Canada is a small power biting the hand that protects it

Our very nice neighbor and ally to our north, Canada, has 42 million people and a GDP of 2.4 trillion, but doesn’t even spend 2% of that GDP on defense. Its new prime minister, Mark Carney, promises that it will reach that minimum standard for NATO alliance members by 2030. The last consecutive years in which Canada contributed 2% of its GDP to the defense needs of the West occurred around 1989-1990, after which defense expenditures dropped significantly.

Canada answered the bell after 9/11, and while it’s standing military is quite small — 68,000 – it sent troops to Afghanistan from the beginning of that long war and kept them there until 2014, sacrificing 158 of their soldiers on that faraway battlefield.

Five hundred sixteen Canadians died during the Korean War, and while Canada did not send its troops to Vietnam, many Canadians volunteered for the U.S. military and as many as 140 died there. ---More...