Not surprisingly, Canadian press was scornful of Chretien for “not acting swiftly enough” to protect the country’s national interest following 9/11. CanWest director David Asper insured that the wardrums raged in his 13 dailies and 11 television stations in eight provinces, which reach 94 per cent of English-speaking Canadians. Canada was slow to react, Asper said, because of a “latent stream of anti-Americanism that’s become part of Canadian culture.” It was, according to Asper and his mass media army, anti-American at the time not to commit the nation’s army to decimating a comparatively defenseless country in the Gulf. But contrary to popular sentiment expressed by the press in assertions like Asper’s, Canada was an “aggressive international partner” in the “war on terror” from the start, in the words of Chretien.
By October, Canada had committed four frigates, a destroyer and a supply ship to help U.S. naval forces already operating in the Middle East.(1) This was not enough for the Canadian press, however, who reacted by stating “finally, the Liberals wake up to the new reality,” when the PM incited a wave of fear in telling delegates of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly meeting that “the scope of the threat that terror poses to our societies and our way of life has no precedent or parallel in history.”(2) As expected, funding poured into the Canadian middle power defence apparatus. The military’s “robust” “3-D” (defence, dipolmacy, development) policy was sharpened as funding poured in, with finance minister Paul Martin saying the country was more than able to commit whatever financial resources were required.
This was still not enough for the press. A headline in the Vancouver Sun read, “We’re at war. Deal with it: Canada is still dragging its feet in the struggle against terrorism in all its forms.”(3) But Canada is certainly more of an “aggressive international partner” than a foot dragger. Paul Chapin said as much in 2004 in an address to The Royal Canadian Military Institute in his role as Director General of the International Security Bureau at Foreign Affairs Canada. Between mentioning Canada’s role in Afghanistan, Haiti and Sudan, Chapin said
In Iraq, one can see the same 3-D effect, though perhaps on a more modest scale (and perhaps it should be 4-D, given the involvement in police operations in that country). We have a political representative in Baghdad. We are not engaged in the coalition, but we do quite a lot – in some respects, we are doing just about everything else. We have a substantial CIDA program for the country, and are also contemplating the potential involvement in a NATO training program. NATO, one should recall, has sent a training reconnaissance mission out to Iraq, pursuant to the Istanbul Summit declaration and the request from the UN and from Iraq for increased NATO involvement.(4)
It should be with little surprise that, on March 2003, US Ambassador Paul Cellucci said “… ironically, Canadian naval vessels, aircraft and personnel… will supply more support to this war in Iraq indirectly… than most of those 46 countries that are fully supporting our efforts there.” The NATO and Canadian training missions have continued unabated since the war began, and the press are starting to warm up to this fact, albeit eight years after the war began. Thus we find Canadian pilots testing their latest toy, the massive Boeing C-17, by flying support missions for Operation Enduring Freedom without Parliamentary support. It perhaps came as a bit more of a surprise to Canadians that, upon notice of his resignation, General Rick Hillier’s training in Iraq was passively addressed but largely ignored amidst the ceaseless fawning of a general who turned Canada into “one of the big boys.” If he is a “hard act to follow,” as the Toronto Star suggests, there is also no shortage of options, with three senior officers all having served in Afghanistan or Iraq.
Richard Sander’s article, “Canada’s Secret War in Iraq,” goes some way into detailing Canada’s further actions in Iraq, unfortunately without citation, but the evidence is clear. In all of this, what is most revealing about Canada’s “quiet diplomacy” in Iraq is the sheer lack of attention it receives in the Canadian press. Afghanistan is “our mission” and it is what the press report on. Mention is rarely made of Canada’s “3-D approach” in Iraq. After expressing “concern” of Russia and the EU’s development of an independent policy (naturally, the pursuit of an independent policy is always a “concern”), Chapin closed his 2004 remarks to the Military Institute by noting the creation of two new cabinet committees: “one on the Canada-US relationship that the Prime Minister himself chairs and one on Global Affairs chaired by the Minister of Foreign Affairs. Within the Privy Council, there are Secretariats for both of these committees, which are headed by senior level people and have 10-14 staff each” (74). All are heavily integrated to the DND, CIDA, FAC and CSIS.
With a commitment to US global interests as strong as this, one would be hard pressed to expect anything less than Canada “indirectly” exceeding most of the 46 countries that are fully supporting US war efforts there. Canada is, and has always been, immensely successful in telling its population one thing with a smile as it bats another population with whatever capabilities it has at its disposal. It also clear which of these two actions the press, and consequently the people, spend their time and energy denouncing.
Yesterday, I posted an article titled “Afghanistan and Canada: Talking to the deaf,” detailing how Canada’s anti-war movement is largely ignored.
(1) “PM plays down chance of wider war” Sudbury Star. Sudbury, Ont.: Oct 16, 2001. pg. A.5
(2) “Finding steel on the road to Kabul.” Hugh Winsor. The Globe and Mail. Toronto, Ont.: Oct 10, 2001. pg. A.19
(3) David Warren. The Vancouver Sun. Vancouver, B.C.: Nov 24, 2001. p. A.21
(4) “The New World of Robust International Peacekeeping Operations: What Roles for NATO and Canada?” Toronto: Royal Canadian Military Institute, 2005. p. 77.
Matthew Brett is an anti-war activist and freelance journalist based in Montreal. Read other posts by Matthew Brett.
