Managing the US relationship

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From The Globe and Mail Wednesday, Aug. 08 2012

Canada has to master the complexity of the U.S. political system

by Allan Gotlieb, Michael Kergin and Colin Robertson (For an interview between Robertson and  RCI’s Wojtek Gwiazda go to RCI site).

In three months we will wake up to see who Americans have elected as president, to the House of Representatives and a third of the Senate. We will be deeply affected by the results, whatever the political stripe of those who occupy the White House and take control of the two houses of Congress. Like it or not, Canadians do have a “dog in this hunt.” Geography, history, economics and culture have created a deep integration that goes far beyond a typical foreign relationship.

Condoleezza Rice, then national security adviser to George W. Bush, captured it well when she said, “Here come the Canadians with their condominium issues.” Not meant as a compliment, it was uttered in frustration at what administration officials felt was the picayune nature of the issues that we were bringing to the table. They were “domestic” – trade and commerce, transportation, energy and the environment, rather than the traditional statecraft of war and peace.

In terms of Canada’s national interests, however, the important issues are the picayune ones that deal with pipelines, dams, bridges, beef, lumber and the quality of the air we breathe and water we drink. This is a tribute to the maturity of a relationship in which it’s been almost 200 years since we last fired shots at each other. Would that the rest of the world had reached this stage of what Franklin D. Roosevelt described as “good neighbourliness.”

It is true, of course, that our relative dependence is asymmetrical – we depend on the United States as a market much more than it depends on us. But it is also true that we are their biggest foreign market – and there is nothing picayune about that.

Three inescapable truths emerge from our high degree of integration:

1. Most Canada-U.S. conflicts emerge as a result of the U.S. domestic, not foreign policy, agenda.

2. Their outcome derives from the uniquely American doctrine of the separation of powers, the Congress being primus inter pares. Our diplomacy must be based on these constitutional realities but also on the equally important truth – to borrow from Lord Palmerston – that in the Congress of the United States, Canada has no permanent friends, only permanent interests.

3. The initiative will almost always lie with Canada to make sure the issue is on the White House agenda.

More than any other country, Canada has to master the complexity of the U.S. political system. Unless we do, little progress will be made on most issues. There are too many players (every congressman a foreign minister), too many special interests, too many bureaucrats, too many lobbyists at the doors of Congress and the White House, too fragmented a power structure and too much truth in Tip O’Neill’s dictum that “all politics is local.”

Although the party affiliation of U.S. legislators or officials can sometimes be important, it becomes far less so than the sensitivities and skills with which the major issues in the relationship are handled.

For all these reasons, we need to take the long view in determining whether our challenges are being successfully met. Relationships are vital, especially between the president and prime minister, but narrowly defined special interests can sometimes trump the national interest. No better example can be found than the devastating softwood lumber dispute, which originated in Ronald Reagan’s first term and has continued for 30 years and counting. It took about a decade for our prime minister to persuade the same president and his successor to reverse his country’s position on acid rain. A protectionist tariff on shakes and shingles imposed by the U.S. almost derailed free-trade negotiations. Yet, as Brian Mulroney demonstrated, Canada never had a friend in the White House greater than Ronald Reagan.

Today there is frustration with President Barack Obama’s unfortunate decision to punt the Keystone XL Pipeline permit until after the election, but like shakes and shingles, this had everything to do with U.S. domestic politics rather than the national interest. Canada was collateral damage, which may yet prove temporary. Fortunately, on the issue of border access, which is of great strategic importance to Canada and on which the President has staked out a leadership role, we seem to be making steady, if slow, progress. When it works, that is how it works.

For a foreign power, the challenge of dealing with Congress is even more difficult. We tend to be treated as just another special interest, but one that cannot contribute to campaigns. As far as the White House is concerned, Canada is usually not seen as a problem. But this means we are rarely, if ever, top of mind. It is doubtful that an American president, who begins each day with a national security briefing, spends an hour a year thinking about Canada.

So we work the system, using all our access points, starting with our able ambassadors. But regardless of the frustrations, experience tells us that the best card that any Canadian prime minister has to play is his ability to talk directly to the president and engage him in those picayune condominium issues that come with sharing a continent.

Allan Gotlieb and Michael Kergin are former Canadian ambassadors to the United States and senior advisers at Bennett Jones LLP. Colin Robertson is vice-president of the Canadian Defence and Foreign Affairs Institute and senior adviser to McKenna, Long and Aldridge LLP.

On Canada’s Submarines and defending our maritime waters and commerce

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From the Ottawa Citizen, July 30, 2012 and the Vancouver Sun July 31

This month a Canadian submarine sank a U.S. warship. It was not part of the events around the commemoration of the War of 1812. Rather, HMCS Victoria demonstrated Canadian submarine capability by torpedoing the decommissioned USS Concord in waters off Kauai, Hawaii, as part of this year’s Rim of the Pacific (RIMPAC) exercises.

Begun in 1971, RIMPAC is designed to enhance the interoperability of participating forces in operations ranging from full combat, mine clearance, anti-submarine warfare, piracy interdiction and disaster relief. As Washington cements its strategic shift toward the Pacific, and we pay more attention to the North Pacific and the South China Sea, muscle-flexing exercises like RIMPAC will only grow in importance.

RIMPAC is the world’s largest international maritime exercise. It lasts six weeks and involves 42 ships, six submarines, more than 200 aircraft, and 25,000 men and women from 22 nations in addition to the U.S. and Canada.

Canada has participated in every RIMPAC and this year 1,400 Canadian sailors, soldiers and air staff are part of the exercise with Canadians in senior command positions. Governor General David Johnston witnessed part of the operations while aboard HMCS Ottawa.

With the rise of Asia, more and more commerce transits the Pacific to North America. It is the world’s busiest container route and this will only increase with the negotiation of trade agreements such as the Trans-Pacific Partnership.

Vancouver is the busiest port in Canada and we are making improvements to this vital gateway as well as to Prince Rupert. Regardless of oilsands pipeline proposals, shipping in and out of our West Coast ports is going to increase.

It is estimated that 90 per cent of international commerce moves by sea. We look to our Forces, especially the Royal Canadian Navy, to secure the safe passage of our sealanes and to contribute to collective security on the high seas.

Our refurbished submarines are an important addition to our naval capacity and our ability to both defend our waters and to project power. In his splendid The Price of Admiralty, military historian John Keegan describes the submarine as the “predominant weapon of power at sea.”

Looking forward Keegan concludes, “it is with the submarine that the initiative and full freedom of the seas rests.” This is the strategic context in which HMCS Victoria and her sister boats, Windsor, Corner Brook and Chicoutimi will operate. This is the strategic reality Prime Minister Stephen Harper recognized in his May speech when he said that, “Canada and its economy float on salt water.”

That is why the government has committed to cutting steel on a new generation of warships with the announcement in June of the National Shipbuilding Procurement Strategy (NSPS). It would be the largest military procurement in modern Canadian history.

Our national motto, From Sea to Sea, celebrates our oceans and our coastline — the longest in the world, enough to circle the equator six times.

But for too long we have done defence, especially of our waters, on the cheap. We spend about 1.4 per cent of GDP: well behind the United States (4.7 per cent), the United Kingdom (2.6 per cent) and even Australia (1.7 per cent). In terms of usable naval power we are situated in the bottom half of the second 10.

The Canada First Defence Strategy aims to redress this and earmarking the dollars through the NSPS should re-establish our shipbuilding capacity and bolster our naval power into the mid-century.

Yet we live in an impatient age.

The time and cost that it has taken to refit and make operational our submarines has stretched beyond what was originally envisaged but, in underwater operation, there is no margin for error.

Defence procurement is a mug’s game that frustrates all involved because of the long time horizons and the sophistication of the weapons systems. Who can predict, for example, the price of copper in 2020? Or a game-changing new technology or shift in the strategic environment, including climate change?

Squaring the circle between defined budgets, constantly evolving weapons systems and the strategic environment is the unhappy dilemma of defence establishments in democracies.

But prepare we must because when disaster or mayhem strikes, whether natural or man-made, Canadians expect that we will be “Ready, Aye, Ready.”

‘Hot Potato’ Award

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Noon, July 16, 2012 FORMER CANADIAN DIPLOMAT RECOGNIZED FOR PROMOTING REGIONAL U.S.-CANADA COLLABORATION

Colin Robertson, a Senior Strategic Advisor for  McKenna, Long and Aldridge LLP was given the “Hot Potato Award” for helping to increase collaboration between U.S. and Canada organizations and stakeholders at the 2012 Pacific NorthWest Economic Region (PNWER) Summit in Saskatoon, July 16.
Each year, PNWER has bestowed the “Hot Potato Award” to someone who has provided exemplary leadership in reducing tension between the U.S. and Canada in the Pacific Northwest, or played a major role in bringing greater awareness and collaboration across the border.

The award takes its name from the Pig War, also called the Potato War, a confrontation in the San Juan Islands in 1859 between America and the British Empire over boundaries. The incident was triggered after an American farmer shot a pig that was eating his potato crop. The pig belonged to an employee of the Canadian-owned Hudson’s Bay Company and was the only casualty of the otherwise bloodless-conflict. For more information visit the National Parks website.

A former Canadian diplomat, Robertson is Senior Strategic Advisor for  McKenna, Long and Aldridge LLP working with the Canadian Council of Chief Executives. He is Vice President and Senior Research Fellow at the Canadian Defence and Foreign Affairs Institute, an Honorary Captain (Royal Canadian Navy) assigned to the Strategic Communications Directorate. Living in Ottawa, Robertson writes and speaks on international affairs and is a commentator on CTV, CBC, CPAC and SUN-TV and a contributor to the Globe and Mail, Ottawa Citizen, ipolitics and a contributing writer to Policy Options.

Last year’s Hot Potato Award winner was Don Alper, Director of the Center for Canadian-American Studies and Beyond Policy Research Institute at Western Washington University.

For more information, contact: Gabrielle NomuraNWER Media Relations Summit cell phone: 306-539-7039 Email: gabrielle.nomura@pnwer.org

In dealing with the US: ‘Be Blunt and Direct’

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excerpted Excerpted from Canadian Prss:  ‘Buy Canadian energy, Sask. premier urges U.S’  July 16, 2012.

Saskatchewan Premier Brad Wall has made a blunt appeal to the United States to buy Canadian energy, which he says is as clean as that from many American sources.

Wall delivered the keynote address Monday at the annual meeting of the Pacific Northwest Economic Region, a bi-national working group of state and provincial officials, business leaders and academics….

Wall called on Americans to curb their “protectionist instincts” and said recent trade headaches have both Canada and Saskatchewan “looking at all options” on the trade front.

At the four-day conference, officials will search for ways to speed up the Canada-US border, reinforce energy and food security, and improve livestock health.

Former Canadian diplomat and bilateral relations expert Colin Robertson said Wall’s blunt tone is often what is needed to get through to the Americans.

“Its good for them to be reminded in direct terms, because that’s how Americans talk to one another — it’s much more direct,” he said.

Top trading partner in 37 states

Americans must constantly be reminded, Robertson said, that some eight million U.S. jobs depend on trade with Canada, and that Canada is the number one trading partner for 37 states.

“He reminded Americans that they matter to us, but we also matter a lot to them,” he said. “That’s a message Americans need to hear because there’s not always that appreciation.”

At the this year’s meeting, officials will search for ways to speed up movement on the Canada-U.S. border, reinforce energy and food security and improve livestock health.

Conservative MP Rob Merrifield, a member of the Canada-US Interparliamentary Group, said problems along the border cost Canada between $16 billion and $48 billion a year — the equivalent of one to three per cent of Canada’s GDP.

States and Provinces and regional co-ordination

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From the Saskatoon Star Phoenix, July 16, 2012

By Colin Robertson, The StarPhoenix

When it comes to foreign affairs and relationships between nations, the tendency is to frame issues in terms of the personalities of our respective leaders.

This is natural as the tough decisions, especially those around war and peace, are made at the top.

For big initiatives such as the current border and regulatory framework agreement with the United States, or participation in the trans-Pacific Partnership, the prime minister and the president need to be working from the same page. They must provide the political leadership in Parliament and Congress as well as drive the bureaucratic engine that sets in place the new rules of the road.

Canada and the U.S. are federations. In the case of trade and commerce, authorities are shared among levels of government. But when it comes to the rubber hitting the road or enforcing the practical side of work in an office, factory or farm – all of which affect issues of cross-border flow of people, goods and services – those authorities involve the provincial or state governments.

Nurtured without partisanship and quietly cultivated over the years by our premiers and governors as well as our legislators, these relationships are like the hidden wiring in our shared condominium. But the hidden wiring works best when there is a level of practical co-ordination to set an agenda and to achieve practical results.

For nearly a quarter of a century, the Pacific Northwest Economic Region (PNWER) has done this better than any other cross-border association. Membership consists of British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Yukon, Northwest Territories as well as Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana and Alaska.

This week PNWER legislators and business representatives meet in Saskatoon. Their agenda includes energy, agriculture and transportation, set against the backdrop of ongoing work on the border and regulatory reform. Once again, PNWER will bring together the minders and users of our shared border, with the aim of making it work better.

PNWER has had great success in developing pilot projects and showcasing excellence. It also uses its moral authority to push an idea or an initiative. The critical piece in the PNWER formula, missing from other cross-border associations, is its secretariat.

Based in Seattle, the secretariat keeps the ball rolling. Its U.S. location gives it legitimacy as a domestic player in the kaleidoscope of interests that constitute the often confusing American polity.

PNWER is results oriented. Take the smart driver’s licence, devised as a proactive alternative to the passport for travellers to the 2010 Vancouver Olympics.

Championed by PNWER, it won approval from the Department of Homeland Security, and is now used by most state and provincial governments.

That focus on results is the attraction of PNWER to business. The region currently is addressing how our West Coast ports would deal with a natural or manmade disaster. Mindful of the labour shortages in the oilsands, it is also working with Alberta to recruit talent in Washington and Oregon state, including veterans.

The Saskatoon meeting also will explore options to make cattle exports easier and less costly through electronic certification documents.

A bigger project, and vital to Saskatchewan interests, is managing the approval process that sends products such as pulse crops (which represent half of Canada’s trade with India) and potash by rail to Lewiston, Idaho, and then by barge down the Snake and Columbia rivers to ocean-bound containers in Portland, Oregon and Vancouver, Wash. Large equipment shipments come in through the same route bound for the oilsands.

This commerce underlines the integrated nature of our West Coast ports and makes a mockery of American protectionists who claim Canadian ports are stealing American business.

Expediting trade is central to PNWER’s mandate. Last week, the United States Trade Representative announced to Congress that it would begin a 90-day consultation on Canadian (and Mexican) inclusion in the trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), which is important on a couple of levels.

It offers an opportunity to place both Canada and the U.S. into an association of Pacific nations with even greater economic weight than the European Union, with whom we are months away from a freer trade agreement. It is especially important to PNWER members, given our shared Pacific orientation and our growing trade and investment.

TPP is also another vehicle to improve the vital continental supply chains that have developed since the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement and the subsequent NAFTA that brought Mexico into the tent.

Despite its association in U.S. eyes with outsourcing and job losses, NAFTA has worked well for all three partners over nearly 20 years. It now needs updating. The TPP offers an elegant way to achieve that while at the same time complement our ongoing work on the border and regulatory initiative.

PNWER this week will once again move the ball forward through informed discussion and practical problem-solving.

A useful outcome would be a strong endorsement of a TPP that includes Canada, the U.S. and Mexico. It would signal solidarity within PNWER and underline the voice and value of the relationships at the state and province level – our essential hidden wiring

On the Mexican election

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From the Ottawa Citizen, July 1, 2012

We need to pay more attention to Mexico Let’s remove the visa requirement. Awkwardly imposed in July 2009, it continues to rankle Mexicans and handicaps those who want to visit Canada for business or tourism.1 Jul 2012 Ottawa Citizen COLIN ROBERTSON On Sunday, as we celebrate Canada Day, Mexicans will be going to the polls. They will elect a new president to succeed Felipe Calderon who is constitutionally limited to a single six-year term. For most Canadians, Mexico is an accessible and slightly exotic beach holiday in wintertime or the location for macabre drug-related murders separating heads from bodies. Yet Mexico matters to Canada. It is an important if overlooked trading partner. It should be our pivot into the growing Latin American market. It is also of critical interest to the United States, our first and foremost strategic relationship. How the United States handles its southern border inevitably becomes the default for management of its northern border, notwithstanding our efforts at differentiation. There is also the political dimension of the 50 million Americans who claim Latino, mostly Mexican, heritage. We need to pay more attention to Mexico. The election of a new administration is the opportunity to re-set Canada-Mexico relations. Start with trade and the TransPacific Partnership negotiations now that we both have a seat at the table. The 20-year-old NAFTA ushered in a several-fold increase in trade but we’ve realized its gains. TPP is the vehicle for taking the economic relationship to a new level. For our trains, planes and automobiles, opening the Mexican border created an integrated continental supply chain that has served us well. The new parts plants in Mexico, many of them under the Magna flagship, have become an essential piece in the recovery of the automobile industry. Regenerating North American manufacturing will require a three-nation dialogue. The Obama administration is preoccupied with its own re-election so we should look for areas of common cause with the new Mexican administration. We bring to the table know-how and resources. Mexico offers a growing market with a population five times that of Canada. Its young, increasingly educated, workforce is literally down the road. The improvement of our transportation corridors by land, water and rail is a priority. We need to secure and establish redundancies for our electrical grids and pipelines, areas in which Canada has competence and experience. This should open the door to how we can improve mutual investment. We have developed significant banking and mining interests. This has not been reciprocated. Mexican investment in Latin America is $50 billion with $10 billion in Brazil alone. We need to try harder. If there is one lesson of the past two decades it is that governments need to better involve business in their deliberations. Governments establish the regulatory framework for growth but it is business that creates the enterprises that guarantee longterm jobs. We need a Canada-Mexico Business Council that involves our leading business associations but, more importantly, their CEOs. There are notable outliers on the Canadian side: for example, Bombardier, RIM and Scotiabank should all be enlisted to share their experiences and to identify problems that need governments’ attention. Labour mobility needs addressing. It may be a taboo subject with the U.S., but this is not the case with Canada and Mexico. Our migrant worker program has successfully supported our farming interests and we could roll this out into other service industries, including the oilsands where homegrown labour is insufficient. Let’s remove the visa requirement. Awkwardly imposed in July 2009, it continues to rankle Mexicans and handicaps those who want to visit Canada for business or tourism. Gov. Gen. David Johnston recently visited Brazil with an entourage of university presidents seeking more international students. Mexico should be next. Canada does governance well. The biggest challenge for the new Mexican government will be the drug wars that have claimed 50,000 lives during the Calderon administration. We have deep experience that we have shared around the world in how to run elections, educate judges, teach police, and train troops. We should also open a security dialogue with the long-term goal of integrating Mexico into NORAD. For further inspiration and ideas, look to the recently published Canada and Mexico’s Unfinished Agenda, the most recent in the “Canada Amongst Nations” series. Foreign policy is about pursuit of our national strategic interests. But with Mexico, mañana — tomorrow — has for too long characterized our relationship. Prime Minister Stephen Harper should be the first to telephone his congratulations to the new Mexican president and set up a meeting with Foreign Minister John Baird with the new Mexican administration. The ever-ready Baird will convince the Mexicans of our commitment, con mucho gusto!

Interview with David Akin on SUN-TV Daily Brief July 5,  2012

G20 Summit in Los Cabos

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Fro ipolitics Monday, June 18: A Canadian Primer to the G20 Summit in Los Cabos, Mexico

On Monday and Tuesday, the leaders of the major economic nations, their finance ministers and central bankers will meet to discuss global economic issues in Los Cabos, on the southern tip of Mexico’s Baja California peninsula. The leaders will be accompanied by their personal advisors, or ‘sherpas’ as well as the usual entourage of paparazzi, pundits, and protesters of what is euphemistically known as  ‘civil’ society. The Los Cabos summit will take place against the backdrop of the continuing euro-crisis, Sunday’s Greek and Egyptian elections and continuing turmoil in Syria.

What is the G20?

The G20, originally a meeting of finance ministers, their deputies and central bankers, was formed in 1999 in the wake of the Asian financial crisis, The member countries include the G8 nations: Canada, United States, Japan, France, Germany, Italy, United Kingdom and Russia as well as Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, Australia, China, India, Indonesia, Korea, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and South Africa. The heads of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank participate, as do the heads of the European Union and European Commission. In the previous G20 summits, the heads of government of the Netherlands and Spain have participated.

Collectively, they account for over 80 per cent of world trade and world production. They began meeting at the head of government level in November 2008 when President Bush convened them in Washington to deal with the economic crisis. G20 leaders reconvened in London (April 2009), Pittsburgh (October 2009), Toronto (August 2010), Seoul (November 2010), Cannes (November 2011), and next year they will meet in Russia.

In advance of the meetings later this week, there was a G(irls)-20 summit, building on the first organized by Belinda Stronach in advance of the Toronto G-20 to discuss the Millennium Development goals

Do we really need a G20?

Yes. Getting the major nations’ leadership together to discuss problems is a good idea. As Winston Churchill, who popularized the word ‘summitry’ observed, ‘jaw-jaw’ is better than ‘war-war’. World leaders have met in various forums regularly since the Second World War.  Henry Kissinger has described 2009 as the year when the new world order began. The United States, arguably for the first time since the Second World War, was obliged to recognize that its economic strength was no longer sufficient to go it alone. The G-8 group of leaders, set up in 1975 to deal with an earlier economic crisis occasioned by a rise in oil prices, had become insufficiently representative of the major economic powers given the rise of China and India.

What does the summit want to achieve?

The “to do” remains the same as last year: to resuscitate the global economy as it crawls forward to deficit control. After the biggest stimulus package in world history, recovery is still very uneven . There is division, especially since the election in May of French President François Hollande, about the emphasis on austerity and deficit containment as opposed to  the need, once more, for additional stimulus to create growth.

The Eurozone crisis continues, with the Greek contagion now threatening Spain and Italy. José Manuel García-Margallo, Spain’s foreign minister, has likened Europe to the Titanic and reminded his fellow Europeans “If there’s a sinking here, even the first-class passengers drown.”

Unfortunately in this situation, we are all Europeans and as the Bank of Canada warned last week:

“If the sovereign debt crisis in Europe continues to intensify, it would further weaken global economic growth and prompt a general retrenchment from risk. In turn, the weaker global outlook would fuel sovereign fiscal strains and impair the credit quality of loan portfolios. Together, these factors would increase the probability of an adverse shock to the income and wealth of Canadian households.”

What else will be discussed?

There are the other continuing crises:

  • How to achieve collective action to advance collective freer trade in the Doha Round, now the longest running trade negotiations.
  • How to save the planet from climate change, although this discussion is effectively punted to the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio Plus 20 summit) later in the week. Prime Minister Harper, U.S. President Barack Obama, German Chanc have deputized their foreign ministers or environment ministers to represent them.
  • How to keep the increasing millions of mouths fed, watered and free of pandemics. Around a billion people around the world suffer from hunger. Development assistance from the once ‘rich’ to poor nations declined last year for the first time in a decade.  The 2011 Global Hunger Index concludes that more than 50 countries were experiencing “extremely alarming,” “alarming,” or “serious” levels of hunger. Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia continue to be hunger hot spots and it is not just the developing countries that face food issues. ActionAid USA found that augmented corn production in the U.S. for biofuel led to a rapid increase in food import prices in Mexico. “Between 2005 and 2011, the tortilla prices rose by nearly 70 percent. Since 2005, the increase in ethanol fuel usage in the U.S. has resulted in up to $500 million in corn price rises in Mexico each year.”
  • How to contain terrorism and crime, with the Mexican hosts certainly able to provide first-hand examples on the problems of drugs, guns and human trafficking.
  • How to prevent everything going up in a nuclear cloud. Half a world away, the P5 (permanent members of the UN Security Council – USA, France, United Kingdom, China, Russia) and Germany will be meeting in Moscow in another encounter with Iran in an effort to contain its nuclear ambitions. Further sanctions are to be applied to Iran on July 1.

President Obama has said that nuclear proliferation is the one issue that keeps him awake at night and Iran and North Korea will continue to be the focus of attention. A second nuclear security summit was hosted by South Korea in Seoul earlier this year, as a follow up to the 2009 conference hosted by President Obama. Earlier this month, the UN Security Council voted to impose new sanctions that target Iranian banks suspected of connections with nuclear or missile programs, expand the arms embargo, and call for a cargo inspection regime.

What are the Canadian interests?

With half of our production destined for trade, our prosperity depends on a healthy world economy. As Harvard economist Ken Rogoff recently told Global TV’s Tom Clark on West Block, Canada would not escape a global recession.

On the big issue – a gameplan for European recovery, Prime Minister Harper and Finance Minister Jim Flaherty will underline Canada’s commitment to fiscal discipline and structural reforms to employment insurance and pensions as well an aggressive expansion of trading opportunities.

“Canada’s message at the G20 summit”, Mr. Harper told the Conference de Montréal last week, “is that economic growth and fiscal discipline are not mutually exclusive; they go hand in hand.” In his speech earlier this year at Davos, Mr. Harper spelled out the Canadian perspective:

“As I look around the world, as I look particularly at developed countries, I ask whether the creation of economic growth, and therefore jobs, really is the number one policy priority everywhere? Or is it the case that in the developed world too many of us have in fact become complacent about our prosperity, taking our wealth as a given, assuming it is somehow the natural order of things, leaving us instead to focus primarily on our services and entitlements? Western nations, in particular, face a choice of whether to create the conditions for growth and prosperity, or to risk long-term economic decline and, as we all know, both from the global crises of the past few years and from past experience in our own countries, easy choices now mean fewer choices later.”

For these reasons, and because of the correct belief that Europeans have the capacity, if they have the collective will to resolve their situation,  Canada (and the USA) will not participate in the most recent IMF bailout for Europeans. Canada’s fiscal deficit is about 1.5% of gross domestic product. The Government is aiming to balance its budget by the 2015-16 fiscal year. As Finance Minister Flaherty put it last week, “You’re not going to have economic growth unless there’s market confidence. You’re not going to have market confidence unless you have a solid fiscal plan that’s credible and believable by the markets.  And that’s where we have been encouraging our European colleagues to go.”

For Prime Minister Harper, it is another opportunity to press President Obama on our application to the Trans Pacific Partnership now under negotiation among the United States, Australia, Brunei, Chile, Malaysia, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore and Vietnam. Japan and Mexico are also seeking admission to the negotiations.  The Canada-Europe Trade Agreement (CETA) is in the final stages of negotiation and this is an occasion for discussions with the European leaders.

Canada, the G20 and our ability to ‘play at the top table’

The G20 owes much to Canadian engineering. As Finance Minister in the Chretien government, Paul Martin recognized that western dominance of the international economy would not endure so he  brought together his counterpart finance ministers in the emerging economies. It was smart public policy that also served the national interest. In any future recalculation of the biggest economic powers we would lose our seat, so better to create a bigger forum that recognized the current realities.

We belong to most of the multilateral clubs, including two in which the US is not a member – the Francophonie and Commonwealth. At our best we are informed, a constructive conscience, consensual and acting especially as a bridge between developed and developing nations, and coming up with useful initiatives – thus, for example, the Kananaskis Action Plan on Africa (2002).

In terms of international power dynamics, we have moved in a generation from the bipolarity that characterized the post World War II period to the unipolarity of the 1990s and now, a new era of multipolarity. Migration has made us a people of many nations and our pluralism is the envy of the world.

Our place at the top tables owes much to our relationship with the United States (it was Gerald Ford and Henry Kissinger who ensured that we were admitted to the original G7).  History, geographic propinquity, economic integration and culture give us a unique appreciation of Uncle Sam. The US is still the paramount world power and has demonstrated remarkable resiliency in times of crisis.

When we fail to appreciate this privileged position and act as a scold and nag, or ‘stern voice of the daughter of God’ in the descriptive words of former US Secretary of State Dean Acheson (whose mother was Canadian), we reduce ourselves to irrelevance.

But when we play our hand well, drawing on our capacity as ‘interpreter’ of the US to the rest and of the rest to the US, we leverage our place and increase our standing. It is something every prime minister since Mackenzie King has come to learn if not always practice. Heading into Los Cabos, Mr. Harper struck the right tone for the G-20 when he told the audience at last week’s Conference de Montréal, “As Canadians neither are we able nor do we desire to impose our views on the world. But Canada can demonstrate, through our actions, a model that works”.

Prepared by Colin Robertson with research by Conor Robertson.

NATO Chicago Summit

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A Canadian Primer to the Chicago NATO Summit  in Ipolitics.ca May 20 2012

Presidents, Prime Ministers, and Ministers responsible for foreign affairs and defense will meet in Chicago for the 25th NATO summit May 20 and 21, 2012 at the invitation of President Obama. It is predicted to be the largest meeting in NATO’s 63-year history. It has been designated a “National Security Special Event” by Homeland Security as the meeting is expected to be met with demonstrations by the occupy movement and a rainbow assortment of other protest groups, including the coalition of clowns. The conference takes place against a backdrop of crisis in the Eurozone and the uncertainty of electoral change in the United States and other European countries. It will be the first NATO summit for newly elected French president François Hollande, whose electoral platform included a pledge to pull French forces out of Afghanistan. The meeting follows directly on the G8 summit held on the weekend at Camp David.

What is NATO?
In the wake of the Second World War, the victors set up a series of international institutions. The foremost was the United Nations, with universal membership designed to advance human progress and prevent the “scourge of war”. At the same time, mindful of the growing division between the Soviet Bloc and the West, the western alliance set up a collective security agreement called the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. In the words of its first secretary general, Lord Ismay, NATO was designed to “keep the Russians out, the Germans down, and the Americans in”. Designed primarily as a collective security agreement, whereby an attack on one would be considered an attack on all (Article 5), it was also designed at Canadian insistence to have an economic dimension to promote trade, investment, and commerce between the members (Article 2).

The agreement was signed on April 2, 1949. Its original membership included twelve countries – the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, France, Denmark, Iceland, Italy, Norway, Portugal, Belgium, Netherlands, and Luxembourg. Turkey joined in 1952, West Germany in 1955 and Spain in 1982. France left the military alliance in 1967 and rejoined in 2009. With the collapse of the Soviet Union (1989), NATO membership has expanded to 28 countries, including most of the former Warsaw Bloc countries as well as the Balkan countries created with the dissolution of Yugoslavia (Albania, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Estonia, Greece, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, and Slovenia).

NATO is headquartered in Brussels, where Secretary General Anders Rasmussen, former Prime Minister of Denmark, leads its Secretariat. Member nations are represented by ambassadors (called Permanent Representatives) who sit on the NATO Council. Each country’s delegation also includes a Military Representative who sits on the Military Committee to provide advice on military policy and strategy. While there has never been a Canadian Secretary General, General Ray Henault, former Canadian Chief of the Canadian Defense Staff, served as Chairman of the Military Committee from 2005-2008.

What has NATO done?
NATO’s original purpose was to serve as a trans-Atlantic political and military alliance to deter Soviet aggression. However, since the end of the Cold War, NATO has expanded its operations. NATO forces were involved in bringing peace to the Balkans, an operation that continues today. NATO forces, under the umbrella of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), have been present in Afghanistan since 2003. In 2005, NATO assisted in the relief efforts following the Pakistan earthquake. In recent years, NATO has also provided support to African Union peacekeeping missions in the Sudan and Somalia. Most recently, NATO led the UN-sanctioned Libyan campaign, maintaining a no-fly zone and conducting air strikes against the Gaddafi regime. Canadian Lieutenant General Charles Bouchard directed the air campaign. Currently, NATO forces are involved in fighting piracy off the Horn of Africa.

Who pays for NATO?
The United States shoulders three quarters of the alliance’s operating budget. The balance used to be half Europe and Canada, and half the United States. In his valedictory remarks to NATO (June 10, 2011), former US defense secretary Robert Gates warned, “The blunt reality, is that there will be dwindling appetite and patience in the U.S. Congress — and in the American body politic writ large — to expend increasingly precious funds on behalf of nations that are apparently unwilling to devote the necessary resources or make the necessary changes to be serious and capable partners in their own defense.” In addition to the United States, only four countries meet the NATO commitment to devote two percent of the GDP to defense: the UK, France, Albania, and Greece. Since 2001, European nations have been cutting their defense budgets by an average of 15 percent annually. The United States, on the other hand, has doubled its defense expenditures over the same time period. As former NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer has remarked, “Defense and public opinion are a difficult combination in Europe”.

What is on the NATO agenda in Chicago?
NATO’s last summit (Lisbon 2010) endorsed a new strategic concept for NATO. The secretariat has grouped the agenda under three headings:

  • Afghanistan: The ISAF mission will shift in the next couple of years from a combat role to providing advice and training to Afghan National Security Forces. Last month, the US signed a strategic partnership agreement with Afghanistan. The US goal in Chicago is to begin to flesh out the outline of the agreement, so as to include contributions from allied and partner nations. On the second day of the conference, the 22 ISAF member nations who are not also members of NATO will join the discussions around the future of ISAF. Observers expect discussions will focus on issues including NATO’s shift to a supporting role in 2013, training and financial support for the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF), partnership with Afghanistan beyond 2014, and long-term international assistance, although explicit financial commitments are not expected until the Tokyo Donors conference in July.
  • Smart Defense in an age of austerity: Defense budgets in each member nation are being reduced. To more fairly share the burden of collective defense, members will be asked to commit to share and pool resources and capabilities and to collaborate on future procurement. The objective is to eliminate duplication and to provide interoperable hardware for the alliance. Looking forward, NATO has to figure out how it can better ensure readiness and operational capacity. General Abrial, Supreme Allied Commander Transformation, has said he will bring to Chicago a series of initial projects clustered around themes like training, education, logistics, sustainment and protection.
  • Partnerships: NATO has effectively become the global security force: part cop; part peacemaker; and part peacekeeper. Through partnerships with non-NATO members, (e.g. Australia and New Zealand in Afghanistan, the African Union and Arab League in Libya) it has also become a ‘coalition of the willing’, although willingness is an ambiguous term. However, protocols must be worked out to deal with the nitty gritty of operations in the field. Even within the alliance, the lack of common protocols hampered NATO operations in Afghanistan.

It is expected that there will be announcements around pilot projects, including air policing in the Baltic and the development of allied ground surveillance. Ballistic missile defense within Europe will also be discussed, although this continues to be contentious, with the Russians describing it as a provocation.

What about the future of NATO?
Recent NATO operations (Afghanistan, Libya, patrolling the Gulf and Straits of Hormuz) have been out of the European theater. If NATO is to become the hub for future Western Alliance military operations, especially given the US pivot to Asia and its focus on the Indian and Pacific Oceans, then NATO will continue to evolve. Partnership with non-NATO nations will become even more important.

What about Canadian interests?
Canada ended its combat role in Afghanistan earlier this year and its training role beyond 2014 is undecided. The NDP official opposition, echoing popular sentiment, wants the government to end the operation in Afghanistan, but the Harper government has not yet shown its hand. As Deepak Obhrai, parliamentary secretary to Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird told the House of Commons on Friday, “Canada is committed until 2014 to participating in an international mission to train Afghanistan security forces to prevent that country from becoming a safe haven for terrorists. We will assess what is necessary to meet these objectives and we have not made any final decisions at this time.”

Other allies, including the UK and Australia, have responded positively to the US request for continued military presence and financial commitment. Like every other NATO nation, Canada is looking to reduce its defense commitments. The decision made in June 2011 to withdraw from NATO’s Airborne Warning And Control System (AWACS) and the Alliance Ground Surveillance project, using drones, has been criticized by the Americans, in part because they fear a knock on effect by other allies. Nonetheless, Canada continues to make a contribution to NATO. In addition to continued economic assistance and trainers in Afghanistan, Canada is providing assistance in in post-conflict Libya.

A significant Canadian contribution to the trans-Atlantic dialogue in recent years is the Halifax International Security Forum held each November. Initiated and hosted by Defence Minister Peter MacKay, it draws ministers, senior military officers, diplomats, and the think tank world for three days of discussion.

Further Reading
Much of this primer is drawn from discussion and papers presented at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs conference on the future of the alliance (March 28-30). Partner organizations included the Canadian Defense and Foreign Affairs Institute and the Canadian International Council. CDFAI senior fellow Elinor Sloan presented NATO and Crisis Management Operations: A Canadian Perspective. See also David Bercuson and Jack Granatstein’s Lessons Learned? What Canada Should Learn from Afghanistan, as well as Paul Chapin’s Security in an Uncertain World, A Canadian Perspective on NATO’s New Strategic Concept (2010).

THe Budget and Foreign Affairs

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FroPruning and Clipping at Foreign AFfairs in the Ottawa Citizen, April5,2012

Diplomacy, according to former U.S. Secretary of State George Shultz, is like gardening. It requires continuing effort and perseverance and, on occasion, pruning and clipping.

Foreign Affairs, like the rest of government, has come under the knife. The recent budget promises to sell some official residences, extend time diplomats spend abroad, review their allowances, cut back on cars and examine Canada’s membership in some international organizations to see that we are getting value for money.

In doing so, we follow the lead of most other western governments. Internationally sanctioned stimulus having saved us from the calamities of economic depression, we now retrench public spending.

As in the past, there is fear and consternation about what this means for Canada’s international presence and our diplomats.

We are a people that derive a good part of what it means to be Canadian from our actions abroad. This is natural enough, especially in a country that celebrates the value of immigration and practices a pluralism that is the envy of the world.

So let’s look at the threatened cuts. Selling some residences could generate $80 million. But that choice must be made wisely, as a residence is an important diplomatic tool.

Taking inspiration from the playbook of Allan and Sondra Gotlieb, during the four years I was consul general in Los Angeles, we hosted more than 300 events at our official residence (compared to just one at our downtown office).

Most of our activity was in support of Canada’s film, television and music industry, usually in collaboration with provincial governments. Entertainment is a multi-billion dollar industry for Canada that we constantly strove to support. For example, in 2004, working with our Quebec colleagues, our campaign helped to deliver Canada’s first foreign language film Oscar for Denys Arcand’s Les invasions barbares. Our Canada Day celebrations focused on a province and helped their products into the Southwest U.S.

Selling the residence in Los Angeles would make no sense but recent audits reveal few residences get as much use. Decisions to sell need to be made on a case-by-case basis, mindful that we have a poor record of reinvestment.

Similarly, closing missions leaves a long-term bad taste in host countries. Far better to preserve a footprint. Keeping Canadian ears, eyes and a voice around the world is critical to our place in the world and, importantly, gives us standing in Washington.

Extending the length of diplomatic postings abroad will save the government money and, in most cases, is a good thing. It takes about a year and a half in situ — developing contacts and getting the lay of the land — before a diplomat is truly effective.

Diplomacy is about serving the national interest. Let’s remind ourselves what diplomats do abroad. They prospect for business, trade and investment; recruit immigrants, tourists and students; and in terms of peace and security, as Churchill observed “to jaw-jaw is always better than to war-war.”

The last decade in the Foreign Service has been difficult. The divorce and then remarriage of trade and foreign affairs was followed by a series of so-called “transformations” that put process ahead of policy development and delivery. Bulking up on bean-counters and senior management at headquarters in the post-Gomery wave of accountability did not advance our diplomatic game. You don’t do diplomacy out of your basement, as Jean Chrétien once astutely observed. An entertainment budget is another important tool for doing business.

Throwing public diplomacy under the bus was unforgivable and the senior bureaucrats of that period have much to answer for in terms of speaking “truth to power.” Where once we led, today we are behind in our application of public diplomacy.

Globalization is obliging diplomats and diplomacy to adapt and re-examine how they do business. The contemporary diplomat is equally comfortable in jeans relying on a laptop and GPS-equipped BlackBerry, as Daryl Copeland has observed in Guerrilla Diplomacy.

Let’s use this budget as an opportunity to review our Foreign Service: its objectives and conditions of service. It has been 30 years and, in terms of technology, another era since the McDougall Commission looked at our diplomats.

In John Baird, we have our most activist foreign minister in a generation and he reflects Canadian values when he speaks about human rights and religious freedom. He has the confidence of a prime minister committed to making “Canada a meaningful contributor in the world.”

We have dozens of trade negotiations in play to open doors for Canadian business. We are rightly re-examining our aid policies recognizing that a job is more important than a handout and that security and good governance are essential to economic development.

To do this work requires a diplomatic service that is at the top of its game. Diplomatic practice is about the hard language of priorities, set against resources. It means trade-offs, and a recognition of limitations. Clipping and pruning are as much a part of diplomacy as seeding and planting.

Canada and the Americas

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Americas strategy? It takes three to tango

colin robertson From Tuesday’s Globe and Mail Apr. 03, 2012

Our size and global placement give Canadians multiple perspectives as we compete in the international market. But these advantages too often distract us, at a time when we need to focus and follow-through.

History and early trading patterns make us an Atlantic nation. With half of all new Canadians coming from Asia, we now have a Pacific outlook that we embrace. Our climate is a constant reminder that we’re also a northern country, and the Harper government has made the Arctic a priority.

As we were reminded by Monday’s trilateral summit in Washington, we are also a nation of the Americas. Our propinquity to the United States has always been a challenge – initially around security, then through cultural seduction – as well as an economic opportunity promised by the world’s biggest market.

For most of our history, with the exception of the Commonwealth Caribbean relationships, we avoided our neighbours south of the Rio Grande. It was a Latin land of dictators and revolutions. Besides, since the Monroe Doctrine, the U.S. had staked its hegemony.

NAFTA gave us a serious relationship with Mexico but, as Monday’s summit illustrated, we continue to be a somewhat reluctant partner.

Taking advantage of our shared continent is a good idea, but it requires vision and boldness if we’re to realize the advantage of resources, market and labour. For now, trilateralism is on life support.

As we saw again Monday, these meetings are essentially “dual bilaterals” between Mexico and the U.S. and then, time permitting, between Canada and the U.S. We have to await the outcome of this year’s elections in Mexico and the U.S. before we can revive the North American idea.

Mexico deserves our support in combatting the drug menace as well as in developing its institutions. If we can wage war in Afghanistan and Libya, then surely we can lend a helping hand in our neighbourhood.

We also have increasing commercial interests. The World Bank says Mexico is the easiest place in Latin America to run a business and, by mid-century, Goldman Sachs reckons the country will be the world’s fifth-largest economy, bigger than that of Germany, Russia and Japan.

Meantime, we should be doing useful continental planning around our shared infrastructure – roads and rail, electrical grids and pipelines and at our gateways. And as soon as we fix our made-in-Canada refugee problem, let’s lift the visa for Mexicans.

With the exception of our ongoing commitment to Haiti, Canadian efforts toward the rest of the Americas have been characterized by quixotic spasms of tango-like embrace – joining the Organization of American States and committing to the now-moribund Free Trade Area of the Americas – followed by a long siesta.

The Harper government developed an Americas strategy with an emphasis on democratic governance, prosperity and security. We’ve made progress through a series of boutique trade agreements, but the grand strategy has been slow to take shape. As we approach this month’s Summit of the Americas, it’s ready for a “reset.”

It takes two to tango, and Latin American governments share responsibility for not taking advantage of Canadian interest and opportunities. During Stephen Harper’s visit to Brazil last year, he promised to be ambitious, saying that, for “too long a time we neglected relations. … Too much grass grows in the cracks on the road between out two great countries.”

Ambition is important. But so is perseverance.

Mr. Harper will need to devote more time and energy if we’re to demonstrate that there are more steps in our dance repertoire. The Canadian business community is engaged. Our mining companies are especially active, and our banks have long had a presence in the Caribbean that has since expanded, notably into Mexico.

Business can be a driving force for taking the relationship to the next level. Twenty years of freer trade has given Canadian companies experience and confidence that they can compete on the wider world stage. As we have learned in Asia, however, our commercial interests are advanced when ministers are there to show the flag.

For Canadians, the U.S. market and relationship will always remain No. 1, and we can take some comfort from Barack Obama’s promise on Monday to make the border “faster and cheaper to travel and trade.”

But the slow economic recovery increases the likelihood of renewed protectionism. Even when it’s not aimed at Canada, we are always at risk through collateral damage. It’s why, while we need always to keep our focus on the U.S., we should look to other markets in the Americas, starting with Mexico. And if we’re to keep the grass from growing back in the cracks, we need a good plan, perseverance and senior political level follow-through.