A vintage car passes by as the Canadian navy patrol boat HMCS Margaret Brooke enters Havana's bay, in Cuba, on June 14.Stringer/Reuters
Lawrence Herman is an international lawyer with Herman & Associates and a senior fellow at the C.D. Howe Institute in Toronto.
Canada has lost its way in the world. Its international influence and respect is in serious decline, as a result of a combination of poor political leadership and inept actions, especially during the nine years of Justin Trudeau’s government.
It is a challenge for any government to avoid foreign-policy missteps. Given the volatility in global affairs with unexpected crises beyond a country’s control, it is impossible to always get things right, as governments react and adjust to sudden events. But Canada’s errors in recent years go far beyond this, showing astonishing ineptitude – own-goals that will have long-term consequences, and are of the Liberal government’s own making.
Take Canada’s latest high-profile foreign-policy initiative, for instance. After media reports and a public inquiry uncovered massive evidence of blatant Chinese interference in our affairs, Foreign Minister Mélanie Joly’s visit to Beijing last week ranks as one of the most ill-conceived and self-defeating Canadian foreign-policy initiatives in recent memory. It is one thing to convey concerns to Chinese officials on the fringes of an international conference in a neutral venue in another country. But for our foreign minister to travel to China and meet her counterpart on Chinese territory – on their home turf, under these circumstances – makes Canada look like a weak supplicant, reinforcing the view that Canada lacks a clear sense of its own strategic interests.
Another own-goal without strategic value or direct benefit to Canada was Defense Minister Bill Blair’s decision to send a naval patrol ship on a courtesy visit to Cuba last June – a visit that, incredibly, Ms. Joly was unaware of. The Canadian ship’s visit coincided with a Russian naval flotilla in Havana’s harbour. Why on Earth would Canada send a warship to Cuba when Russian ships were there, especially without informing Canada’s foreign affairs minister? Cuba supports Russia’s war on Ukraine and Cubans have been fighting alongside Russian soldiers in that country. The contradictions surrounding this incident speak for themselves, making Canada look amateurish – and offer yet another example of faulty strategic thinking.
Another thoughtless blunder: the Prime Minister’s public criticism of Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s government on LGBTQ rights during a G7 summit press conference in Japan in May, 2023. Italy is a G7 country, a NATO ally and a key European power, meaning that it is in Canada’s strategic interests to reinforce the value of those ties, not show itself as a critic of that democratic country’s internal affairs. Imagine if the Italian leader did the same thing about Canada’s Indigenous policies.
Inept, ill-conceived and inappropriate statements by the Prime Minister go back to the early days of his government. A particular example was his speech to the UN General Assembly in 2017. Instead of speaking about Canada’s role in the world as a strong supporter of global peace and development, he spent his podium time telling the bewildered UN audience that Canada was a “work in progress” with a “legacy of colonialism,” failing its own Indigenous and LGBTQ communities. This was self-flagellation without precedent in that international body. No wonder international respect for Canada has been on the decline.
Yet none of these missteps – some of which will have longer-term implications than others – compare with the seriousness of Canada’s appalling performance in not meeting its NATO defence-spending obligations, with Mr. Trudeau saying Canada will only reach the 2 per cent of GDP spending in eight years’ time, an astonishing announcement that only adds to Canada’s declining reputation, particularly in Washington.
While trying to defuse criticism of Canada’s lacklustre defence spending, Mr. Blair made a last-minute announcement at the end of the NATO summit in July, saying that the government “is taking the first step towards the procurement of up to 12 conventionally-powered, under-ice capable submarines.” But there were few details, including the type, timing and costing, giving the impression to NATO allies that it was conceived on the fly for public-relations purposes. After all, this announcement came only weeks after the release of the government’s long-awaited defence policy update on April 8, which did not refer to any kind of submarine acquisition program.
Taken together, these blunders, large and small, have helped to diminish Canada’s international standing, a tarnished reputation that spills over into other areas and could entail negative economic consequences, particularly in dealing with whatever new administration is elected in the U.S. this November. A change in Canada’s foreign-policy direction, with a more determined sense of long-term strategic and sovereignty interests, is urgently needed.
Editor’s note: A previous version of this article incorrectly stated that the government’s April 8 defence policy update referred to refurbishing Canada’s four Victoria class submarines. The four submarines were not mentioned. This version has been updated.