You may find this of interest:
Alienating Washington - and for what?
Lorne Gunter
National Post
Monday, February 28, 2005
If Prime Minister Paul Martin feels obliged to warn the Americans not to invade Canadian airspace with their anti-ballistic missiles in case they're attacked, isn't he also obliged to warn the North Koreans, the Iranians, the Chinese and whomever else might someday fire a ballistic missile through our airspace in the other direction?
I mean, it is our airspace, after all. Surely, the PM's warning applies to all nations alike. He can't be worried just about an American breach, can he?
Or is it that Ottawa's refusal to endorse ballistic missile defence (BMD) actually has nothing to do with Canadian sovereignty and is really about the Liberals' juvenile anti-Americanism?
Nah. Can't be.
But if the federal government's decision last week really isn't just for show -- if it really isn't just about looking tough by wantonly poking our nearest neighbours in the eye -- then what about those warnings to Pyongyang and Tehran and Beijing?
I'm sure those letters are already in the mail.
Heck, if this isn't just some narrow-minded, petulant, political temper tantrum, shouldn't Mr. Martin be telling the whole world: "Look everybody, if anyone, anyone at all, violates Canadian airspace, we're gonna ... we're gonna ...
"Oh, hang it. There's nothing we can do. But be sure of this: We're gonna be really, really huffy. Got it?
"We'll hector you into a pounding headache. Maybe we'll even dispatch an Arctic Ranger on a snowmobile, rifle slung over his shoulder, to stare up at the sky, shake his fist and curse your family's name as your missile overflies Canada."
Last week in this space, I argued that the U.S. preoccupation with BMD is misplaced. While I am confident the Americans will eventually develop the technology to shoot down incoming missiles in flight, I'd bet the biggest nuclear threats to the United States aren't missile-based. Even if rogue states manage to manufacture workable nukes, they're more likely to sneak them into the States on container ships than on the tips of ICBMs.
Or their strikes will be "in-theatre" -- overhead large concentrations of American soldiers on some far-off battlefield.
Still, I'd intended to use this week's column to lay out a case for why Canada should go along with missile defence, anyway. The Yanks weren't asking us to help pay. They weren't asking us to site their interceptor missiles on Canadian soil or cede control of our national air defences to their generals.
Basically, they were asking us for just two things: an endorsement and real-time warning of inbound missiles. And we were already giving them the one they really want -- the real-time warning.
And I suspect we will continue to give them warning of any menacing blips we pick up on our radar, even after our refusal to endorse BMD.
Is there anyone in Canada so rabidly anti-American and anti-military that they would argue we not let our neighbours know if a Taepo-Dong 1 or Dong Feng 41 or Shehab-5 were bearing down on Chicago?
They're our neighbours, for crying out loud. And we're supposed to be their friends. We're partners in continental defence and collective security. And BMD, unlike the invasion of Iraq, is not about defending freedom "over there," it's mostly about protecting North America from attacks.
It's not about American aggression, either; it's about protecting America (and Canada) from others' aggression.
Nor does BMD "weaponize space," as so many Canadian critics contend. ICBMs travel through space. Anyone who fired them at the United States would have weaponized space already.
Besides, by not joining the Americans' coalition of the willing in 2003, Ottawa left itself with few choices to prove its reliability as an American ally. As imperfect as BMD was as a defence priority, it was a low-threshold way for Ottawa to show friendship with Washington, and the Liberals blew it.
More irritating still is the likelihood that the Libs blew off the Americans to keep BMD from ripping apart their biennial convention in Ottawa next weekend.
Thanks to our withdrawal from BMD, the Americans now have every excuse to refuse to co-operate on trade, mad cow disease, border security and a host of other issues. It is bad enough that we would provoke them in this way. That we would do so not because of real differences over missile policy, but rather to ensure some big Liberal gathering goes smoothly, is an additional disgrace.
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