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Interesting thread guys. Should Canada build up its military? Of course! Simply because of the political power it will yield. This isn't about Canada protecting itself from a foreign enemy (although it is essential should the need arise to be able to do so).

Do you think China will swim a navy half way around the world in hopes of a BC invasion? In the past this was possible (Pearl Harbor), today satellites and other means would pick that up before a foreign navy left their port!
Although if the US wasn't directly to the South, what would stop them from doing so? Nothing.

A substantial military yields tremendous political power, take your own history for example, when Canada was a leader in peacekeeping, countries listened when you had something to say, the UN relied on the Canadian Armed Forces for peacekeeping missions. You spoke and the world listened to what you had to say. Today you speak and the world responds: Come again?

To put things succintly, you are all bark and no bite. This is why you get pushed around and have been playing follow the leader for decades.

It is never about your service personnel, we all know how brave and well trained they are. It's about the cards you hold, and as it stands you have no ace in the hole.

   

While having more politcal influence sounds nice, peackeeping, great, foreign aid, spectacular however, I believe we should focus on better ourselves before reaching out to other countries. We don't need armed forces, there is no point in spending on them. Instead of maintaining an army we could use that money in things like the healthcare line up times, making post secondary costs down, or anyother social program. We should start with ourselves before trying to help other countries.

   

Beaverbrook you have no concept of international relations other then what you might have read in your grade 10 history book. If a nation wants to have other nations LISTEN to any ideas they might have (specifically in the area of foreign relations) then a strong (not necassarily large) military goes a long way in aiding that nation.
Having no military or a weak, limp-wristed military is almost the surest way to have over 90% of the nations out there dismiss ANYTHING you say. Also you state in one part of your post that peacekeeping is great (How many tours have you been on?) and later in your post that we don't need an armed forces. Would you prefer to send unarmed soldiers to these hot spots in the world? If so then be prepared for a lot of flag draped coffins to come home!
The rest of your post just further indicates your complete and total lack of world affairs or national issues. Please stick to the gaming forums where your opinion might actually have some relevance. If ignorance is bliss then you truly must be the happiest guy in the country!

Almost forgot, peacekeeping as you think, hasn't been done by Canada since the early 90's in Cyprus. For the most part we are either engaged in peace-enforcement, or lately in war! The majority of the CF's soldiers that I have met want nothing more to do with UN style peacekeeping, it solves nothing and usually makes you a target. Before you go on about, so does war, at least in a war with much more relaxed rules of engagement I can defend myself, or kill my enemy without being second guessed to death by UN arseholes in New York! You may comment on military issues when you do one of two things, either join the military (doubt if you could cut it) or become a working member of society who pays taxes!

   

I see that 2Cdo has already adressed this point, but I'm posting this anyway...

Reading through this thread, I find a lot of references to ‘peacekeeping’. Peacekeeping is good; all you need for the average peacekeeping mission is a well-trained infantry or armour led mission element, mounted on light vehicles such as jeeps. Personal weapons such as rifles and LMGs will suffice for individual protection, after all, the mission is treaty supervision, monitoring disarmament and conducting surveillance to maintain pre-established zones of control.

Yep, traditional peacekeeping doesn’t require a robust, combat ready military.

Hup-hup, gather round troops as I pass out your UN brassards, blue berets all around, hu-zah!

Unfortunately, Canada hasn’t conducted a ‘peacekeeping’ mission in nearly a decade.

Instead we are peace enforcing, peace making or providing security. Here’s a news flash: personal weapons and light trucks don’t cut muster in Afghanistan. Soldiers on the ground on the road between Kabul and Khandahar had damn well better be prepared to put their money where their mouth is, otherwise they become soft, easy targets for people who don’t like us very much.

Since to fall of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War bi-polar power balance, there haven’t been many chances to go out there and supervise ink-still-wet UN peace treaties. Post Cold War conflicts are tribal/ethnic/religious based and often fought over precious scarce resources. There are no treaties, there are no demilitarized zones, and there are no borders with well-marked checkpoints. The biggest military blunder in the history of the Western political world was cashing in the so-called peace-dividend once Russians and Ukrainians started buying Levi’s and listening to Ice Cube.

If Canadians want to continue to enjoy the prestige (and moral high-ground) of being the world’s premiere peacekeeping nation, then chest thumping and resting on the laurels we received 50 years ago in Cyprus is not enough. Fielding a military capable of taking on the missions out there today is going to take cash.

Put up or shut up Canadian taxpayer.

   

I would just like to point out that Belgium wasn't really invaded in WWI. The Germans just wanted to pass through Belgium, not conquer it, so they could defeat France quickly.

Yeah N.A.T.O. [ Is imagining Bush saying " NO, in an elongated fashion multiple times while pointing an mean countries that wish to attack Canada]

I hope we can all soon look at the world as a large community and get ride of national pride and such, we have different leaders, that's great, we mostly all live in houses and work hard for a living. That is all.

   

I do not like how a Country is judged by it's military prowess. If ya got a nice military, you get respect. Not a pretty concept, but coldly true. Canada can still do peacekeeping, peace-enforcing, peacemaking, etc., protect its own soil without help from America and do this all effectively with A decently sized and well-trained and equipped military. If we had a larger military we could do so much more.....

   

No need to be so insulting Mr.2Cdo, you clearly did not take time to fully read my post sir. I claim that Canada should better itself rather than spend money on others. I suggested we shouldn't have peacekeepers, not send people out in an dangerous environment without suffiecient defense. I suggested while having a strong voice in world politics is great, the cost is not worth it. In others words, isolationism in world affairs, we are not needed when we have our good friends the Americans/Brits/Australians and everyone else in Iraq making sure no fascist regime emerges.

As for asking me how many tours I have been in, I don't see the rellevance, as for the grade 10 comment, if you would care to be more observant my age clearly indicates that I'm 16. That also suggests the near impossibility of me being able to even get sent overseas on a tour. In your responce to my post you took everything [litterally] out of context and found invisible words, please read more carefully friend.

   

Wow......

You know, I think for the first time in my life, I agree with you.

   

It would be a pretty bleak world if you let Dad (Britain) and Big Brother (the US) dictate the terms without a little input from little ol' Canada. Isolationism is the exact wrong way to go unless you would like the rest of the planet to turn into an even greater festering stink-hole while we wallow in our relative opulence back here in Canada. We Canadians are generally speaking, showered with the advantages that the rest of the world only wishes they could enjoy. You would have us close out the barbarain hordes and leave the savages to thier own devices??

Thanks but no thanks. I for one am glad that most Canadians don't share your irresponsible world view.

   

Barbarians? Savages? You are rather ethnocentric my friend. You should not judge another culture based on our values, but rather by their own merits. They must learn to settle their own disputes, if they won't help themselves, then where are we to force it upon them, when did become our responsibility to change those whom don't wish to change.

I am saddened that you would so quickly lash out such insulting and hurtful comments such as insinuating that I'm irresponsible. There is no such thing as right and wrong, moral and immoral, correct and incorrct, truth and deceit, there is no reality, there is only perceptions, who's to say that the 30 year guy who likes looking at pictures of 12 girls is immoral or that George Bush is a "bad" president or that the Liberal party of Canada is corrupt? Where is your higher plain of existance to judge? As there is no truths in this world that means there is no right, so I hope you could try to be open minded.

Although I applaud your enthusiasm for your beliefs, I would hope you could take the time to fully consider the different sides of the issue before commenting next time in an open-minded 3rd person objective sort of view.

   

Look up sarcasm or irony in the dictonary. Apply it to what I wrote. Proceed.



By your flawed rationale we should have allowed the Germans and the Jews to settle thier own disputes back in '42? Far be it from us to impose our ethnocentric world view on the German Third Reich. Why if the Jews and the German can't sort things out between the two of them then it sure isn't my responsibility to force a resolution on them. It becomes our responsibility to change those who do not wish to change when the things they do are reprehensible.

The problem that the philosophers who were proponents of those ideas you so clearly hold is thus: Indivudals invent thier own morality. The ideas of good/bad, moral/immoral do not exist in a vaccuum, however in the world of thinking, feeling humans these ideas become real and translate into application. You are right, there are no universal truths, but that does not prevent us from attempting to establish a global moral standard with which to interact with our fellow humans.



I have considered your view sir, and as noted above, I find it irresponsible. I am in fact being open-minded, I respect what you have to say. I do however feel that it is my responsibility, based on my own morality to point out to you where I see the flaws in your thinking. That my friend is what debate and discourse are all about.

   

It is the wording that is the problem I would think. Forums are not quite as polite [ I don't mean the people] as in person debates because one cannot tell when a person is being sarcastic. Now, now, no one declared war on germany for being anti-semetic, they declared war on Germany for invading Poland. I highly doubt anyone would have declared war on Germany if they stopped after taking over Czechsovakia and still implimented the "Ultimate solution" to the "Jewish Question", but that is speculation and can never be proven unless someone here has a time machine and can influence Hitler not to invade Poland.

But back to the wording "I respect what you have to say. I do however feel that it is my responsibility, based on my own morality to point out to you where I see the flaws in your thinking"

The respect is not apparent, but I am very glad to read this, realized it is recipricated. "based on my own morality to point out to you where I see the flaws in your thinking" perhaps "

Based on my own morality to pount out to you where I THINK I see flaws in your thinking" As saying it the other was suggests that my way of thinking is flawed indefinetly. I had feared this would turn into a "flame war" as I've seen it called before, I now shall metaphorically shake your hand. [do not fear, they are clean, for now]

   

**He returned the handshake with a devilish smile and a curt nod of head**

Without delving into an esotheric conversation about the philosophy of grammer, from my point of view, your arguement is indefinately flawed. I can only think from my own point of view.

Regardless of the economic basis and political motivations that caused France to enter the war (remember Britian actually declared war following the invasion of Belgium), WW2 has become the quintessential symbol of why early intervention is necessary.

You still haven't answered the implied question though, do you think Germany should have been left to thier own collective devices and allowed to eradicate the Jews simply because on a metaphysical level there is no right and wrong? Do you think that it was somehow boorish or ethnocentric of those nations that defeated the Third Reich to impose thier collective will on Germany?

   

Beaver I can only comment on what you write, and I stand by my ascertation that you really don't have any sort of life experiences to offer any valid argument. Your writing skills are maybe part of the problem. You seem to write rather disjointed sentences with contradictory subjects within them. You also clearly missed the sarcasm in the how many tours comment as I had already alluded to your age in the grade 10 history book comment.
I also stand by my statement that maybe you should stick to the gaming forums because you know shit about how foreign affairs works in a global setting.

   

Either way I think maybe he skittered off. Perhaps he's looking for something to justify his isolationist stance. Sure, isolationism works great if you're happy with your nation becoming marginalised and pushed to the sidelines whenever something important happens in the world.

How much press did you hear about Sweden, Finland or Siwtzerland's stance on... well anything? News flash you neutral jerks: no one cares what you think.

   

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