There was a particularly surprising moment last week in Warsovia when Prime Minister Mark Carney renewed his friendship with Donald Tusk of Poland, a flash that subtly captured the brands elections that Canada will probably face in the not too distant future.
Carney was genuine in her praise for the enthusiastic and enthusiastic hug of the country of Eastern Europe of NATO and the defense expense objectives of the Western Alliance.
“We learn a lot from prime minister, his government, including the importance of taking out all our weight in NATO,” said Carney.
It was a comment out of script, revealing about the difference between Poland and Canada when it comes to defense expenses.
“It will take us for a few years to reach the Polish levels of commitment. But it is possible, and we have made that commitment. We will heal our defense expenses between now and the end of the decade.”
Prime Minister Mark Carney followed a surprise visit to kyiv with a blow through Warsaw, and said that Canada is taking a Poland lesson when it comes to defense expenses.
A few years is a euphemism. Warsovia exceeded the old point of reference for NATO expenses of two percent of GDP in 2022. Ottawa hopes to get there next spring.
Poland is expected to spend 4.7 percent of GDP in defense this year, which makes it the best NATO speaker with an annual defense budget equivalent to $ 45 billion.
But what has been sacrificed to get there? And is it a model that Canada should or could emulate?
During the federal elections of last spring, the liberals promised to rebuild the country’s military and defense industrial base, but have studied the details of how already cost.
Details, questions? Wait for the new defense acquisition agency, they tell us.
Canada has adopted the NATO -inspired increase in Trump in the defense spending target of five percent of GDP (3.5 percent in direct military expenses and another 1.5 percent in defense infrastructure) during the next decade.
The cost? Up to $ 150 billion per year.
“Poland’s starting point is already very, very different from ours,” said Catherine Godin, Canada’s ambassador to Poland, who was asked during Carney’s visit about rearmament efforts in the country of Eastern Europe.
Poland, because it limits with Russia, has made a conscious political decision when it comes to expenditure priorities, he said.
“Health and education are the second to security and defense, something that we cannot understand in our country. It would be a very different conversation. Therefore, learning from them, certainly put this at the top of their priority. We would have to have a Canadian consensus to be able to do it in the same way.”
And there is the rubbing.
While the public has generally been in favor of a higher defense expense, compensation have not been clarified.
Difficult options in Horizon
The Federal Autumn Budget could be a restoration of basins in the way the country spends money and the public could be asked to accept difficult decisions.
Carney has already ordered all federal departments, with the exception of defense, which find 15 percent savings in their budgets.
At the end of the NATO Summit in June, the prime minister insisted that building the Canadian Industrial Defense Base is not a budgetary year.
“We are not in compensation. We are not in sacrifices to do them,” said Carney.
“In other words, more [defence production] It will happen in Canada. More of this will help build our economy while improving our defense, and we will obtain the benefits. “
The members of the Canadian army are receiving a salary increase of up to 20 percent, since the federal government seeks to boost recruitment and retention in the ranks. The $ 2 billion expenses package also includes new allocations for certain implementations and operations.
The prime minister reiterated his campaign promise to grow the economy and balance the country’s operational budget in three years.
For his part, Defense Minister David McGuinty said he believes that the public understands the severity of what we face as a nation beyond our borders.
“I think Canadians know that the landscape has changed, that geopolitics is changing,” McGuinty said.
Analysts of different European tanks have noticed how Poland is recovering faster than you can find soldiers.
He has been buying military equipment in the United States, as well as in South Korea, where hot production lines continue to produce combat airplanes, tanks, armored vehicles and war ships at a rate that European manufacturers are fighting to match.
Godin says that it has been easier for Poland to build the defense industry of that country because, unlike Canada, much of its defense industry is state or operated.
Defense production is consolidated within the Polish Armament Group (PGZ), which includes more than 50 companies. Much of the industrial base was inherited from the moment the country was part of the Warsaw Pact of the Soviet Union, although some private companies exist within the framework.
Poland’s decision to continue buying in the United States is not as controversial in that country as in Canada.
Warsaw obtained $ 4 billion in Washington Foreign Military Financing (FMF) in July to buy teams such as Apache attack helicopters, Himars mobile rocket artillery and patriotic missile defense systems.
It is a conscious political choice that the country’s main leaders have said that it is being done to keep Poland in a friendly base with the Trump administration.
Canada, on the other hand, is reviewing its purchase of marquee defense of 88 stealthy f-35 combatants of the United States Defense Giant Lockheed Martin. There are other projects, such as the purchase of P-8 and Himars surveillance planes for the Army, which could also be politically unpleasant for an irritable electorate that has been told that Canada intends to buy elsewhere for its military hardware.
Alan Williams, an acquisition expert who headed the purchasing branch of the Department of Defense in the early 2000s, stressed that when fighting with this problem, the federal government cannot lose sight of the mission, which is to equip the military with the best team, whether American, Canadian or European.
“As a bureaucrat, my goal would be: I will buy the best product no matter where it comes from,” said Williams.
“If it is from the USA, I will not say that not because there is a hatred with Trump. I would buy it there. If the government has a different policy frame for that, it would turn it on. That is its decision and it is a political decision.”
