"Canada Joins the Unwilling"

March 19, 2003

As I put pen to paper on Wednesday, March 19th, it seems certain that by the time these words are published, bombs will be dropping and troops will be advancing on Iraq. 

After years of diplomatic efforts to persuade Saddam Hussein to destroy his weapons of mass destruction, the promise to disarm him with military action will be carried out by the United States and its allies. 

Allies that do not include Canada.  The federal Liberal government finally ended months of uncertainty about its position on the Iraqi crisis when Prime Minister Chrétien announced this week that Canada will not support military action against Iraq. 

No doubt many Canadians will find comfort in the fact that someone, somewhere is willing to step forward to disarm a tyrannical dictator of his chemical and biological weapons … but, as of today, polls seem to show the majority of Canadians do not want that “someone” to include Canada.  

Locally, in Prince George-Peace River, a recent poll found that without the United Nations endorsement, 61 percent of residents do not believe Canada should join military efforts to force Iraq to disarm. 

Just as it’s important to me that I know my constituents’ opinions on an issue, I believe it also important that they know mine.  For the record, I personally believe that it was wrong for the federal government to refuse to support our traditional allies, the U.S., Great Britain and Australia. 

Saddam Hussein denied for years that Iraq even had a chemical and biological weapons program.  Now he admits that such a program did exist, but that all such weapons have been destroyed.  Why should the world take him at his word now? 

It’s not even a matter of the U.S. requiring Canada’s military support.  Washington knows as we know, that following years of cuts to our defence budget, Canada simply doesn’t have the resources to offer.  But by failing to offer solidarity with our traditional allies, Canada has allowed countries like France, Russia and China to turn the need to disarm a dictator into a political statement about their opposition to American foreign policy in general. 

Even Japan, which is prohibited by its constitution from engaging in military operations except in national defense, offered its moral encouragement and support to its former World War II enemies.  

As for the Canadian government, it did not endear itself to any nation along its path to non-participation.  Canada is now discounted as an unreliable and confused international player.  That the Canadian government played both sides of the international debate will not be forgotten by the countries both for and against war.  Nor will either side soon forget Jean Chrétien’s confounding claim last week that U.S. President George Bush had already defeated Saddam Hussein.

I am not only saddened that Canada did not support its traditional allies in this international crisis, I lament the irreparable damage done to Canada's international diplomatic and economic relationships by the Liberal's fly-by-the-seat-of-their-pants foreign policy.