Stop the Hogs!

"Canada Revisiting Ballistic Missile Defense"

May 12, 2014

Events are unfolding quickly today . . .

This morning I am accompanying a retired U.S. General and a recent Obama Administration science advisor to Parliament Hill.

Lt. General Robert Gard Jr. (ret) and Philip Coyle will be testifying before the Senate’s Committee on National Security and Defence on “Star Wars,” or the U.S. Ballistic Missile Defence (BMD) system.

Their remarks will be so important – because they do not support this weapon system!

You can watch their testimony, live, on the Parliamentary web channel at 1 p.m. ET -

Meeting No. 15 Senate Committee on National Security and Defence

[ http://www.senparlvu.parl.gc.ca/Guide.a ... Language=E ]

I have a lot more to tell you – because we now suspect strongly that Harper is considering whether to restart the debate on the weaponization of space and Canada joining the awful U.S. missile defence system.

This conclusion is based on a statement by a high-ranking Harper MP at a defence conference I attended last Thursday, and more mounting evidence.

I urge you to read this news story which appeared in the international media – but has not been reported in the Canadian media yet.

Read more here - Defense News - "Canada Revisiting Ballistic Missile Defense"

[ http://www.defensenews.com/article/2014 ... RONTPAGE|p ]

Your support will be needed greatly in the coming weeks as we face this new challenge from the Harper government. Thanks so much for everything you can do for peace!

Steven Staples
Co-founder, Ceasefire.ca

P.S. Have you signed the petition yet? “No Canadian warplanes in Eastern Europe.”
[ http://www.ceasefire.ca/?p=18413 ]

Sign up to take action on Hiroshima Day!

[ http://www.ceasefire.ca/?p=19316 ]

From: Steven Staples, Ceasefire.ca
Sent: Friday, August 1, 2014 3:01 PM
Subject: Reminder! Sign up to say “no” to ballistic missile defence and “yes!” to abolishing nuclear weapons

Posted on July 30, 2014 by Ceasefire.ca in Action Alerts, Blog

Be louder than the bomb on August 6th 2014!

Join Ceasefire.ca for our annual day of action to call for the abolition of nuclear weapons, to be held on Wednesday, August 6th – the 69th anniversary of the horrific atomic bombing of the Japanese city of Hiroshima by the United States in 1945.

Stephen Harper’s government is considering joining the American ballistic missile defence program (BMD). Let’s send a message that we don’t want to be part of U.S. missile defence forces.

Instead, Canada should be a leader in abolishing the over 15,000 nuclear warheads in the world, nearly all of which are held by the United States and Russia.

See more at:

http://www.ceasefire.ca/?p=19316#sthash.EvkxVGn3.dpuf

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Have you heard about our annual Louder than the Bomb campaign? Nearly 1,000 people have already signed up for to take action this Hiroshima Day,

Wednesday, August 6.

We need to send a message to Harper: say "no" to the U.S. ballistic missile defence, and "yes" to abolishing nuclear weapons.

Please see Celyn's note below.

I hope you'll join us and sign up for this day of action: http://www.ceasefire.ca/?p=19316

In peace,
Steven Staples
Ceasefire.ca

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- - - - Forward Message - - - -

I am a campaigner at Ceasefire.ca, and I want you to join us for this year’s “Louder than the Bomb” day of action on Hiroshima Day, Wednesday, August 6th 2014.

Next Wednesday we need you and thousands of Canadians to tell Prime Minister Stephen Harper to say "no" to joining the disastrous U.S. ballistic missile defence system (BMD), and "yes" to working to abolish nuclear weapons altogether.

Sign up for the day of action, and receive a reminder to sign our petition on Wednesday, August 6th 2014:

Sign up to take action on August 6, 2014:

http://www.ceasefire.ca/?p=19316

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The Harper government is considering joining the American national BMD program. It doesn’t work, could cost Canada millions and would put in
jeopardy longstanding Canadian policy against weapons in space.

Don’t let him ruin our future!

Let’s urge Harper and all political leaders to keep Canada out of this costly, misguided system and to focus instead on meaningful steps to abolish
nuclear arms and keep space weapons-free.

Thanks for everything you do for peace,

Celyn Dufay, Ceasefire.ca

= = = = = = = =

BALLISTIC MISSILE DEFENCE - (Liberal) Senator Grant Mitchell’s Summer Newsletter 2014 - See Page 5

[ http://senatorgrantmitchell.ca/docs/DbM ... er2014.pdf ]

n June, the Standing Senate Committee on National Security and Defence tabled its latest report titled “Canada and Ballistic Missile Defence: Responding to the evolving threat”.

The committee unanimously recommended that the Government of Canada enter into an agreement with the United States to participate as a partner in ballistic missile defence (BMD), in order to preserve Canada’s sovereignty, security and national interests.

In conducting the study, the committee sought to better understand the reasons for the decision in 2005 not to join the BMD program, the current threat environment, as well as a path forward which will protect Canada’s sovereignty and security, while at the same time strengthening Canada’s NORAD partnership.

Over the course of the study, the Committee learned from the Deputy Commander of NORAD, Lt. General Parent that Canada cannot simply assume that all of its territory will be protected by default under the existing U.S. BMD arrangement. Canada has been sharing early warning information for some time – without the benefit of BMD protection – so full participation in BMD is a logical next step in Canada’s defence policy.

To read the committee’s report or to learn more about the Standing Senate Committee on National Security and Defence, please visit its website at
http://senate-senat.ca/secd-e.asp.

Why joining BMD is still a bad idea

[ http://www.ceasefire.ca/?p=23531 ]

• Posted on April 23, 2016 • by Ceasefire.ca

At the beginning of April, the Liberal government decided that it would launch a review of Canada’s defence policy [ http://dgpaapp.forces.gc.ca/en/defence- ... /index.asp ] and, as part of that, has reopened the issue of Canadian participation in Ballistic Missile Defence (BMD), [ [ http://dgpaapp.forces.gc.ca/en/defence- ... -paper.pdf ] ] a contentious debate which 11 years ago ended with the Paul Martin government opting not to join. [ http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/martin-wi ... t-1.519736 ]

The reasons why this was and remains an excellent decision can be succinctly summarized as follows:

1.The American ballistic missile defence system (called GMD or ground-based missile defence) does not work despite 30 years of investment and billions of dollars spent. [ http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/1821 ... oney-on-it ]

2.It is an incentive to build ever more offensive weapons in order to overwhelm the defences, should they ever work. (It is infinitely cheaper to build more offensive systems.)

3.BMD is extraordinarily costly.

4.The alleged threat to North America from North Korean and Iranian yet-to-be-developed missiles is minuscule to non-existent and, in any event, is a non-proliferation not a defence challenge.

5.The fact that NATO countries have accepted a version of theatre missile defence is an entirely distinct and separate issue from whether Canada should participate in a strategic system (that does not work) for North America. There might be a separate debate over whether Canada should participate in any way in the NATO short range systems (for example, on ships), but that is not what we are discussing here.

6.Did we mention that the system does not work?

To elaborate the above arguments, we are very pleased to reprint below an excerpt from a prescient article by Project Ploughshares co-founder Ernie Regehr, [ http://www.thesimonsfoundation.ca/peace ... -regehr-oc ] published last December even as pro-BMD advocates lobbied the new Liberal government. We also provide a link to the full article here: The “Rogue” Missile Threat: Getting from BMD to NPT (Ernie Regehr, The Simons Foundation, 18 December 2015). [ http://www.thesimonsfoundation.ca/sites ... 2015_1.pdf ]

Canadians might soon be asking just where George W. Bush is when we really need him. He used to be a key antidote to Canadian temptations to embrace North American ballistic missile defence (BMD). Canada’s 2005 rejection of BMD was driven largely by anticipated public reaction to Canada signing on to a system championed by a Bush Administration that was, to understate it, little loved in Canada and that had especially offended disarmament advocates with its trashing of the ABM Treaty and its hostility toward arms control generally.

Now, however, with the Bush effect waning, the allure of a Canadian BMD role seems to be waxing. So, well into the final quarter of the still appreciated Administration of Barack Obama, and with a new and less polarizing but Washington friendly Government in Ottawa, BMD supporters in Canada see a new opportunity to pursue BMD involvement without generating a major backlash.

What hasn’t changed, though, is the basic reality that, even if its technology improves, BMD won’t solve the rogue state missile problem. That’s because the North Korean missile threat is finally a non-proliferation, not a defence, challenge.

For a direct link to the full article, click on: The “Rogue” Missile Threat: Getting from BMD to NPT (Ernie Regehr, The Simons Foundation, 18 December 2015). [ http://www.thesimonsfoundation.ca/sites ... 2015_1.pdf ]


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