(2) Strategy and Aid
| Published date | 01 March 1963 |
| DOI | 10.1177/002070206301800108 |
| Author | W. H. Pope |
| Date | 01 March 1963 |
| Subject Matter | Notes and Comment |
NoTES
AND
COMMENT
81
require
us
to
maintain
friendly
relations
with as
many
other
nations
as
possible.
Dr.
Sutherland
would
certainly
like
to
see
Canada
a
member
of
the
OAS,
thus
requiring
us
to
end
all
contact
with
Cuba.
He
would
probably
like
to
see
Canada
included
in
SEATO,
thus
ending
our
tenuous
commercial
contact
with
China,
and making
even
less
likely
than
at
present
development
of
friendly
contacts
with
North
Vietnam
or
North
Korea.
We
would
both
like
to
see
Canadian forces
maintained
at
least
at
their
present
levels.
Dr.
Sutherland
seems to
think
that
the
primary
role
of
these
forces
should
be
the
defence of
Canada,
and
their
second-
ary
role
as
part
of
the
strategic
reserve
of
the
free
world. Both
these
roles
are
illusory in
the
light
of
our
criteria, the
first
having almost
no
meaning
in
the
era
of
ICBMs
and
the
second
based
on
a
misconcep-
tion
of
the
utility
of
strategic
reserves
in
the
aftermath
of
an
atomic
war.
The
only
meaningful
role
we
can
envisage
for
Canadian forces, if
atomic
war
is
averted,
is
the
peace-keeping
role
in
which
they
are
now
chiefly
employed.
If
this
is in
fact
to
be
their
major
function,
a
much
higher
level
of
training
is
required
for
the
officer
corps,
particularly
in
languages,
in
geography,
in
anthropology, and
in
history
and
political
science.
Apparently
we
are
agreed
that
Canada should recover
the
ability
to
supply
and
to
transport
her
own
forces.
This
requirement
is
in-
herent
in
the
role
we
have
proposed
for
Canadian
services;
it
would
appear
to
be
quite
at
variance
with
the
close
integration
of
Canada
in
U.S.
defence
planning
that
Dr. Sutherland generally
regards as
both
desirable and inevitable.
Finally,
Dr.
Sutherland
would
welcome
the
further
involvement
of
Canada
in
the
system
of
world alliances
supported
by
the
United
States;
certainly membership
in
OAS
and
eventually
In
SEATO.
Our
criteria
indicate
that
there
should
certainly
be
no
extension
of
our
existing
commitments,
and
possibly
a
close
re-examination
of
the
reasons
for
our adherence
to
NATO
and
NORAD.
(2)
STRATEGY
AND
AID
W.
H. Pope
Ottawa
Dr.
R.
J.
Sutherland's
article
is
an
excellent
expose
of
the
con-
ventional
thinking inspiring all
of
Canada's
defence
policy.
He
accepts
our
geographic position
of
northern
neighbour
of
the
United
States
as
a
fundamental
fact.
Of
course
he
is
right
to
do
so.
But
he
Is
wrong
to
assume
so
uncritically
that
Canada's
defence policy
must therefore
be
merely
an
extension
of
U.S.
defence
policy.
In
the
pre-thermonuclear
era
Dr.
Sutherland's
assumption
would
have
been
a
natural
extension
of
the
conventional
thinking
appropriate
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