About Turn! Time to Revise Canada’s Foreign Policy

[TCBF]

Hey Look!... Internationalists![/url]

- You are taking the term "Internationalist" out of context.  To put it back in context, think COMINTERN: the "Communist International."

- Your average Commie will always self-identify about thirty nano-seconds after opening it's mouth by spouting such M-L terms as "progressive", "internationalist", etc.

- They might as well tattoo "Marxist-Leninist Sock Puppet" on their foreheads (or is it 'four heads'?).

 

[Reccesoldier]

- You are taking the term "Internationalist" out of context.  To put it back in context, think COMINTERN: the "Communist International."

- Your average Commie will always self-identify about thirty nono-seconds after opening it's mouth by spouting such M-L terms as "progressive", "internationalist", etc.

- They might as well tattoo "Marxist-Leninist Sock Puppet" on their foreheads (or is it 'four heads'?).

I'm willing to bet that most of the people who answered that poll were unaware of the connotation of the wording.  It is an interesting choice of wording though

 

[sgf]

Most excellent.  72% of Canadians want Canada to work within an international framework.  so that would inmvolve countries like France, Germany, Australia, the UK, The USA, Sweeden, Spain, Turkey...

Hey Look! Internationalists!

Dear god sometimes people can be so stupid.

and that would exclude the States...which is a very interesting point

 

[Edward Campbell]

and that would exclude the States...which is a very interesting point

Not at all! Despite a rather unilateralist president and a somewhat isolationist congress the USA remains the most engaged nation on earth and in history.

If anyone thinks hopes, even for a microsecond, that one can have an internationalist foreign policy that does not rub up against the USA and its interests then they are not thinking at all.

 

[Edward Campbell]

Here, reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions (§29) of the Copyright Act from today’s Globe and Mail is the second (of three) contributions to the series “Finding Canada's place in the world.” This is by noted Canadian historian and sometimes Milnet.ca contributor Jack Granatstein:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20080215.wcomment0218/BNStory/specialComment/home

Part II

Finding Canada's place in the world
It's a matter of realizing our national interests

J.L. GRANATSTEIN

Globe and Mail Update

February 17, 2008 at 1:00 PM EST

Recent surveys indicate that Canadians increasingly care about international matters and want our country to play a constructive role in world affairs.

But what role should that be?

To help consider the options, globeandmail.com has invited three foreign policy activists to give us their thoughts and lead us in debate and discussion.

Today, Jack Granatstein, political and military historian, and senior research fellow at the Canadian Defence and Foreign Affairs Institute, insists we must pursue our true national interests and they can never be divorced from those of the U.S. and other like-minded nations.

All Canadians want Canada to play a useful, credible role in the world. We all want us to be as independent as we can be in an increasingly globalized world. And we all understand that we must protect and advance Canadian national interests, even if we tend not to talk very much about them.

What are Canada's national interests? The first, the basic one common to every state, is obvious: We must protect our people, territory, and sovereignty. We must see that we remain united and independent. Then we must advance the economic well-being of Canadians. We must help protect North America and, as we are not now and never will be a great power, we must work with like-minded states to advance freedom and democracy around the world.

None of those national interests should be controversial, though the last one may sound so. It's not. In fact, the spread of democracy and freedom has been Canada's basic goal abroad for more than a century and that is the reason we have gone to war against autocrats and dictators in the past. That is why we offer development aid to nations around the world today. Our values, our humanitarianism, our multiculturalism, and our belief in justice at home and abroad, spring directly from our national interests and our long history as a democracy.

To realize our national interests, we need an interested and involved population, strong political leadership, a capable foreign service, and a small but robust military that can operate effectively in benign blue beret peacekeeping, in counter-insurgency campaigns such as that in Afghanistan, and in wars fought by coalitions of our friends and allies.

These aims are hard to achieve, and some might believe that we have failed totally here. Curiously, for an unmilitary nation, we have likely come closest to achieving a small, capable Canadian Forces. Going to war, however, just as sending peacekeepers abroad, must serve our national interests.

Above all, given our geographic location, we must have close relations with the United States. The U.S. is our best friend, as a now-forgotten politician said 45 years ago, "whether we like it or not." Strong in their anti-Americanism, Canadians took a long time to learn this, and some never have. But unless we can learn to eat grass to survive, we must have access to the American market, the largest, richest in the world. We need Americans' investment, and access to their brainpower and culture. We will need their military support in extremis. And the Yanks aren't going away — Canada is not an island, nor can we hide behind psychological or trade barriers.

Some Canadians foresee the Americans being surpassed in the coming years by others such as China, India, Brazil, or the European Union. If that occurs, and it may, then Canadians must realize that we will inevitably be forced even closer to the U.S. in our own economic and defence interests. The bulk of our trade will almost certainly continue to flow in a north-south direction, and we will only prosper if it does. Who dares to contemplate a future in which Beijing, say, occupies the economic role that the U.S. now plays for us? Could anyone, even the most fervent anti-American, believe that would be better for Canada?

We can be as independent as we want to be, as interdependent as we must be. But too much independence or interdependence can carry a high price, and Canadians must weigh their nation's interests — and their own — in making choices about where we go.

Realizing what our national interests truly are may help.

----------​

Earlier: Lloyd Axworthy, president of the University of Winnipeg, and foreign minister of Canada from 1996-2000, argued we must throw out our slavish adherence to outdated U.S. policies and embrace truly international practices..

Tuesday: David Eaves, a public policy consultant, and the lead author of the 2004 Canada25 report From Middle to Model Power, concludes that we must unleash the great under-utilized power of our outward-looking citizenry in roles still to be determined.

Dr. Granatstein hits on a few of The Ruxted Group’s favourite notes:

1. Canadian (actually anyone’s) policy ought to be based on a clear understanding our our own vital interests;

2. Our national interests can be summed up, fairly neatly, in two words: Peace and Prosperity. Granatstein calls it protecting “our people, territory, and sovereignty” and advancing “the economic well-being of Canadians” but it’s pretty much the same thing;

3. Like it or not, the USA is a global superpower, our neighbour, best friend and most important trading partner – in short, the key to both peace and prosperity. Clearly good relations with the USA must, always and without fail, be at the heart of all of our policies.; and

4. There is a price to be paid for independence.

Point 3 goes towards explaining why Pierre Trudeau’s 1970 foreign policy white paper was the dumbest policy document in Canadian history – it ignored the USA, it was a monument to childish pique masquerading as political  sophistication. One of Canada’s major political problems is that a substantial majority of Canadian still believe that Trudeau was something other than a useless bloody twit; they believe, wholly incorrectly, that the USA does not matter. Wrong! As Granatstein says, as other powers, notably China and India, muscle their way into the global power structure, competing with America, we will be, of necessity driven closer and closer to the USA – it is, in fact, hardly a foreign country at all now, it will be less and less so as the 21st century advances.

The way ahead? I agree with Dr. Granatstein:  “we need an interested and involved population, strong political leadership, a capable foreign service, and a small but robust military” able, I suggest, to –

1. Fight the ‘Three Block War’ at brigade (minus) or battle group (plus) levels in two foreign theatres, simultaneously; and

2. Maintain Canada’s sovereignty at home by (at least) ‘enough’ for continental security and defence; and

3. Contribute to global peace and security by helping others to maintain the sea lines of communication and commerce around the world.

With what? See: Ruxted’s A Triple A+ Military for Canada and Capabilities and Money.

How much? See: The Ruxted Group again, this time: A Look to the Future in which Ruxted deals with costs – at the national level. I agree with Ruxted, we need to get the defence budget up to around 2%+ of GDP* very soon and that is far more than it appears many politicians, bureaucrats and journalists thinks is “doable.”

In my opinion anything less than 2% of GDP, years after year after year, for a generation or more, means disarmament by stealth – a conformation of Trudeau’s madness.


----------
* Our GDP is over $1.5 Trillion and growing which means that our defence budget traget needs to be $30 Billion per annum, right now, not the $20 Billion which, last I heard, was the flavour of the month in Ottawa.

 

[Edward Campbell]

Here, reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions (§29) of the Copyright Act from today’s Globe and Mail web edition is the third and final piece in the “Finding Canada's place in the world” series:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20080215.wcomment0219/BNStory/specialComment/home

Part III

Finding Canada's place in the world
Unleash the power of our citizens

DAVID EAVES

Globe and Mail Update

February 18, 2008 at 8:00 AM EST

Recent surveys indicate that Canadians increasingly care about international matters and want our country to play a constructive role in world affairs.

But what role should that be?

To help consider the options, globeandmail.com has invited three foreign policy activists to give us their thoughts and lead us in debate and discussion.

Today, David Eaves, a public policy consultant, and the lead author of the 2004 Canada25 report From Middle to Model Power, concludes that we must unleash the great under-utilized power of our outward-looking citizenry in roles still to be determined.

For two decades, pundits have argued that Canada has lost its way in the world, that it no longer articulates a clear role for itself. But, in our search for answers, perhaps we've asked the wrong question. Rather than "what is our role," maybe we need to reaffirm "what is our goal?"

To this question, the answer is remarkably consistent. Canada's foreign policy has sought to model and advance the ideals of our national experiment: peace, order and good government. In a world too often governed by realpolitik, Canadians have worked tirelessly to preserve and promote an international system that, grounded in international law, allows peaceful people everywhere — including in Canada — to select their governments, to trade and to move about safely.

For almost two centuries, we've pursued this objective. And yet, we've repeatedly redefined our role. In our efforts to improve and defend this system Canadians have, among other things: served as allies and fierce warriors, fighting in two world wars and one Cold one; operated as diplomatic honest brokers, inventing peacekeeping and preventing war between superpowers; and organized as human rights and human security activists, extending the benefits of stability and justice to those who've known little of either.

And yet the pundits and politicians want us to choose just one — we may yet have an election over this. But Canadians know better. We've been all these things, and are proud of them not for what they were, but for what they were in service of.

More importantly, this diversity, and continuity, has never been more important. The challenges of the 21st century — international terrorism, global warming, ethnic conflict, weapons of mass destruction and collapsing eco-systems — are markedly different from those of the 20th century. Their dispersed and complex nature means no single actor — not even governments — can address them alone.

In the face of these challenges, Canada has, quietly, carved out a new role. As a country we may appear adrift, but, as individuals, Canadians are more effectively and successfully engaged than ever. Quietly, we've transitioned from a middle power — a plucky country whose government prevented conflicts and ensured stability — to a model power — a country whose plucky citizens innovate solutions to new global challenges.

In an era where technology enables individuals to self-organize, deploy resources, or simply get involved, Canadians have jumped at the opportunity. New groups such as Engineers Without Borders, Peace Dividend Trust, Journalists for Human Rights, help people channel their energy and focus on results. Broader still, the recent Canada's World poll suggests that Canadians gave $7.3-billion to internationally focused non-profits over the past year. This is more than twice CIDA's budget of $3-billion, and equivalent to 0.6 per cent of our GDP. And this doesn't even include the $20-billion in remittances sent abroad annually or the hundreds of thousands of hours in international volunteer work donated by everyday citizens.

As a model power, Canadians enjoy their ability to strike out and serve as global citizens. Those I speak with are looking for — but not willing to wait for — leaders who will draw on our multiple identities.

Canadians want leaders who will be warriors when confronting those who would use violence to remake our world, diplomats when addressing the threats and opportunities in our global commons, and activists against anyone — even our allies — who would use their power to impinge on the rights and opportunities of others.

Most of all, Canadians are looking for leaders who will empower each of us. As employees, consumers, business owners, investors, aid workers and, above all, citizens, the decisions we each make increasingly shape Canada's reputation and impact. The modern world is one in which the capacity to affect international affairs is shared among organizations and, indeed, among all citizens. A foreign policy that enables each of us to make better choices in pursuit of our common goal will create a role in which Canada and Canadians will thrive.

----------​

Earlier: Lloyd Axworthy, president of the University of Winnipeg, and foreign minister of Canada from 1996-2000, argued we must throw out our slavish adherence to outdated U.S. policies and embrace truly international practices.

Earlier: Jack Granatstein, political and military historian, and senior research fellow at the Canadian Defence and Foreign Affairs Institute, insisted we must pursue our true national interests and they can never be divorced from those of the U.S. and other like-minded nations.

This ”model power” stuff appears to be a takeoff on Jennifer Welsh’s work – some of which almost made its way into the (never completed) Paul Martin foreign policy. We discussed this in an earlier Army.ca thread. See: http://forums.army.ca/forums/threads/20359/post-187372.html#msg187372 and the next few pages.

Although he is quite wrong to say that Canadians have “transitioned from a middle power — a plucky country whose government prevented conflicts and ensured stability — to a model power — a country whose plucky citizens innovate solutions to new global challenges,” I think that is exactly what a solid majority of Canadians wish we were doing or had done. I also think, therefore, that he is right when he says, ”Canadians want leaders who will be warriors when confronting those who would use violence to remake our world, diplomats when addressing the threats and opportunities in our global commons, and activists against anyone — even our allies — who would use their power to impinge on the rights and opportunities of others.”

The problem, in my view, is that we’ve only even had to distinct “roles”:

Leading middle power – Louis St Laurent’s policy in the ‘50s; and

Helpful fixer – Lester Pearson’s adaptation of St Laurent’s policy. (It was only an adaptation because, as Pearson well knew, Canada could only be a helpful fixer, the precursor of “model power” if it was and remained a middle power.

The key to the Welsh/Eaves “model power” model and to Granatstein’s “self interest” model and to Axworthy’s “Responsibility to Protect” model, too, is a sufficiently sensible, interest driven, foreign policy and enough military muscle to make our voice heard.

For more on this, by Eaves, see:  http://www.gordonfn.org/resfiles/Canada25.pdf

 

[Edward Campbell]

Here, reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions (§29) of the Copyright Act from the Globe and Mail web site are the three rebuttals to the “Finding Canada's place in the world” series of articles:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20080215.wqacanadaworld16/BNStory/specialComment/home/?pageRequested=1

Jack Granatstein:

Thanks for the opportunity to reply to my colleagues' articles in this interesting exercise in 21st Century journalism.

I find much to agree with in David Eaves' article. Like him, I think that we need new leaders who can be warriors, diplomats and activists as circumstances demand.

But what should guide their (and our) choices? To me, Canadian national interests, as laid out in my original article, remain the best road map toward peace, order and good government.

I firmly believe that actions that best serve a free and democratic Canada will almost always serve global interests well.

Running our planned actions and initiatives through a national interest test can help us decide when to act — and when not to act.

I have much more difficulty with Lloyd Axworthy's article. He writes with an animus to the United States that is markedly unhealthy.

I am no supporter of President Bush or his policies. He is, I believe, the worst American president since Warren Harding.

But Bush blessedly will soon be gone and the U.S., our neighbour and biggest trading partner, will remain. We simply must get along — in our own national interest.

Too many Canadian jobs depend on good relations to allow anti-Americanism to shape our policies, as it sometimes appeared to do under the Chrétien and Martin governments.

Dr. Axworthy sounds even more harsh than Jack Layton in his criticism of Canadian participation in the Afghan war.

Both forget that this is a United Nations-mandated mission to which a Liberal government quite properly committed us. We must remember that Canada and its friends are trying to rescue a failed state and its impoverished, abused people.

Yes, the government in Kabul is inefficient and corrupt. But could it possibly be worse than another Taliban regime which would terrorize the population and again be a terrorist haven?

The struggle in Afghanistan today is the "Responsibility to Protect" in action, every bit as much as Darfur would — and should — be.

As Foreign Minister, Dr. Axworthy had little hesitation in committing Canada to the Kosovo bombing campaign in 1999, even though the UN did not back that operation. The UN supports the Afghan operation, and we see from his article that Dr Axworthy is a believer in the global organization.

What is it about Afghanistan that so infuriates him — other than that the Americans are involved?

Just as he did when he was in government, Dr. Axworthy seems to believe that pulling the tailfeathers on the American eagle is in the Canadian national interest.

Many of the readers who commented on these articles seemed to agree with him. I believe that he and they are wrong.

Anti-Americanism is Canada's secular religion, the one form of socially-sanctioned "racism" that we allow ourselves in a politically correct nation. It clearly makes many of us feel good to preach our superior morality and wisdom to the neighbouring superpower.

But the question we need to ask is if it serves our national interest to carp and complain and proclaim our small differences.

Will doing so help us to open up the Canada-U.S. border once more? Will it resolve our trade disputes? Will it encourage the U.S. Administration to approach problems in a multilateral fashion? Or will it only rile whoever sits in the White House today and tomorrow?

Let's begin to think of our national interests before we spout off.

David Eaves:

Hanging over Axworthy and Granatstein's pieces is the shadow of Bush's deplorable ultimatum: "You are either with us or against us."

Axworthy defines "the against" camp. To this end, he doesn't so much as propose a new map, but an updated version of his old map.

This is understandable. Under his stewardship and with remarkably few resources, Canada enjoyed several accomplishments — most notably the land mines treaty.

However, his vision of Canada as global activist is also narrow. Wishing the United States didn't exist won't make it disappear, particularly when many of his priorities — Arctic sovereignty, nuclear weapons, and the responsibility to protect principle — will require American support or acquiescence.

In contrast, Granatstein appears comfortable with the current government's approach. Clearly, we are with the United States "whether we like it or not."

But important differences remain and we must be vigilant to ensure we never conflate American interests with our own.

Yes, many Canadian government and American administrations have sought to advance freedom and democracy around the world.

However, virtually every American administration balances this goal with structuring the international system to ensure the United States' supremacy, sometimes at a cost — in human rights, freedom and democracy — that should be unacceptable to Canadians.

In summary, despite their apparent differences both pieces are united in that they validate Bush's ultimatum. To a degree, they assume the world must be seen through this lens. But isn't this the first mistake?

America was in a similar mood in the mid-60s over Vietnam. And yet Pearson's refusal to join the war did not prevent the signing of the auto pact, nor, a few months later, did his public criticism of the war result in the pact's cancelation.

America is far more complex than Canada often gives it credit. There is always room for nuance and a more balanced approach, no matter what its leaders may say.

More importantly, significant pieces of both Granatstein and Axworthy's pieces are not mutually exclusive.

We do not need to choose a single tool — activism or warrior; microphone or hammer.

Our toolkit has always been much more complex — and this flexibility has served us, and the United States, well.

And:

Lloyd Axworthy:

I've had a chance to read the comments of the other two contributors and would like to make a short comment on their charges of my being anti-American.

If they had bothered to read more carefully — rather than falling all over themselves to condemn — they might have noticed that what I was promoting was an agenda that counselled working with a new U.S. administration on rebuilding the UN's capacity to prevent the ongoing slaughter of innocent civilians using the R2P principle.

I was also arguing for an agenda that joins the admirable effort of former U.S. secretaries of state and defence to raise the need to pursue nuclear disarmament, of using our best efforts to bring the U.S. into a global partnership on climate change, and in particular to work with us in forging a new legal regime for the Arctic.

These are not anti-American statements. Rather, they express a hope that Canada will become much more of an active voice in persuading Americans to use their strengths for global good.

As for Mr. Granatstein's take on my views on Afghanistan, my tone is not one of harshness but of lament at the way we are ready to commit ourselves indefinitely to a failed strategy at such a great cost of lives and resources without looking to see if there is a better way — something, by the way, that Americans are now doing over their role in Iraq.

I think these three worthies have, fairly, summed up the debate: right, centre and left.

My guesstimate is that Canadians, in an overwhelming majority – even including the tiny minority that bothered to read any of the series, will find much to favour in Eaves and Axworthy and little to like in Granatstein. As is so often the case they (Canadians) will be seeing the world through the rose coloured glasses provided by a failed public education system that institutionalizes wishful thinking and knee-jerk, adolescent anti-Americanism.

The Globe and Mail has done us all a service by providing a forum for this debate – too bad few Canadians will pay attention.

 

[Edward Campbell]

I am recalling some old articles to introduce a new one, in the next post.

Link to original article on ruxted.ca


Saving NATO?

The Ruxted Group believes that the Report of the Independent Panel on Canada’s Future Role in Afghanistan (hereafter the Manley Report or just the Report) makes two vital points:

First (as we said just a few days ago): Prime Minister Harper must convince Canadians that this mission, which the Manley Report describes as “honourable and achievable” is, indeed, worth the blood and treasure Canadians have paid and that it is worth more of both; and

Second: this is the first major test of NATO’s utility in the 21st century.

About 13 months ago we said, “for a half century and more, NATO was the cornerstone of our foreign and defence policies,” but, now, “NATO is less and less a useful 'cornerstone' for Canada and, more and more, a stumbling block.”

The question we posed then was: is saving NATO worthwhile? We answered it, to our satisfaction, with a qualified “yes.” Our main qualification was and remains that the UN needs a new military “agent” to plan, coordinate, mount and manage complex operations. We believe that agency should a small, nimble, global (not just North Atlantic) alignment of like-minded nations; not a formal alliance with all the bureaucracy and politics that implies. We propose Australia, Britain, Canada, New Zealand, Singapore and the USA as the core group with countries like Denmark, India, the Netherlands and Norway closely affiliated. Most of the core members are already united in various military standardization groups – some of which already “lead” NATO in those efforts.

The Manley Report’s conclusions may have put the task of “saving NATO” in Prime Minister Harper’s hands. He appears to have accepted the Report’s recommendation that we should “stay the course” only if another NATO nation deploys a battle group to augment the active combat force in Kandahar.

We believe it is fair to say that most countries from Ruxted`s core group are relatively ‘committed’ to this UN sanctioned NATO mission while most European members of NATO (Denmark and the Netherlands excepted) are, relatively, ‘disengaged’ either in terms of the numbers of troops committed or, in the cases of France and Germany, for example, by the number and nature of the caveats imposed on their forces. NATO says it is determined to find the 1,000 additional troops for Southern Afghanistan, but Canadians need to take NATO’s assurances with a grain of salt because this is not the first time NATO has been determined to increase ISAF combat forces in the South.

In political terms, some European NATO nations have already run for cover by authorizing a peacekeeping mission of sorts in Chad. This is understandable; many, probably most, European governments are unconvinced that the US-dominated ISAF mission is “right” for them. This is, roughly, the same position Canada took (albeit relative to joining the US led coalition in Iraq) when it joined ISAF.

We must remember that NATO invoked Article V (an attack on one is an attack on all) for the very first time on 12 Sep 01. There was a broad, general rush of support for the USA in September 2001. Canada, almost immediately - in October 2001, sent naval units (HMC Ships Charlottetown, Halifax, Iroquois and Preserver) to the Persian Gulf with specific orders to join in the “war on terror.” In the autumn of that year Canada offered a battle group (3 PPCLI Battle Group deployed to Kandahar in early 2002) to fight alongside our American friends. Opinions, in Canada and most of Europe, changed rapidly with the invasion of Iraq. Support for the USA faded because many countries could not understand that strategic rationale for President Bush’s actions. Afghanistan and Iraq got mixed together in the public mind – and the polling Ruxted has seen indicates that confusion exists today – and support for the UN-sanctioned (we should say UN begged for) mission in Afghanistan also faded.

Most respectable security/defence and foreign policy analysts seem to agree with the Manley Report that:

1. The mission in Afghanistan, while difficult, is “just” and important for the West;

2. The campaign in Afghanistan can be “won” if two things happen –

a. We get the aim (the victory conditions, as Ruxted described them) right, and

b. We get enough troops on the ground, in the right place – in the South, especially in Kandahar; and

3. NATO will, quite likely, be a useless shell if it cannot manage to win in Afghanistan.

The question, for Prime Minister Harper is not, we suggest, whether to save NATO but, rather, how.

Perhaps the threat of an institutional failure will be sufficient to convince some NATO members to offer more troops. But the threat of a NATO failure may be cushioned by the “promise” of a new, robust EuroForce of some sort. Some NATO nations might be only too happy to see less and less North American influence in world affairs and those nations might be willing to make promises about a strong, influential, united Europe. In Ruxted’s view: it is highly unlikely that the European members of NATO (excepting the UK from that category) can or will be persuaded to strengthen their forces in Afghanistan. That leaves two choices –

1. Persuading other non-European ISAF members, to increase their contributions – perhaps Australia and New Zealand, Turkey, the UK or the USA could be targeted for political pressure; or

2. Recruiting (a) new member(s) for ISAF; China and India are obvious choices, but so are Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Indonesia, Mexico, Malaysia and South Africa.

In our view, the best immediate term course open is to ask the USA to make at least part of the recently announced “surge” both permanent and part of NATO’s response to Canada’s justified “demand” for help in Kandahar. Another good long term course is to ask Australia and New Zealand to form a combined battle group, based on their existing contribution but to move from Bamiyan and Uruzgan provinces to Kandahar. That course would improve matters in Kandahar but it would not add many new troops to ISAF.

It is likely that NATO’s reaction to Canada’s pending demand will signal the future of the alliance. If members (American and European, alike) want NATO to survive then some nations will offer new forces. If they fail to do so and if Canada cannot persuade other, non-NATO friends to take up the burden then NATO will, rightfully, be seen as a “paper tiger” and its utility, as the UN’s “military agent” will be reduced and the alliance itself may wither and die from lack of a useful role in the world.

No matter what NATO and others decide, Canada must continue to rebuild its military capabilities so that we will be able to respond when our much-hyped “Responsibility to Protect” requires it. We must, simultaneously, work diplomatically to create a new, better, global alignment of like-minded nations to help plan, coordinate, mount and manage the sorts of military operations the United Nations is certain to want us to undertake in the coming years.

The Ruxted Group believes that Prime Minister Harper and Canadian ministers and officials must all press hard, at forthcoming NATO meetings – in an effort to save Afghanistan and NATO, itself.

Link to original article on ruxted.ca


Saving NATO II

A deeply divided NATO held ministerial level meetings recently with a Canadian threat to withdraw from Afghanistan hanging over its head. Prime Minister Harper has, correctly in The Ruxted Group’s estimation, suggested that "NATO's own reputation and future will be in jeopardy"1 if it cannot get its act together and figure out a way to win in Afghanistan.

In an effort to forestall a NATO failure a panel of distinguished retired military commanders2 have reviewed the current situation and have proposed a new grand strategy for a much-reformed NATO and, indeed, the West in a recent paper prepared for the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) (hereafter “the paper” or “Paper”).

The Ruxted Group accepts the paper’s broad analyses of the challenges ahead and of the grand strategy proposed, but we dispute the paper’s main finding that an enlarged and reformed NATO can or should be the key actor when complex military operations need to be planned, coordinated, mounted and managed on behalf of the United Nations (UN).

The paper’s distinguished authors begin by enumerating six challenges the whole world will face:

1. Demography - population growth and change across the globe will swiftly change the world we knew;

2. Climate change - is leading to a new type of politics;

3. Energy security – the supply and demand of individual nations and the weakening of the international market infrastructure for energy distribution make the situation more precarious than ever;

4. The rise of the irrational and/or the discounting of the rational - though seemingly abstract, this problem is demonstrated in deeply practical ways. There are soft examples, such as the cult of celebrity, and there are the harder examples, such as the decline of respect for logical argument and evidence, and a drift away from science. The ultimate example is the rise of religious fundamentalism;

5. The weakening of the nation state - that coincides with the weakening of world institutions, including the UN and regional organisations such as NATO; and

6. The dark side of globalisation - interconnectedness has its drawbacks. These include internationalised terrorism, organised crime, the rapid spread of disease, the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, and asymmetric threats from proxy actors or the abuse of financial and energy leverage. Migration continues to provide challenges across the world; globalised threats are wide in scale and unprecedented in complexity.

Source: Paper, pps. 14/15

Taken together, the paper’s authors conclude, and we agree, these challenges mean decades, even generations of conflict which we, the US-led, law-abiding, secular Western democracies, cannot escape. They conclude that there is: a new form of warfare that abuses leverage in finance, energy and information technology. War could be waged without a single bullet being fired, and the implications of this need to become part of strategic and operational thinking. The threats today are a combination of violent terrorism against civilians and institutions, wars fought by proxy by states that sponsor terrorism, the behaviour of rogue states, the actions of organised international crime, and the coordination of hostile action through abuse of non-military means. These dangerous and complex challenges cannot be dealt with by military means alone. The West needs to agree on a new concerted strategy that would include the use of all available instruments, and to prepare for those global and regional challenges that we can predict, as well as those we cannot. Source: Paper, pps. 44/45

More follows.

 

[Edward Campbell]

Saving Nato Part II (cont)

The Ruxted Group agrees with most of the analysis but we part company on the “threat” posed by the rise of Asia. We do not believe that it is a zero sum game of Asia vs. the traditional West (which includes e.g. Australia and Japan); rather, we prefer to take a free market perspective and assume that the rising economic, social and political tides in Asia will lift our boats, too. Further, since the challenges we face are global it stands to reason that we need a global response – one that must include friends and traditional allies from the Asia Pacific region.

The Paper moves on to address existing international security capabilities, from a wholly Eurocentric or, at best, North Atlantic perspective, concluding that:

1. The United Nations remains a vital tool and should play a decisive role, but it is not capable of doing so;

2. The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) is useful in many respects, especially because both Russia and the USA are members. It has a mechanism for the peaceful settlement of disputes among its members, but it lacks a broad vision and a common strategy;

3. The European Union (EU) is a unique international organisation, partly supranational and partly a confederation. It has brought prosperity to its citizens and has succeeded in maintaining peace and eliminating war among its members. The EU also has political weaknesses, and it lacks unity. In areas of security and geopolitics, there are many internal differences concerning the status of the transatlantic alliance including the relationship with Russia and issues surrounding the Mediterranean and the Middle East; and

4. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) has been the most successful political organisation and military alliance in recent history, having managed to settle the Cold War peacefully and on its own terms. Despite its success, NATO faces serious challenges in Afghanistan and has lost the momentum required for transformation of its forces. NATO is, therefore, in danger of losing its credibility. In addition, the organisation seems to need an adequate vision for the future, including an effective strategy. It lacks capabilities, and its constituent nations are showing a marked lack of will for it to prevail. Unreformed, NATO will not be able to meet the challenges it faces now or in the future. NATO’s effectiveness is further constrained by the differences of opinion between the US and Europe, as well as by differences within Europe about the role and use of war, about hard and soft power, and about the legality of armed intervention. European NATO members are also divided among themselves about the size, role and scope of NATO. One important difference among Europeans concerns the range of NATO’s involvement: one view holds that NATO should be focused on Western security and should not extend its competence or its membership worldwide. In this vein, certain members are also opposed to extending NATO membership to non-North Atlantic nations, such as some of the democracies of the Pacific.

Source: Paper, pps. 71/75

The currently vexing problems of national caveats and sharing of intelligence are well-presented in the paper; it is hard to form a team-approach when each player, for national political reasons, applies different caveats to its forces and relies upon different intelligence estimates. Part of this problem is created by the very size of NATO which, later, the authors propose to enlarge. NATO, like the EU, is, simply, too big, too divided and too political to bring forward a tight, cohesive plan for the sorts of complex military operations that will confront us in the future.

The paper concludes that there is a serious shortfall between the threats facing the world, not just the West, and the existing capabilities of e.g. the UN and NATO.

The authors posit (p. 85) that all is not lost because, and here we agree: “What we do have, however, are common aims, values and interests, and these alone provide a sufficient basis on which to design a new global strategy – one that appreciates the complexity and unpredictability, and that links all the instruments and capabilities together. Looking at the scale of trends, challenges and threats, we cannot see a solution in America, Europe, or any individual nation acting alone. What we need is a transatlantic alliance capable of implementing a comprehensive grand strategy that is integrated, both nationally and among allies.”

Ruxted takes great issue with one word of this assessment. The authors should have said and the leaders of the secular, law abiding democracies must insist that “what we need to is a global alliance capable of implementing a comprehensive grand strategy,” etc.

The central issue, the one the paper’s authors got right, is that the problems and challenges are global – they are not, in the main, in and around Europe and the North Atlantic. The ‘cockpit’ is, now, as it has been so often in history, in West and Central Asia and it is likely to shift towards Africa sooner rather than later. It is highly unlikely that Eurocentric or, at best, North Atlantic solutions are going to work all that well.

The Ruxted Group agrees with the paper’s broad thrust. The proposed new grand-strategy aims to preserve peace, values, free trade and stability. It seeks as much certainty as possible for the member nations, the resolution of crises by peaceful means and the prevention of armed conflict. In doing so, it aims to reduce the reasons for conflict and – should all attempts to find peaceful solutions fail – to defend the member states’ territorial integrity and protect their citizens’ way of life, including their values and convictions. Source: p. 92

The authors propose (Paper, p. 106) a clear, simple and, in our view, workable grand-strategy. But, despite the paper’s many, many excellent analyses and deductions the authors end up making the wrong conclusion because about implementing that strategy because, we think, of their highly Eurocentric views. NATO, even an expanded alliance,3 cannot meet the objectives the UN will set because NATO will still be centred on the divided and divisive Europe.

The paper correctly points out that the problems facing us are global in nature but the paper then proposes only a ‘North Atlantic’ solution. Ruxted repeats: that is not going to be good enough. NATO should be maintained, enlarged and reformed but it needs to be steered, in the purely military sphere, by a small, nimble, global alignment (rather than a formal alliance) of internationally respected (hopefully trusted), secular, law abiding democracies that have similar (even shared) intelligence systems and military standards. The Ruxted Group has proposed in the past and continues to suggest that this alignment must include the USA (for credibility) and should also include trusted members from the Americas (Canada), Europe (the United Kingdom) and the Asia-Pacific region (Australia, New Zealand and Singapore). Other qualified nations will be associated with the group; countries like Chile, Denmark, India, Japan, the Netherlands and Norway might be amongst them.

The world, connected or not, is dangerous and is growing more so. Existing international institutions (the UN, NATO, etc) are ill-suited to protect the world from itself. All can and should be reformed but a new global alignment of traditionally law biding, secular democracies is required to lead reformed regional groups, like NATO, in creating and managing the five-point strategy outlined above to serve our own and the UN’s interests – such leadership is especially necessary when ‘enforcement’ is the order of the day.

Canada needs to have its voice heard in the world. Canadians want to contribute, actively, to the quest for world peace and security and they want their ‘values’ to animate any grand strategy which might involve Canada. Therefore, Canada should whine less and work assiduously, albeit quietly, to save NATO from itself and, more importantly, to create a new ‘alignment’ of like-minded, respected democracies which we can join with confidence and pride.


----------
1. See: http://www.nationalpost.com/story.html?id=290006
2. General (ret.) Dr. Klaus Naumann, KBE Former Chief of the Defence Staff, Germany and Former Chairman of NATO’s  Military Committee; General (ret.) John Shalikashvili Former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the United States of America and Former NATO Supreme Allied Commander in Europe; Field Marshal The Lord Inge, KG, GCB, PC Former Chief of the Defence Staff of the United Kingdom; Admiral (ret.) Jacques Lanxade Former Chief of the Defence Staff of France and Former Ambassador; and General (ret.) Henk van den Breemen Former Chief of the Defence Staff of the Netherlands
3. See ‘Enlargement and the three circles’ pps. 132/136 of the paper

Here, reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions (§29) of the Copyright Act from today’s Globe and Mail is an opinion piece by Profs. Roland Paris (University of Ottawa) and Sten Rynning (University of Southern Denmark):

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/opinions/madly-off-in-all-directions/article1214521/

Madly off in all directions
NATO is at a crossroads after expanding too far and losing its core purpose

Roland Paris and Sten Rynning

From Monday's Globe and Mail Last updated on Monday, Jul. 13, 2009

NATO is at a crossroads. After two decades of promiscuously embracing new tasks and partners, the alliance is suffering from overstretch and mounting internal tensions.

These problems have partly stemmed from the organization's success at reinventing itself after the Cold War. Defying analysts who predicted the dissolution of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization after the Soviet Union's collapse, the alliance instead nearly doubled its membership, as it absorbed most of Eastern Europe's former Warsaw Pact states, then undertook new “out-of-area” assignments from enforcing peace in Bosnia and Kosovo to patrolling the high seas for pirates and weapons smugglers.

Behind this rapid expansion of membership and functions, however, there was no clear plan and no member consensus on NATO's core purpose. Time and again, there was no agreement on priorities but instead an implicit tradeoff: NATO would pursue all goals.

In principle, there is nothing wrong with a multifunctional NATO. If the alliance can solve problems, then it should. But there has been a reckless quality to NATO's ever-expanding roles and commitments. NATO has effectively lost sight of its collective interest and is now less able to explain what it means to be “Atlantic” and how the Atlantic alliance can contribute to international order.

Last year, for example, NATO leaders announced that Ukraine and Georgia would eventually become members. This announcement represented a compromise of sorts between the Bush administration, which saw Ukraine and Georgia as two pieces in a global puzzle pitching democracies against autocracies, and European members, including Germany and France, which saw regional complexity, including potentially destabilizing relations with Russia.

As expected, Moscow was livid. An invasion of Georgia and the interruption of gas supplies to Ukraine followed in due course. Don't worry, some defenders of NATO's policy have responded - since Ukraine and Georgia are not yet formal members of the alliance, existing members have no obligation to defend these two countries against Russian threats or acts of war. But in fact, the current arrangement is the worst of both worlds because it creates informal obligations (transforming Ukraine and Georgia into de facto clients of NATO) but not an alliance-wide agreement to protect these countries - a situation Russia cannily exploited when it invaded Georgia. As a result, Russia has been able to strengthen its influence over both countries while making NATO look weak.

At the same time, the mission in Afghanistan is demonstrating the limits of what NATO may be able to accomplish in its out-of-area operations. What began as a U.S.-led invasion in 2001 became a predominantly NATO-led operation in 2003-2004, and every alliance summit now includes a browbeating of those members perceived to be not pulling their weight.

There have always been divisions within NATO over the use of force in particular circumstances. Most famously, during the strategic bombing of Serbian targets in 1999, when the alliance responded to Serbian military actions in Kosovo, the process of authorizing individual bombing raids required time-consuming and contentious consultation with multiple capitals. Although the Serbs yielded in the end, NATO came out bruised from the experience, with some allies, including the United States, concluding that they would never again fight a war “by committee.”

Afghanistan, worryingly, is a larger and more demanding mission. Counterinsurgency war is deadly, difficult and costly - and it is pulling the allies apart. Only the most dedicated allies operate in the violent southern and eastern parts of Afghanistan. This is not the only indicator of division. NATO's Afghan operation runs in parallel to the coalition operation Enduring Freedom led by the United States, and a U.S. general is the double-hatted commander of both operations. NATO is becoming a three-tiered alliance: The United States does the heavy lifting, partly inside and partly outside NATO; some Atlantic-minded countries follow suit within NATO's operation; the remainder hang on in more peaceful regions.

In light of these problems, some observers are calling for all NATO countries to “get serious” about new global security threats by preparing their militaries and populations to contribute more actively to Afghan-like missions in the future. According to this view, the alliance needs to continue transforming itself into a multipurpose global force capable of undertaking major combat and counterinsurgency missions wherever they may be required.

Others take the opposite view, proposing that NATO “get back to basics” by concentrating on the security of its members and the Euro-Atlantic area and focus, in particular, on the growing Russian challenge.

In fact, neither of these positions gets it right, nor is there a need to make a false choice between a global and regional NATO. The alliance has important roles to play in Europe and beyond. But NATO needs to be smarter and more focused in its ambitions. It should now stabilize regional relations in order to enable its wider, global engagement.

In the Euro-Atlantic area, the priority should be to bring Russia in from the cold: specifically, by clarifying the seriousness of NATO's commitment to the security of its existing members, while informally signalling that we have no intention of admitting Georgia and Ukraine into the alliance and are willing to negotiate the contours of missile defence. NATO should build small and mobile standing forces for quick deployment within member countries, regularly exercise these forces across the alliance's eastern regions as well as its northern and southern flanks, and clearly communicate that any threatening actions against members, including energy cutoffs or cyber-attacks, will be viewed as hostile acts.

Regarding NATO's global role, the need to maintain alliance unity must be balanced against growing demands for ever-more diverse and ambitious overseas operations. NATO should strengthen its ability to make specific contributions to multilateral peace-building operations - including strategic airlift, deployable headquarters teams and other specialized functions that are often lacking in United Nations missions, such as engineers and professional military trainers.

Next month, former Danish prime minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen will become NATO's new secretary-general. His first and most difficult task will be to lead the organization through its first major strategic policy review since NATO's last Strategic Concept document was approved in 1999. He will be pulled in a thousand directions, but if he is to make a lasting contribution, he will need to convince alliance members to pare down and clarify NATO's expansive ambitions.

Roland Paris is director of the Centre for International Policy Studies and associate professor in the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Ottawa. Sten Rynning is a professor of political science at the University of Southern Denmark.

We have either forgotten or just choose to ignore von Clausewitz’ maxim that: “War is not merely a political act, but also a real political instrument, a continuation of political commerce, a carrying out of the same by other means.”

Our political ends, and, therefore, NATO’s raison d’être as the military means to our ends, were very clear in 1949 and they remained so for about 40 years: we needed to prevent further Soviet/Russian expansion into “our” sphere in Western Europe. These ends were equally applicable to America, Belgium, Canada, Denmark and so on. The collapse of the USSR and the Warsaw Pact left us with a military “solution” in search of a problem. For the past decade NATO has expanded its “solution” base but is still bereft of real problems that make political sense to even a bare majority of the allies.

Canada’s political end, early in the 21st century, is to magnify our limited influence in the world – in order to more easily accomplish our common, enduring interests: peace and prosperity. NATO is one, but only one, of several tools, means to that end. It (NATO) is a useful tool, it should not be abandoned but it needs to be reassessed, by Canada, for utility, and it may need some reformation, too.

Magnifying our influence requires, inter alia, seats at the tables. NATO provides one; ditto the G8 and the OECD and the G20, and, and ... ad infinitum. We always were, and must remain, great joiners. One of the core, albeit informal, groups to which we belong is the community of traditional allies sometimes called the Anglosphere.* It is a good, useful group and will remain so until someone tries to formalize it. It should become the centre of our military efforts, displacing NATO until, at least, NATO finds its way again.



-------------------------
* Consisting of, at least, America, Australia, Britain, Canada, New Zealand and Singapore and, probably, India, too.

 

[Edward Campbell]

Here, reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions (§29) of the Copyright Act from today’s Globe and Mail, is an interesting comment by Prof. Doug Bland:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/opinions/pursuing-our-hemispheric-interests/article1275193/

Pursuing our hemispheric interests
The PM should explain that Canada is no longer merely a ‘North Atlantic nation'

Douglas Bland

Friday, Sep. 04, 2009

The arrival of Anders Fogh Rasmussen, the Secretary-General of NATO, in Ottawa next week will give Prime Minister Stephen Harper an opportunity to explain to him the implications or the alliance of a very significant shift in the government's thinking.

Mr. Harper could begin by saying that Canada's national security ties to Europe are weakening as memories of the Cold War fade and deployments of the Canadian Forces alter our perceptions of this country's place in the world. Mr. Harper might emphasize that it is impossible today to imagine any credible scenario whereby Canada would ever again rally to the defence of Europe. As Europe's policies demonstrate in Afghanistan, it is obvious to Canadians that they cannot expect Europe to spend one soldier's life in the defence of Canada's interests. Indeed, Mr. Harper should warn Mr. Rasmussen that his government is busy preparing to meet serious and prolonged challenges to Canada's sovereignty, especially in the Arctic and in the Gulf of St. Lawrence – challenges, ironically, launched by our so-called NATO allies.

The Prime Minister should also inform the Secretary-General that Canada is no longer merely a “North Atlantic nation.” Rather, changed and changing international circumstances, and Canada's strategic imperatives – the security of Canada and the security of North America – are bringing Canadians home to America; that is, home to the idea that Canada is a natural constituent in an enormous political and cultural entity: the Western Hemisphere.

Mr. Harper could illustrate the practical evolution of this idea that Canada is a Western Hemispheric nation by handing to Mr. Rasmussen copies of the federal government's major foreign-policy statement, “Canada and the Americas: Priorities and Progress” or its “Canada First Defence Strategy.” He could go on to explain that officials in Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada and the Canadian International Development Agency are radically reshaping policies to concentrate more resources and programs in this hemisphere.

He might describe to Mr. Rasmussen the several recent visits to the region by the Chief of the Defence Staff, or the significant increases in military assistance and training programs in Latin America and the Caribbean, or the deployment in Mexico, Latin America and the Caribbean of five senior military attachés where none existed before 2000. Mr. Harper could explain the importance to Canadian security of our naval operations to deter and intercept drug-runners and contraband and human smugglers in the Caribbean as part of his government's strategy to build a new and more relevant alliance within the Organization of American States.

Mr. Harper should mention also how the training of Latin American and Caribbean military officers and Canada's help in developing “counterterrorism operational groups” and “counterterrorism capabilities” – particularly in 2008-09 in Jamaica – are part of a rapidly developing Canadian Forces “stability in the Caribbean” mission. Mr. Harper should stress that after 2011, when the “bulk of our troops” withdraw from Afghanistan, he anticipates that significant “whole-of-government” Canadian deployments may be required in Haiti and perhaps in certain other Caribbean and Central American states to assist “stabilization operations” there.

Mr. Harper would want to make sure that Mr. Rasmussen and European NATO member states understand that although Canada has had no direct involvement in police and military security operations in Mexico in 2009, the continuing criminal insurgency in that state is a major Canadian security concern. He might explain to his European guest that the insurgency is forcing thousands of Mexicans out of contested regions and prompted thousands more to flee to Canada in the hope of escaping the chaos at home. In strictest confidence, he would tell the Secretary-General that U.S. and Canadian officials and intelligence agencies believe that if Mexico cannot at least contain the insurgency, then the violence and growing power of transnational criminal organizations operating mainly from Mexico may migrate to the United States and Canada.

Finally, the Prime Minister would want NATO's Secretary-General to carry this final strong message to Brussels. Canada simply does not have the necessary resources to defend Canada effectively and to co-operate appropriately with the United States in the defence of North America, while guarding Europe's interests, responding to UN military commitments and securing our “near-at-home” in the Caribbean and Latin America.

As it is plain for all to see from their choices and actions, Europeans have defence priorities that begin and end in Europe. Our European allies, therefore, should expect and accept that Canada's security priorities will begin at home – and extend only so far as the broad reaches of our own Western Hemispheric backyard.

Douglas Bland is chair of the Defence Management Studies program at the School of Policy Studies at Queen's University.

I think Prof. Bland is quite correct on two counts:

1. Our vital interests no longer include Europe; and

2. The government of the day has decided is in the process of deciding to cut its foreign/defence policy suit to suit its economic cloth by limiting its ambitions and, arguably sensibly, by working in “concentric circles” – starting in our own hemisphere.

I continue to believe that:

• Despite the government’s intention we will get dragged into Africa in what will be a long, long and very messy series of conflicts that will be characterized by increased frequency and violence;

• We should better define our “backyard” to emphasize the Caribbean rather than Latin America – which is, primarily, in the US’ exclusive military, economic and political sphere; and

• We should look beyond our backyard, but towards Asia and away from Europe. I guess that sometime in the next quarter century China and Russia will clash over resources and borders. Europe will support Russia; Canada (and America) likely should not.

 

[Old Sweat]

And it is interesting that the p word does not appear anywhere in Doug Bland's (retired 8 CH LCol) article.

 

[observor 69]

Sorry... the "P" word ?

 

[Old Sweat]

p is for peacekeeping

 

[Edward Campbell]

Here, reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions (§29) of the Copyright Act from the Globe and Mail are some thoughts by Prof. Ian Buruma on the impact the Dutch withdrawal from Afghanistan will have on NATO:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/opinions/the-dutch-retreat/article1494141/

The Dutch retreat
With Dutch troops set to depart Afghanistan, the alliance forged in the Cold War is fraying

Ian Buruma

Amsterdam

Tuesday, Mar. 09, 2010

The Dutch army has been operating as part of NATO in a remote and unruly part of Afghanistan since 2006. Fighting against the Taliban has been heavy at times. Twenty-one Dutch lives have been lost, out of about 1,800 men and women.

The Dutch were supposed to have been relieved by troops from a NATO partner in 2008. No one volunteered. So their mission was extended for another two years. But now the Social Democrats in the Dutch coalition government have declared that enough is enough. The Dutch troops will have to come home. Since the Christian Democrats do not agree, the government has fallen.

This is highly inconvenient for U.S. President Barack Obama, who needs all the help he can get in Afghanistan, even from small allies, if only for political reasons.

To many Americans, especially of the neoconservative persuasion, Dutch behaviour might confirm all their suspicions about perfidious Europeans, addicted to material comforts, while remaining childishly dependent on U.S. military protection. When the going gets tough, they argue, the Europeans bow out.

It is true that two horrendous world wars have taken the glamour out of war for most Europeans (Britain is a slightly different story). The Germans, in particular, have no stomach for military aggression, hence their reluctance in Afghanistan to take on anything but simple police tasks. Mindful of Ypres, Warsaw, or Stalingrad, not to mention Auschwitz and Treblinka, many regard this as a good thing. Still, there are times when pacifism, even in Germany, is an inadequate response to a serious menace.

Pacifism, however, does not really explain what happened in the Netherlands. The reason the Dutch are wary of carrying on in Afghanistan is not the trauma of the Second World War, but of a small town in Bosnia called Srebrenica. In the mid-1990s, the Dutch volunteered to protect Srebrenica from General Ratko Mladic's Serbian forces. Under United Nations rules, the Dutch, bearing only side arms, could fight only in self-defence.

Air support, although promised, never came. Dutch hostages were taken and threatened with execution. The world watched as the hapless Dutch allowed heavily armed Serbs to massacre about 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys.

Then, too, pacifism had nothing to do with what happened. Quite the contrary: The main reason the Dutch allowed themselves to be manoeuvred into an impossible situation, without military support from the UN or from NATO allies, was their overeagerness to play an important role, to be taken seriously by the larger powers, to play with the big boys. As a result, they were left holding the bag. Now that the Dutch have done their duty in Afghanistan, the Social Democrats want to make sure that this does not happen again.

Hope of punching above its weight, of influencing the U.S., was also an important reason why Britain joined in the invasion of Iraq, even though public opinion was set against it. Tony Blair enjoyed the limelight, even if the light was reflected from the U.S.

But this was not just national hubris; it exposed a basic condition of postwar Western Europe. In return for U.S. protection, European allies always tended to fall in line with U.S. security policies. This is what kept NATO going since 1949. It made sense while NATO did what it was designed to do: keep the Soviets out (and, sotto voce, the Germans down).

After the fall of the Soviet Union, NATO suddenly found itself without a clear goal (and the Germans no longer needed to be kept down). It is never easy to mobilize people in democracies for military enterprises. It took a direct Japanese attack on the U.S. Navy to bring America into the Second World War. And when the former Yugoslavia was sliding into serious violence in the 1990s, neither the U.S. nor the Europeans wanted to intervene. By the time NATO forces finally took military action against the Serbs, 200,000 Bosnian Muslims had been murdered.

A military alliance without a clear common enemy, or a clear goal, becomes almost impossible to maintain. NATO is still dominated by the U.S., and European allies still fall in line, if only just to keep the alliance going – and in the hope of exerting some influence on the only remaining superpower. This means Europeans participate in U.S.-initiated military adventures, even though national or European interests in doing so are far from clear.

It is hard to see how this can continue for much longer. Democratic countries cannot be asked to risk the blood of their soldiers without the solid backing of their citizens. The only solution to this problem is for Europeans to reduce their dependence on the U.S. and take greater responsibility for their own defence.

This can no longer be accomplished on a purely national level. No European country is powerful enough. Yet, in the absence of a European government, there can be no common defence policy, let alone a common army. It is like the euro zone's problems: Only political unity could solve them, but that is a step most Europeans are still unwilling to take.

So we are stuck with an unsatisfactory status quo, in which NATO casts about for a role, Americans are less and less able to afford to be the world's policemen, and Europeans struggle to find a way to define their common interests. The alliance forged in the Cold War will become increasingly fragile. For, whatever Europe's interests are, they are unlikely to be best represented by a seemingly endless war with the Taliban.

Ian Buruma's latest book is Taming the Gods: Religion and Democracy on Three Continents. He is a professor of democracy and rights at Bard College

It is unlikely that NATO can continue to be a ’cornerstone’ of anyone’s foreign policy – not in a world in which Sam Huntington’s Clash of Civilizations model works so well. But Canada should be closely allied with the Netherlands, we are both middle powers with global interests and ambitions. Something better than NATO, for the 21st century, is needed by America, Canada, Europe and the rest of the ill named 'West.'

 

[Old Sweat]

Ian Buruma's latest book is Taming the Gods: Religion and Democracy on Three Continents. He is a professor of democracy and rights at Bard College

What, pray tell, is a professor of democracy and rights? Methinks he is not an Euroskeptic for starters, but I wonder what his geopolitical view is, other than to not believe that Europe's interests are "best represented by a seemingly endless war with the Taliban." In my opinion, that is code for not aligning with the Americans in ventures that do not involve the direct and obvious furthering of greater European interests.

 

[Rifleman62]

Two problems for Europe:

1. Muslim Colonization; and
2. "The only solution to this problem is for Europeans to reduce their dependence on the U.S. and take greater responsibility for their own defence". Due to the extremely high cost of military hardware (R & D to deployment) the Europeons will be reliant on the US for some time. Congressional approval of technology transfers will continue to hamper this trade. But the  Russian and Chinese  would love to take over this market. That would weaken NATO.

Additionally, is it not time to get rid of the UN.

 

[Edward Campbell]

...
Additionally, is it not time to get rid of the UN?

I don't think so.

The main UN, the Security Council and General Assembly in New York, are, arguably, fairly harmless and the SC's imprimateur on military operations is still regarded, by most of the nations of the world, as the closest thing we can got, now, to international, legal, approval for such things.

Several of the UN's various and sundry member agencies, many of which are considerably older than the UN, itself, and even predate the old League of Nations, do excellent, essential work and form the base for constructive international cooperation and, now and again, peacebuilding.

While some UN reform is, remotely, possible, I think we are stuck with the creaky, old, spastic, muddled huddle on the Hudson, if only because, from time to time, it does just enough to justify all the time and money we waste on it.

 

[dapaterson]

The UN is much like Churchill`s summation of democracy: It`s the worst of all, except for the alternatives.

 

[Edward Campbell]

Here, reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions (§29) of the Copyright Act from The Mark is an interesting article by Oxford doctoral candidate Taylor Owen:

http://themarknews.com/articles/1084-who-will-build-peacebuilding

Who Will Build Peacebuilding?
By withdrawing from Afghanistan, Canada and the Netherlands are leaving the development of peacebuilding to others.

Taylor Owen

First published Mar 09, 2010
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News of the Dutch withdrawal of combat troops from Afghanistan, combined with Canada’s parliamentary mandated withdrawal at the end of this year, represents an unceremonious end to NATO’s experimentation with a new, integrated form of peacebuilding. It will now be left to the U.S. and the U.K. to lead the substantial effort of figuring out how to build peace in 21st century conflicts.

There is an emerging consensus that state failure is the product of a complex relationship between different political and economic factors. If peacebuilding is to be successful, it needs to provide solutions to all of these problems.

This represents a dramatic break from the past and poses a particular challenge for Canada. Our long-held, and somewhat mythical, view of peacekeeping as blue helmets passively separating two warring parties no longer matches the reality on the ground. Pearson’s model does not apply when there is not yet peace to keep.

Canada and the Netherlands have responded to this challenge with innovation. Both have been leaders in developing a new form of peacebuilding that is both more ambitious and more demanding than previous models. Rather than treat defence, diplomacy, and development as separate but related components of our broader engagement, Canada now seeks to do all three at once. From this perspective our various military, diplomatic, and humanitarian activities should reinforce each other, together creating the stability, prosperity, and local support needed for rebuilding a failed state. This approach has been called, “3D,” “Whole-of-Government,” and “Integrated Peacebuilding.”

The NATO mission in Afghanistan is perusing strikingly varied goals – killing Taliban, building schools, dams, and roads, delivering government services, promoting democracy, and protecting women’s rights. What’s more, depending on which of these are prioritized, policies likewise shift. If we are fighting the insurgents at all costs, we care less about the number of women in schools. If we are building government capacity, we have a higher threshold for corruption. Finding this balance has been the central challenge of the mission, and Canada and the Netherlands have been leaders.

This is a different kind of involvement for Canada and places new demands on our civil service. Departments accustomed to pursuing differing goals now have to agree on a common course of action. The complexities of civil conflicts have to be grasped with sensitivity and insight.

While progress has been made, much work remains. I had hoped that Canada would lead NATO in addressing the following lingering challenges.

First, peacebuilding demands balance. According to the Manley Panel on Canada’s role in Afghanistan, “for best effect, all three components of the strategy – military, diplomatic, and development – need to reinforce each other.” Withdrawing combat forces while continuing development and diplomatic efforts creates strategic confusion just as the disparate components of our mission were starting to come together.

Second, much of the Canadian debate about our role in Afghanistan has omitted the international context. We are a modest contributor in a 35-member coalition. Success or failure in Afghanistan depends crucially on the actions of our allies more than our own. In this sense, it is hard to see the benefit of an arbitrary withdrawal in 2011. Our commitment has to be viewed in the context of the larger strategy, one in which we will no longer have a voice.

Third, coordinated and comprehensive policymaking demands exceptional clarity. The government has consistently failed to provide the verifiable information, clear benchmarks, and concrete timelines necessary to judge Canada’s mission accurately. An arbitrary withdrawal date imposed irrespective of our strategic objectives ensures that the type of transparent policy-making necessary for complex peace operations will not be developed.

Fourth, strategy begins in the capital. While Prime Minister Harper has taken steps to improve coordination between the departments contributing to the mission, old habits die hard. Other countries, such as the UK, have explored alternate means of encouraging departments to work together when managing complex peacebuilding missions. We will not get the chance to see through such necessary shifts in our own bureaucracy.

Whereas the Americans originally eschewed integrated peacebuilding for a more traditional, militarized approach, by accepting General McCrystal’s recent strategic recommendations, President Obama has matched a troop surge with a tactical shift towards far greater civilian protection. In so doing, they are modeling much of their engagement after the Canadian experience in Kandahar, and are picking up where Canada is leaving off.

Some may say this is the positive legacy of the Canadian mission. Others will surely see it as a missed opportunity to ensure that the future of peacebuilding has a Canadian face.

Mr. Owen’s condemnation of successive (Chrétien, Martin and Harper) governments for failing to understand, much less explain, what they wanted to do in Afghanistan is spot on. But it is not confined to Canada. I seriously doubt that anyone in the Bush or Obama administrations, including Generals Pertraeus and McCrystal,  understood/understands what America’s aim might be.

But peacebuilding, as Mr. Owen describes it, is a pretty airy-fairy concept and is best left for bureaucrats to chew over, with their Chardonnay and Brie. The military has a major supporting role in whatever peacebuilding might be involving:

• Peacemaking; and

• Peacekeeping – the proper sense of that word, the one that doesn’t, necessarily, involve baby-blue berets.  Sometimes peacekeeping is just maintaining plain old security while whatever peaceful people want and need to do gets done.

 

[Kirkhill]

Sometimes peacekeeping is just maintaining plain old security while whatever peaceful people want and need to do gets done.

As you said about Owen, E.R.: "Spot on".

Isn't that ultimately the sum total of the soldier's profession?  Whether it be maintaining a cordon, manning OPs (real or virtual), standing sentry or, in extremis, acting as the National SWAT team to oppose miscreants willing to use force against the National Will.  Sometimes those miscreants are a ragged mob with pitchforks.  Sometimes they are a group with a defining cohesive principle, either criminal or political (terrorist, bandit, pirate, freedom fighter or libertarian).  Sometimes they are organized, state sponsored and operating under flying colours.  Not that the latter appears to be much of a winning strategy these days.  Hence the increase in that portion of operations defined in  maintaining the cordon and acting in low level conflicts.

The military also likes to get involved in C4I ops and logistical ops but I suggest that they should be concentrating on "coal face" support and "privatize/civilianize" as much of the second, third and fourth line as possible so that it can be paid for only when it is needed.

Beyond that the military still needs to be allowed to hire itself out to friendly regimes, at a reasonable pace, so as to keep the spontoon honed.  The government will accumulate international kudos for the loans of competent forces - but that should not be the primary raison d'etre of the deployments.  The deployments should be self-serving to the extent that they are live fire training exercises.