U.S. ambassador slams Canada’s defence budget
Fuck you and the horse you rode in on, buddy. Why do we need to spend more on our military? Yes, we have bought shoddy helicopters and submarines (why did we need submarines in the first place?). I’ve yet to be convinved that Canada should be involved in most out-of-territory action that it has been. Perhaps rather than increase spending, we need to retool spending. We’ve had success as a partner in the US space program by providing a highly-specialized service. Maybe, rather than spending more on our military, we need to axe portions of our military to focus on others? Let’s say our military was half the size it was. Each soldier could be paid more. There would be more money to spend on training these soldiers for a specific task. Ideally in my mind, this might be a support role, but perhaps all Canada should have is the equivalent of the US Marines? High-end profesisonal soldiers? Yes, we need such things as a coast guard, but that it a domestic role (which probably does need better helicopters).
It was noted that shortly before this, Canada had chided the US for not signing an international germ warfare treaty. Personally, I think that Canada & Europe have an excellent ace-in-the-hole right now. The US is trolling for support for war on Iraq. How about trading this for signing say, oh, the small arms treaty? Or the land mine treaty? Or the biological warfare treaty? Or hell, the International Criminal Court treaty? Or any number of international treaties designed to help make the world safer that the US has refused to sign on to?