Canada makes mega bucks selling to the US war machine

[JohnyCanuck]

When PM Jean Chretien took a pass on the Iraq war, Canadian business leaders, wingnuts and the US amabassador warned that Canadian businesses could jeopardise cross-border business deals and lucrative US military contracts by pissing off the mentally-challenged boy-president south of the border.

According to this article in the Toronto Star it appears Canadian businesses have not noticed any dropoff in sales to the US military machine. Meanwhile the Aussies and Brits are crying in their beer that their arms suppliers and death merchants are still having a hard time getting their foot in the Pentagon door.

But a decade's worth of publicly available U.S. government contract data, obtained and analyzed by the Star, shows just how integrated Canadian companies are in the U.S. business of war.

Records show more than 4,300 contracts — worth $2.5 billion (U.S.) — were won by Canadian companies from 1997 to 2002, the period this investigation focused on.

<snip>

Meanwhile, executives at companies in Britain and Australia — members of the so-called coalition of the willing — are increasingly upset that they are not reaping any material rewards from their countries' decisions to join Bush.

They want what Canada has enjoyed for decades, and continues to enjoy — a cozy 51st state status when it comes to dealing with the U.S. military.

It can well be said, Canada didn't go to war in Iraq but Canadian business did.

Human rights groups and anti-war activists have long argued as much, criticizing Canada's military industry for its behind-the-scenes involvement in American and other military conflicts. They say it contradicts Canada's more visible — and palatable — image as a peacekeeping nation.

Canada didn't go to war, but out businesses did

I guess with the exchange rate difference between the US and Canadian dollar, the Pentagon feels it's getting a bargain on its equipment purchases from Canada and knows full well that the Canadian military couldn't supply more than a token force for an Iraq invasion anyway. Never forget the Pentagon is always hard at work making sure you US taxpayers are getting value for your money.

It was the same in the Viet Nam war. Canadian businesses made out like bandits supplying the US military with equipment even though Canada kept well out of the way when it came to involving our own troops in the morass.

During the 1990s, Canada exported military equipment to several governments engaged in war. Chief among these was, of course, the U.S. that has always been Canada's largest purchaser of military equipment. Even during the worst excesses of the 1960s - during the Vietnam War, when three million people were killed in Southeast Asia - Canadian industries were assisted by our government in ensuring a steady supply of military hardware to fuel the U.S. war machine.

The fact that the U.S. has engaged in more interventions and invasions than any other country this century has never stopped the Canadian government from actively promoting military exports to our friendly neighbour to the south. Neither have Canada's military exports been stopped because the U.S. has armed, financed, trained and equipped dozens of covert wars, organized death squads, backed military coups against elected governments, undermined and rigged elections, assassinated foreign leaders and propped up ruthless dictators who offer bargain basement, union-free factories and all-round cheap access to natural resources.<7>

www.converge.org.nz/pma/atmyth.htm


So Chretien earns some brownie points with the anti-war crowd by keeping Canadian troops out of Iraq, but the Canadian government and Canada's business establishment are more than happy that Canada can earn some greenbacks by playing a role in keeping the war machine supplied. Sounds a lot like HYPOCRISYto me.