With apologies for voicing an opinion rather than linking an external article.
I am of the strong opinion that Remembrance Day had become at best grandstanding, and at worst, completely meaningless. There are phases tossed around like “Lest we Forget” or “Never Again”. But when Russia invaded Ukraine, we have effectively done the opposite (or very nearly).
Sure, we can send ammo so Ukranians can fight back, or host some of their forces for training. But the reality is, we are only marginally involved. We haven’t mobilized. We aren’t on war footing economically.
The root causes are many. But a combination of NATO’s article 5 protection only kicking in if we are attacked (rather than joining an already existing war), and the threat of nuclear retaliation, means we are paralyzed politically.
At a minimum: I would support direct involvement, whether that’s ramping up our own military, deploying specialists, reservists for minesweeping, stationing our own troops (meagre as they are) in Ukraine to directly support the fight. I would actually support much larger actions, including naval blockades or airspace closures but wholly understand that Canada cannot execute those on their own.
We cannot allow genocidal wars to be pressed in the modern world. And we should be doing everything we can about it. Right now, we’re doing barely more than nothing.
Stop right there.
we cannot mobilize against another NATO member
Ukraine isn’t a NATO member, and sadly our legal obligation is a matter of political debate. We are winning the debate, but it’s slow, and political opponents plan to use this support of a state they don’t value as a means to seize control on the next election
even our hands-off, here-are-guns involvement is not without complaint and scrutiny.
The truth is, we forgot that Russia rules by its strength and we obviously have no clause about belligerent invasions terminating membership. And while Russia is a.member of NATO, no one will consider invading.
…which is good, as the only thing Russia spent its money on was its military. It’s like America, but with more corruption and less money to throw around.
This proxy war is already too much while it’s also not enough. It’s going to ruin our current leaders and plunge us into a populist nightmare the likes of which we’ve been seeing in America for a decade. Let’s not be more idiots voting without the facts, as we already have enough of those to damn us.
… Russia isn’t a member of NATO
Uhhh, Russia isn’t in NATO… it’s quite literally the enemy of NATO.
The NATO alliance was created so countries could protect one another from Russia’s military. When the USSR still existed, they responded by creating the Warsaw Pact, which consisted of countries on or near their border with Europe. In the time since the USSR collapsed, several former Warsaw Pact countries have joined NATO.
Russia absolutely despises NATO, and always has. Putin has used the expansion of NATO as one of his excuses for invading Ukraine (he claims to see NATO as a threat, but since the NATO treaty is purely defensive, I don’t understand his reasoning there).