Roundup: The usual NATO meeting tropes

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In advance of the NATO summit happening today in Latvia, Justin Trudeau was in Latvia to announce that Canada would be doubling our military presence in that country by 2026, which is actually easier said than done with the current state of our Forces. This was, of course, superseded by news that Turkey has agreed to drop their objections to Sweden joining NATO (leaving Hungary as the last to sign off, though they insisted they won’t be the last). Here’s Stephen Saideman to parse what this means.

Of course, as with any NATO meeting, we get the usual lazy tropes about Canada supposedly being a “freeloader,” because we don’t spend the minimum two percent of our GDP on defence. But that analogy doesn’t actually work because NATO isn’t a club where members pay dues and then it does stuff with them—it’s a military alliance that depends on the participation of member countries, and Canada participates. We participate more than a lot of other countries who have a higher percentage of defence spending than we do. And it bears reminding yet again that the two percent target is a stupid metric, because the fastest way to meet the target is to tank your economy and have a recession, and it’s easier for countries with a smaller GDP denominator to meet. But hey, the two percent target is easy fodder for media because they can make hay about it with little regard for the nuance, which is why it has been a fixation for years now.

And yes, one of our biggest issues when it comes to our military spending and capacity to spend is our ability to recruit, which we have had a hard time doing—it’s a very tight labour market, and it can take a long time for applications to be processed, by which time potential recruits are likely to have found new jobs. It also seems to me that the military has never adapted to the changes that happened about two decades ago, when they could no longer rely on economically-depressed regions (such as the Atlantic provinces) because of the rise of the oil sands and the ability for people to fly out to Fort McMurray on two-weeks-in-two-weeks-out shifts, that changed their fortunes. We’ll see if they can fix their recruiting now that they are allowing permanent residents to apply, but that is one of the major challenges they need to address.

Ukraine Dispatch:

Russia launched 28 drones over Kyiv and Odessa in the early morning hours, 26 of which were downed. Ukrainian forces also say that they have trapped Russian occupation forces in Bakhmut and that they are pushing them out. A statistical analysis shows that as many as 50,000 Russian men have been killed in the fighting to date.

https://twitter.com/ukraine_world/status/1678651881185243137

https://twitter.com/defenceu/status/1678332390052098048

Good reads:

  • Prime minister Justin Trudeau said that cluster munitions shouldn’t be used in Ukraine, keeping us in our international leadership position on this issue.
  • The deputy minister of public safety says they didn’t brief Marco Mendicino on the Paul Bernardo transfer because they had no reason to believe he wasn’t aware.
  • The CRTC released their proposed regulation backgrounder for C-18, and lo, it addresses some concerns the web giants had (which they’ve been saying all along).
  • Bombardier claims they could produce military surveillance planes for a similar price point to the ones the government plans to buy from Boeing. (I’m sure).
  • It sounds like the proposed Torstar/Postmedia merger is off.
  • The Assembly of First Nations has chosen New Brunswick regional chief Joanna Bernard as interim national chief until a new one can be elected in December.
  • Pierre Poilievre and Danielle Smith say they don’t agree with the “straight pride” message on a t-shirt each posed with. (And yet no one stopped them).
  • Elizabeth May’s husband says that she was hospitalised for fatigue and exhaustion last week.
  • The premiers began their summer meeting yesterday, and Danielle Smith arrived doing the “federal interference” song and dance in order to get attention.
  • Incoming Toronto mayor Olivia Chow is calling for a third-party review of the municipal property assessment system after data showed unfair outcomes.
  • Emmett Macfarlane explains how the so-called “Alberta model” of dealing with the opioid crisis is not only evil and immoral, but unconstitutional.

Odds and ends:

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One thought on “Roundup: The usual NATO meeting tropes”

  1. Yes, the 2% goal is a false metric but if Canada were to meet or surpass this then taxes would have to be raised. Unpopular with the voters, Polly would have a hayday.
    Then we have the “housing shortage” one can look to the provinces to blame. Housing is their jurisdiction. The glacial movement on housing is similar to the Province’s lack of action on building hospitals and training for doctors and nurses. Also trade schools cannot find candidates for training leading to a shortage of construction workers.

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