Season 2: #5 A Conscious Uncoupling

Canada must have a ‘conscious uncoupling’ from our former partner in security, the United States.  Here are five keys to a totally different defense strategy. Want a hint?  How about a Climate Corps instead of a tank corps.

Transcript

4          A Conscious Uncoupling

To have peace, you prepare for war. We know the adage. That is why NATO members set a spending target of 2% of GDP (Gross Domestic Product) on the military. The purpose was to deter cold war enemies Russia and China, and non-state actors such as Islamic extremists. Canada, for reference, spends about 1.37% of GDP on defense. Whether it is spending on the right things is a different issue.

Less well known, but inspired by Canada, the UN set a target of 0.7% of GDP to be invested in foreign aid. Foreign aid is security spending. With aid, developing countries can build an economy, support democracy, fight climate change and ensure peace, order and good government. Butter costs less than guns.  Ballots are better than bullets. Having set the 0.7% target, however, Canada spends an embarrassingly small 0.37% of GDP on aid.

The United States is vastly richer and more powerful than Canada. Their spending totals before Trump reflected this. As a % of GDP, American aid was always miserly.

The Americans spend 3.4% of their GDP on the military, 40% of all global military spending. Their arms industry thrives. US aid was always low, 0.3% of GDP. Much of this was political rather than humanitarian. Under Musk and Trump, the American aid budget has been gutted.

As previously discussed, Russia and China threaten their neighbours, but pose no immediate danger to Canada. By contrast, the Trump threat to make Canada a 51st state is a real and present danger. The tariff damage is real. American control over Canada’s information ecosystem is real. The close relationship of the past century has been shattered.

In the short term, our interdependent economies create a mild deterrence to an American invasion. Economic disruption from tariffs or the invasion of Canada would harm the MAGA base. This may lead Trump to temper his aggression, but that is not a certainty. Under the America First policy, American companies will disengage from Canada. They will be supported as they exploit Canada, but Canadian companies will face obstacles in the United States.  That’s the nature of a trade war. 

When Canada stands up for itself, the threat of invasion will grow. Trump will look for an excuse. After all, a war is the ultimate distraction from the domestic damage he will be trying to hide. During this interim, Canada must avoid doing anything that might give a pretext for invasion. At the same time, Canada must plan to avert the take-over.

It starts with what might be called conscious uncoupling. This should be more than simple “buy Canadian” campaigns. True independence requires much more. 

The Americans are in the process of buying 1760 Lockheed Martin F-35 stealth fighters. Canada can drag out its $44 billion order for eighty-eight of the F-35s. There are always problems that can justify delay. Even better, the order could be cancelled, but that might be seen as provocative.

The order of sixteen Boeing P-8 aircraft at a cost of $8 billion can be slow-walked. The order of fifteen new frigates for $60 billion might be delayed. The Support Ships costing $3.4 billion, and icebreakers at a cost of $8.5 billion, might be re-assessed in favour of new Canadian technology. 

To avoid the pretext of hostility, Canada would stay in NORAD. The early warning radar systems could be maintained, even if they are useless. The Reaper drones, at a cost of $2.5 billion, might be useful for southern border surveillance so long as Canada has absolute control over them. 

All this presumes that events do not proceed so rapidly that the military contracts are irrelevant. If the border is closed, and a trade war gets out of hand, Canada must simply survive. The basis for hope is that the faster Trump moves, and the more extreme his actions, the sooner it will all come to a climax.  Americans themselves will intervene. That’s the ideal outcome, that Americans themselves will stop Trump. How that struggle ends is anyone’s guess. 

Regardless of this immediate threat, Canada must totally re-think national security based on the longer realities. That is, the Trump threat is real, and we will know the outcome this decade. Plans made today for national security will only bear fruit in the mid-term, next decade.  Action on climate will impact generations to come.  It will take decades to know if anything we have done will bear fruit.

From a strictly military perspective, national security priorities must be re-aligned. The new battlefield involves cyber-warfare, robotics and drones and AI.  National security demands Canada become self-sufficient with a real deterrence and an understanding of future warfare.

For Canada’s defense strategy to provide this, it must modernize. Canada should think outside the traditional military structure of army, navy and air force. These services are a remnant of World War II and the cold war. The next war will be very different.  

To re-imagine national defense for the next war, a total re-organization might look at the priorities in a different way. 

First, foreign aid should be seen as a critical line of nation defense to address the threats of climate, population, and authoritarian governments. This would boost Canada’s image and prestige, with no direct threat to Trump. It might provoke his  scorn, which is of no consequence.

Canada might invest $50 billion annually. In the short term, this could quickly help fund the World Health Organization, the World Food Program, the International Red Cross, the United Nations Environment Program, the United Nations Population Fund, and other family planning organizations.  

For development assistance, Canada should cut out the expensive middlemen, the large aid contractors, and fund grass-root efforts to build from the bottom up. But that’s a longer term strategy. We do not have the people in place to do it at the moment. It seems risky to taxpayers, and easy to abuse, but it works. Of course, a Canadian flag should fly in acknowledgement.

For humanitarian assistance, which is distinct from development assistance, Canada could donate goods with a Canadian brand, everything from grain to on-line education programs. That is, donate things needed in refugee camps that Canada has in surplus, but donated in a way that does not invite corruption or disrupt local markets.  

To manage a massive increase in the aid budget, Canada’s aid agency should be separated from Global Affairs Canada, as it was until a decade ago. It should be a proud feature of the Canadian brand.

Canada’s second line of defense should be enhanced digital security and intelligence technology. Two organizations currently defend Canada from cyber-attacks. The Communications Security Establishment (CSE) and the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS). They work with allies to gather and share intelligence, and to advise governments. Under the Five Eyes arrangement, Canada intelligence is shared with the U.S., Britain, Australia and New Zealand. 

This has historically been led by the United States, which has by far the most extensive intelligence services. Under Trump, the Five Eyes may soon be reduced to four. Canada may in the future play a lead in gathering intelligence about the United States, for sharing with other democracies. 

Canada’s intelligence organizations must be strengthened, while quietly disengaging from the now untrustworthy United States. Canada needs its own satellites, the high ground of modern war. Better satellites would allow Canada to gather intelligence, to monitor military craft on our borders, foreign fishing fleets, chemical spills, floods, forest fires or crop data.  

Cyber-defense is something that Canada can do by and for itself. Canadian computer scientists are among the best in the world. The enhanced cyber-services would first respond to attacks already underway. Totalitarian countries already seed disinformation and disrupt elections. They take advantage of the fact that democracies value free enterprise and free speech, and are reluctant to impose restrictions. It is a tricky balance.

While foreign nations pose the obvious threat, the transnational technology industry is also undermining Canada.  It has to be treated as an enemy. Companies like Facebook, X, and Amazon undermine democracy and the free market. They favour posts that promote anger and distrust. They intend to be addictive to users. Canada must therefore work with allies to protect democracy from the techno-oligarchs and their growing control over information, especially in a new era of artificial intelligence and the future era of quantum computing.  This is a critical concern for all democracies. This involves the security services, but must be addressed as a political issue first and foremost.

Canada also needs the capacity to study and advise on the future of autonomous warfare, artificial intelligence, and robots.  This should be a government role, not the private sector. Americans get this type of service from companies like Palantir. Canada needs its own version. We cannot trust them. 

The greatest weakness of militaries throughout history is that they prepare for the last war, and do not anticipate how the next will be fought. Militaries are by nature bureaucracies. They move slowly, and change slowly. The Canadian advantage, forced upon us by circumstances, is that the pace of change in the very near future will be dramatic. It will require nimble planning and a dramatic increase in domestic production. Most weapons systems in the future will likely be purchased from Europe and Asian democracies. It’s a very different world ahead.

The third line of Canadian defense is to protect our ocean perimeter. These threats are economic and ecological, more than military, but require a strong and unified Navy/Coast Guard as a single department. The Coast Guard is now under Fisheries and Oceans. The Navy should assume full control of both. 

This would not be a blue-sea navy. Canada is not trying to project military power around the world. No foreign adversary is about to sneak across the ocean to drill for oil, or dig a mine. Anything like this would be easily detected and destroyed. But China is already invading Canada’s territorial oceans, stealing fish, and damaging the environment.  Fishing disputes with the United States can also not be ignored, but can be managed.

Canada has an obligation to defend the legal 200-mile exclusive economic zone on ocean borders. The unified Navy should protect the coasts in every way possible. For this, the Navy would need the ability to confront and engage foreign fleets and ships on all three ocean perimeters, and to control the North-west passage. They would have to monitor, investigate, and if necessary bring offenders before our justice system. 

This would be seen as an act of aggression to China or even the United States. There would be repercussions. There could be no backing down. At the same time, Canada and China could easily cooperate on new ideas such as “fish ranching”. China is by far the largest consumer of seafood in the world. Their government is aware of the drastic decline in fish stocks world-wide. In response it is developing a concept which is called “ecological civilization”, which is an effort to preserve nature and harvest it too. The fish ranches are designed to rebuild fish stocks without the problems of the type of fish farms that cause problems to wild fish and to the quality of the sea water. 

For more traditional perimeter security, defense starts with satellite surveillance, which the new Intelligence service could provide. Airships are now being designed specifically for arial surveillance. They would be ideal for Canada’s ocean perimeter. A variety of drones would also ensure blanket coverage, including underwater drones in northern waters. Artificial Intelligence would coordinate resources and tactics.  

This Navy might be better served with a very large fleet of much smaller ships, powered by hydrogen in order to be green. These ships could use a variety of air and sea drones to provide intelligence and tactical firepower. Canada could design and build their own ships and drones as a matter of national security. Ukraine has shown this can be done with drones.

Fleets of airships could play a supporting role. Much of the work of the former Coast Guard could be done better and cheaper by airships. The potential of airships, and hydrogen airships in particular, will be discussed in relation to northern transport. In a war, airships would be fat targets. But for domestic use this is less of a concern. Airships have the ability to move people and equipment to locations over land or sea where winged craft cannot go, with greater speed than ships. Airships can be carriers for fleets of drones. 

The fourth change in strategic direction for the military concerns the Army and Air Force. 

Canada has a low probability of becoming entangled in a major ground and air war, such as those of WWI and II. Any major war, such as in Ukraine, is an ocean away. Sadly, the risk from the south is greater.

If Trump does invade Canada, Canada’s military would be swatted aside. The victory might not last, as many Americans and most Canadians would resist even if it isn’t by taking up arms. The economic damage would be significant. Democracies everywhere would shun the United States, but that is already happening.  Canada can only hope it does not come to war. In the meantime, a conscious uncoupling of the military must take place.  

It is costly to maintain a large standing army that simply sits at home. The war in Ukraine shows how the Canadian army has limitations. It is slow and costly to transport a traditional army across oceans to join allies in a war. The re-vamped army and air force should reflect this. That is, a useful Canadian force would be powerful, and very mobile, much smaller. In a situation like Ukraine, Canada would want the capacity to provide rapid response with effective and lethal non-American weapons.

There is also a constant need for a military presence in support of humanitarian and peace-keeping activities. Military leaders sometimes gripe about these roles. They are notoriously difficult and dangerous, as Canada has discovered in places like the Balkans and Rwanda. They are also necessary, and can potentially break up wars before they get really bad. 

The military designed for these purposes would be elite, highly lethal, mobile and agile. They should get better pay, better equipment, and better training. The forces would make extensive use of artificial intelligence, autonomous weapons, and other tools that have to be invented. These systems should be Canadian, with no reliance on the United States. Countries like Finland, Poland, Ukraine and Britain are much more reliable partners.

Consider the use of drones. Americans have small quadcopters that survey a battlefield, big quads that drop mortar shells, suicide drones, systems that jam the enemy’s drone swarms, scanners to pick up enemy signals, and robots designed to fight. The Chinese are doing the same. If a Canadian military is to survive in this environment, it should be with tools invented and made in Canada that can defeat this enemy, not the tanks and battleships that are upgrades from WWI. 

My generation remembers the Avro Arrow. Half a century ago it was the most advanced fighter in the world that was almost built. It was designed in Winnipeg, home of the Jets.  It was cancelled for political reasons, which is to say, to avoid butting heads with the American military industry. It is time for Canada to lead again.

As part of a re-invented military, the entire Canadian air fleet should systematically convert to hydrogen. Hydrogen powered airplanes are now being developed. All Canada’s fleet should go in that direction. This would be a massive, slow undertaking, but has to start sometime.

Airships could provide heavy-lift transport where enemy attacks are not a threat. The lack of attention to the potential of this industry is disappointing. Canada can be a leader in what will be a disruptive industry in the very best sense.

In designing fighting aircraft, Canada could skip a generation of technology. One glimpse of the future is the XQ-58A. It is an American fighter drone now being tested. At one twentieth the cost of an F-35, and half the size, drone fighters will fly in coordinated swarms with no frail human passengers. Canada could design and build its own hydrogen versions with potential sales to allied democracies. Canada’s craft could be programmed to patrol the border perimeter autonomously, and to operate independently up to the point of engagement. 

Taken together, the new Canadian Armed Force would be smaller, more powerful, and ready to serve Canadian interests. It is a long-term transition taking decades.

The fifth major initiative in a re-imagined security system comes in answer to the question: what is the greatest threat we face? There is a 100% probability of an absolutely catastrophic outcome from climate change. 

Catastrophic events… storms, floods, fires, droughts, train crashes and chemical spills… will occur on a frequent basis at home and abroad. In Canada, the most immediate threats come from forest fires, floods, droughts, ice storms, tornados, and pandemics. Events like these will increase in number and severity. Our military has in the past pitched in to help, but has told Parliament it doesn’t really want the job. Nor would a re-designed military have this kind of specialized capacity.  

Canada needs a “Climate Corps”. This corps would be a significant, well-trained, well-equipped organization set up specifically to deal with climate and industrial catastrophes. It would respond rapidly to these sudden crises. 

To build a Climate Corps, Canada might start with the Canadian Rangers, and enlist army units that are redundant. The 5000 strong Rangers are a part of the Army Reserve, and have significant Indigenous membership. This is useful because Indigenous Canadians understand the land and nature better than most of us city-based Canadians. The Corps would be uniquely Canadian.

The Climate Corps could encourage short-term enlistment by young Canadians as a form of national service. The work for the “boots on the ground” members of the Corps would be strenuous, dangerous, and difficult.

There is no equivalent to a Climate Corps anywhere on earth. Nor is there a set of tools off the shelf to equip the Corps for the many and varied events that will occur. Canada would have to invent new tools, and build them. 

A Climate Corps would be required to rapidly transport highly trained Corps members and tons of equipment over huge distances in horrible emergency circumstances. Airships could provide this transportation without the need for ports or landing strips. On arrival, the Corps would need portable energy, which could come from very small micro modular nuclear reactors. The Corps would have significant medical capacity and field hospitals. It would have logistical expertise to coordinate the response.  

The Climate Corps would serve Canada first. It could be deployed to assist the United States, or indeed anywhere around the world where natural crises occur. It would replace Canada’s Disaster Assistance Response Team (DART), which is part of the military. The Climate Corps, like foreign aid, would become part of Canada’s brand.

The Corps would not duplicate the work of organizations like the Red Cross and the World Food Organization that provide humanitarian assistance, and have surge capacity. The Climate Corps would support those organizations as needed in specific locations for a time-limited humanitarian mission. Where required, the Canadian military would provide armed protection the overseas. 

These five priorities for the defense system (foreign aid, cyber-security, perimeter defense, a new Armed Force, and a Climate Corps) are proposed as a way to re-invent what is needed to protect Canada in the decades ahead. Some technologies Canada would need will take decades to invent and produce. National security requires constant learning, and constant re-evaluation.  It is all about risk assessment.

Perhaps, somewhere in a basement cubicle at National Defense headquarters there are other, better recommendations than the ones just outlined. Perhaps some policy shop has creative ideas on how to re-imagine Canada’s national security to meet the world we actually face. If so, it is time to talk about it with Canadians. Just as the cavalry was abandoned a century ago, it is time to let go of traditions that are no longer fit to purpose.

We know the warning: “In case of emergency, break glass.”  Canada faces a national security emergency. It’s time to break the glass.