Expert says Canadians ready for increase in military funding

University of Calgary's Jean-Christophe Boucher, speaks with Alberta Primetime host Michael Higgins about Canada’s commitment to increase defence spending.

University of Calgary political science associate professor Jean-Christophe Boucher speaks with Alberta Primetime host Michael Higgins about Canada’s commitment to increased defence spending.

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

Michael Higgins: This is being described as the biggest increase for Canada since the Second World War. How would you describe this as a turning point for the Canadian Armed Forces?

Jean-Christophe Boucher: It’s long overdue. For several years now, experts and even allies have suggested that Canada’s defence spending was too low for the kind of commitments we wanted to make in the world. The Trudeau government increased those budgets a little bit, but now this is a major inflection point where we’re moving into an environment where there’s going to be a lot of dollars put on defense spending, a lot new platforms, a lot of transformation in the forces and how we think about defense policy in Canada. I think this is a significant increase.

MH: Obviously the military is at the centre of this, but how far do you see this extra funding extending? Where could all of these dollars end up going?

JCB: The Government of Canada said they’re going to spend 3.5 per cent on defence spending and 1.5 per cent on capital spending associated with national security. There hasn’t been a lot of detail on what that 3.5 per cent has been for.

A suggestion, for example, was that we would fold the Coast Guard into that funding — the Americans do this. So, there’s some moving budget lines between Excel spreadsheet columns. I don’t think some of it will not be new money, but there’s indications that we’re going to start to increase funding for platforms or for different kinds of things, maybe new submarines.

There are also conversations in Ottawa about cloud sovereignty, AI sovereignty, and that would be part of the funding. So there’s a lot of new things that we want to do in the defence environment that will be part of that funding.

MH: But it could extend beyond defense, though, could it not?

JCB: Absolutely. So maybe we won’t really see this, but right now in Ottawa, everything that touches foreign policy is on the draft block. The Carney government right now wants to push a new foreign policy document, which hasn’t been done since the (Paul) Martin years, so that’s 20 years ago.

There’s also a new national security document that’s coming in. So although the 3.5 per cent on defence is really kind of the first big announcement on defence policy, we’re going to see investment on national security conceived largely in borders, infrastructures, A.I. All across the board, all departments that touch national security or international security in a certain fashion will see their spending increase.

That means public safety and a lot of other actors in that ecosystem. So we’re going to see a massive change in foreign policy, in our posture and how we’re doing things, but also a lot of new money into those capabilities.

My sense is that, in the next couple of years, we’ll see a much more competent Canada, but also a more assertive one.

MH: How do you see Canadians responding to such an expansive change?

JCB: For a long time, the common wisdom was that Canadians didn’t like defence spending. What I find interesting is that at the University of Calgary, we have had a seven-year look at public opinion on national defence, and what we’ve seen consistently for the last five years is that Canadians are ready to spend more on defence.

In fact, when we’re asking Canadians, ‘Would you be willing to increase defence spending a lot more?’ People would say yes, even more in Quebec than elsewhere. I think when we’re looking into this, it also is tied to how Canadians are perceiving the international system.

The last couple of years we’ve seen actors like Russia, like China, like Iran, a lot more aggressive in international space and challenging Western rule-based order. We’re seeing right now the United States is less willing to sustain that environment, and somehow Canada now is stuck in an environment where it has to fend for itself.

So Canadians have been responding to this, and we’ve seen this in the polls. I’m not seeing a lot of opposition to that spending. I think most Canadians are ready for that.

MH: Does the rest of the world, friend or foe, respond in kind with military buildup to match NATO?

What kind of global defence or threat environment could all of this create?

JCB: Everywhere in the world there’s increased defence spending, not just in Russia or in China, but also amongst NATO allies. Some of the neighbours of Russia for example, Poland or the Baltic states are spending almost four per cent of their GDP on defence. It makes sense because they’re bordering Russia, but even in Germany, and France and Japan. Everywhere in the world, people are increasing their spending.

It’s important for Canada too, because when we go abroad and when we try to co-operate and collaborate with these actors, the first question is always, ‘Canada’s here. What can you do?’ If we have no money or no capabilities, then our capacity to shape these relationships is limited.

People are saying, ‘Canada is nice, but they can’t commit anything’. Whereas now, because our capabilities will increase and because our allies will also increase their capabilities, it means that we’ll have a more assertive Western alliance. It also means that we’re going to be able to move away from a U.S.-centric environment into a much more multilateral world.

MH: The military obviously has a significant presence in our province, CFB Edmonton, Camp Wainwright — maybe most notably Fort Wayne Cold Lake, Canada’s busiest fighter base.

What is this NATO commitment going to mean for military installations in Alberta?

JCB: A couple of things. There are indications that salaries within the Armed Forces will grow. I think that’s good news. There’s a lot of indications that those didn’t match Canadian wages.

There’s also a lot of these installations and capabilities that are still lagging behind, or they need to be improved, so I think we’re going to see spending all across the board, not just on defence or bases but also in our industry. When we listen to the Carney government, they’re talking about A.I. cloud computing, they’re talking about all sorts of investment in all areas of our defence industry from satellites to bullets and ammunition.

So all across the spectrum, across the defence industry, we’re going to see a lot of investment into those environments and some trickle down right into our province.