Canadian infantry and medical personnel take part in a medical evacuation demonstration on the United Nations base in Gao, Mali, in 2018.Adrian Wyld/The Canadian Press
Bob Rae is Canada’s former ambassador to the United Nations. This article is adapted from an earlier version in Policy Magazine.
The Department of National Defence has announced what it calls “a rebalancing of its global operational commitments to better align resources with evolving defence priorities in an increasingly complex security environment.”
It said that the 50 to 60 soldiers assigned to peacekeeping duties would be “progressively reintegrated” into other roles.
“These changes will better align CAF resources with current defence priorities, including defending Canada, supporting the Euro-Atlantic region, and contributing to Indo-Pacific stability,” a press release said.
Operations in Kosovo, Cyprus, South Sudan and the Democratic Republic of the Congo will be wrapped up by mid-2027. Other commitments will be maintained, in the Sinai Peninsula, elsewhere in Africa and in the Middle East.
But the effect cannot be avoided: Canada is once again pulling back from its role as a global peacekeeper, to the point where it struggles to show that UN peacekeeping matters.
Canada cuts its UN peacekeeping forces as it tilts to Europe and Indo-Pacific
This announcement was made as if it only involved some minor shuffling of personnel, of no importance to anyone else.
In reality, the wording in the announcement is “economical with the truth.” These were cuts DND long wanted to make. And it risks redefining Canada’s international role.
The opposition within the Department of National Defence to United Nations commitments is deep-seated and thoroughly embedded. During my five years at the UN I had experience with this reluctance.
This ill-conceived announcement must be changed, and given the two-year time frame, it is not too late.
Other NATO allies continue to engage in providing personnel to UN operations. The U.S. of course barely does. And therein lies an important tale.
Canada’s integration with the Pentagon is about more than people, supplies, and equipment. This is also about a mindset; the integration of a way of thinking between the Pentagon and DND is deeply subordinate.
Opinion: Canada’s peacekeeping commitments have plunged to an all-time low
Canada’s withdrawal from peacekeeping has been years in the making. It is not clear that the Security and Defence Strategy that is supposed to be in the making will have any coherence on peacemaking, peacebuilding, and peacekeeping, even though these remain critical to our security, and, yes, our prosperity. Investors hate conflict.
At the Canadian mission to the UN in New York there is a dedicated group of DND personnel, both military and civilian, who have for decades tried to maintain a credible Canadian presence in discussions on the planning, financing, and operation of major UN missions. Canada’s deputy permanent representative to the UN is currently presiding chair of the committee that oversees these missions.
Canada’s international reputation has long hung by a thread: We were only in the game because of history, steady payment of regular UN assessments, and willingness to engage at the political level.
Justin Trudeau’s government came forward with the Elsie Initiative, which aimed to increase women’s participation in peacekeeping, and assigned some additional key personnel.
Of course, the thinking and strategy of many UN and other peacekeeping missions need to be reassessed. But this unilateral announcement has undercut Canada’s credibility in engaging in these discussions.
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The Carney government cannot let this stand as our last whimper on UN peacekeeping. The Prime Minister has rightly said that nostalgia is not a strategy. But to tackle global threats to security – from conflict and terrorism to displacement and human trafficking – is critically important strategy, not nostalgia.
These issues have to be part of a wider discussion about defence and security, and in particular about how to strengthen Canadian sovereignty and what the full breadth of our international commitments and engagement look like. We now have the resources to better plan our commitments. We should do so, not withdraw.
The argument that the decline in Canadian peacekeeping has been longstanding is true, although it is important to remember that commitments to missions in Haiti under Prime Minister Jean Chrétien and President Bill Clinton had the full support of the UN, as did the NATO mission in Afghanistan.
But the fundamental point is that any review of Canada’s national security needs to consider the value of UN peacekeeping missions in Africa, the Middle East, and elsewhere that are challenging, difficult, but in some form necessary.
Above all, it must be remembered that strategy without resources is better called hallucination.
Canada’s security policies need to be joined up. Security and development are essential partners. They are not the exclusive purview of any one department or branch of government. They belong to all of us.