“I oppose Carney’s $100 billion attack submarine purchase”. Avi Lewis won’t say those words but wants peace minded activists who helped him win the NDP leadership race to believe that’s his position. What does it say about the party and Canadian politics that a leftist NDP leader can’t clearly oppose an unprecedented increase in a belligerent navy’s capacity to kill?
After waiting through an interview Lewis was giving before a speaking event Friday, I asked the new party leader why he backed Carney’s plan to purchase a dozen attack submarines, which are expected to cost $100 billion over their lifecycle. Lewis denied it, saying (correctly) he’s spoken out on Carney’s militarism. But I noted that he hadn’t expressed opposition to the unprecedented submarine purchase despite thousands emailing him to oppose purchasing vessels expected to be fitted with cruise missiles. He admitted receiving many emails on the matter but criticized the tactic of petitioning politicians as “not that effective”. Lewis then said I was “bullying” him by challenging his position and disparaged pressing politicians to take positions. At the end of the walk from a nearby park to the talk venue he labelled my questioning “boring”.
Throughout the two and half minute exchange Lewis refused to explicitly state that he opposed the submarine buy while claiming his position was “clear”. As far as I can tell, the NDP hasn’t said a word about a submarine purchase the government labelled “the largest defence procurement in Canadian history”. The Conservatives, on the other hand, released a critical statement within hours of Carney’s submarine announcement three weeks ago.
As Lewis’ reaction to my questioning makes clear, the NDP have calculated that they don’t want to explicitly state, “Canada shouldn’t buy attack submarines” or “Canada should buy four not twelve expensive new submarines”. Or “the cost of Carney’s submarines will cover Environment and Climate Change Canada’s budget for 58 years.” Or even “it is wrong to spend $2400 per Canadian to better assist the US war machine in intimidating and killing impoverished people abroad.”
“I don’t agree with Carney’s militarization” is not enough from Lewis. He can’t simply stay mum on submarines, Carney buying $7 billion in light armoured vehicles, joining a program to develop a sixth-generation stealth fighter jet, a new military drone research program, quarter trillion-dollar ongoing destroyer procurement, Defence Industrial Strategy, dispatching four ministers to an international arms bazaar, giving more arms to the NATO proxy war, purchasing $800 million in cruise missiles. (In what may have been a bid to dissipate criticism of his silence on the submarines, two days after the sub announcement Lewis released a statement opposing the NATO war bank and subsequently sent an email to an NDP list critical of it. He’s also opposed purchasing fighter jets from Lockheed Martin). A week ago, the Serfs noted that in the previous week Carney made “17 posts promoting the military industrial complex”. As such, is it too much to expect a purportedly anti-militarist NDP leader to put out a release or post once or twice a week criticizing Carney’s radical militarization?
While he hasn’t questioned Carney buying submarines, Light Armoured Vehicles, cruise missiles, etc. Lewis has repeatedly stated “Canada needs a modern and well-equipped military”. The need to say he supports a “modern and well-equipped military” every time he criticizes an element of Carney’s militarism highlights Lewis’ deference to the military industrial complex and its backers within the NDP.
Instead of simply articulating what he knows is right, Lewis disparaged activist pressure campaigns. Apparently, he continued doing so after I left. A filmmaker who videoed my questioning of Lewis wrote me stating, “After you left, I went inside just to listen to Avi’s interview. At first, he actually complained about you to the group around four or five times, until a nice lady in the audience asked him to stop. She defended you, he apologized, and after that he didn’t do it again.”
Why the defensiveness?
I waited ten minutes for Lewis to finish an interview, and journalists commonly question MPs on their way in and out of Parliament. It’s important to normalize pressing Lewis from the left, especially concerning his support for the submarine purchase. If he won’t speak out about submarines when it is front-page news, he’s emailed privately (as happened before the public email campaign), he receives thousands of messages or is challenged by an activist journalist then the pressure must be increased. If we want to have a chance of stopping or reducing Carney’s odious submarine purchase, we need the NDP to openly condemn it.
The submarine procurement is important because of its size and the fact Canada has barely had subs, but it also serves as proxy for Lewis’ willingness to buck the NDP’s history of promoting militarism, particularly the navy. Thus far Lewis is failing the submarine test.
Avi Lewis is unwilling to simply state that the $100 billion in public resources Carney is preparing to spend on attack submarines should instead go to putting thousands of Canadians to work in building social housing to combat the housing crisis.
Join thousands who have emailed Lewis and Green leader Elizabeth May asking them to oppose Carney’s costly submarine purchase.
Support Yves’ work. Donate Now.
