Should Canada raise defence spending to 2% of GDP?

[BigNumbers]

Originally Posted by IgiTang

what??



My father in-law was trying to convince me to go the private school route with my kids. i told him its too expensive and he told me no.. A lot of it is subsidized by the feds. I was blown away... Millionaires and such being subsidized for education?? Wtf?

Also. Raise corporate tax. Burger King should be helping buy us new ships if they want to live here!

I vote yes!

So much wrong information in such a small post. My head hurts.

[Huntingwhale]

No. 'Murica will save us.

[FlamesAddiction]

Even if we spend 2% of the nation's GDP on defense, Russia is still a force that we couldn't match. As someone else mentioned, some of our own allies do not even recognize our arctic sovereignty. If this is the driving force for extra spending, then it is pointless. Sovereignty isn't something that can be asserted militarily in this case. It has to be established through development and infrastructure investment. Why should anyone recognize our sovereignty in areas that we barely even have a presence (if at all)? If you can't move civilian people and assets to those areas faster than your rivals, then the sovereignty simply isn't there to defend in the first place. That's the real issue IMO. We should be recruiting people either domestically or through immigration that will invest time building communities in the arctic. Russia has 3 cities in their arctic with populations greater than 100,000, and Norway and Finland have cities over 50,000; as such, there is no question over their sovereignty. When Canada's western sovereignty was an issue, we built a railway from coast to coast. Something similar needs to be done concerning our arctic (not a railway per se).

Sorry, that is a little OT. I am not necessarily against raising defense spending for other issues though.

[Flash Walken]

As part of a comprehensive national infrastructure cash infusion, I absolutely think the armed forces should be funded more.

It's not increaed funding at the cost of funding somewhere else, it's part of a general increase in funding for federal and provincial infrastructure.

A well funded and trained military is an essential infrastructure apparatus and I think it's an important investment for all Canadians.

[Zulu29]

I think that it should be raised to the 2% mark. In order to pay for it I think the government could do a few things like look at legalizing marihuana and allowing the provinces to tax and regulate it. This would allow the federal govt to reduce health transfer payments to the provinces and save on court and corrections costs. Raise the GST back to 7%, not popular but it is a consumption tax and I don't think 2% on most items would deter people from buying them. Reduce the amount the Feds pay to the provinces through the gas tax and download the responsibility for local infrastructure to the provincial level. Finally look at some sort of "carbon tax", it's gonna become a reality worldwide anyway and we have pretty low corporate taxes so hopefully that would reduce the sting a bit.

I'm sure there are a bunch of silly programs and funding that I don't know about that could get the axe.

[Swarly]

Originally Posted by MarchHare

We just need to trim the fat, cut waste, and find efficiencies.

Don't forget we can also Synergize to maximize efficiency potentials.

[ah123]

I think it should be raised, as long as it gets used to upgrade equipment and personnel and the money doesn't get "lost" in the bureacracy

[undercoverbrother]

Originally Posted by BigNumbers

So much wrong information in such a small post. My head hurts.

If there is incorrect information in the post why not correct or comment on it, beyond what you did?

Your post is useless.

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by Huntingwhale

No. 'Murica will save us.

Chances are they won't without us giving up serious sovereignty conditions.

We have to pull our weight in our own defense and be active contributors to our treaties.

To not live up to that obligation is stupid.

[nik-]

I think we have to do more than pull our weight. Our soldiers seem more than capable of punching above their weight class, and I think that we should equip them accordingly. Perhaps, if this sabre rattling ####### sticks around, we should develop further deterrents.

[Harry Lime]

Originally Posted by Devils'Advocate

I think everyone who is saying yes should say how they are going to pay for it. It's easy to say Canada should spend more money, finding that money to spend is far more difficult. Are you going to raise taxes? If not, you are going to shift the money from where?

Someone suggested we cut foreign aid and immigration. First, we aren't meeting the 0.7% of GDP on foreign aid that we promised, so we're not even meeting our obligation there. I think foreign aid is probably THE BEST investment that we can make in terms of reducing violence in the world. But more than that, I think we have a DUTY to help the least fortunate people on the planet.

As for immigration.... What? Why? Do we have enough coloured people and we don't want any more? Or do you want to hurt the economy?
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/repor...ticle14711281/

The racism card is an unfair and unrealistic argument which is thrown out every time anyone ever talks about immigration reform. I actually believe in balanced immigration from each continental group, but Africa, South America and Europe are significantly underrepresented compared to Asian immigrants. We are losing our identity as a multi-cultural country through exclusion of most of the geographic world, in favour of heavy population base. But that's not what we are talking about here, I just don't like the implication of racism.

The idea that we would be hurting the economy because immigration bolsters the age 20-44 demographic isn't true in practice, but looks good on paper. The under 20 demographic is growing, so immigration is a short term solution. We are producing the long term solution internally, there just seems to be a lack of desire to have a younger median workforce.

The current unemployment rate sits at 7% and the jobless rate is estimated to be a couple of % points higher. If immigration was tied to the jobless rate and resources allocated to relocating Canadian citizens for employment purposes, the resulting savings could be spent on covering a portion of the increase in the defense budget.

Trust me, I'm looking for a new job right now, and the competition for skilled and white collar employment is much more intense now than it was five or ten years ago. The vast majority of available jobs are in the service and sales markets.

http://ottawacitizen.com/news/nation...numbers-survey

So, my answer would be 'yes'. Increase spending and protect the arctic, meet our responsibility to our allies.

As for foreign aid, I tried to find out where our money is going and how it is being handled and allocated. It's a murky river of money, that one. I'm not sure if it is being appreciated or reducing violence globally. And as a nations GDP rises, our aid to them seems to rise as well, which doesn't make sense. Shouldn't aid shift then to a country even more in need? Again, another discussion.

When I said earlier that foreign aid could safely drop 0.5% I misread that aid was at 1.7% and not 0.7%. I still think that we can eliminate aid to places such as Pakistan entirely and save 0.2% easily. Absolutely positive that money is being wasted, after what happened in the Afghanistan war.

http://news.nationalpost.com/2013/01...ries-of-focus/

So, there's 0.7% savings and that gets us up to 2% defense increase, using absolutely no math at all. Ballpark.

[automaton 3]

Absolutely we should. It is a bit embarrassing that a country of our comparative wealth needs to lean on our allies to such a degree. It is like going for beer and wings with friends, we are the guy that has 5 beers and throws a $20 in and says "that's good right" when the rest are throwing in $40.

In particular our navy is in tough shape and needs a huge cash influx. Instead we are getting a handful of weakly armed slushbreakers and two new support ships that are more expensive and less capable than was available at the start of the process.

So far lots of empty talk from the Conservatives, which is very disappointing.

[polak]

lol arctic sovereignty. We have zero claim to most of the arctic. Sorry, I have more friends on Facebook than there are Canadians living in the disputed parts of arctic.

You want to fend of Russia, The US and other countries that are disputing our claims then we need to increase our infrastructure and civilian presence there, not our military presence. We have zero shot of defending the arctic by military means.


Take that 1% increase and apply it to subsidies on corporate investment in the arctic. Maybe establish one reason for the world to consider "Canadian" other than the fact that someone drew a line around it a hundred or so years ago when nothing up there mattered.

[undercoverbrother]

Originally Posted by polak

lol arctic sovereignty. We have zero claim to most of the arctic. Sorry, I have more friends on Facebook than there are Canadians living in the disputed parts of arctic.

You want to fend of Russia, The US and other countries that are disputing our claims then we need to increase our infrastructure and civilian presence there, not our military presence. We have zero shot of defending the arctic by military means.


Take that 1% increase and apply it to subsidies on corporate investment in the arctic. Maybe establish one reason for the world to consider "Canadian" other than the fact that someone drew a line around it a hundred or so years ago when nothing up there mattered.

The same could be said of much of Northern Alberta, BC, Sask, Manitoba, Quebec, Labrador (which has 28,000 people in 294,000 sq Km's)........

A military defense is the only defense that is possible. You need boots on the ground to claim/defend the land.

I do agree that Canada should develop industry further in the north, perhaps we can rip open a few more of these:

[Plett25]

I don't know about 2%, Canada hasn't spent that much since the 1960's... we went pretty much the whole Cold War under 2%. With the exception of the bump in spending due to the Afghanistan mission, we've been trending towards 1% since the breakup of the Soviet Union.

But I'd be onboard with 1.5% or 1.6% as a baseline long-term commitment, but with additional costs for Afghanistan type missions to be separately funded.

[undercoverbrother]

Originally Posted by Plett25

I don't know about 2%, Canada hasn't spent that much since the 1960's... we went pretty much the whole Cold War under 2%. With the exception of the bump in spending due to the Afghanistan mission, we've been trending towards 1% since the breakup of the Soviet Union.

But I'd be onboard with 1.5% or 1.6% as a baseline long-term commitment, but with additional costs for Afghanistan type missions to be separately funded.

Our military, has also been using #### equipment that was purchased in the 60's......trust me......It has been under funded for years and should change.

[FlamesAddiction]

Originally Posted by polak

lol arctic sovereignty. We have zero claim to most of the arctic. Sorry, I have more friends on Facebook than there are Canadians living in the disputed parts of arctic.

You want to fend of Russia, The US and other countries that are disputing our claims then we need to increase our infrastructure and civilian presence there, not our military presence. We have zero shot of defending the arctic by military means.


Take that 1% increase and apply it to subsidies on corporate investment in the arctic. Maybe establish one reason for the world to consider "Canadian" other than the fact that someone drew a line around it a hundred or so years ago when nothing up there mattered.

I agree. The "fight" over arctic sovereignty will be fought mainly by lawyers and politicians, not with military might. I am not sure if "being prepared" to defend it is a convincing argument if a country like Russia could still walk right over you. Having a military presence in the north is still a part of the picture, but in a court room, having a civilian presence probably goes a little further. Russia, the U.S. and other arctic nations are also prepared to defend it militarily, so we need to make a stronger case than that.

[indes]

Originally Posted by FlamesAddiction

I agree. The "fight" over arctic sovereignty will be fought mainly by lawyers and politicians, not with military might. I am not sure if "being prepared" to defend it is a convincing argument if a country like Russia could still walk right over you. Having a military presence in the north is still a part of the picture, but in a court room, having a civilian presence probably goes a little further. Russia, the U.S. and other arctic nations are also prepared to defend it militarily, so we need to make a stronger case than that.

Of course the lawyers and politicians will fight over it. Then whoever wants it bad enough to send their military in will get it. Sanctions aren't as effective as guns and resources.

[FlamesAddiction]

Originally Posted by indes

Of course the lawyers and politicians will fight over it. Then whoever wants it bad enough to send their military in will get it. Sanctions aren't as effective as guns and resources.

If that did happen, what chance would we stand against powers like the U.S. and Russia? That extra 1% of spending would be like wearing a helmet when skydiving. If the parachute doesn't open, then it won't matter.

Costa Rica has no standing army and no one challenges their sovereignty based on their ability to militarily defend their territory. Obviously Canada's arctic sovereignty is not an open and shut case, otherwise the need to for military defense of it would not be necessary. Canada should be doing more to make our arctic sovereignty a non-question, thereby diminishing the need for a larger military presence. Increasing military spending on that issue is like treating the symptoms of the problem without getting to the root of it. The issue is even more complicated because we are mostly concerned with jurisdictional maritime/continental shelf resource rights, and not land borders.

Given Russia's aggression and the increasing roll of NATO for peacekeeping and nation building, I would support increased spending on those issues though.

[Regorium]

I think so. While 2% of our GDP still isn't going to give us any extraordinary military capabilities, it will give the proper equipment to our forces and fulfill our obligations to the alliance.

Personally, I think it's disgusting that all the European countries are cutting military spending and hoping for the US to come bail them out. While we'd still need the US to bail us out, I think it'd be a lot easier to build american support if they knew that we stand by them to the best of our own capabilities.

And I really don't care how they want to pay for it. Spending cuts or increase in taxes don't matter to me. Personally I would prefer an increase in taxes, but I'm not sure what government would have the political capital to do that.