rise to the notion of declaring war by ultimatum — basically, retreat or suffer the consequences. But formal declarations were more the exception than the rule, with some historical analyses suggesting only about 10 per cent of wars in 18th century Europe were formally declared.

The Hague Conventions aimed to change that when they came into force in 1910.

“The Contracting Powers recognize that hostilities between themselves must not commence without previous and explicit warning, in the form either of a reasoned declaration of war or of an ultimatum with conditional declaration of war,” they read. “The existence of a state of war must be notified to the neutral Powers without delay, and shall not take effect in regard to them until after the receipt of a notification, which may, however, be given by telegraph.”

In the decades since, however, as the Cold War gave way to the War on Terror, the old formalities looked ever more archaic, such that Canada today is in the strange position of fighting a fight while its allies wage a war.

Den Tandt: War Of Words over "War"

Written by Michael Den Tandt, The National Post 

Canada is not at war with the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. Of course not. It’s a police action. A lawenforcement and publicsafety issue, to address a pernicious threat, one being met with utmost seriousness by the federal government, which has applied a range of remedies across the span of policy, without resorting to fearmongering that would … where was I?

“A war is something that can be won by one side or the other and there is no path for ISIL to actually win against the West,” Prime Minister Justin Trudeau told the CBC Wednesday. “They want to destabilize, they want to strike fear. They need to be stamped out.” Stamped out! Excellent wording, that. Foreign Affairs Minister Stéphane Dion calls it a fight. This is progress.

But they’re both wrong, demonstrably and clearly wrong, in saying it’s not war. It is precisely that.

Let’s dispense first with the too-easy cliché that Trudeau and his Liberals are “soft on terror.” They’re not. No government in its right mind would be or could be, given events. This is why, as reported by the Ottawa Citizen’s Ian MacLeod, it is moving on several fronts behind the scenes to block terrorists before they strike again in Canada, including via information-sharing enabled by the former government’s Bill C-51. Good. That much is reassuring.

Trudeau’s contention that the new anti-ISIL mission launched by his government, even sans CF-18 fighters, can provide invaluable help to the U.S.-led coalition, is well taken. It’s true that other countries, especially the United States, have a corner on air power. It’s also true that Canadian soldiers are good at training allied ground forces in hostile environments, having acquired this skill in Afghanistan. And it’s equally true that military power alone cannot “defeat” an enemy such as ISIL in a 21st-century, asymmetrical insurgent conflict that collapses and conflates previous categories of warfare. OK. But no one ever said otherwise, that I know of.

And it’s all beside the point on the question of what is, and is not, war.

The conflict with ISIL is war in the sense that French Prime Minister Manuel Valls used the term after Tuesday’s bombings in Brussels. Valls said this: “We are at war.”

France is not at war in a Napoleonic sense. There are no clear battle lines. The French Foreign Legion is not (yet) poised to move in great numbers into northern Iraq. Yet France is at war, because the seat of its society and one of the shining beacons of global society, Paris, was attacked and is under threat of further attack. Brussels has been attacked, no doubt because of its symbolic heft as the European capital. Europe — the very idea of a free society, multilingual, multicultural and borderless — is shaken to its foundations by the inflow of refugees, partially (though only partially) caused by ISIL. All that makes this a war.

Ah, but ISIL is a non-state actor, says the technician. It’s not “war” because one side can never win. Calling it war gives ISIL too much credit! They’re unhinged, degenerates and sociopaths to be viewed with contempt, not elevated to the status of combatants. And that’s true, as far as it goes. Of course they’re unhinged. Based on a literal reading of ancient prophecy, these men seek to catalyze a global conflagration that will bring about their own mass death and ultimately Armageddon. To say they’re unhinged really doesn’t cover it.

But let us be clear about a couple of things. First, ISIL holds territory. It has a capital city, Raqqa. That makes it different from al- Qaida, which never did that, rather choosing to infest failed states and cling to them parasitically. As I and many others have written, the fact of ISIL’s holding land and administering institutions of government, albeit in demented and criminal fashion, is its principal drawing card. Land gives the selfanointed caliph, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, legitimacy, by radical Islamist lights.

Therefore the land he controls must be taken back. The peshmerga and Iraqi ground forces doing that, at great cost to themselves, believe they’re at war, one suspects. It would be astonishing, indeed, if Canadian special forces risking their lives to help them don’t feel the same way.

In 2002, the Liberal government launched the Afghan mission against a ragtag band of illiterate opium farmers who fought with looped-up Soviet-era artillery shells buried in roadways. Yet most Canadians, particularly the estimated 30,000 soldiers who served there, likely now consider that to have been war.

It’s an absurd descent into technocracy for the PM and his top foreign policy hand to suggest the conflict with ISIL, which poses a far greater threat to Canadian citizens than the Taliban ever did, is anything but.

Canada not at war with ISIL, says Trudeau and Dion

Written by: Mike Blanchfield, The Canadian Press

OTTAWA — The Liberal government says Canada is not at war with Islamic militants — a view not shared by ally France.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Foreign Affairs Minister Stephane Dion rejected the "at war" label just one day after the bombings in Brussels that killed more than 30 people and injured 270.

After the attacks, French Prime Minister Manuel Valls used the term Tuesday following a crisis meeting called by French President Francois Hollande.

"We are at war," said Valls. "We have been subjected for the last few months in Europe to acts of war." Added Hollande: "This war will be long."

The bombings in Brussels came four months after the attacks in Paris that left 130 dead.

The militant group known as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant has claimed responsibility for both incidents.

Trudeau, who made his comments during a CBC Radio interview, and Dion — speaking Wednesday in the House of Commons foyer — both said the conflict with ISIL does not fit the true definition of war.

"A war is something that can be won by one side or the other and there is no path for ISIL to actually win against the West," Trudeau said.

"They want to destabilize, they want to strike fear. They need to be stamped out."

Dion suggested the notion of labelling the fight against extremists as an actual war might simply be outdated.

"If you use the terminology 'war,' in international law it will mean two armies with respecting rules and it's not the case at all," Dion said.

"You have terrorist groups that respect nothing. So we prefer to say that it's a fight."

A fight, Dion added, that the West is determined to win. "Each of the attacks will only strengthen our resolve."

Last month, Canada withdrew its fighter jets from the American-led coalition that is bombing ISIL in Iraq and Syria.

But it tripled the number of Canadian special forces trainers in northern Iraq, buttressed intelligence gathering assets and also increased federal spending on efforts to help displaced civilians.

"That's why our new mission, which is much more focused on empowering locals on the ground on a military level, on a humanitarian level, on a refugee level, is going to be an extraordinarily strong piece of the coalition's fight against ISIL," Trudeau said.

Trudeau Government Shopping for Drones; RCAF Wants them Armed

Written by: Murray Brewster, The Associated Press, published by The National Post 

OTTAWA — The Trudeau government is quietly shopping for drones for the military and expects to see expressions of interest from the defence industry by mid-April.

But the tire-kicking exercise is setting the stage for a potentially bruising policy debate over whether the remotely controlled aircraft should be armed and under what circumstances they would employ deadly force.

The Royal Canadian Air Force has lobbied hard over the last few years for the capability to fire weapons from whatever drone is selected and has even written the assumption into mandatory requirements, according to a series of access to information records obtained by The Canadian Press.

Under the heading “Lethality,” the high-level requirements review — dated June 5, 2013 — explicitly states that whatever system is chosen, the RCAF expects the remotely piloted aircraft to be capable of “carrying and employing precision-guided munitions.”

A separate slide presentation, dated Dec. 12, 2013 and intended as an update for the project management office at National Defence, noted there would have to be support for a precision-strike capability, but anticipates “public concern.”

The Pentagon and CIA run drone programs which have been subject to increasing scrutiny and criticism, particularly in light of the dramatic rise in strikes over the last eight years and claims of civilian casualties.

The intelligence agency’s program of targeted assassination has been the most controversial, prompting the Obama Administration to pledge three years ago to create “clear guidelines, oversight and accountability” when it comes to decisions to employ lethal force.

A Washington-based think tank of former generals and policy experts has been monitoring the promise and issued a report card this week that gave the administration a failing grade, particularly around transparency.

A spokesman for National Defence, Evan Koronewski, acknowledged the air force wants a strike capability, but the drones Canada intends to buy will “be used primarily for surveillance and reconnaissance” of the coastlines and the Arctic.

“The policy and operational questions posed by the use of these systems are significant and require careful thought and discussion within Canada and internationally,” Koronewski said in an email.

“However, it is clear that the legal implications of the use of these systems vary depending on the context and legal framework. Any such system acquired by Canada would be compliant with Canada’s domestic and international legal obligations and employed in a manner that is consistent with these obligations.”

But Errol Mendes, a University of Ottawa professor and an expert in international law, says there will have to be more than careful thought and discussion.

He says the Trudeau government should start now to develop a framework of transparency and accountability for the use of those weapons system, if only to avoid the kind of public debate and condemnation that’s happened in the U.S.

“The issue is quite pertinent given the huge range of debate that’s gone all of the way up to the president,” said Mendes, who recently lectured the NATO council on the subject.

Introducing a Canadian program “must be done with utmost care and supervision” and with highly trained operators, he said.

“That whole area needs to be studied very, very carefully. I am not actually against well-trained and well-focused use of weaponized drones, which meet the parameters of international humanitarian law. So, I’m not against it. I know others are, but I am not.”

What needs to happen, Mendes said, is that every time the weapons are fired, it is cleared at the top, by either the defence minister or the prime minister. He says there needs to be a clear chain of responsibility that stretches beyond the military to the political level.

Retired colonel George Petrolekas, of the Conference of Defence Association Institute, says he knows there’s been debate, but hasn’t seen any evidence of the policy architecture that would be needed to run a drone program.

He also suspects that the ballooning federal deficit will put a crimp in plans to acquire drones around 2020.