Canada needs to stop the ‘partisan slagging’ on Arctic security, expert says
Whitney Lackenbauer says conversation is filled with inaccuracies
Professor Whitney Lackenbauer gives a keynote speech Wednesday on assumptions about Canada’s approach to Arctic security, at the Aqsarniit hotel in Iqaluit. (Photo by Arty Sarkisian)
The national discussion on Canadian Arctic security is full of “hogwash garbage” attempting to “embarrass Ottawa” into pouring more funds into Arctic defence infrastructure, despite the lack of a real threat of military invasion of the region.
That’s one expert’s assessment, shared Wednesday in a keynote speech during the Nunavut Mining Symposium in Iqaluit.
“When people say we haven’t done anything or we haven’t done enough in terms of security, who has attacked us?” asked Trent University professor Whitney Lackenbauer, who is also an expert in Arctic defence.
He made this point to about 70 delegates in his speech about “getting serious about our assumptions about Arctic security.”
Lackenbauer has authored and edited more than 60 books focusing on the Canadian North and its security.
With global tensions rising and the cooling of the relationship between Canada and the current U.S. administration, Arctic security and sovereignty have become top of mind for Canadians and makes up part of all three major federal parties’ campaign platforms for the April 28 federal election.
These discussions often describe Arctic security and sovereignty as one thing, even though they require different approaches, Lackenbauer said.
“And premier, I think I share your view of what sovereignty is at its core,” Lackenbauer said, addressing Premier P.J. Akeeagok who was in the audience.
On Tuesday, Akeeagok said an important part of Canadian Arctic sovereignty is creating “healthy and resilient” Nunavut communities.
“Sovereignty is not a military problem if we’re just sending our military as a form of human flagpoles up to the North to say it’s Canadian,” Lackenbauer said.
The public is “bombarded” with articles and expert opinions about the Arctic as a “place that’s contested,” he said.
“Much of that has elements of truth to it. But in other ways, I think it can feed our own assumptions and not encourage us to get very precise about our thinking.”
In recent months, many of Lackenbauer’s fellow security experts have warned that Canada’s Arctic is not ready to face the threats posed by international tensions and is largely undefended.
Lackenbauer called that irresponsible “partisan slagging” directed at the federal government.
“Don’t believe a minute of hearing this stuff,” he said. “We do have a Canadian Armed Forces presence in the region. How has our security been threatened in a military sense that we’ve not been able to provide security for Canadians?”
To Lackenbauer, the Arctic became a place of “great power competition spillover.”
There is no significant threat to the Arctic communities themselves, he said, but military threats to Canadian national security could come “through” the polar region.
In an interview after Lackenbauer’s presentation, Akeeagok didn’t say whether he agrees that there is no direct threat to Nunavut communities.
“Defence falls within the responsibility of the federal government. That’s not within our mandate,” he said.
The mining symposium wraps up Thursday at the Aqsarniit hotel.
Now you guys are trying to say that. Bring more investigation and better public inquiry is going to be better, not just ask federal government. There’s got to be check with Health system and Police system and justice system. You guys only start pretending to be working when there is something up with you guys. You might be paid by government and get some information and just use them. Even though you guys make documentation and time and dates from your computer that can be investigated too. And make a lot of hours from work and still refuses.
Canada can show use of the Arctic by Inuit so Canada’s sovereignty should not be questioned from the tip of Ellesmere Island in the north to the Alaska/Yukon border in the west and the southeast tip of Baffin Island in the east.
Whether transit navigation of the Northwest Passage is allowed is an unresolved issue and one that Canada needs to be ready to back up with military force if necessary. That could be difficult as one of our opponents in this regard is our somewhat fickle ally the U.S.A.
Transit of the Northwest Passage aside I doubt that we need be overly concerned with Russia or China trying to surreptitiously open and operate a rare earth mine in the Arctic.
Other than being on guard for ICBMs and flights of Russian bombers there is not that much of a need for military strength in the north.
By the way, did the governments (Canada & U.S.) ever really say what they shot down outside of Deadhorse, Alaska and Dawson City, Yukon?
Whatever that was, it may be the real threat.
You just give out some more information and they wouldn’t care less until they really showed up. That’s how these governments work. I don’t care if we become Russians. They would care better to inuit then these people they say they do their work.
I just wanted to take this opportunity to share my favourite Irish word: “eejit”
This is the attitude of so many future conquered states, right up until the night before their invasion (think Poland, former Yugoslavia, and recently Ukraine). The “expert” speaker seems to know only about how North America has been to date, not how things have recurred in the rest of the world nor what reality we face.
Just because Canada undervalues it’s North and doesn’t support its people there doesn’t mean that others don’t.
Russia in particular has sizable populations in their Arctic regions.
Besides, US politicians don’t need to be aggressive to have an impact. They only need to signal that their resolve to jointly ward with the North is fickle.
Canada and Denmark should be collaborating on a proactive plan to secure Baffin Bay/Labrador Sea and tbh, I think that the US should not be allowed in our waters until such a time that they are fully collaborative partners again. It will be harder to claim exclusive sovereignty if their presence continues in the current climate
This article seems confused. Lackenbauer has written lots about Arctic sovereignty and security, as you can read on the North American and Arctic Defence and Security Network (NAADSN) website (www.naadsn.ca). He explains why people should not treat sovereignty and security as the same thing because this causes confusion. His recent work distinguishes between security threats through, to, and in the Arctic, and argues that the military threats that pass through the Arctic (like missiles and bombers) to strike at targets outside are not primarily caused by Arctic issues (like sea ice melt or resource competition or contested boundaries) but by broader global competition and technology that spill over into the Arctic. These military threats require a military response to defend Canada and North America as a whole, rather than being primarily about defending the Arctic itself (because it is not the target). He suggests that threats to the Arctic from Russia and China are not primarily military (meaning that those countries plan to attack or invade us) but threaten economic, political, and societal security. Think foreign ownership of mines and disinformation designed to polarize us. And he sees threats in the Arctic as primarily related to climate change, disaster response, and climate change, with investments in building Northern community resilience often representing the best way to address these challenges. His work on the Canadian Rangers and with Peter Kikkert on search and rescue and emergency management is a strong example. In the end, Lackenbauer’s critique is that many commentators are too quick to disparage past politicians and officials for not doing enough, rather than actually explaining the emerging Arctic security threats that we face today and into the future that require new investments. As you will see in his dozens of books and articles, Lackenbauer is a big supporter of the military and of defence investments in the Arctic, as well as a “Whole of Society” approach to security that involves many federal departments, territorial and Indigenous governments, Northern civil society, and the private sector.
Even with its military focused on the invasion of Ukraine, Russia continues to refurbish and expand its military infrastructure in the Arctic region.
Russia has 3 major military bases that are only a 7.4 hour flight directly across the Arctic Ocean to Nunavut. We all know the Rangers are going to fight in any invasion. While there’s the North Warning System, there’s no missile or anti-aircraft defence systems, and we certainly don’t have anywhere near enough of our own aircraft operational to repel an air invasion.
If the Russians wanted to take Alert, Resolute Bay or Grise Fiord, who’s gonna stop them?
“Russia understands that its main western adversaries still maintain overall superiority in the aerospace and subsurface maritime domains of the Arctic, but Moscow can still compete – conventionally and otherwise,” explains Dr. Troy Bouffard, Director of the Center for Arctic Security and Resilience at the University of Alaska Fairbanks.
wow ! did I just read that? boy oh boy if I was Trump I would definitely take Nunavut and Make It the Greatest State of the north , big fat period.
I listened to Lackenbauer’s talk this morning and interpreted his message as being: (1) Arctic sovereignty is rooted in the people of the North, and is not is question; (2) security is not only about military threats, but also about threats to our economy and political system posed by others who might want our resources (China) or might want us not to develop our mining economy because it would compete with theirs (Russia) or challenge their control of global markets (China and critical minerals); and (3) we need to make smart investments across various “sectors” of security, spanning from defence to community resilience. I think he made a convincing case that we need to invest across the board, including defence against threats that pass through the Arctic and threaten all of Canada and North America, including the Arctic.
Unfortunately our journalists are pressured for time and don’t give a lot of credit to their readers. Granted, if you read the comments section for too long you might not either.
I also heard him on CBC highlighting that Arctic security is a priority for all the parties in this election so they might differ on details but have general agreement that it is important. Maybe that is what this reporter means by “partisan slagging” and “hogwash garbage”.
When if decisions are left to armies military we would bomb ourselves into another stone age where the few survivors would be throwing stones at the other after everything else is destroyed. That is why more diplomacy is needed and why the hawks need to be reined.
This article is hot garbage. I am actually dumbfounded by how poorly written this article was, and how badly it misconstrues Whitney Lackenbauer’s arguments (which I have heard many times and which strongly advocate for smart investments in defence and security). Go and listen to or read Lackenbauer’s many recent interviews if you are interested in what he really has to say. Lackenbauer always emphasizes that military conflict may come to the Arctic (as it has always been a theatre for military force projection and competition), but any conflict in the Canadian Arctic will not be caused by Arctic drivers as much as the spillover of global affairs into the region. And he has written many, many books both justifying and explaining the military’s role in the Canadian Arctic. Don’t trust this article as an accurate reflection of his ideas.
“Sovereignty is not a military problem if we’re just sending our military as a form of human flagpoles up to the North to say it’s Canadian,” is a quote attributed to Lackenbauer (although it seems to be missing something). This story fails to complete the point that he actually made. He said we need to explain the PURPOSE for beefing up our military presence. Lackenbauer showed a slide that quoted from a 1969 document about how “It should not be ‘presence’ for the sake of ‘presence’, in the absence of any military rationale. To build a role for Canadian forces merely to satisfy the optical demands of political sovereignty would be to build on shifting sands.” His whole point was that politicians and commentators need to explain more clearly WHY Canadians need to make these military investments in the North, rather than simply referring to vague ideas about “sovereignty,” if we actually want to see sustained funding.
“Canada needs to stop the ‘partisan slagging’ on Arctic security” is a misleading heading. Lackenbauer complains about individual commentators making disparaging partisan critiques, not “Canada” doing so!
“who has attacked us?” Um… the whole point is to make sure they DON’T.
There’s always been interest in taking bites out of the Canadian Arctic for certain other countries. You gonna wait until we lose some before worrying about the rest? Recent events have proven we’re not going to get much help from outside the country.
And yes this is a big problem
But who do we blame for not fixing this when they already had 10 years to do something, and nothing was done
Blame the liberals for putting money in their pockets and not the security of the north. Yep increasing their income, and especially Singh’s pension.
LIBERALS HAD 10 YEARS TO FIX THIS AND THEY HAD DONE NOTHING
They do not need to be in government under any circumstances from this day forward, because of their selfish motivation, of lining their pockets.
How will you speak up to let the rest of Canadians know that the liberals increased their incomes and let the north suffer,