If three incidents makes a trend, then we may have a serious problem with civil-military relations on our hands in this country. After the allegations that Mark Norman leaked Cabinet confidences to publicly pressure the government to run a procurement his way, and calls by soldiers in uniform for the defence minister to resign, we now have a retiring general who wants less political control over combat missions (on top of greater resources). Because apparently civilian control over the military isn’t a Thing and we should just let them run their own show.
Oh, wait. This is a problem because it’s looking to weaken that civilian control. No one can deny that there were a lot of problems with the way that things were run in Afghanistan because of some rather spectacular bureaucratic bungling, but that doesn’t mean that we should simply turn over operational control to the military. Madness – and coups – lie that way. And if serving members of our military can’t see that, then we have a serious problem on our hands.
Meanwhile, as Harjit Sajjan issued yet another apology for characterizing his role in Operation Medusa, we also saw a letter released from General Fraser on Sajjan’s role was at the time. The more that this drags on, and the more we hear military voices chirping on about this, the more I’m seeing another problem with the way in which Sajjan was given the role as minister, while he was still an active member of the Canadian Forces Reserves (and indeed, the point was made upon his appointment that he had to resign because he was still technically subordinate to the Chief of Defence Staff owing to his rank). This is a problem for civilian control of the military, when we put recently retired members into the civilian role of oversight – they’re too close to the culture for one, and as we’re seeing with this particular incident, the soldiers still serving have different expectations of the minister because they’re still seeing him through the lens of being a “good soldier” rather than a politician, which he is now. We’re also seeing this problem in the States with appointments of recently retired military personnel into Trump’s cabinet, where they are blurring lines around civilian control. And We The Media aren’t helping by treating Sajjan as a former soldier instead of a politician in how this whole thing is being handled, which is only amplifying the problems. Neither, frankly, are the Conservatives, who keep trying to insist that the military be left to handle their own procurement (particularly around fighter jets), apparently forgetting about the problems they had with those same files when they were in government when the military’s wish lists were unrealistic, and the fact that just turning it over again undermines civilian control. This is really serious business, and I fear that we’re letting this get out of hand, with not enough voices pushing back against this creeping problem.
Good reads:
- Bardish Chagger is backing away from some of her Parliamentary reform plans, but plans to push ahead with others. Opposition parties remain unimpressed.
- It looks like we are coordinating responses with Mexico in how we deal with the latest NAFTA eruptions from the Trumpocalypse.
- The government is issuing new guidelines for better handling LGBT refugee cases at the IRB, where documentary evidence is harder to obtain.
- Former employees of Senator Meredith are now going to the media with tales of harassment and sexual harassment. Investigations have been ongoing since 2014.
- Senator Ataullahjan was mugged while in Pakistan.
- Nova Scotia will be going to the polls on May 30th.
- Kevin O’Leary says he dropped out to be selfless because he would have a tough time delivering a majority mandate.
- Aaron Wherry wonders why an “evidence-based policy” government can kill an ineffective transit credit, but not Supply Management.
- Susan Delacourt looks at the Trudeau government’s willingness to engage with the media, while still keeping on top of their “message.”
- Chantal Hébert points to recent history in showing that there is no guarantee that Kevin O’Leary can actually play kingmaker in the Conservative leadership.
Odds and ends:
A failed American trade deal helped lead to Confederation here in Canada, in case you wanted some historical parallels.
Here’s a look at the career of political cartoonist Terry Mosher aka Aislin.