February 28, 2015

U.S.-Canada rift over Ukraine as big as that with Europe

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This week Ukraine celebrates the first anniversary of the Euro-Maidan revolution that toppled kleptocratic President Viktor Yanukovych and when Ukrainians became the first Europeans to die under the European Union (EU) flag. In the same week the second peace agreement signed in Minsk on February 12 collapsed for the same reasons as the first Minsk agreement signed last September: then and now, Russia and its separatist proxies failed to adhere to a single article of the Minsk agreements.

Therefore, it is only a matter of time before the EU will return to the question of tougher economic and financial sanctions and U.S. President Barack Obama has to decide whether to continue to fight his own Democratic Party, as well as Republicans and both houses of Congress, over whether to authorize supplying defensive military equipment for Ukraine (https://foreignpolicy.com/2015/02/18/lets-call-the-ukrainian-cease-fire-what-it-is-russia-putin/).

But, Canada, in addition to Western Europe, is also opposed to providing Ukraine with military equipment. With Minsk-2 having disintegrated at the strategic railroad crossing of Debaltseve from which Ukrainian forces retreated, will Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s government, which has been strong on rhetoric but weak on substance, and the Canadian Parliament continue to oppose the sending of military equipment to Ukraine?

While the rift between EU members Germany and France and the U.S. over the sending of defensive military equipment to Ukraine has been prominently highlighted, there has been no focus on as important a rift between the U.S. and Canada, the second in just over a decade since the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. Ukrainian Canadian activists point the finger at Germany and France for selling out Ukraine, while ignoring their own political leaders.The split between the then Liberal government and hawkish neo-Con Bush administration represented a strategically important shift in the NATO alliance as Canada broke ranks with the U.S. and Britain over intervention and regime change in Iraq. Today, a new rift has appeared between a Conservative government and the Canadian Parliament and a Republican-dominated U.S. Congress and the U.S. president.

Both houses of the U.S. Congress support sending defensive military equipment to Ukraine, while the Ukrainian Canadian Congress has found only two MPs who support this move in the House of Commons – a Conservative and a member of the National Democratic Party.

Former Liberal MP Borys Wrzesnewskyj stated: “As the founder of what at one time was the most active parliamentary friendship group, the Canada-Ukraine Parliamentary Friendship Group, I do not understand why the group has not passed a resolution demanding that Canada send defensive lethal weapons to Ukraine” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= pfsfqf3Xk3M).

Last December the U.S. Congress adopted the Ukraine Freedom Support Act that provides for all-round economic, financial, democratic and security assistance to Ukraine. There is no such equivalent legislation in the Canadian Parliament.

The U.S.-Canada rift is perhaps best seen in the plethora of editorials and opinion page commentaries in the British and U.S. media in support of sending defensive military equipment to Ukraine and a generally tougher policy toward President Vladimir Putin’s Russia. There is an absence of such media coverage in Canada.

Former Ukrainian Ambassador to Canada Vadym Prystaiko complained last summer about the low level of support (http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/ukraine-has-not-received-canadian-aid-promised-months-ago-ambassador-says/article19735632/). After President Petro Poroshenko visited Ottawa last September, the promised aid was dispersed to Ukraine.

Nevertheless, just as President Poroshenko told the U.S. Congress that his country could not fight Russian troops and their terrorist proxies with blankets, Ukraine’s Debaltseve “Dunkirk” shows he could have told Canada the same thing about the winter clothing that was sent.Canadian government ministers and commentators have argued along two lines against sending defensive military equipment to Ukraine.

Firstly, the argument goes, Ukraine is highly corrupt and the aid could be stolen. While it is true that Ukraine has a high level of corruption, this is true for Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, with which Western democracies have long had security ties. Indeed, if Canadian special forces can train the Kurds to fight the Islamic State’s threat to Iraq’s sovereignty, why couldn’t they train Ukrainians to defend theirs? Training could be increased within long-running annual Canada-Ukraine Maple Arch and Rapid Trident exercises.

Training and advice are as important as military hardware in transforming Ukrainian forces into counterinsurgency forces, and such assistance by its very nature cannot be stolen. Training by Canadian special forces, considered to be one of the best in the world, would make Ukrainian forces more accountable, reducing civilian casualties arising from outdated Soviet-era military tactics that rely heavily on indiscriminate artillery and rocket attacks.

A second argument cited by those opposed to sending defensive military aid to Ukraine is that such aid could end up in the hands of nationalist volunteer battalions. Here, the answer is simply for Canada to do the same as the U.S. in sending assistance only to the Ukrainian military.

While Prime Minster Harper has used a megaphone in his attacks against President Putin’s destructive support for the conflict in Ukraine, his government and the Canadian Parliament have adopted weaker economic and financial sanctions than the European Union and the United States. The Harper government has responded that the purpose of the sanctions against Russia is to punish Mr. Putin’s government, not Canadian industry (http://ottawacitizen.com/news/politics/canada-under-pressure-to-strengthen-ukraine-crisis-response). New sanctions adopted this month have targeted the Russian energy companies Rosneft and Chemezov. Canada has also not supported the call of the U.S. Congress to provide defensive military assistance to Ukraine. What’s more, the U.S. will begin to train Ukrainian forces next month.

Now is the time for Prime Minister Harper to follow the lead of Lithuania and Poland, which have stated their willingness to begin supplying arms, and Britain, which has sold 75 Saxon armored personnel carriers to Ukraine. Canada should be on the same page as the U.S. on this important strategic decision.

Failing a repair of the rift with the U.S., Canada’s 1.5 million voters of Ukrainian descent will undoubtedly bare the Harper government’s reticence when they go to cast their votes in the next elections. Former Liberal MP Wrzeznewskyj said, ‘Ukraine will win this war of aggression that Russia has begun against Ukraine. The question is, at what cost? Will it be at the cost of 10,000s? Will it be at the cost of 50,000s? Will it be at the cost of 100,000 Ukrainians? This is why it’s imperative that the West finally act in ways that will change Putin’s calculus.’ (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uqg2GqLNFLA).

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