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Canada’s NATO response: A missed opportunity

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By Zachary Wolfraim:

Meetings of the Defence Ministers at NATO Headquarters in Brussels - Meeting of the NATO-Ukraine Commission (NUC) (Source: Reuters)

Earlier this May I analysed Canada’s tentative re-engagement with NATO given its full-throated defence of Ukrainian sovereignty and its commitment of military assets to NATO’s reassurance mission in Eastern Europe. The deployment of F-18s, the participation of a Canadian frigate in NATO’s Standing Naval Maritime Group, as well as additional headquarters staff, raised the profile of Canada in the NATO alliance and is a welcome step given that Canada was seen to be somewhat disengaged after the end of the Libya campaign and its withdrawal from Afghanistan. Indeed, it is noteworthy that Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper was one of the longest-serving leaders of one of the founding NATO member states at the Wales Summit, however there was no distinct Canadian ‘stamp’ on any initiatives adopted. Now, in the wake of the NATO Summit in Wales this past week, can this still be characterised as a significant re-engagement with the Alliance? More broadly, does this signal any kind of change in direction for Canadian foreign policy?

Over the weekend Prime Minister Harper made a number of foreign policy announcements related to Canada’s commitment to international security. He grudgingly committed Canada to spending more on defence, however, he had previously noted that increasing spending to the NATO target of 2% of GDP would be unpalatable to Canadian taxpayers. By the Harper government’s reckoning, the Canadian public is not overly keen on spending on foreign policy or defence and moreover, spending on defence has not been a guarantee of international influence. Given that Canada’s defence spending currently lies around 1% of GDP it represents a disconnect for the government with regards to its previous public commitment to supporting and investing in the Canadian military. The current government had been withering in its criticism of the previous Liberal governments who slashed defence spending during the 1990s (to a comparable 1%). This disconnect between investment and rhetoric undermines Canadian credibility as ultimately, Canada has little ability to back up its threats with actions and raises questions about the actual priorities of Canadian foreign policy.

NATO and the Afghanistan mission were paramount up until they were no longer politically tenable and Canada unceremoniously withdrew from combat operations in 2011, pushing aside the ‘in-together, out-together’ mantra. The Conservative government had been keen to stress its links with the military and a willingness to utilise ‘hard power’ in response to crises unlike preceding governments which had favoured multilateral, diplomatic solutions. Nonetheless, the current Conservative government has been willing to follow the lead of other nations when it comes to determining a response to Russian aggression in Ukraine. This however, remains a fundamentally reactive response and reflects a wider shortcoming in the current government’s approach to diplomacy. Though this government has eschewed the idea of ‘going along to get along’ it appears to be willing to do so provided some conditions and coalitions are right and as long as it allows for strong rhetoric. This has been the case with Canada’s recent deployment of the Canadian Special Operations Regiment to northern Iraq to assist multinational efforts against ISIS. That said, while a positive contribution this once again reflects a reactive response to international affairs and ultimately a solely military response.

Years of disengagement from the UN along with other multilateral partnerships mean that Canada while certainly still respected for its contributions to various initiatives, is left out in the cold when it comes to actually influencing international affairs. While content to offer ‘bullhorn diplomacy’, and making bellicose statements, it has done little of the behind-the-scenes diplomatic work to actually try and remedy these issues. This naturally absolves the government of any failures when it comes to major foreign policy initiatives. However, it also means that Canada’s influence in the world is also diminished. The government needs to acknowledge that influence in the world does not come only through military contributions and trade, but that diplomacy and development also matter.

NATO requires the diplomatic and military capabilities of all its members in the face of growing threats from Russia as well as the Middle East, on top of its current NATO commitments in Afghanistan, the Balkans and off the Horn of Africa. While the NATO Summit in Wales reaffirmed and reinvigorated the Alliance, the real work has yet to be done – namely staffing, basing and supplying the Rapid Reaction Force along with continuing to put pressure on Russia for its invasion of Eastern Ukraine and Crimea. Indeed, the Alliance needs countries like Canada to not only remain staunch supporters, but also to undertake vital public diplomacy and communicate the value of the Alliance in order to maintain its momentum and relevance. Given that the Harper administration has focused largely on headline diplomacy it seems unlikely that there will be a concerted effort to rebuild the NATO relationship to levels it once reached, nor to regenerate Canadian diplomacy more broadly.

Canada’s attitude towards NATO is indicative of a fickle approach to world affairs which has focused more on immediate public diplomacy rather than any kind of overarching strategic aim or narrative. The government has stressed trade but thus far its crowning achievement, a Canada-EU free trade agreement, has languished since it was signed in principle last October and has yet to be fully concluded. While the importance of trade shouldn’t be underestimated, using this as a central platform for diplomacy does not offer many avenues for future crisis management or leveraging Canadian influence in other forums. Ultimately, the current government has not articulated a clear vision of Canada’s place in the world and by failing to seize on the initiative leading up to the Wales Summit, has lost an opportunity to reinvigorate Canadian diplomacy and reinforce Canada’s international influence.

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Zachary Wolfraim is a PhD researcher in the Department of War Studies, King’s College London, where he focuses on the role of narratives in shaping foreign policy in relation to NATO operations. He previously worked as a consultant in NATO Headquarters on operations in Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya. You can follow him on Twitter @ZachWol.

The player: "Plot for Peace"

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Editor’s Note:

This movie’s highlight for those like myself fascinated by diplomacy, its study, theory and practices, is its exceptional depiction of Track II diplomacy. We see Olivier, French businessman, deeply involved in many of the preliminaries to the Angola-Namibian accords. Whilst the claim of the film, that this was crucial to the end of Apartheid, is somewhat far-fetched, we may well understand that this is the need of the market, to link to the obvious symbol of Mandela’s liberation as the end of that process.

On the other hand, the machinations, tribulations and frustrations of Track II diplomacy are well represented, as are the personal international networks that made this preliminary diplomacy possible. This film is also a fascinating corollary to anybody interested in the diplomacy of that period and conflict (see for instance G. R. Berridge, ‘Diplomacy and the Angola/Namibia Accords’, International Affairs Vol. 65, No. 3 (Summer, 1989) , pp. 463-47 <http://www.jstor.org/stable/2621723>) and looking to retrieve the personal, the informal, where institutions and ministries fail to reach the conditions for dialogue and necessitate the weird, the friendly, non-sovereign and influential intervention of a non-diplomatist like Olivier.

Pablo de Orellana
Editor, Strife

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The player: “Plot for Peace”

Plot for Peace - STRIFE

By Mike McCahill:

Jean-Yves Ollivier is a French businessman with a story to tell: how he came to be personally involved in securing Nelson Mandela’s release from prison. When we first meet Ollivier in Carlos Agulló and Mandy Jacobson’s impressively detailed documentary Plot for Peace, he’s playing solitaire in a shaded backroom filling up with his own cigar smoke, and professing his own skill at making order from the chaos of the world. Clearly, this is one of life’s cannier, savvier players, his rotund belly and ruddied cheeks speaking to a level of personal success; he proceeds to recount the circumstances of the greatest hand he claims to have ever laid down.

Ollivier moved to South Africa in 1981, and found it to be a nation on the verge of a grave and terrible schism: as some particularly choice, occasionally vicious archive footage makes apparent, this was a country determined to do just about anything to keep its poor black citizens from disrupting the high life its white elite were enjoying elsewhere. The status quo could only hold for so long, Ollivier sensed, and any destabilisation would prove damaging indeed to the West’s considerable business interests in the region - his own among them. As the violence stepped up, he hit upon the idea of mining his own gilded contacts book, with the aim of enlisting key figures from both sides to sit around the same table and thrash out a deal for peace.

There followed a torturously complex process of negotiation, which went on for several years before the ANC leader’s name came up: the talk had first to pass through events in neighbouring Namibia, and hit a major stumbling block in the form of Angola, beset as that country then was by both Cuban and South African forces, with the US, almost inevitably, starting to poke its nose in over the issue of the continent’s vast mineral reserves. In the midst of all this talk, it is possible as a viewer to start getting lost, although the tangled web of allegiances Ollivier’s narration sets out seems to prove beyond all doubt the enduring diplomatic theory that everything everywhere is connected - while also suggesting there was more of interest going on behind the scenes than the recent Mandela biopic pushed front and centre.

Ollivier’s claim is that his profile is such that it can open doors others cannot, while still allowing him to fly under the radar (in the case of one anecdote here, literally) if need be. All governments need guys like him to take the steps and carry the baggage state-accredited diplomats cannot. Needless to say, this leaves him a figure at least as controversial as might be heroic. You could well come out of the film arguing that Ollivier’s actions were governed more by self-interest than any more humanitarian or philanthropic impulse, although he’s the first to insist the economic sanctions imposed on South Africa at the time of his arrival weren’t helping anybody. Perhaps the ends do, sometimes, justify the means.

His contact book has, at the very least, helped the filmmakers to secure access to most of the key diplomatic and political figureheads of this particular moment, including Winnie Mandela and representatives from Congo Brazzaville, and Mozambique, further complicating the notion this whole tale might merely be one ageing white man’s prideful reappropriation of a defining moment in recent black African history. A reliance on talking heads to corroborate or redirect elements of the subject’s narration may prove a little wearying for the layperson - though enough of Ollivier’s reference points actually come to pass to leave one mulling over the idea there’s more fascinating truth in here than not.

Plot for Peace is touring selected cinemas nationwide ahead of its DVD release on Monday, 24 March.

 

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Mike McCahill writes on film for The Guardian, The Sunday Telegraph, The Scotsmanand Metro, and is the chief film critic for MovieMail. He has contributed to Radio 4’s Today programme, and made regular appearances on the Press TV show Cinepolitics. His reviews can be found in The DVD Guide (Canongate, 2006; second edition 2007), Halliwell’s The Movies that Matter (HarperCollins, 2008) and online at http://cinesthesiac.blogspot.co.uk. He’s a lover, not a fighter.

Canada: The retirement of a global peacekeeper?

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by Joana Cook

“We cannot close the door on diplomacy. We cannot rule out peaceful solutions to the world’s problems. We cannot commit ourselves to an endless cycle of violence, and tough talk and bluster may be the easy thing to do politically, but it’s not the right thing for our security.” At least our American neighbours to the south think so, as Obama said this week while discussing the recent breakthrough nuclear deal with Iran.

Following tense, and earlier secret negotiations, the P5+1 consisting of the US, Russia, UK, China, Germany and France struck a deal with Iran. This deal, in exchange for the lifting of a number of strict sanctions imposed by the UN, EU, and US (valued at $7 billion USD), will see Iran take a number of clear actions to curb its nuclear program. These include Iran ceasing enrichment above 5%, neutralizing its stockpile which currently exceeds this, and granting greater, regular access to inspectors to its two key nuclear sites, Natanz and Fordo, amongst other clauses.

While this deal has received some criticism in the US, and the expected opposition of Israel, even Saudi Arabia, Iran’s regional rival, offered cautious optimism. So why has Canada opted for a position that can be viewed as cynical at best?

Canada, once viewed as an international peacekeeper, and often still thought as such by its population, has now assumed a stance that can be viewed, in frank terms, as negative and uninspired. Canada justifiably shuttered her embassy in Tehran in 2012 and has ceased any type of relationship with the Iranian government since due to its nuclear ambitions and human rights abuses. While certain P5 members, such as the US and UK, had previously done the same, seeking broader security goals took precedence and high-level contact was carried out between these parties over an extended period of six months to reach this breakthrough deal. This is not the case in Canada, whose Minister of Foreign Affairs, John Baird, stated he was “deeply sceptical of the deal and Iran’s intentions” and had no intention of engaging in the foreseeable future. While stating that Canada wants to be part of a diplomatic solution, and will continue to work through organizations like the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), little was offered in the way of innovative or inspired approaches that Canada could take to support the constructive actions of the past weekend. It also appeared that higher goals of lasting security, or what positive implications improving relations could play in other areas (such as its influence in Syria), were simply sidelined.

What is now appearing to be an aged, though historic, highpoint for Canada in international diplomacy was its 1957 Nobel Peace Prize won by Canadian Liberal politician Lester B. Pearson for negotiating a peaceful end to the Suez Crisis. As introduced in the presentation speech, Pearson was applauded for his qualities, demonstrated during the crisis - “the powerful initiative, strength, and perseverance he has displayed in attempting to prevent or limit war operations and to restore peace in situations where quick, tactful, and wise action has been necessary to prevent unrest from spreading and developing into a worldwide conflagration”. It is a sentiment which could be easily applicable to modern day Iran, but what is lacking is this same will and spirit.

Canada’s current narrow, even, arguably, non-existent, vision for what is achievable through diplomatic channels risks side-lining itself not only from future negotiations with Iran, but also from other potential opportunities that may rise for it to again utilize its past strengths as negotiator, mediator, and peacekeeper. It will take a strong stance from Canada to do this, but there is no reason it can not engage with Iran while continuing to hold her position and stress the importance of human rights, particularly at this pivotal stage in Iran’s new leadership. With peace talks for Syria now planned in Geneva in January 2014, and instability currently threatening the Central African Republic, there is certainly no lack of opportunity to re-establish a positive global role for Canada in the world.

Simply put, Canada must reflect inwards. It must reassess not only how it views its current position, but also, more broadly, what role it wants to perform on the world stage or whether sitting in the audience will be enough.

Britain, Rwanda, and the DRC: Using aid for diplomatic aims.

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By Katie Cornish

In July, the UN released an interim report alleging Rwandan government support to the M23 rebels
in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The UK, Rwanda’s largest bilateral donor, withheld scheduled
budget support, with Prime Minister Cameron setting out conditions for resumed aid. A few months
later, Andrew Mitchell released the funds on his final day as international development secretary, a
decision sparking much controversy. Two months later, Mitchell’s successor, Justine Greening, has
again suspended direct budget support to the Rwandan government.

On the surface, withholding aid from a government backing a rebel group guilty of raping women,
pillaging villages, and recruiting child soldiers seems obvious. If the Rwandan government has
resources to finance war in the DRC, then it must not need the UK’s budget support. But the decision
to withhold budget support may pack more than it appears, and relying on aid as a political carrot or
stick has the potential to be quite problematic for the aid effectiveness agenda.

In 2005, donors and recipient countries met in Paris to discuss aid effectiveness. The result was
the Paris Declaration, which highlighted five principles of ownership, alignment, harmonisation,
managing for results, and mutual accountability. The Paris Declaration was later followed up by
the 2008 Accra Agenda for Action, which renewed donor and recipient commitments to the Paris
Principles. At both forums, donors committed to using recipient government systems to deliver aid
wherever possible, directly supporting recipient development strategies and priorities.

So what does this have to do with Britain’s decision to withhold budget support from Rwanda?
There are a few key elements of the aid effectiveness agenda that the decision contradicts. First and
foremost is a commitment to mutual accountability. Under the Paris Declaration, donors commit to
“provide timely, transparent and comprehensive information on aid flows so as to enable partner
authorities to present comprehensive budget reports to their legislatures and citizens.” Not only did
the British government provide very little notice that aid would be withheld, in a matter of months
that decision was both retracted and reinstated. Treating aid like a tap that can be turned on and off
poses obvious challenges for effective budgeting and planning.

Secondly, the decision contradicts principles of alignment. Under the Paris Declaration, donors
agree to “draw conditions, whenever possible, from a partner’s national development strategy or
its annual review of progress in implementing this strategy.” Alongside this, additional conditions
require sound justification and should be coordinated amongst donors to the extent possible. Using
aid as a political bargaining chip contradicts commitment to agreed-upon conditions, risking an aid
culture where recipients must cater to ever-changing donor conditions. Furthermore, using aid as a
political stick may very well be ineffective when there is a lack of consensus amongst donors, as is
the case with the response to Rwanda.

Finally, the decision challenges the principle of ownership, whereby donors agree to “respect
partner country leadership and help strengthen their capacity to exercise it.” Principles of aid
effectiveness suggest that development should not be imposed by the West, but rather that
developing countries should own their development process. Once an agreement has been made
between donors and a recipient country, the recipient’s obligations are limited to the likes of demonstrating accountability for donor funds, establishing sound development strategies, and
working to strengthen institutions. If donors are truly committed to this value, than these should
be the only conditions imposed and donors should refrain from using aid to interfere in national or
regional politics.

This entry does not intend to condone the actions of the Rwandan government, but rather highlight
the dilemmas that policy makers are confronted with when it comes to the delivery of effective
aid. If one believes that aid should be completely benevolent and separate from politics, then they
must be prepared for these types of contradictions. On the one hand, donors face pressure to
achieve sustainable development results and good value for money through aid effectiveness. On
the other hand, they are encouraged by constituents and rights groups to use aid to send highly
political messages to support peace. But the reality is the two cannot often coexist. Aid cannot be a
bargaining chip for diplomacy and an effective tool for sustainable development.

At the end of the day, donors will have to make tough decisions regarding the use of aid. Should aid
be used as a diplomatic tool for peace in the DRC, at the risk of disrupting services and development
for the poor in Rwanda? Politicizing aid inherently requires donors to take chances. Should the
Rwandan government respond positively to pressures from the UK and others, it may yield positive
results for Rwandans and Congolese alike. Should it fail, the poor and vulnerable in Rwanda and
DRC may suffer. Donors can either approach aid with as much neutrality as possible, or take
responsibility for the short and long term consequences of politicizing aid. With a basket of both
hard and soft diplomatic tools available to donor governments, does aid have to be one of them?