Conrad Black: Canada’s New Defence Industrial Strategy Shows Promise If Bureaucracy Doesn’t Bog It Down

Commentary

The federal government’s indicated defence strategy to grow into its commitment of 5 percent of GDP annually seems in all respects to be a commendable initiative. The objectives include doubling Canada’s defence exports in the next 10 years and creating 125,000 new jobs in that sector, while increasing the share of defence spending for acquisitions of relevant weaponry, technology, and ordnance from Canadian companies to 70 percent. At present, American suppliers enjoy that percentage of these expenses, albeit on a much smaller budget. Ottawa projects increases in defence revenue for small- to medium-sized Canadian defence contractors of more than $5 billion.

The plan includes spending $6.6 billion over the next five years on the elaboration of the defence industrial strategy. This appears to be an encumbrance indicative of the government’s addiction to feathering the bureaucratic bed even as it undertakes significant productive objectives. By increasing the percentage of GDP devoted to defence-related matters to 5 percent, $180 billion will be spent on defence procurement, $290 billion on defence-related infrastructure, which will surely enjoy a generous definition, and $125 billion on related downstream economic spending.

In the introduction to the strategy document, the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the COVID pandemic are cited as game-changing events in Canada’s appreciation of supply chain vulnerability.

The document also grapples itself onto Prime Minister Carney’s address at Davos last month when he claimed that the traditional Western Alliance had been ruptured, and purported to set himself at the head of a group of so-called middle powers objecting to the high-handed behaviour of the United States. The document proclaims the necessity that “Canada possess the capacity to sustain its own defence and safeguard its own sovereignty.”

The new defence strategy names 10 key capabilities requiring enhanced Canadian competence: aerospace, ammunition, digital systems including artificial intelligence, maintenance support, personnel protection, sensors, space, specialized manufacturing, training, and unmanned systems. The strategy also announces the objective of becoming self-sufficient in nitrocellulose, the principal compound in explosives.

The procurement process is apparently being handed over to the Defence Investment Agency, formerly an arm of the public services and procurement administration, which will be transformed by legislation into an autonomous entity that will produce a Defence Advisory Forum and Secretary of State for Defence procurement. All of this reeks of this government’s love of bureaucratic structures and committees, and it can only be hoped that that affection for proliferating administration does not retard the progress that is targeted or absorb unseemly amounts of the overall increase in defence spending.

The government’s outline of its strategy commits not only to expanding procurement within Canada but proactively assisting the Canadian private sector in being able to provide more of the country’s increasing defence needs. Where this proves not to be possible, it is pledged to seek allies in Europe, including the UK and the Indo-Pacific countries, to pursue these projects jointly. When it is not possible to find such collaboration, the government pledges to acquire from allies while protecting Canadian sovereignty. It is clear that there is a powerful aversion to buying anything more than is absolutely necessary from the United States. In the current circumstances, that is a reasonable ambition, as long as the quality of our defence does not suffer as a result of it.

There are a number of other initiatives identified, including swifter security clearance procedures for industry personnel, a good deal more regular fraternization between appropriate officials of the armed forces and the private sector that supplies them, and amendments to the much-criticized industrial and technological benefits policy. Another proposed institutional creation is the Bureau of Research, Engineering, and Advanced Leadership in Innovation and Science. This is stated to be the equivalent of the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, which is generally credited with the development of GPS and the internet.

As with the Major Projects Office and other initiatives of this government, there is the sense of the lead weight of proliferation of officious committees and positions of joint decision-making that are not reassuring to anyone accustomed to the private sector’s generally highly efficient movement from concept to production. All the objectives cited are commendable, and it can only be hoped that the government will exceed its usual standards of efficacy and recruit some capable and proven private-sector executives to assist in the smooth and swift pursuit of these objectives.

It is possible that Canada’s steel and aluminum sectors, under threat from the United States and under sentence of redundancy from President Trump, could also benefit from the Strategic Response Fund. A hunt for and promotion of skilled labour is another promise in the accompanying documentation.

Taken as a whole, and despite the chilling bureaucratese in places, this looks like a thoroughly desirable bootstrapping-up of Canadian sovereignty, and incidentally of Canada’s performances as an ally. Procurement in defence is almost always of the most advanced technology, and the more of it that can be produced domestically, the greater the resulting benefit to our most sophisticated industries. Also, the military in Canada and many other countries is by far the strongest centre of adult education, and the greater the number of personnel attracted to the armed forces or the supply of them, the better the impact will be on job creation and on the steadily increasing sophistication of the workforce.

On its face, this looks like an excellent program that represents a good deal of determined and original thinking by the government departments and ministers responsible. Bring it on.

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.