Trudeau should expect criticism at NATO summit over defence spending: analysis?

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Prime Minister Justin Trudeau heads to Washington for the NATO summit early next week with more than $30 billion in recently awarded military equipment contracts and a new defence policy that promises a major cash infusion for the Canadian Forces.

But that spending spree will likely carry little weight and Trudeau can still expect criticism that Canada isn’t doing enough on defence.

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In May, 23 U.S. senators sent a scathing letter to Trudeau, citing the upcoming NATO summit, and expressing their profound disappointment over Canada’s level of military spending.

This letter came despite Canada being ranked seventh in NATO when it comes to actual spending of money on its military. In addition, Canada ranks 16th in the world on defence spending.

But that isn’t good enough for NATO and, in particular, for U.S. politicians as they denounce Canada as a defence laggard and unreliable ally.

At issue is the NATO two per cent doctrine. That calls for NATO nations to spend two per cent of their GDP on defence.

American politicians, along with retired Canadian generals and Ottawa think tanks who receive funding from the arms industry, have used that to hammer Canada as a failure on defence.

With its defence budget of almost $27 billion, Canada spends some 1.33 per cent of its GDP on the military. The Liberal government is pumping in billions more dollars into the Canadian Forces, with projections of a defence budget hitting almost $50 billion by 2030. Still, that would only push Canada to 1.76 per cent of GDP.

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U.S. Ambassador to Canada David Cohen recently declared Canada was now considered an outsider in NATO. “Canada has moved within NATO from being a bit of an outlier to being the outlier in the entire alliance,” he told Global TV.

So who does the U.S. and NATO consider the gold standard when it comes to the spending issue? NATO points to Estonia in that regard. Under the GDP measure, Estonia is considered among the top nations in the alliance, spending almost three per cent of its GDP. Yet Estonia’s military budget is only $2 billion. It’s navy is one of the smallest in the world. It has no combat aircraft.

Former Conservative prime minister Stephen Harper tried to argue that measuring defence capability by using a GDP ratio was not an accurate way to gauge a nation’s contributions. Trudeau has tried similar arguments.

Defence Minister Bill Blair has recounted how hard it is to try to convince cabinet as well as Canadians about the need to meet the two per cent commitment because “nobody knows what that means.”

“Trying to go to cabinet, or even to Canadians, and tell them that we had to do this because we need to meet this magical threshold of two per cent,” he said at an Ottawa defence conference May 1. “Don’t get me wrong. It’s important, but it was really hard convince people that that was a worthy goal, that that was some noble standard that we had to meet.”

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Add to that mix the current fiscal environment and ongoing concerns from Canadians who have been struggling financially. Directing tens of billions of tax dollars into more tanks, submarines and fighter jets isn’t a top priority among Canadian families.

But the Americans aren’t buying those concerns.

Harper simply ignored the NATO spending guideline despite signing on to the initiative in 2014. Instead, he cut defence spending.

Trudeau has taken a different tack, boosting military spending and awarding contracts to predominately U.S. arms companies with the hope that bolstering American jobs will win some goodwill.

He could push that further by announcing at the NATO summit a detailed plan to get Canada to the two per cent mark.  That might hold off the Americans for now.

But there are other looming threats. Canada can expect more pressure on defence, in particular, if former president Donald Trump is re-elected. In February, Trump said he would “encourage” Russia to attack any NATO member that didn’t contribute enough money to the alliance.

In addition, it looks like the two per cent figure might be boosted even higher. Some NATO nations are now calling for the GDP figure to be raised to 2.5 per cent or even to three per cent.

By the time Canada reaches the two per cent mark, the spending bar may have been moved upwards, adding further problems for whatever government is in power at the time.

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