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Government hints at boosting Canada’s military spending

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I have long said that you could fund the CAF to 4 percent of GDP, but we would still lag behind in NATO and be much the same where we are.

It's never the money, it's politics. It's procedures. It's the pork-barreling in our defence spending that makes us a paper tiger in NATO.

My only hope in all of this for the CAF and the GoC, whatever the political stripe that may be, is that it will rouse them out of the "Peace Dividend" slumber. The world has been unstable since 1945. We have used geography, proximity, and association as a Defence Policy ever since. ICBMs don't care how close to the U.S. or how far from Russia/China we are.

Don't give us a dime more, but let us spend money on defence like it matters. The fact we follow the same rules for purchasing a fighter aircraft as we do for buying office furniture for a Service Canada office is disgraceful. Don't treat defense procurement as a stimulus package for Canadian Industry. There I said it.

We spend so much money, time, and effort trying to get that money to stay in Canada; be it by awarding contracts to companies with no capability to produce items without first "retooling" and"developing the production lines", or by hamstringing perfectly competent and competitive bidders by forcing the project to be made in St. Margaret de Poutain de Champignon, QC because the ruling government either lost the seat in the election, or won it with promises.

We spend so much money and staff hours jumping through TBS regulations that are great for other departments, but are terrible for defence procurement. Some items you have to sole source, because there are technologies and capabilities no one else makes. By doing the bid process, you get companies clamoring for a project they can't deliver on, but because they tick the bright boxes on the score sheet....

I truly and honestly belief we need to split from PSPC and legislate that its not beholden to TBS, only to the PBO/PCO. The guiding principles of this new Defence Procurement department should be "Off the shelf, from somewhere else" if there isn't an industry in Canada.

BOOTFORGEN has demonstrated how well we do when we are able to actually get what we need, instead of lining the pockets of a Canadian company that got lucky.

That, but with tanks, fighters, ships, weapons systems....
 
I’d love to see a TV series on Canadian heroes, both those in the military and those in the private sector. Much of the “glamour” of the U.S. comes from myths that were based on reality…e.g. Davey Crockett at the Alamo, George Custer, etc. Canada has done little to create heroes and those that were historical heroes have now largely been demoted in stature due to wokeism. Unlike America’s heroes, ours tend to be victims of our own self righteousnes.

If Sam Steele were American, there would be a hundred movies about him and every kid would know who he was.

 
I assume it will resume after we find out which political party forms the government.
And we'll probably lock this up around the election and open a new one when the new governments budget is presented at the end of May.
 
Not exactly. They changed it because they felt Napoleon was the true villain of the series, whereas the Americans are only antagonists in any capacity in three books.

As well, in the book The Far Side of the World, the American frigate is the same size as the Surprise, and is discovered shipwrecked halfway through. The ship battle in the climax is taken from the midpoint of the first book, where Aubrey uses deception to defeat a larger Spanish frigate, while his orders to take a significantly larger ship are lifted from the first Hornblower novel.
From the link quoting Director/Co-Screenplay Writer:

“The Americans would never back a film in which they were the enemy,” Weir said on the 2004 Master and Commander DVD’s special features. “It was just confusing emotionally for the audience. Who did they feel for? Jack or their own countrymen?” Ultimately, the director recalled with the faintest hints of a smirk on his face that “given it was an American-backed picture, it was asking too much.”
 
Unfortunately, the best that Canadian cinema could come up with was Paul Gross's "Passchendaele" and "Hyena Road".

Forget the Yanks

How come we can't produce Breaker Morant, Gallipoli, The Light Horse, Kokoda, Danger Close....?

Not to mention all sorts of good material in the Seven Oaks Massacre, the Upper and Lower Canada Rebellions, the Red River and Northwest Rebellions, The Fenian Raids, the Assassination of D'Arcy McGee, the Gold Rushes... even the Long Trek to Fort Whoop-Up and the Battle of Belly River and the Cypress Hills Massacre that prompted it.

We prefer to ignore our history rather than face it.
 
Forget the Yanks

How come we can't produce Breaker Morant, Gallipoli, The Light Horse, Kokoda, Danger Close....?

Not to mention all sorts of good material in the Seven Oaks Massacre, the Upper and Lower Canada Rebellions, the Red River and Northwest Rebellions, The Fenian Raids, the Assassination of D'Arcy McGee, the Gold Rushes... even the Long Trek to Fort Whoop-Up and the Battle of Belly River and the Cypress Hills Massacre that prompted it.

We prefer to ignore our history rather than face it.

Because: profit.

Alot of war movies bomb at the box office. Even US war movies, which would attract alot more viewers (money) than Canadian films.

 
Forget the Yanks

How come we can't produce Breaker Morant, Gallipoli, The Light Horse, Kokoda, Danger Close....?

Not to mention all sorts of good material in the Seven Oaks Massacre, the Upper and Lower Canada Rebellions, the Red River and Northwest Rebellions, The Fenian Raids, the Assassination of D'Arcy McGee, the Gold Rushes... even the Long Trek to Fort Whoop-Up and the Battle of Belly River and the Cypress Hills Massacre that prompted it.

We prefer to ignore our history rather than face it.
add in the Black Donnellys
 
The whys and whynots of Canadian war movies could make for an interesting discussion but as production costs won't count toward 2% of GDP, perhaps a thread split? Or here's an idea for increasing defense spending - each service gets $50 million to make a movie. :ROFLMAO:
 
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