The Defence Budget [superthread]

[211RadOp]

From the Kingston Whig Standard

http://www.kingstonwhigstandard.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=2990015

PM defends defence spending
By BRYN WEESE, PARLIAMENTARY BUREAU
 

OTTAWA -- The first duty of a national government -- "everywhere and always" -- is to protect its people and territory from external threats, and that means buying the best for the Canadian Forces, according to the prime minister.

Stephen Harper threw down the gauntlet Tuesday to his critics who question his government's military spending, including the $16 billion put toward 65 new F-35 stealth fighter jets.

That purchase is expected to be a major election issue for the Liberals and NDP in the next campaign, whenever it's called.

While announcing a new $155-million helicopter base in B.C., Harper warned against "wilful naivete" in national security, and said Canada has to be ready to defend itself from any and all threats.

"If you don't do that, you soon don't have a country and you don't have any of the other good things you once thought were more important," he said. "Our country has certainly never gone and will never go looking for trouble. However, many times during the past 200 years, trouble has come looking for us. While Canada does not aspire to be an armed camp, neither is there any place in national defence for wilful naivety."

NDP defence critic Jack Harris shot back at Harper Tuesday, saying protecting Canadians is equally important in times of peace, too, and in that regard the government has failed.

There's no excuse, for example, for Canada to be the worst in, probably, the developed world in terms of search and rescue response times, Harris said, adding response times in Canada are 30 minutes between 8 a.m. and 4 p.m., Monday to Friday, but slows to two hours during the evenings and weekends.

Norway, by comparison, has pilots in the air within 15 minutes of receiving a search and rescue call, 24/7, and the United States and Australia both have 30 minute response times, 24/7.

The new 20,000-square-metre helicopter base announced Tuesday at Canadian Forces Base Esquimault near Victoria, B.C., will house the 443 Squadron, and its nine new Cyclone helicopters are expected to arrive in 2014.


Canada is buying 28 Cyclones to replace the country's ageing Sea Kings.

bryn.weese@sunmedia.ca

 

[Container]

Layton understands that we are a huge country mostly filled with nothing right? We can't have the same response times as......Norway.

Nor do we have the population density to have the same coverage as the States.

Has he ever been out of Toronto?

**EDIT** OOPS! I saw NDP Jack and missed Harris. My apologies to Mr. Layton- this time!***

 

[Wookilar]

No need to apologize, there's not much difference between any of them IMHO (Peter Stoffer is about the only one on that side of the house that has any sense at all).

The only way to improve SAR response times would be more.....as in more SAR Techs, more pilots, more FE's (are they still called Flight Engineer's?) more choppers and planes and more Bases for them to operate from.

Gee, didn't we used to have more????

There's no way the NDP will support more spending on the CF, for any reason.

Once again, empty posturing from the NDP. If they really were worried about SAR response times, they'd support more initiatives that would actually affect them.

Wook

 

[ModlrMike]

Mr Harris needs to remember that for virtually all of the current government's tenure, Canada has not been at peace. Perhaps his gaze should turn elsewhere in assigning blame for reaping the "peace dividend".

 

[George Wallace]

Reproduced under the Fair Dealings provisions of the Copyright Act.

Coffee Talk


Canada's military spending highest since World War II

by Sameer Vasta
10/03/2011 1:00:00 PM


LINK

Increasing Canada's defence budget by 54 percent over the past decade should not come at the expense of foreign aid and diplomacy.

According to a new study by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, military spending in Canada is expected to hit at least $22.3 billion this budget year, the highest since World War II and a 54 percent increase in defence spending over the last decade.

The increase in defence spending is staggering, but perhaps not surprising considering Canada's recent role in the Afghanistan War. What is shocking, however, is that our country now ranks 60th out of 102 contributing countries to United Nations peace-support missions. This is a drastic change from the years before, where Canada not only was a top worldwide contributor to UN peace missions, but is also a radical departure from our previous role as the country that redefined modern peacekeeping under the leadership of Prime Minister Lester B. Pearson.

Over the next 17 years, Canada has committed to increasing its military spending by $90-110 billion dollars. This not only comes at a shaky time in the global economic environment, but also at a time where the need for humanitarian aid and non-military global security spending is high. The report continues to say that Canada could easily meet the 0.7% Official Development Assistance (ODA) target by diverting the increase in military spending to global aid. (Canada has never met the 0.7% ODA target, coming closest — 0.5% — in 1986-1987.)

Does Canada really need to increase its military spending over the next few years? As far as I know, the credible threats to the country's sovereignty and security are small; justification for an increased defence budget is difficult to find in light of the other competing priorities that face our nation and the world around us. Our troops deserve new and adequate equipment and preparation, but this should be done by re-evaluating military priorities and using the current budget wisely. Substantial increases, in the billions of dollars, to defence spending should instead be invested in areas where Canada has had the most impact, and can continue to lead the world and help make it a better place.

Investing in humanitarian aid, peace-support missions, and research on global issues like climate change and migration also has a role in the security of our country and the role it plays on the world stage. Increasing military spending to World War II levels — especially at the expense of international diplomacy, foreign aid, and thought leadership — may not be the best way to remind the world that Canada is strong, free, and committed to peace.

 

[vonGarvin]

I find that the author of that piece is comparing 2011 dollars on par with 1945 dollars.  While the gross spending may be the same, the purchasing power is obviously not at World War Two levels.

As well, I wish that people would remember that even though we "were there" with UN Peacekeeping Missions, we were simultaneously "there" with our NATO brigade, Air Division and Fleets during the Cold War.  But times have changed, and sometimes you just have to shoot people in the face to make a point: the blue beret only gets you so far.

 

[Good2Golf]

...good thing nobody is asking questions about the $1.76 TRILLION that HRSDC will spend (estimates based on pro-rated figures from the HRSDC 2010-2011 Report on Plans and Priorities (Section 1.7 - Spending Profile)) in that same 17-year period...


I suppose helping a proportionately small number of Canadian citizens, vice protecting ALL Canadian citizens doesn't warrant as much interest, even though the expenditures for them are approximately 500% higher than defence and protection of Canadian rights and values for all. 


Regards
G2G

 

[HavokFour]

This is being debated on CPAC this very moment, if anyone is interested.

EDIT: And by that I mean the F-35 price tag. Accountability, blah, blah, blah.

 

[MarkOttawa]

In any event ISAF has been repeatedly authorized by the UN Security Council; hence by participating in it we are taking part in a UN mission.

Mark
Ottawa

 

[thunderchild]

It was the Liberals who got us into Afghanistan not the Conservative party.

 

[HavokFour]

It was the Liberals who got us into Afghanistan not the Conservative party.

Something they tend to forget at times.

 

[MarkOttawa]

From the government's 2008 "Canada First Defence Strategy":
http://www.forces.gc.ca/site/pri/first-premier/defstra/summary-sommaire-eng.asp

...the Government has committed through Budget 2008 to raise the annual increase in defence funding to 2 percent from the current 1.5 percent starting in fiscal year 2011-12. Over the next 20 years, these increases will expand National Defence's annual budget from approximately $18 billion in 2008-09, to over $30 billion in 2027-28. In total, the Government plans to invest close to $490 billion in defence over this period. Most importantly, the infusion of reliable funding will provide the certainty required to conduct longterm planning and meet future requirements...

The 2011-12 situation is outlined in Conference of Defence Associations' "Commentary 1-2011", by Brian MacDonald.  Money has been clawed back a bit:

Waiting for Defence Budget 2011/12: Third of the Canada First Defence Strategy Budgets
http://cda-cdai.ca/cda/uploads/cda/defbudget2011.pdf

Mark
Ottawa

 

[Haletown]

2%, while a paltry sum, would be a huge increase from our traditional 1.2%  - 1/3 %.

I really doubt that Harper et al will come through with the funds.  They are pretty good at obfuscating, but better than the alternatives at CF support.

 

[MarkOttawa]

Sad but true.  One does rather long for the days of the muscular Mickey I.:
http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.com/index.cfm?PgNm=TCE&Params=M1ARTM0013421

...Following a 2005 lecture at the University of Dublin's Trinity College, Ignatieff excoriated Canadians for trading on Canada's "entirely bogus reputation as peacekeepers" for 40 years and for favouring "hospitals and schools and roads" over international citizenship. "If you are a human rights defender and you want something done to stop [a] massacre, you have to go to the Pentagon, because no one else is serious," Ignatieff said.

"It's disgusting in my own country, and I love my country, Canada, but they would rather bitch about their rich neighbour to the south than actually pay the note," he said, in response to a question about PEACEKEEPING. "To pay the bill to be an international citizen is not something that they want to do."..

Mark
Ottawa

 

[Bert]

The original article talks about SAR response time without definition and compares the response
process of other countries with equal ambiguity.  <Sigh>. 

Perhaps a defense white paper may help Canadians to understand the challenges of maintaining
a viable military capable of domestic assistance, SAR, and national defence.  Defence spending
is like maintaining a car.  Most people understand why they have a car, but the partisan political
forum confuses the "why(s) we have the car" with the relative "quality of the parts to put into it".

 

[Sythen]

Wonder how much different the SAR response times would be had the Liberals not canceled the EH-101 like they plan to cancel the JSF?

 

[Chilme]

Its too bad we couldn't have one of these politicians against spending make an emergency landing in the middle of NWT.  I'm sure the time they spend waiting for SAR pers to fly up from Trenton, would be enough for them to think of better ways to spend that cash.

 

[PuckChaser]

Its too bad we couldn't have one of these politicians against spending make an emergency landing in the middle of NWT.  I'm sure the time they spend waiting for SAR pers to fly up from Trenton, would be enough for them to think of better ways to spend that cash.

Or put them in a HLVW on Route Fosters.

 

[infantryian]

I wonder if the article comparing our defense budget to that of the second world war takes inflation into account. I haven't studied information, but I find it hard to believe that we are spending the same money (in today's dollars) or as a GDP percentage.

Edit: Not even mentioning the blanket remark that we are at over 50% increased spending since this time last decade... 9/11 led to Afghanistan, so perhaps the defense budget is a little more strained, and a little more important than it was January-September 10, 2001.

 

[ArmyRick]

It a fairly simple concept IMO. If we want to participate in international military operations (most Canadians do) we have to pay for it.

Or we we don't pay fiddle for defence and keep all our troops at home, strictly domestic defence.