The Canadian army has witnessed a resurgence in hateful behavior and racism reports during the last year after several years of decline, according to data obtained by CBC News.
Detailed information occurs when the army deals with a new set of extremism and accusations of behavior of bad reputation.
The sudden change has aroused the curiosity of extreme extreme experts of the extreme right, who say that it is no coincidence that the numbers will begin to be reversed in 2024, as well as the tumultuous political and social change, it was unleashed in the United States with the re -election of Donald Trump as president, and when the Canadian army is deep in a mission to change its culture.
The Canadian army commander analyzes evidence with consternation.
“I think that Canadian army soldiers should be as furious as the impact that this is having on their reputation,” Lieutenant Gen. Mike Wright said in a recent interview.
The new data show that 54 incidents were reported last year to the monitoring system of incidents of hate behavior (HCIT), almost double what was recorded in 2023. The monitoring system was created several years ago after a series of cases related to extremism and public shame.
Since 2020, 364 occurrences of odious behavior have been reported in the HCITS registry.
After an initial increase in the reports, the numbers had been in a gradual downward trend until last year’s change. The HCIT registered increases in most of the categories of what the military defines as hateful behavior, including participation in hate discourse and propaganda (26 in 2024 versus 10 in 2023) and pronouncing threats (17 in 2024 versus 11 in 2023).
Experts who look at the data say that social and political events south of the border can be an explanation for worrying resurgence.
“There is a link between that increase and the choice of Donald Trump,” said Andy Knight, a political scientist at the University of Alberta that investigates the extremism of the extreme right.
He said that Trump’s rise has brought “a significant sensation of empowerment” to those who push antidemocratic rhetoric “particularly against black and brown individuals.”
Knight wrote an exhaustive study for the Department of National Defense (DND) in white supremacy, racism, xenophobia and discrimination in the Canadian army.
The report, written before the last presidential elections of the United States, was presented in December 2024. It was followed with an informative session in person for the members of the Department of Defense about two months ago in Ottawa.
Knight says he shared with the department an “explosive” anti -immigrant comment of a former member of the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) who said he was trying to preserve the “true Canadian population”, which for him was white.
“He said: ‘I joined the military to learn to kill brown and black people,” Knight said.
He said that DND members shook their heads at this revelation.
“They said: ‘Do you know what? We know there are people like this in the army. But we didn’t realize that they would be so open.”
Tumultuous decade for CAF
In addition to the external social and political climate, there are probably internal pressures that contribute to change.
The Canadian army, for more than a decade, has been trying to eradicate not only hate activity, but also sexual misconduct with a series of new and strict policies.
“There is a rejection against that cultural change,” said Barbara Perry, a researcher who has studied extremism in CAF.
The army is trying to control a certain behavior, he said, and those efforts are considered “intrusive or stepping on their rights and freedoms. Then, that attracts people to extremist narratives.”
For the first time, an active member of the Canadian Armed Forces faces a burden related to terrorism, but extremism in the ranks has been a concern for decades. For the National, Jonathan Montpetit of CBC explains how the military has been trying to handle the problem for almost 30 years.
The recent increase in hate behavior incidents also occurs despite repression through a series of political initiatives and threats of discipline initiated by the former army commander, the general now retired Wayne Eyre, almost five years ago.
Among the provisions introduced at that time there was an expectation that the soldiers would call racist and shameful behavior between them if they saw it.
That has not been happening. In light of the most recent cases, Wright says he is dismayed and angry.
“That is the most disturbing for me,” Wright said. “I am asking the soldiers who are prepared to finally go into combat, to have the courage to enter the fight. There are some who did not have the moral courage to take a step forward and call an inappropriate behavior when they saw it.”
In early July, a case of terrorism arose in Quebec, where two soldiers in service, a former member and a civilian, former cadet instructor, They were accused of cooking an extremist anti -government plot to take care of a land plot. Supposedly they stored a highly restricted arsenal and military teams, including the avant -garde night vision team.
The RCMP accused Simon Angers-Audet, 24, Raphaël Lagacé, 25, and Marc-Aurèle Chabot, 24, to facilitate a terrorist activity and other crimes related to the illegal storage of firearms and possession of explosives and prohibited devices.
A fourth man, Matthew Forbes, 33, is accused of crimes of weapons. DND acknowledges that Forbes and Chabot were active members of the Army at the time of their arrest on July 8.
Separately, two investigations are being carried out, including an investigation by the Military Police, on a Facebook group now missing where the members of the Highlanders Cameron of Ottawa (Duke of Edinburgh) supposedly published hateful and inappropriate content.
Since 2020, according to the data obtained by CBC News, the military has recognized that 21 incidents of hateful behavior have led to the release of members under the disciplinary system.
The Mounties arrested four men, three of whom are accused of “actions to facilitate terrorist activity.” RCMP is describing its actions as a violent extremism motivated ideologically.
There have been called for the military to be more proactive by notifying the Civil Police every time they have discovered cases of hate behavior, efforts that have so far gone anywhere.
It depends on the army counterintelligence unit identifying extremists within the ranks. The National Defense Department was asked if the unit played any role in the recent case of Quebec.
In a written statement, the department would only recognize that “the Military Police supported the investigation led by the police mounted in the royal royalty.” The question of whether the counterintelligence had carried out its own investigation, or even having been aware of the training in the style of the suspicious militia, remained unanswered.
