Impotent Legacy

by John Thompson

03/03/03

In the last week of February 2003, the true legacy of Jean Chretien’s forty years in public office became manifest. A hotshot MP, a cabinet minister, party leader, and finally as Prime Minister for 10 years, he was — for just over thirty of those 40 years — one of those who shaped Canada’s policies in Party caucus meetings, at the Cabinet Table, and as an increasingly autocratic leader.

Forty years ago, Canada had a healthy international influence and our strong presence in international crises had been noticed in the UN. In those days, we could and did send large numbers of well trained and well led troops on short notice to places like Cyprus, the Sinai, and the Congo. Our influence in the UN was also backstopped by the memories of the outsized contribution we had made in the Second World War, where our navy beat the U-boats in the Atlantic and Allied commanders had acknowledged the outstanding quality of our hard-fighting Army.

Our economy was in superb shape, healthy and robust, and the government debt occurred during the Second World War was just about paid off. We had a small but highly professional federal civil service. Canadians were also quite sure about who we were, and had a confident sense of self-identity. As Prime Minister Louis St. Laurent had observed 10 years before Chretien’s 1964 arrival on Parliament Hill, the real secret to governing Canada was to do as little as possible — the country ran itself quite well despite what Ottawa did.

But in late February 2003, our flaccid failure is plain for the world to see. One symbol is glaringly obvious — the Naval destroyer that we sent off with such fanfare from Halifax to float the Canadian flag off the Middle East came limping back, with a broken helicopter dangling off its fantail. The destroyer, HMCS Iroquois, was launched in 1970 and is already well past its ‘best-before’ date. The helicopter it carried was even older as our Sea Kings went into service even before Chretien did. Few people were impressed when Iroquois left port, and nobody is by its return.

Then there is the crisis of the day over Iraq. The United States, and its "coalition of the willing" are resolved to finally eliminate the disruptive and dangerous presence of Saddam Hussein, and to give a new chance to the suffering people of Iraq. Much of the UN — for reasons either sensible or petty — is opposed to the invasion. Our Prime Minister proposed a new plan, and plainly hoped that his Elder Statesman ploy would be heeded. However, the days of Canada’s real influence have long since been spent.

Sometimes it helps to think of the World as a club dedicated to the pursuit of poker. This is a club where, if you wish to sit with the big players, you need to have something to bring to the table. Canada used to sit at some of the big tables, but for forty years, we’ve avoided putting blue chips into the pot, and we’ve folded whenever the stakes got high… but we kept talking like we are big players while our reputation became increasingly cheap.

For example, six months ago, our paltry infantry battalion in Afghanistan was pulled out and returned home because Ottawa said it couldn’t afford to replace them. There was no discredit to our troops, they have delivered epic performances in recent years despite operating with antiquated equipment on miserly budgets without substantial political support. Through the rest of 2002, everything that could literally be scraped together by our Army was brought to form a larger 1,800 man force that could be used in Iraq to assist the tens of thousands of Australians, Britons, Spaniards and others who are backing the Americans.

Then our government, instead of putting a blue chip onto the Iraq Crisis table, cashed out — the force is going to Afghanistan (where another disaster on the scale of the Somalia intervention is brewing) and we have lost any say we might have had. The destroyer we sent as a red chip for the table has just come home — as lame as our reputation.

After shorting our military for decades, making economies on aid, arguing about soft power in a hard world, the impact of 40 years of shortcuts is now obvious. Talk is cheap, and nobody’s talk is cheaper than ours. As Jean Chretien looks for a ‘legacy’ to mark 40 years of public life, his real legacy is obvious.

John Thompson is President of the Mackenzie Institute which studies political instability and terrorism. He can be reached at: mackenzieinstitute@bellnet.ca