As Trump once again threatens to destroy all of Iran, Canadian politicians won’t even condemn the US president’s rhetoric, let alone push to reduce military ties. And in an embarrassing turn, the annexationist president is the one who has paused a major bilateral military accord.
Just before speaking with an Israeli Prime Minister pushing to restart a full-scale war against the country of 93 million, Donald Trump posted on Sunday “For Iran, the Clock is Ticking, and they better get moving, FAST, or there won’t be anything left of them. TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE!” A week ago, the leader of the only country ever to have employed nuclear arms suggested he might employ these horrific weapons again saying, “If there’s no ceasefire you’re just going to have to look at one big glow coming out of Iran.”
In a prior example of rhetoric even supporters of the US/Israeli aggression ought to denounce, Trump said, “If they don’t sign this deal, the whole country is going to get blown up.” That same day the president posted to Truth Social, “the United States is going to knock out every single Power Plant, and every single Bridge, in Iran. NO MORE MR. NICE GUY!” A week beforehand Trump threatened “a whole civilization will die tonight never to be brought back again” and then declared “Open the Fuckin’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell.”
To the best of my knowledge the last time any Canadian politician directly condemned Trump’s unhinged rhetoric was after he threatened to destroy “a whole civilization”. And even then, it was mostly NDP representatives who didn’t demand any concrete action.
Elsewhere leftist politicians have been far bolder in opposing Trump’s despicable threats, repeatedly calling to withdraw from NATO or end the US military presence in their country. Sunday, France Insoumise presidential candidate Jean-Luc Mélenchon responded to Trump’s post by noting, “The blatant threats from Trump and Netanyahu to destroy Iran are only possible thanks to European complicity. World peace has been reduced to the interests of Trump and Netanyahu’s colonialism. Long live the end of France’s alignment with these criminals! 2027, let’s break the leash! Let’s become independent again.”
Leaving aside any push for “independence”, no prominent Canadian politician is even calling to pause joint military exercises with the US. Nor is any MP saying we should withdraw from the hundreds of bilateral military accords Canada has with the US. In fact, military leaders are more likely to openly call for continuing, even deepening, ties to the US military. After a previous visit to push deepening ties, Chief of the Defence Staff Jennie Carignan promoted the deep integration status quo in a Le Devoir interview last week headlined “La défense nationale du Canada reste liée de près aux États-Unis”. Similarly, a Walrus article headlined “Ottawa Says It’s Not Involved in the Iran War. It Might Be Lying” reported on a “February LinkedIn post from Rear Admiral Kristjan Monaghan, Canada’s defence attaché to the US and commander of the Canadian Defence Liaison Staff, states that more than 750 CAF members serve across America as part of the North American Aerospace Defense Command and in ‘exchange roles’ internationally. ‘They plan with, fly with, sail with, and operate alongside their American counterparts in support of continental defence and Canada’s security interests,’ the post says.”
As Trump threatens to annex Canada and Greenland, kidnaps the Venezuelan president and wages a massive war on Iran while bombing 8 other countries, the Canadian military is boasting about its extensive support for the US war machine. It’s criminal. And pathetic. The US president is threatening annexation and openly seeking to undermine Canada’s economy.
Instead of Canada pausing a training mission or officer exchange or a bilateral military accord, it’s the annexationist president who has made the first move. On Monday the US Undersecretary of War announced he was pausing the US-Canada Permanent Joint Board of Defence, an 85-year-old bilateral forum.
The Americans clearly view this move as putting pressure on Canada to become even more subservient to US interests than we currently are. And they’re likely right, especially as regards Ottawa’s “defence” establishment.
It’s remarkable and telling about this country’s actual independence that no major Canadian politician has declared it’s time to cut ties to the war machine led by a warmongering psychopath.
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