Valpy: You Can't Hide the Military Anymore

The Globe's Michael Valpy is offering a thoughtful analysis of why, it seems, it's now okay to be "out and proud" to be a Canadian Forces member.

Actually, that's a bit of a misidentifier: it's always been okay to be proud to be part of the CF. It's just that public support has grown tremendously, away from the old idea that Canadians were "peacekeepers, not warriors." The latter attitude has been around, apparently, since Sir John A., who preferred his armed forces to be citizen reservists. (Then again, it has to be remembered that Sir John A. still wanted Canada to be British; if the country needed full-time soldiers, they could always cable London to send a regular regiment.)

Valpy attributes the military's now acceptable public visibility to three factors:

• the aging "boomer" population is getting more conservative, with a more accepting attitude towards soldiering as part of increased security


• the military did incredibly good (and visible) work during major disasters, like the Manitoba floods and the ice storm


• vigourously active CDSes such as Ray Henault and Rick Hillier, aggressively promoting the work of the CF

The result is that the CF has gained, in stature, as a client group of the government for funding, earning much bigger clout. The worry, for Canada's elites, is that this new attitude is getting uncomfortably close to the flag-waving attitude of the Americans towards their own military.

Personally, I don't see any harm in that. The ability to wage war is a serious business, requiring careful analysis and study based on empirical experience. It's one of the reasons why Americans invested such a huge amount of time, money and effort into military culture -- a significant bit which comprises military history.

The article ends with an interesting question:

"“What we know is that Canadians are supportive of the troops, and it's a dramatic and important thing when lives are lost, and we're sympathetic and supportive. But whether or not we're supportive of further kinds of engagements like Afghanistan ... this could be one of the last of these things for a long time, and if there's no Afghan mission, what the heck does the Canadian military do?”

This really gets back to the idea of "lessons learned," and it means that DND needs to predict what the next conflict is going to be like. There have already been some noises about patrolling the Arctic, and of course there's disaster relief to think about as well. But it also means a better look at the CF infrastructure -- equipment, logistics, pay, benefits, recruiting and retention -- are going to get a serious look.

And they're going to get that look with Canadian public support, which is the point of Valpy's article. And the real, unasked question is: will that support stay at this level? Or will Afghan withdrawal force it back to the beginning of another "decade of darkness"?

(Cross-posted from The Phantom Observer.)