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Justin Trudeau hints at boosting Canada’s military spending

Justin Trudeau hints at boosting Canada’s military spending

Canada says it will look at increasing its defence spending and tacked on 10 more Russian names to an ever growing sanctions list.

By Tonda MacCharles
Ottawa Bureau
Mon., March 7, 2022

Riga, LATVIA—On the 13th day of the brutal Russian bid to claim Ukraine as its own, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is showing up at the Latvian battle group led by Canadian soldiers, waving the Maple Leaf and a vague hint at more money for the military.

Canada has been waving the NATO flag for nearly seven years in Latvia as a bulwark against Russia’s further incursions in Eastern Europe.

Canada stepped up to lead one of NATO’s four battle groups in 2015 — part of the defensive alliance’s display of strength and solidarity with weaker member states after Russia invaded Ukraine and seized the Crimean peninsula in 2014. Trudeau arrived in the Latvian capital late Monday after meetings in the U.K. with British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Netherlands Prime Minister Mark Rutte.

Earlier Monday, faced with a seemingly unstoppable war in Ukraine, Trudeau said he will look at increasing Canada’s defence spending. Given world events, he said there are “certainly reflections to have.”

And Canada tacked on 10 more Russian names to an ever-growing sanctions list.

The latest round of sanctions includes names Trudeau said were identified by jailed Russian opposition leader and Putin nemesis Alexei Navalny.

However, on a day when Trudeau cited the new sanctions, and Johnson touted new measures meant to expose Russian property owners in his country, Rutte admitted sanctions are not working.

Yet they all called for more concerted international efforts over the long haul, including more economic measures and more humanitarian aid, with Johnson and Rutte divided over how quickly countries need to get off Russian oil and gas.

The 10 latest names on Canada’s target list do not include Roman Abramovich — a Russian billionaire Navalny has been flagging to Canada since at least 2017. Canada appears to have sanctioned about 20 of the 35 names on Navalny’s list.

The Conservative opposition says the Liberal government is not yet exerting maximum pressure on Putin, and should do more to bolster Canadian Forces, including by finally approving the purchase of fighter jets.

Foreign affairs critic Michael Chong said in an interview that Ottawa must still sanction “additional oligarchs close to President Putin who have significant assets in Canada.”

Abramovich owns more than a quarter of the public shares in steelmaking giant Evraz, which has operations in Alberta and Saskatchewan and has supplied most of the steel for the government-owned Trans Mountain pipeline project.

Evraz’s board of directors also includes two more Russians the U.S. government identified as “oligarchs” in 2019 — Aleksandr Abramov and Aleksandr Frolov — and its Canadian operations have received significant support from the federal government.

That includes at least $27 million in emergency wage subsidies during the pandemic, as well as $7 million through a fund meant to help heavy-polluters reduce emissions that cause climate change, according to the company’s most recent annual report.

In addition to upping defence spending, the Conservatives want NORAD’s early warning system upgraded, naval shipbuilding ramped up and Arctic security bolstered.

In London, Johnson sat down with Trudeau and Rutte at the Northolt airbase. Their morning meetings had a rushed feel, with Johnson starting to usher press out before Trudeau spoke. His office said later that the British PM couldn’t squeeze the full meeting in at 10 Downing Street because Johnson’s “diary” was so busy that day. The three leaders held an afternoon news conference at 10 Downing.

But before that Trudeau met with the Queen, saying she was “insightful” and they had a “useful, for me anyway, conversation about global affairs.”

Trudeau meets with NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg Tuesday in Latvia.

The prime minister will also meet with three Baltic leaders, the prime ministers of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, in the Latvian capital of Riga.

The Liberals announced they would increase the 500 Canadian Forces in Latvia by another 460 troops. The Canadians are leading a multinational battle group, one of four that are part of NATO’s deployments in the region.

Another 3,400 Canadians could be deployed to the region in the months to come, on standby for NATO orders.

But Canada’s shipments of lethal aid to Ukraine were slow to come in the view of the Conservatives, and the Ukrainian Canadian community.

And suddenly Western allies are eyeing each other’s defence commitments.

At the Downing Street news conference, Rutte noted the Netherlands will increase its defence budget to close to two per cent of GDP. Germany has led the G7, and doubled its defence budget in the face of Putin’s invasion and threats. Johnson said the U.K. defence spending is about 2.4 per cent and declined to comment on Canada’s defence spending which is 1.4 per cent of GDP.

But Johnson didn’t hold back.

“What we can’t do, post the invasion of Ukraine is assume that we go back to a kind of status quo ante, a kind of new normalization in the way that we did after the … seizure of Crimea and the Donbas area,” Johnson said. “We’ve got to recognize that things have changed and that we need a new focus on security and I think that that is kind of increasingly understood by everybody.”

Trudeau stood by his British and Dutch counterparts and pledged Canada would do more.

He defended his government’s record, saying Ottawa is gradually increasing spending over the next decade by 70 per cent. Then Trudeau admitted more might be necessary.

“We also recognize that context is changing rapidly around the world and we need to make sure that women and men have certainty and our forces have all the equipment necessary to be able to stand strongly as we always have. As members of NATO. We will continue to look at what more we can do.”

The three leaders — Johnson, a conservative and Trudeau and Rutte, progressive liberals — in a joint statement said they “will continue to impose severe costs on Russia.”

Arriving for the news conference from Windsor Castle, Trudeau had to detour to enter Downing Street as loud so-called Freedom Convoy protesters bellowed from outside the gate. They carried signs marked “Tuck Frudeau” and “Free Tamara” (Lich).

Protester Jeff Wyatt who said he has no Canadian ties told the Star he came to stand up for Lich and others who were leading a “peaceful protest” worldwide against government “lies” about COVID-19 and what he called Trudeau’s “tyranny.”

Elsewhere in London, outside the Russian embassy, other protesters and passersby reflected on what they said was real tyranny — the Russian attack on Ukraine. “I think we should be as tough as possible to get this stopped, as tough as possible,” said protester Clive Martinez.
 
In 1939 we started with practically nothing. Within two years we had a solid START on a navy, a major training system capable of turning out hundreds of aircrew per year and the airports to fly them from, we had 5000 soldiers preparing to invade Dieppe and 2000 more in Hong Kong. By wars end we had 1.1 million people in uniform so there is absolutely nothing we can't achieve if we are given the leadership and green light to do it.
But Hong Kong and Dieppe were still disasters in large part due to our unpreparedness in 1939. I would rather we be ready for Day 1 and avoid those types of disasters.
 
Using WWII or WWI mobilization as a "we'll be fine..." for current state of affairs is not in the least reassuring.

Read some accounts of what transpired in 1914 and 1939 when we actually started, we were severely behind the 8 Ball in terms training capability and equipment. We were blessed to have the run up time we did to get our house in order.

Like @KevinB said, the cost and complexity of modern warfare doesn't lend itself to "just in time" procurement and training.
 
Using WWII or WWI mobilization as a "we'll be fine..." for current state of affairs is not in the least reassuring.

Read some accounts of what transpired in 1914 and 1939 when we actually started, we were severely behind the 8 Ball in terms training capability and equipment. We were blessed to have the run up time we did to get our house in order.

Like @KevinB said, the cost and complexity of modern warfare doesn't lend itself to "just in time" procurement and training.

I think our weapons systems are to complicated to be replicated en masse and replace combat losses fast enough. I propose that if the, non nuclear, ball ever drops we will be reverting to something more akin to WW2 or Korea very quickly as highly technical and complicated equipment is expended and lost and then replaced with easy to produce en masse materials and equipment.

Quantity has a quality all its own
Joe Stalin
 
In 1939 we started with practically nothing. Within two years we had a solid START on a navy, a major training system capable of turning out hundreds of aircrew per year and the airports to fly them from, we had 5000 soldiers preparing to invade Dieppe and 2000 more in Hong Kong. By wars end we had 1.1 million people in uniform so there is absolutely nothing we can't achieve if we are given the leadership and green light to do it.
Sorta think you also need an imminent threat.
 
But Hong Kong and Dieppe were still disasters in large part due to our unpreparedness in 1939. I would rather we be ready for Day 1 and avoid those types of disasters.
Too true. We are long overdue to re-equip and rejuvenate our forces
 
The low tech nature of WWII has no comparison to today. Turning 'prairie farm boys' into soldiers, sailors and pilots in mere month would be like what we see with many Russian troops in Ukraine. Flower Class corvettes were based on a fishing boat and turned out in a matter of months, which is whole lot longer than the time they would last today in action.
 
Using WWII or WWI mobilization as a "we'll be fine..." for current state of affairs is not in the least reassuring.

Read some accounts of what transpired in 1914 and 1939 when we actually started, we were severely behind the 8 Ball in terms training capability and equipment. We were blessed to have the run up time we did to get our house in order.

Like @KevinB said, the cost and complexity of modern warfare doesn't lend itself to "just in time" procurement and training.
Didn't you read the last line? The previous discussion was all handwringing with regards to the 2% and no one will come and we can't get our training in gear. Frankly it was all why we couldn't. Well, we can and we must but it will require leadership.
 
I think the danger of East Asia exploding into a full blown nuclear war is at least as serious as NATO vs WP in the 1950s and '60s.
I feel like many/most of our political & military leadership have a fundamental misunderstanding of how war and also great power competition is going to be fought in the 21st Century.

It's actually surprising to me because "Hybrid Warfare" is all we've been hearing about since 2014, but our leadership (many of whom supposedly have big brains) can't seem to wrap their heads around the concept.

Conventional Military Power is but one aspect of a Hybrid Warfare Strategy, but one finger from many different hands if you will:

RUS-Hybrid-Warfare-Hydra-e1614190468607.jpg


The problem space that I don't think the Collective West has wrapped its head around is the fact that Russia's Conventional Military Power isn't there for us, it's for its client states and those States it has Strategic Interests in, Ukraine being one of.

Any discussion about the superiority of NATO Forces vs the Russian Armed Forces is stupid because the Russian Armed Forces doesn't really exist to fight NATO in a conventional war. The Russians know they aren't strong enough and that they would lose, they've even admitted as much. They have nuclear weapons though, which is the ace in their sleeve and they know it.

On the eve of the Ukrainian Invasion, Vladimir Putin actually mentioned this in a speech (the clip of which has since disappeared and I cannot find it). The gist of it though was that Russia knows NATO would win in a conventional war but it's irrelevant because Russia has nuclear weapons and any conventional exchange becomes a nuclear exchange, at which point we both lose.

This isn't to say it isn't important to have conventional military capability, on the contrary it's important for us for two reasons:

1. To be able to provide support to our partners against our adversaries, with weapons and military capability, as us being done in Ukraine; and

2. To be able to carry out our own operations in areas of the globe where we have strategic interests.

Where Canada fails massively in this regard is that we can't really do either of the above because a) we have no excess of weapons or military capability to give anyone and b) we have let our standing forcss atrophy to the point we also really can't do #2 in a meaningful way either.

The Russians also aren't doing badly or as badly at the strategic level as we are led to believe. They are currently having a lot of success running France out of their former Colonial Empire and they are sowing dissension in Europe & Elsewhere through the considerable control that they wield on commodities markets. The World is also interconnected to the point that things we have tried to do, like our sanctions regime, has been shown to be essentially toothless because we've allowed our diplomatic and economic capital to erode in many parts of the World.

See the following:

20230109_102219.jpg

Screenshot_20230110_084749_Chrome.jpg

Screenshot_20230110_084856_Chrome.jpg

Screenshot_20230110_085026_Chrome.jpg

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I could write an entire thread on each of the other fingers of hybrid war strategy but I'll save it.

The point I'm trying to make is that conventional rearmament is but one aspect of how wars are going to be conducted in the 21st century.

Much of our wealth in the West is tied to the "Liberal World Order" we've built Post WWII but I believe we've rested on our laurels for the most part over the past few decades. We've deluded ourselves in to a false sense of security with an illusion of economic and supposed military superiority.

Our adversaries have not been idle, they've been developing new strategies for confrontation with us and they've shown ability to synchronize efforts and leverage multiple areas of State Power that we have not.
 
Any discussion about the superiority of NATO Forces vs the Russian Armed Forces is stupid because the Russian Armed Forces doesn't really exist to fight NATO in a conventional war. The Russians know they aren't strong enough and that they would lose, they've even admitted as much. They have nuclear weapons though, which is the ace in their sleeve and they know it.
Which puts Russia in with the Pakistan, Indian, North Korean (and Israeli) grouping. Second/third-rate aspirational nations with nukes.
 
Honestly a lot of programs on the Army side could be done with very limited project staff -- IF the CAF was to buy systems that are in use with NATO allies.

I agree, but that's still a lot of cumulative projects, and individually they aren't really worth a lot per year.

Was part of a six person team on a $100M project, which went from concept to award within 2 years, and is now fully up and running, but that $100M is spread over 20 years, so really isn't a big impact on spending $20B more a year.

If we are currently spending around $18B a year with about 100k people (military plus civilians), as well as a whole whack of other department pers involved, hitting $40B won't happen with 'leadership and effort'.

Don't forget, the same people that would be doing the projects would also be responsible for maintaining existing gear, and most are already beyond capacity.
 
Which puts Russia in with the Pakistan, Indian, North Korean (and Israeli) grouping. Second/third-rate aspirational nations with nukes.
Considerably more powerful than any of those Countries unfortunately. Absolute scoundrels and criminals but they are really good at it.

Vlad and his Cronies are basically the Juiced up version of "Pepe" Pablo Escobar except they have nukes, way more money & industrial capacity and a security council seat.

pablo escobar GIF
 
More powerful in a quantitative sense yes. Qualitative? Not really.

At some point, little Vlad continuously trotting out his nukes for show-and-tell will grow old (if not already)…his entire structure is built in ooor faith interactions with others. One could almost have more respect for Kim Jong Un…
 
More powerful in a quantitative sense yes. Qualitative? Not really.

At some point, little Vlad continuously trotting out his nukes for show-and-tell will grow old (if not already)…his entire structure is built in ooor faith interactions with others. One could almost have more respect for Kim Jong Un…

They don't look too good in the lineup that really counts....

Balance-of-Power17.png


 
The low tech nature of WWII has no comparison to today. Turning 'prairie farm boys' into soldiers, sailors and pilots in mere month would be like what we see with many Russian troops in Ukraine. Flower Class corvettes were based on a fishing boat and turned out in a matter of months, which is whole lot longer than the time they would last today in action.
Not to mention those ships were sent to sea from our yards, missing equipment and with crews were only one person onboard had any deep sea experience. We were far luckier than we deserved.
 
Too true. We are long overdue to re-equip and rejuvenate our forces
Technically and realistically we are. Canada has committed to a new fleet and has just signed on for brand new state of the art fighter aircraft.

There are many areas where we are lagging, particulalry in the army, but its the most spending on new, major equipment in a long time.
The point I'm trying to make is that conventional rearmament is but one aspect of how wars are going to be conducted in the 21st century.
One can't argue with that but, conventional rearmament is, nonetheless "one" aspect and as such must be continuous. It's interesting to note that we have just agreed to buy NASAMs for the Ukrainians while we still have none of our own.


🍻
 
I think our weapons systems are to complicated to be replicated en masse and replace combat losses fast enough. I propose that if the, non nuclear, ball ever drops we will be reverting to something more akin to WW2 or Korea very quickly as highly technical and complicated equipment is expended and lost and then replaced with easy to produce en masse materials and equipment.

Quantity has a quality all its own
Joe Stalin

All true - but there is a peculiarity with manufacturing.

If someone says they want 100 items - that is a bespoke order.

If someone says they want 100,000 of the same items - that becomes a competitive opportunity. People will figure out how to get the job done cheaper and faster and will manufacture jigs and get sub-suppliers to do more so the contractor has to do less.

My take is that missile launchers are starting to look the same regardless of which missile and which platform. The key element to me is the cheap manufacture of precise missiles.

And lots of PS5 controllers.
 
The low tech nature of WWII has no comparison to today. Turning 'prairie farm boys' into soldiers, sailors and pilots in mere month would be like what we see with many Russian troops in Ukraine. Flower Class corvettes were based on a fishing boat and turned out in a matter of months, which is whole lot longer than the time they would last today in action.

Flowers - 85 men in 1000 tonnes.

I can float 1000 tonnes with a crew of zero and position all 225 that were built in a permanent conveyor from Halifax to Derry with torps, missiles, sonars and UAVs. Add some SSNs underneath and you have a much more secure highway to Europe than was possible in 1943.

Satellites, UAVs and LRPAs over head all the way across. Tankers and Fighters launching from Norway, UK, Iceland, Greenland, Canada and the US.

The modern game looks nothing like the old game with its Condor Gap and Wolf Packs.

"User Friendly" means something. And a lot of technology is geared towards making "User Friendly" kit. That means kit that doesn't require much training.

NLAW and Javelin are popular because they are user friendly.

Guns and tanks and F35s aren't.

But UAVs and Missiles are.
 
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