Should I Even Be Surprised?
By: Quigley
on Saturday, February 26th 2005 at 7:55pm
It's odd, you know. I always liked Paul Martin as a finance minister, and greatly respected his balanced budgets, his sense of fiscal responsibility, and his ability to stand up to his megalomaniacal then-superior, Jean Chretien, and say, "no, it has to be done this way." I often thought during the (far too many) years that Chretien was head of this country that Paul Martin was perhaps the only thing stopping it from collapsing entirely. If we had had, for example, Lloyd Axworthy, or Art Eggleton as finance minister for all of those years, I would not have been surprised to find our country today in a state of all out economic depression. What's confusing to me is that in light of all of that, I was never comfortable with the idea of Martin as Prime Minister. Despite my reverence and respect for the man as I knew him Back Then, there was a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach the day the announcement was finally made, and though I've since oscillated back and forth on the matter depending on the issue of consideration, it's never really gone away. The strangest thing of all is that I was never really able to put my finger on the reason... until now.
When I heard the news of his choice on the missile defense issue, it finally hit home: Paul Martin is a rational, intelligent man, who makes good political decisions on his own, but lacks the fortitude to defend them to the Canadian people. As finance minister, he was clear-headed and sharp, knowing that when our typically stupid, excessively socialistic population reacted badly to his prudence, there would always be someone else to take the brunt of the backlash. People liken the office of Head of Government to being at the helm of a ship, but Paul Martin knows what I know: it is more akin to being strapped helpless to the bow, beaten relentlessly by the waves. At least in Canada, where the public seems to be incapable of remembering how they voted, taking responsibility for their government, or, most importantly, distinguishing that government from its figure head. Despite the evident tension between the two, the Chretien-Martin team worked phenomenally. Martin made the country work as best he could, and Chretien was there to shut the idiot public up by telling them what they wanted to hear.
And so we reach the problem in Canada today. With Martin, seemingly the only intelligent federal Liberal alive today, in the role of Smiley Gladhands, there is nobody left to make good, strong decisions, and save Canada from the will of its own people. My evidence? See the link above.
Martin said Friday: "We would expect to be consulted.
"This is our airspace, we're a sovereign nation and you don't intrude on a sovereign nation's airspace without seeking permission."
I'm sorry, Mr. Martin, if it's to save your people from a potential disaster, then yes, you do, and you do so without question, and without hesitation. In time of trouble, the United States is not going to go booking an appointment with Paul Martin to discuss the issue and obtain proper permission - nor should they. They will do exactly what is called-for: protect their people at the potential cost of short-term diplomatic tension, and patch things up with us later - if, that is, they feel like bothering.
Has it not occurred to Mr. Martin that there may be something wrong with this need to constantly remind himself, ourselves, and the U.S., that Canada is a sovereign nation? That perhaps a nation confident in its own sovereignty, strength, and equality, would not require its supposed ally to ask before entering airspace on a non-aggressive mission?
If and when the time comes, Canada will be, as Paul Cellucci put it, outside of the room, and Paul Martin can bark all he wants, but in the end, it is he who will have put us there.
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Comments for Should I Even Be Surprised?
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2 Comments
Quigley Wrote...
Sunday, February 27th 2005 at 10:47am
I agree that, at least right now, we shouldn't be spending lots of money on the missile defense system. The chance that we will be targeted rather than the U.S. seems at this point to be rather slim. Perhaps there is a better chance that a stray, U.S.-intended missile would malfunction and hit us instead, and one could argue that point too, but I really don't feel like it.
The reason for my anger is that I didn't really think we were being asked for a financial commitment at this point - just cooperation, and input. They weren't offering total protection for us from what I understand. It was their system and their funds; they just wanted our consent and our input. I could be wrong; I haven't had a chance to research the figures involved, but really, if those figures even existed, the article should have mentioned them. Obviously they were looking for anything they could find to sway the opinion back toward a pro-Martin stance, or they would not have closed with comments from Layton.
In response to your fighter jet question, we already have roughly 200 F-18's, superior in a number of technical respects to the U.S. models. I'd be surprised if we had pilots to fly them all at once, but we've got the jets! I don't think that theory really works, though. Scrambling jets takes minutes; responding to such a threat as this may leave one with seconds. Remember what they told us on September 12th about the Pentagon? They didn't have time to protect the Pentagon by scrambling jets from Langley A.F. Base to intercept the attack. At the time I calculated that at 1/2 the top speed of an F-18, Langley Air Force Base is less than one minute from the Pentagon.
I think part of being paranoid (or careful) is not relying on someone else's quick action to protect you, and that's probably why the idea of a protection bounty isn't likely to happen. Besides, there's a lot more involved in chasing a missile than intercepting one, as I'm sure you're aware; the odds of success are slimmer if it isn't done working backwards from the target.
As for the fact that nobody has missiles with this type of range, that's really not decided, I don't think. All a nation would have to do is go semi-ballistic (low Earth orbit, slingshot around to desired point of re-entry, back into the atmosphere, realign using guidance system and fine-movement thrusters, boom!). The physics involved are incredibly simple; I wouldn't be surprised if you could program a cell phone to handle the navigation. And what else do you need? A warhead of some sort, physicists, engineers, determination, materials capable of withstanding high speeds and null atmosphere and a few G's without buckling or losing aerodynamics... and the money to put it all together. I could do that for $100,000 plus the cost of the warhead. Which means that anyone else could, too. I'm willing to bet the best reason it hasn't already done is the fear of reciprocity. Even the U.S. fears that, which is evidently why they haven't been into North Korea in a while, or, for that matter, China.
And Japan's space program is picking up...
I have to go back to work now - just some food for thought heh. :)
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2 Comments
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SmrtySsa Wrote...
Saturday, February 26th 2005 at 10:18pm
I think the whole missile defence system in both mechanics and political standpoints is sketchy.
I think Martin's "answer" was clearly pointed towards the masses. It was poorly crafted. But I'm one of those masses. I don't think money should be spent on a theoretical defence system that is years away from being useful. Can't we just buy a handful of nice fighter jets and some air-to-air missiles?
If someone were to launch a missile tomorrow at the US from the ocean sides there's a 20% chance of it making it (based on their short range test results, but of course these tests are "tests" and the interceptor knew there was going to be a launch) But, that would also require someone with missiles of long enough range. If someone launched a missile towards the US that came "over the top" the odds of it making it right now are slim-to-none. Why? because no one has missiles with that range, and if they did there's a whole bunch of euro/asian countries that would detect it first. Really what the US should be doing is putting out a "protection bounty" to EU and Russia if they're really that paranoid (which clearly they are) and say "Yo, We'll give you $1 Billion if you detect and destroy a missile targeted for US soil." And then shortly afterwards deploy mass amounts of millitary to the source and wipe out whoever launched it.