Canada can learn from Australia’s grown-up defence strategy.
CANADIANS DON’T UNDERSTAND THE MILITARY BECAUSE, IN GENERAL, WE DON’T SEE IT. IT’S OUT OF SIGHT AND LARGELY OUT OF MIND. — MATT GURNEY
THE REASON OUR POLITICIANS CARE SO LITTLE ABOUT NATIONAL SECURITY MATTERS IS SIMPLE: THE CANADIAN PUBLIC DOESN’T EXPECT ANY BETTER FROM THEM
Last week, my colleague Matthew Fisher, Postmedia’s senior international writer, had a column in the Post noting, correctly, that Australia has a lot to teach Canada about national security.
“What has evolved Down Under is an all- party consensus that robustly defending Australia is a toplevel national interest,” he wrote. “Decisions on strategic policy, defence budgets and procurement policies reflect that. A common vision on security supercedes everything.”
In in other words, when it comes to defence matters, Australia is a grown- up country. Canada, sadly, isn’t. We have no coherent national security vision, haven’t upgraded our official defence plans through a white paper since I was in grade school, regularly reverse major military policies when we change governments, and can’t seem to organize a proper military procurement program to save our lives (or, more to the point, the lives of Canadian personnel who might have to go into action in outdated or inappropriate equipment — recall the Iltis jeeps we first sent to Afghanistan). The Canadian Forces work miracles with what they have, but they don’t have enough. Not enough equipment, not enough units, not enough manpower, not enough training time.
Fisher is right to note that Australia’s political culture is simply more advanced on these matters than ours. But the problem, as I see it, is more public than political. In Australia, I don’t know what came first: the chicken of political maturity or the egg of public expectations of same. But I do know that in Canada, our political immaturity isn’t a glitch or anomaly. It’s an entirely predictable and understandable, if unacceptable, byproduct of the Canadian public’s low literacy on military matters.
As Fisher notes in his column, the easy explanation for Australia’s comparative maturity is that it is isolated and alone, in a rough neighbourhood, far from its major Anglosphere allies. If Australia was suddenly threatened by one of its neighbours, even if its allies came rushing with aid, it could still take weeks or months to rally a major force (there are some U.S. units in the Pacific at all times, of course, and a contingent of U. S. Marines is always in Australia, as a tangible sign of U.S. commitment, but not enough to win a war). That’s the easy explanation, granted, and probably not the full one, but it’s actually probably true enough.
Canada, of course, is in the opposite position. Our closest ally and primary military partner is literally next door, and would protect us because our stability and sovereignty are essential to its own security. We don’t have to think about national defence, or invest heavily in it, so we don’t. We should, because that’s what sovereign countries and reli- able allies do, and it would allow us to be a much greater force for good in a world that could indeed use more Canada. But you admittedly can’t make a case for a larger, more capable Canadian military force on the basis of literal need. So we don’t talk about it at all.
But there’s another issue at play here. It’s not entirely separate from having our big, heavily armed brother next door, but it’s distinct enough to note on its own: Canadians don’t understand the military because, in general, we don’t see it. It’s out of sight and largely out of mind. Canadians support their troops. They admire the military and respect the courage of our armed forces personnel. But it’s not a top of mind issue because the Armed Forces are generally tucked out of the way in remote areas of the country, far from our major population (and cultural) centres. With the exception of small arsenals, most of the military’s real estate in the big cities was sold off years ago. I’m sure it fetched a pretty penny.
We barely teach history at all in the schools, and what we do teach downplays our military conflicts. We don’t have officer training programs on post-secondary campuses, where students could get some exposure to the military and the kind of people who choose to serve in it ( though some associates of mine are working to change that). And because our military has been very small since the end of the Second World War, there are many Canadians, including generations who came here after the 1940s, who may not have a single serving member or veteran in their families. Indeed, I recall the first time I ever saw a Canadian soldier in real life. I was probably 13 or 14 years old, and it was one poor guy walking home from a bus depot, hauling a gigantic backpack through frigid winter cold. I stared at the poor man. I was amazed to actually see a soldier, a real one, in public, in Toronto’s suburbs. It was unheard of.
If Canadians had more exposure to the Armed Forces, if they felt more of a sense of understanding and ownership of the military, and the incredible role it plays at home and abroad, we wouldn’t let the politicians get away with the shameful neglect that has been the reality of governments Liberal and Conservative. Recruitment shortfalls would be big news. Military procurement debacles would be public scandals, not fodder for mostly ignored auditors- general reports and the odd oped or column, a distressing proportion of which are written by Fisher and I, along with a few other colleagues.
But we don’t. And our politicians will continue to treat the military like an afterthought for as long as there’s no public demand for better. If our friends in Australia have any advice on how to change our entire cultural perspective on this matter, I hope they don’t keep it a secret.