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  28 mai 2020 | International, Aérospatial, Naval, Terrestre, C4ISR, Sécurité

  Post-pandemic world presents real opportunity to change U.S.-Canada relationship, experts say

  By AIDAN CHAMANDY MAY 27, 2020 As the COVID-19 pandemic rages and the American election gets closer, Canadian foreign policy experts weigh in on how the pandemic has affected bilateral relations, and where we go from here. As the November U.S. presidential election approaches, with the prospect of a second-Trump term a real possibility, and the COVID-19 pandemic upending life on both sides of the border, some Canadian foreign policy experts say they expect the fallout from the pandemic will have a lasting effect on the bilateral relationship and the post-pandemic period presents a good opportunity for Canadian foreign policy practitioners to take novel approaches to the age-old problem of over reliance on trade with the United States, regardless of who sits behind the Resolute desk on Jan. 20, 2021. One of the most high-profile issues currently facing the relationship is managing the nearly 6,500-kilometre border, especially as both countries begin to gradually reopen and COVID-19 cases continue to spike in certain locales. Both countries have agreed to keep the border closed to non-essential travellers until at least June 21. Certain cross-border health-care workers are permitted entry to either country, and trade and commerce continue to flow. Refugee claimants who cross into Canada at official points of entry and meet certain eligibility criteria under the Safe Third Country Agreement are also allowed to enter. The decision on when and how to open the border will likely become a much more difficult issue to manage as time passes, given the divergent political incentives of U.S. President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau (Papineau, Que.), said Christopher Sands, director of the D.C.-based Wilson Center's Canada Institute. The two leaders' differing political incentives are based “on the election cycle and the economy,” Mr. Sands said. “Trudeau was hit in the last election, but his election is behind him and he has a huge advantage because of the official opposition leader's weakness.” On the economic front, however, Mr. Sands said, is where Mr. Trudeau's job gets trickier. “Canada's economy was almost in recession in the fourth quarter of 2019. Canada is going into a recession and has been performing bad, economically, for some time. Mr. Trudeau is not in a strong position,” Mr. Sands said. Canadian gross domestic product (GDP) growth was largely flat from the third quarter to the fourth quarter of 2019, and that trend continued into early 2020 with factors such as rail disruptions contributing to the slow growth, according to data from Statistics Canada. In March, GDP dropped nine per cent and the most recent Labour Force Survey data showed more than three million Canadians have lost their jobs due to the pandemic. Because Canada's economy was already a poor performer prior to the pandemic, Mr. Sands said it behooves Mr. Trudeau to take an extremely cautious approach to reopening the border and to continue to emphasize the centrality of public health in the decision. “It's in his interest to say ‘safety first,'” Mr. Sands said. “As long as COVID is on everyone's mind, he has a perfect thing to blame for hard economic times.” The incentives for President Trump are almost exactly the opposite. “The U.S. has an election in November and Trump was going into it with a much stronger economy. He was planning to run on good times, but then COVID throws everything into question. He's got a political and economic interest in moving forward, but Trudeau doesn't,” Mr. Sands said. With the border closed until at least June 21, many would-be travellers on both sides have found their vacation plans interrupted. As the world adjusts to the new and yet-unforeseen norms of international travel post-pandemic, the U.S. will become an even more attractive target for Canadians looking to get away, said Sarah Goldfeder, principal at Earnscliffe Strategy Group and a fellow with the Canadian Global Affairs Institute. “The reason a lot of people go from Canada to the U.S. isn't because they want to see things, it's because they want to see people,” Ms. Goldfeder said. As the pandemic has and continues to prevent families with members on either side of the border from travelling to see each other, Ms. Goldfeder said she expects vacations to be “centred around seeing family, and the reality for many Canadians is their family is on the other side of the border.” However, Ms. Goldfeder also said security will be tightened. “It's going to be a long time before we take for granted crossing the border like we used to,” she said. “There will be more pressure to account for where and why you're going. There will be longer conversations about who you're going to see and how long you're staying.” Time to diversify trade options, say experts While the border and all the downstream implications are a more pressing problem, for some experts the pandemic and four years of the Trump administration—with four more potentially on the horizon—have highlighted the need for a renewed push for rethinking trade diversification and the broader relationship with the Americans. Fear of over-reliance on the United States for economic prosperity and external security has long pervaded Canadian foreign policy thinking. In 1972, foreign minister Mitchell Sharp articulated the “Third Option” doctrine in an article published in International Perspectives. Mr. Sharp tried to answer the question of how to live “distinct from, but in harmony with” the United States, as rising nationalist tides hit the shores of both countries. He argued against increased integration with the U.S. in favour of a trade diversification and a national industrial strategy emphasizing Canadian ownership. The proceeding years saw the creation of institutions such as the Foreign Investment Review Agency and Petro-Canada that addressed Canadian ownership issues. Trade diversification, however, did not bear the same fruit. The 1982 Macdonald Commission recommended taking a “leap of faith” and signing a free trade agreement with the U.S. In the late-1980s, the U.S.-Canada Free Trade Agreement, which later became NAFTA, made Canada and the U.S. two most of the most integrated economies, and countries, in the world. Then came Mr. Trump's claim that NAFTA was “perhaps the worst trade deal ever made” and his administration's subsequent efforts to renegotiate the deal, ending with the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement (CUSMA), which comes into effect on July 1. “One of the fundamental damaging things Trump has done to the relationship is shaken Canadians' trust in the U.S. in ways that have been profound and radical. Threatening the destruction of the Canadian economy resonated deeply in Canada,” said Eric Miller, president of Rideau-Potomac Strategy Group and fellow at the Canadian Global Affairs Institute. Canadians have mistrusted U.S. presidents before, Mr. Miller said, but where unpopular leaders like George W. Bush were perceived as “cowboys that would do bad things that harm the world,” Mr. Trump is entirely different. “There was no sense under [Ronald] Reagan or George W. Bush that the U.S. was deliberately going to use its power to injure Canada. Canada might be excluded from certain things, but there was no sense that we [the U.S] are going to destroy your economy,” Mr. Miller said. “Canada now has to make choices about co-operation on bigger picture issues, on economic issues that it hasn't had to contemplate much in the past.” The Liberals' 2018 fall economic statement announced the federal government's intention to increase non-U.S. exports by 50 per cent by 2025. Attached to the announcement was a $1.1-billion investment over six years to beef up trade resources and infrastructure for exporters. Mr. Miller said that is a welcome investment, but new ideas in addition to new money will be required for diversification to be successful. “When Canada looks for models it tends to look at the Anglosphere. Neither the U.S. or U.K. are good models because Canada needs a mid-sized country that trades a lot,” he said. Mr. Miller said countries like Japan have successfully grown their respective trade volumes by reducing the risk of exporting, something Canada has not done well. Japan deploys a model dubbed “Consortium for a New Export Nation,” wherein the Japanese government essentially approaches a partner country and fronts it money for an infrastructure project to be built by Japanese companies, ensuring future servicing of the infrastructure will also be done by Japanese companies. The model incorporates small, medium, and large companies, which Mr. Miller said would be essential to replicate in Canada's SME-driven economy. Just as Mr. Miller said Canadian trade policy needs to take advantage of the geopolitical environment, James L. Anderson, an external fellow at the Centre for International and Defence Policy at Queen's University, said he believes Canadian foreign policy is in a similar position. Mr. Anderson said the Trump administration's focus on the domestic challenges of the pandemic creates space for global leadership on infectious disease co-operation, especially as the World Health Organization comes under heavy criticism from multiple countries, which he said Canada is well-positioned to fill. Whereas the WHO is made up of all 193 United Nations countries save for Liechtenstein, Mr. Anderson sees value in a smaller body tasked with handling infectious diseases, what he calls “an infectious disease analogue to the G7.” Pursuing such a policy could be a boon to Canada's campaign for a UN Security Council seat, too, Mr. Anderson said. https://www.hilltimes.com/2020/05/27/post-pandemic-world-presents-real-opportunity-to-change-u-s-canada-relationship-experts-say/249721

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  23 octobre 2020 | International, Aérospatial, Naval, Terrestre, C4ISR, Sécurité

  The Week In Defense, Oct. 23-30, 2020

  U.S. Approves Possible Missile, ISR Pod Sale to Taiwan The U.S. government on Oct. 22 approved and notified Congress of a possible sale to Taiwan of 135 Boeing AGM-84H Standoff Land-Attack Missiles... More details on : https://aviationweek.com/defense-space/missile-defense-weapons/week-defense-oct-23-30-2020

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  24 février 2020 | International, Aérospatial

  MDA Embarks On A New Generation Of Missile Defense

  Jen DiMascio The Pentagon is in the midst of a massive upgrade of its Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD) system, designed to protect the U.S. against an attack by an ICBM. The new Next-Generation Interceptor (NGI) would modernize GMD, arming it with an all-up round that can counter more sophisticated ICBMs. In pursuing the new program, the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) will end the planned purchase of 20 current-generation GMD Ground-Based Interceptors (GBI), after already having canceled a key aspect of that system, the Redesigned Kill Vehicle (RKV). While it works on NGI, the MDA also intends to supplement its defense of the U.S. against ICBMs with shorter-range interceptors that provide regional defense. The change in course will not be cheap. GMD itself has cost more than $68 billion over its lifetime. In its fiscal 2021 budget request, the MDA is asking for $664 million in fiscal 2021 for NGI and another $4.3 billion through fiscal 2025.It is an amount that will grow over time and that some worry could pull funding from other urgent priorities, as the type and number of missile threats from other countries evolves to include more sophisticated ballistic missiles and hypersonic weaponry. The MDA is poised to issue a classified request for proposals to sponsor two contractors through a preliminary design review (PDR) of a new interceptor and kill vehicle—the part of the interceptor that defeats an incoming missile while in space. MDA Director Vice Adm. Jon Hill says the agency plans to award contracts by the end of 2020, with the intention of starting testing in the mid-2020s and putting NGIs in silos by 2027, 2028 or beyond. “Right now we're funded through PDR, and you know there's plenty of arguments out there that you [have] got to go all the way to the [critical design review (CDR)]. We'll have that conversation when the time is right,” says Hill. The release of the budget solidifies a plan that has been slowly percolating in the background. Last March, Boeing was put on notice after the RKV—a projectile launched by the GBI booster that is tasked with locating and defeating the incoming ICBM in space—did not meet the needs of its CDR. The Government Accountability Office noted problems with the program meeting its cost and schedule goals “with no signs of arresting these trends.” By August 2019, Mike Griffin, the Pentagon's top research and engineering official, stopped work on the RKV after the MDA had spent more than $1 billion to develop it, as it was not proving to be reliable. These RKVs were to ride atop the next 20 GBIs, a project overseen and integrated by Boeing, which Congress had approved in 2018 after a spate of North Korean missile tests. In concert with ending the RKV, Congress rerouted that funding to the NGI, and the MDA conducted a review of options for the interceptor. Coming out of that assessment, budget officials say they will not buy the 20 new GBIs as the military embarks on NGI development. New NGIs are so far being planned to be placed in silos that were to be inhabited by GBIs, according to Hill. “The current intention is for the Next-Generation Interceptors to be able to work with both current and future sensor systems,” says MDA spokesman Mark Wright. From a security standpoint, existing GBIs will still protect the U.S. from foreign missile threats, says Hill, but he adds that over time their reliability will begin to fall off. While the NGI program works its way through development, the MDA plans to supplement GMD with a layered network of theater-range systems—the Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense System (THAAD) and the Aegis Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) Block 2A—to fill any gaps in defending the U.S. from North Korean missile attacks. “What this budget really does for us is it starts to say, ‘Let's take advantage of these regional systems that have been so successful and are very flexible and deployable,'” Hill says. In 2020, the MDA will test the SM-3 Block 2A missile against an ICBM. “When we prove that we can take out an ICBM with an Aegis ship or an Aegis Ashore site with an SM-3 Block 2A, then you want to ramp up the evolution of the threat on the target side, right? We'll want to go against more complex threats,” Hill says. That will require upgrading the combat system used by Aegis ships so it can process data from new sensors and engage with a missile. Adding the ability to launch SM-3 Block 2A missiles on ships or from Aegis Ashore sites will give combatant commanders the additional flexibility they have sought, he adds. A future commander could then choose to launch a GBI, THAAD, SM-3 or, when it is ready, NGI. Such an interim solution using regional systems is still far from a reality. The Pentagon is requesting $139 million in its fiscal 2021 budget to “initiate the development and demonstration of a new interceptor prototype to support contiguous U.S. defense as part of the tiered homeland defense effort,” the MDA's budget materials state. That involves developing hardware and software and conducting demonstrations leading to a flight test in fiscal 2023. One other potential gap in the missile defense architecture is in Pacific-based radars that would have cued GBIs to protect against an attack on Hawaii. The “Pacific radar is no longer in our budget,” Hill says. Today, forward-deployed AN/TPY-2 radars and a deployable (sea-based X-band) radar work with the GMD system in that region. Plus, Aegis ships can be repositioned, he adds. “We realize we need to take another look at that architecture,” he says, which will focus on the Pacific region. Missile defense experts are not unsupportive of the effort to build a new NGI. But they do question whether the cost will leach funding for other important priorities. Frank Rose, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, points out that GBIs are built using 1990s technology and as a development prototype tasked for an operational mission. That means that requirements such as reliability, survivability and suitability were afterthoughts. Despite the sound logic involved in moving toward a new interceptor, “I see a couple of challenges,” he says. That includes that the Pentagon's budget request was flat for fiscal 2021, a trend likely to continue. In the years ahead, the military will have big bills for its nuclear modernization budget and to recapitalize its conventional forces, which will hit about the time budgets for NGI would need to swell to support procurement of the system. Meanwhile, in the near-to-midterm, the U.S. is likely to be dealing with a limited North Korean threat. Over time, the threats will grow in number and sophistication. Given challenges with the budget—not to mention technical challenges with developing a successful kill vehicle—Rose wonders if that money could be applied elsewhere. Kingston Reif, director of disarmament and threat reduction policy at the Arms Control Association, is skeptical the MDA can deliver an NGI on its current timeline. “Congress must be extremely wary of allowing the Pentagon to repeat the mistakes that have plagued the GMD system in the past,” he says. “In particular, the development, procurement and fielding of the NGI should not be schedule-driven but based on the maturity of the technology and successful testing under operationally realistic conditions. Accelerating development programs risks saddling them with cost overruns, schedule delays, test failures and program cancellations—as has been the case with the GMD program and other missile defense programs to date.” The expansion of U.S. homeland missile defense may be viewed as a provocation by Russia and China “and likely prompt them to consider steps to further enhance the survivability of their nuclear arsenals in ways that will undermine the security of the United States and its allies,” Reif says. “The costs and risks of expanding the U.S. homeland defense footprint in this way greatly outweigh the benefits.” But like all proposals, it will be up to lawmakers to decide and is likely to be a point of interest in the year ahead. “This is the single biggest muscle movement in the 2021 budget proposal, and Congress will be scrutinizing carefully whether the administration has a compelling vision and realistic funding stream for the short, medium and long term,” says Tom Karako, director of the missile defense project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. https://aviationweek.com/defense-space/missile-defense-weapons/mda-embarks-new-generation-missile-defense