Author Topic: Mattis Meets Sajjan  (Read 315 times)

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Offline JMT

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Mattis Meets Sajjan
« on: February 04, 2017, 08:27:17 pm »
http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/harjit-sajjan-james-mattis-first-meeting-1.3967127

Monday, Secretary Mattis will meet with Minister Sajjan in Washington.  When Mattis spoke to Sajjan, it seemed to be the normal love in between allies.  The shared relationship and goals was spoken of.  There was something missing though.  When he spoke to the UK Minister of Defence, there was mention of the Trump Administration's appreciation of their commitment to the 2% of GDP spending target.  Not so with Canada.  Canada only spends 1% of GDP.  Will the push for more spending start to come in this meeting?

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Offline ?Impact

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Re: Mattis Meets Sajjan
« Reply #1 on: February 04, 2017, 09:57:24 pm »
commitment to the 2% of GDP spending target.  Not so with Canada.  Canada only spends 1% of GDP.  Will the push for more spending start to come in this meeting?

While I think that target is just plain dumb, I have no problem with increasing our spending on National Defence. The issue I have is we tend to do it very foolishly. Lets not get into the role of being strong armed into just supporting the American Military Industrial Complex. Lets have a buy Canadian - and I mean Canadian program. No more of having foreign owned companies set up branch offices in Canada to farm out a little of our procurements. Canada used to be a world leader in the field. Some of the first mass produced submarines were made in Montreal. During WWII we were a leader in Aerospace. Canada is still doing fairly well in small arms, and not too bad in road/offraod vehicles.

Offline SirJohn

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Re: Mattis Meets Sajjan
« Reply #2 on: February 05, 2017, 12:00:49 pm »
While I think that target is just plain dumb, I have no problem with increasing our spending on National Defence. The issue I have is we tend to do it very foolishly. Lets not get into the role of being strong armed into just supporting the American Military Industrial Complex. Lets have a buy Canadian - and I mean Canadian program. No more of having foreign owned companies set up branch offices in Canada to farm out a little of our procurements. Canada used to be a world leader in the field. Some of the first mass produced submarines were made in Montreal. During WWII we were a leader in Aerospace. Canada is still doing fairly well in small arms, and not too bad in road/offraod vehicles.

That was the idea behind Harper's ship building strategy. There would be a constant series of purchases over many years so we wouldn't have ship builders having to tool up every time we needed new ones, then laying everyone off afterward. It hasn't worked out very well. It would work even less well for aircraft. I don't think we have the necessary size of military  to keep a factory busy churning out tanks or armored personnel carriers or even uniforms and boots for the military.
"When liberals insist that only fascists will defend borders then voters will hire fascists to do the job liberals won't do." David Frum

Offline ?Impact

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Re: Mattis Meets Sajjan
« Reply #3 on: February 05, 2017, 12:51:49 pm »
That was the idea behind Harper's ship building strategy.

Yes, at that level I think the strategy was right. Implementation of the strategy is always a problem, and I would like to see far more than just final assembly as Canadian content.

Offline JMT

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Re: Mattis Meets Sajjan
« Reply #4 on: February 05, 2017, 01:02:00 pm »
BTW, to see the progress of what we're building:

http://www.seaspan.com/nss-progress-galleries

http://shipsforcanada.ca/

Offline wilber

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Re: Mattis Meets Sajjan
« Reply #5 on: February 05, 2017, 06:53:45 pm »
If we want a robust arms industry, it would have to be built around export. Our own armed forces just aren't large enough.
"Never trust a man without a single redeeming vice" WSC

Offline kimmy

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Re: Mattis Meets Sajjan
« Reply #6 on: February 05, 2017, 08:56:09 pm »
General Mattis appears to be one of the few grown-ups in Trump's cabinet, so I am sure that the meeting will be highly professional.



As for the economic potential of defense spending, it seems to me that many of the things our military units do are also in high demand in non-military applications.  For example, detecting and tracking targets in a battlefield seems to me to be expertise that could also be applied to search-and-rescue,  border patrol, aerial surveillance, forestry and wildlife services, anti drug smuggling operations, and similar kinds of things that are a lot more significant to Canada than shooting wars are at the moment.  Getting troops and supplies into hazardous areas might not be too different from getting aid workers or emergency supplies or medical equipment into disaster areas. And so on.  If Canada had domestic industry that specialized in technologies like those, there might be enough non-military market to justify its existence.

 -k
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Offline JMT

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Re: Mattis Meets Sajjan
« Reply #7 on: February 05, 2017, 09:20:40 pm »
I'm sure it will be professional.  Still, I wonder if there will be a push on for us to start spending more?

Offline JMT

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