By Scott Taylor
On Wednesday, May 28 newly sworn in Defence Minister David McGuinty gave an address to kick off the 2025 CANSEC exhibition.
For those outside of Canadian military circles, CANSEC is the largest annual defence and security trade show in Canada. Held at the sprawling EY Centre in Ottawa, organizers claim that this year's CANSEC attracted over 12,000 industry, military and government delegates from Canada and around the world. This group included more than 600 VIP's and over 40 international delegations.
The attraction was the weaponry, vehicles and munitions on display in 280 exhibitor booths.
McGuinty was only appointed to his current post when recently elected Prime Minister Mark Carney named his cabinet on May 13. Thus McGuinty's breakfast speech at CANSEC was highly anticipated as a stage-setter for the roughly 1,000 defence industry executives and senior military officers in attendance.
In the interest of full disclosure, I was in attendance that morning, and I have attended every CANSEC show since the exhibition was first held in 1998. I can honestly say that in those 27 years the mood at CANSEC among the gathered arms dealers was the most optimistic by far. There is definitely 'blood in the water' to use a shark analogy as everyone realizes that the Canadian Armed Forces are in dire need of just about every weapon platform you can imagine.
There is also the worrying commentary from US President Donald Trump threatening to annex Canada. In bowing to Trump's pressure, Carney made the election promises to bring Canada's defence spending up from the current 1.3 per cent of our Gross Domestic Product (GDP) to 2 per cent GDP sooner, rather than later. Carney also ordered a review of the ongoing F-35 fighter jet purchase with a view to seeking non-American defence suppliers in the future.
McGuinty's speech writers are to be given full credit as they realized this venue, at this juncture, was a key opportunity to build bridges with those who supply the CAF with gear.
As such McGuinty made the point that moving forward the rebuild of the CAF will be done in partnership with industry. "We're moving quickly to ensure our military has the tools to defend our country and continent, while remaining an engaged, reliable partner abroad," McGuinty said. "Here's the key message I want to leave with you here this morning. This work can only be done in partnership with you."
Where McGuinty really won over the room was when he discussed the possible timeline. In his closing remarks he pledged the newly re-elected Liberal government will take "immediate and decisive action to rebuild Canada's defence capacity."
The word 'immediate' was the most discussed issue among the attending delegates for the remainder of the two-day exhibition. Many were buoyed at the prospect of a Liberal government finally cutting through the Gordian's knot of bureaucracy that reduces Canadian military procurement projects to that of a snail's pace.
However, more keen eyed attendees realized that in the wake of McGuinty using the word 'immediate', the minister actually made no further 'decisive' announcement. For those of us that have become accustomed to hearing words and not witnessing deeds from successive Liberal and Conservative governments, McGuinty's failure to make an 'immediate' action in the wake of using that particular word, speaks volumes.
Fast forward to Thursday June 5 wherein McGuinty was attending a defence ministers' meeting at NATO Headquarters in Brussels. In response to questions from the European media, McGuinty backed away from the word 'immediate, telling them instead that 'the federal government will have more to say “very soon” about its alliance spending commitments and will be “making announcements in this regard.” All of this is in advance of the NATO leaders' Summit which will take place at the end of this month in the Netherlands. It is widely expected that many of our allies are seeking to raise the current NATO spending objective to 5 per cent of GDP.
With Canada flailing and stumbling to get to the two per cent bench mark, suddenly we’re looking at more than tripling our current defence expenditure? As Charlie Brown would say 'Good Grief'!.
