If The Liberals don’t release a White Paper on defence...

We’re in for a lot more of the same 

For those who don’t know, a White paper is is a repot issued by the government of a state that delivers a highly complex government policy in regards to a specific issue. It  spells out in immense authority: the government’s philosophy and it’s respective polices on the issue, a strategy for procuring or developing the necessary resources and infrastructure associated with the governments purported solution for the issue, and the necessary industry requirements and benefits that support the previous item. It seeks to do this in a way that helps the reader understand the issue, understand the solution, and hopefully agree with the later. 

When a new federal government takes office in Canada there is not a mandate to release such a paper, but often governments seeking to distinguish themselves from their predecessors choose to do so, usually with a paper written about the area in which they wish to make their differences apparent. When speaking of defence policy, according to the governments website, Canada has officially released six white papers on defence. The use of papers was started in Canada in 1964. The most recent paper put out in 2008 I discount for reasons I will defend shortly, but six papers in 52 years mean there is a paper released once every eight and a half years. If we count the 2008 paper, we are right up against that eight year window, and the time could not have come soon enough. 

If you don’t pay attention to defence issues, or Canadian politics (how are you here?) then I have some news for you, the Liberals have been making announcement after announcement regarding defence. Many of these announcements are extensions of campaign promises, such as reopening the bid for Canada’s new multi-role fighter (putting Canada’s role in the F-35 program in jeopardy for dubious reasons, even though it’s arguably the best aircraft available) and some of them are not even really announcements. Rather, they are small pieces of information, like the fact that Canada’s new Single Surface Combatant Vessel will de based on “off the shelf plans”. Most of these announcements are the finishing touch on many plans from the aforementioned 2008 white paper, named: The Canada First Defence Strategy. This policy by the Conservatives, was not in my opinion not a full white paper as it left out some crucial elements. It do not include for instance, any policy regarding industry requirements, or the benefits directly, it also left a few blanks over design specifics. What it did spell out in some depth with the Conservative policy and philosophy on recruitment, mission requirements, arctic sovereignty, funding, among a few other boilerplate defence issues such as global terrorism response. 

While the Canada First Defence Strategy did give specifics on the subjects I mentioned, its scope and authority was lacking as it did not set down industry requirements, nor did it fully spell out procurement in an authoritative way. This is why I defend it is not a true white paper, but I digress.

Despite its shortcomings, the paper followed through on most of its policy and philosophy statements. As well, Harper and the Conservatives completed several of their stated procurement items such as the C-17 Globemaster, C-130J Hercules, CH-47F Chinook helicopters, and Canada’s new Arctic Offshore Patrol Vessel (although the Liberals seem to be taking the credit even though steel had started cutting before Harper left office). It also spelt out funding for new Destroyers and Frigates, funding to update search and rescue aircraft, funding for land combat vehicles, and of course controversial funding for 65 new “next generation” fighter aircraft to replace the CF-18 by 2019. What was left with some ambiguity was the specifics as to what destroyers, frigates, and aircraft would be chosen to replace Canada’s current assets. 

My problem with the Liberals announcements to date, is so far as I can tell, they’ve been shooting from the hip. They have continued their election strategy of separating themselves ideologically from the conservatives, in the F-35 issue for instance they have said much about re-opening the bid, however when you consider the procurement of the F-35 is some eight years in the making, that the planes are both budgeted and scheduled to be complete in three years, slowing down the process by cancelling the contract now is some serious hip fire nonsense. Its not like previous Liberal governments did the same and left us flying 50 year old helicopters that are literately museum pieces to our American neighbours, causing severe monetary strain and seven Canadian military deaths in the process…

(A Seaking Helicopter that looks in better condition than Canada's -
on display at the USS Midway floating museum in San Diego CA.)

The politicizing procurement that has occurred is in my opinion, some serious hip fire bullshit for this new batch of Liberals. After Judy Foote’s missing announcement the other day, and various Harjit Sajjan releases, some about …drones? You can see how this apparently impulsive stagey begins to spread. 

If the Trudeau Liberals want to separate themselves ideologically, change Canada's procurement priorities, and overhaul our Country's military philosophy, a White Paper is the way to do it. 

(The pained  expression of Harjit Sajjan
as he conducts  public consultations
 on Defence Policy)

Shooting from the hip and politicizing procurement (an issue I will write about in greater depth in the coming weeks) is a bad decision, and can have dire consequences for our state. 

Lets hope the defence review that is ongoing, is a precursor to a new Liberal white paper, a decade without a real one is to long, and shooting from the hip, often has a way of hitting yourself in the foot. Its time Justin, its 2016 after all.

Why do we need jets at all ?

A brief examination of Canada’s supersonic prerequisites 

With the recent announcement from Defence Minister Harjit Sajaan stating that, Canada still needs to replace its aging CF-18 multirole fighters, many such as myself who keep an eye on defence policy, are left saying, no shit. 

However this got me thinking back to my days of studying international defence policy, and i began to wonder, do Canadian’s know why we must keep a squadron a fighter jets at all ? I will go into a bit more detail, but it basically comes down to two major points: Firstly, if we didn’t have some sort of supersonic jets with the ability to patrol the high arctic, the USA would take over the roll and without the blink of an eye and Canadian airspace would be populated with a plethora of F-22 raptors, F-35 lightings or whatever was available, all flying american roundels. The second point is that whichever Canadian politician doesn't buy new jets and de-facto cedes sovereignty of our airspace to the Americans will most certainly lose their job.

Like most Canadians, I don’t like the idea of our friendly southern neighbours running wild in our precious airspace, but if i’m critical, I can’t come up with a whole lot of reasons why. After all the Royal Canadian Navy is borrowing its resupply capacity from Chile and the West coast, and Spain on the Atlantic side. Its not like Canada has undertaken a lot of unilateral military action lately (or really ever for that matter) we flew out of various NATO bases during our engagements in Libya, Syria, and any other middle eastern military engagement. This means that as an armed forces we are constantly relying on logistics that aren’t 100% ours, supply lines we didn't control, and in the case of marine resupply, even foreign vessels providing a service within Canadian territory. 

(Canada's last domestic resupply ship, and a RCN Officer
presumably confused as to why the ship is being
towed from Vancouver to Nova Scotia only to be destroyed)

Let me ask my initial question again, why do we still need new jets? If we admit Canada rarely, if ever takes unilateral military action, and that we already let foreign navies take over specific roles within sovereign territory, why is this supersonic northern defence so important. After all, the threat we’re talking about here is soviet aggression( read:ICBM) coming into America over the poles… and because we’re in the way, us too. If you read the previous statement and said, “huh, that doesn’t seem like a salient issue” you would be right. Why then is Canada, the eternal military pragmatists - we’re the ones foresaw the quagmire of Iraq among other oraclaculr predictions after all - running expensive jets in a role other nations could do better, to unilaterally patrol the Arctic (unilateral action being far from our norm) from a threat that largely doesn't exist. Well, it has a lot to do with ego, and the Colorado Rockies.

(This emblem showing the shared nature of the Centre
 [with American spelling though] with a glimpse
of Russia, and a hint at the operations conducted)

See, Canada has for quite some time been highly involved with a small branch of the American Defence infrastructure called the North American Aerospace Defence Command - or NORAD. NORAD is the body responsible for monitoring north american airspace for airborne threats, and responding to them appropriately. I most cases where we partner with the States, the partnership is 90% them and 10% us, NORAD is somewhat of an exception wherein Canada and the USA taken turns having the top job, and therefore making the tough calls. This was illustrated gravely on September 11th 2001 when a Canadian became the most important military official in America after terrorists hijacked several planes in American airspace. The command to ground all american air traffic on September 11th, was made by a Canadian national, look it up. Now when the US found this out they were pissed, as mad as we get about our sovereignty, is nothing compared to how the americans feel. It’s basically how they were founded. For every iota of american anger over the fact that some Cannuck had been in charge during the worst terrorist attack ever on american soil, there was an equal amount of ego swelling in Ottawa. Nothing swells our ego like taking over for America. One only has to look at how much we still brag about the League of Nations - a basically american creation - that caused WWII - yet because the US never joined its one of Canada’s diplomatic high points. 

So what point am I beating around at the moment? 

Fine i’ll come out an say it: Canada has no need for a multirole fighter aircraft. The reasons we want to buy them is so politicians can make sure they aren’t the ones who cede sovereign airspace ending their careers. We buy them because we have this ego where we need to keep up with the USA, we have this ego that allows us to think we deserve to be involved. Well fact check: militaries don’t at unilaterally anymore - Canada is no exception, we constantly relay on other nations to cover gaps in our capabilities essentially ceding sovereignty if we look at it like that, the only reason we want to spend billions on supersonic multirole fighters is the ego of being in the club - being a parterre in NORAD that sort of thing. It would not be out of character for us to cede this task to someone else, and why shouldn't we ? We don’t have the budget for these hard assets anymore. Canada has said we want to focus one military training and advising, i’m not sure how well a CF-18 multirole fighter advises, probably not much worse than an F-35, but i’d wager it still isn’t as well as a human being does. These jets are counter to our current objectives, they are something we don’t need, and the reason we are going to be paying off superfluous military hardware for decades to come ? Ego.