University Hawks get bucks to sell war (Paul Weinberg)
Toronto Now 2007-02-22
University centres hot on Afghan peace get left out of federal funding loop
With the the release last week of the Senate’s oddly contradictory report on Canada’s Kandahar mission, the country is once again awash in foreign policy polemics. But can we really have a fair Afghanistan debate when so many of the sources we rely on for info are bankrolled by the Department of National Defence (DND)?
That’s the worry of peace studies experts who point out that a disproportionate number of those quoted by the media or penning op-eds on foreign affairs hail from the 14 defence, international studies and military history programs across the country receiving DND dole-outs.
Peter Langille, a University of Western Ontario professor specializing in conflict resolution, has a word for the scholarly recipients of such funds: “embedded.” He’s critical of the federal department’s $2.5 million yearly Security and Defence Forum (SDF) program, which shells out for research.
“It has a near monopoly over discussion and programs not only of defence issues, but also IR [international relations studies] within Canadian academe,” he says, referring to the prevalence of a paradigm inclined toward a long war policy and expansion of the military sector.
It’s a worry shared by Mark Vorobej, acting director at the Centre for Peace Studies at McMaster University. The problem for conflict resolution programs everywhere, Vorobej says, is that they don’t have powerful allies but instead have to shuffle along on ad hoc funding and indifference from university administrations.
“We have a solid track record of delivering a substantial bang for the miserly buck the university gives us, but after 17 years, we still do have not a single faculty position,” says Vorobej, referring to the fact his centre’s academic instructors are seconded.
Things are certainly lusher at the SDF-supported Centre for Military and Strategic Studies at the University of Calgary, headed by the oft-quoted David Bercuson, who champions a stronger defence sector and a sustained war against the Taliban. The last 18 months, he admits, have been good ones for advocates of military preparedness. “I’d like to think that we have had some impact on government thinking, both the previous government’s and the current one’s,” he says.
It’s the same sense of satisfaction expressed by Queen’s University’s Doug Bland, chair of the DND-financed defence management studies program. He helped edit Canada Without Armed Forces?, which was instrumental in a $12.8 billion bump in military expenditures over the next five years in the 2005 federal budget.
Have proponents of a stronger military been able to set the tone?, I ask him. “Oh, absolutely,” says Bland, “in fact, I just got off the phone for an hour with somebody from CanWest News. The media come to us almost all the time looking for background.”
Kim Richard Nossal, head of political science at Queen’s and a member of a committee that decides which centres get SDF funding, believes Langille has got it terribly wrong. But he does admit that defence academics tend not to stray too far from politics as they are now arranged. “At one level Peter is correct. There are very few people who do defence studies from a radical perspective, that is, non-mainstream and critical of the government’s perspective.”
One such “non-mainstream” scholar is University of British Columbia’s Michael Byers, an international law expert who’s been critical of Canada’s current Afghan mission. He talks about the potentially “chilling” impact DND munificence can have on academic research. That’s why he says he maintains a distance from the SDF funds flowing into the campus’s Liu Institute for Global Issues, where he is academic director.
“Out of respect for my colleagues’ freedom of decision making, the only steps I’ve taken are (a) not to use or benefit from the SDF money, and (b) to request that my name not be listed as part of the UBC stable of experts on applications for renewal of the funding.”
Not all of the SDF centres, however, are exactly alike. York’s Centre for International and Security Studies, for one, promotes itself as more critical theory-oriented in areas like international relations than others. Last year, it had to go through considerable negotiation to fit the new scholarly priorities of DND, which include failed states, terrorism, weapons of mass destruction and Canada-U.S. defence.
“There were very, very few references in York’s proposal to the word ‘defence,’” says DND’s Aaron Hywarren, who says SDF gets a thousand inquiries a year from reporters seeking quotes from its subsidized academics.
David Dewitt, former director of the York centre, defends DND cash as a way of fostering new scholarship, but he is concerned nonetheless about a “narrowing” of the SDF criteria.
“The situation right now between the Department of National Defence and the pressure of the SDF group on academics is problematic and troubling, but is, perhaps, one of those things that will change when there is a change in government,” he says.
This is not to say that all defence scholars are wont to bolster the military quotient of Canada’s foreign policy. It’s just that those who don’t have a difficult time, as Walter Dorn, a prof at the Canadian Forces College (affiliated with the DND’s Royal Military College) has discovered.
Last March, Dorn found himself in the middle of a controversy when the Minister of Defence received complaints about his articles lamenting the demise of peacekeeping. The college’s principal stood up for Dorn’s academic freedom. The armed forces, Dorn says, resents “the public’s view that our soldiers are peacekeepers.”
But if not all military studies folk are hawkish, not all hawks get SDF funds for their research. Take the case of Jack Granatstein, York U professor emeritus and board member of the Canadian Defense and Foreign Affairs Institute. He is near the top of the list of military experts quoted by the media, according a study by independent defence analyst Steven Staples.
(Staples’s survey, which doesn’t include the Globe and Mail, concludes that from February to September 2006, General Lewis Mackenzie was quoted 224 times in the press, Granatstein 133, the Conference of Defence Associations 96, the Mackenzie Institute 63 and Bercuson 56. Staples himself was the only conflict resolution expert to rate, with 126.)
Granatstein, along with Bercuson, pushes an agenda that includes closer Canada/U.S. military co-operation and an abandonment of peacekeeping. But despite his high profile, he is demure. “I wish I had more influence,” Granatstein says, chuckling on the phone. He is working on a new lobby org, Canadians for Defence and Security, aimed specifically at countering peace advocates like Staples.
Staples, however, is doing some retrenching of his own, setting up a new think tank, the Rideau Institute. “My concern is that this intolerance for any discussion of policy that deviates from the priorities of the brass is spreading into the general public.”
Comment by hossein, writing from Canada on March 9th, 2007 at 3:03 pm:
War on Oil
I thinks you have right to know what is going on here , I am talking about war on terrorist? From 1984-1986 I had chance to enter in revolutionary guard , Islamic military in Iran ,war between Iraq and Iran. My information back from those times and later which I was working as journalist in Iran, Mohahad reza pahlavi shah Iran and his regime claps by the revelation , by The Ayatollah Komeni, because Shah of Iran was had dreams to build first Iranian nuclear programs, in Busher.Iran, also he had dreams to bring Iran as third country close to first world, like Japan,his dreams to have nuclear bombs like Israel or India, and why CIA and Israel and French…are replacing Shah of Iran by creating revelation in Iran, because Ayatollahs Khomeini didn’t trust the American, he order to university student in Tehran captured the American who’s are working at this times in USA embassy in Tehran to replace the Khomeini with another regime… so many documents are fined by the student at this times and available on internet you can search if you like, To assassinated Ayatolhas Khomeini and release the American hostages from Iran, American and CIA, sending specials force’s in Iran , which in north of Iran, were American having plane to landing in Sahara close to border of Iran and Russian, perhaps Russian are attack on American and this times to support new regime of Iran, because Russian government (communist) also having plane to replace the Ayatollahs Khomeini by the communist party of Iran,( which Ayatollahs Khomeini leater order to capture are members of this party, include Mojahedin Khalgh and he order to some things like 10,000 members of this groups execution in jail CIA came with another plane which order to the Saddam Hussein to attack on Iran, were is Iranian oil, for this reason to stop the Iran have access to this oil after revelation and we know this new regime need money….
In war between Iraq and Iran which I be there, Iranian and Iraqi losing milliards of dolor’s and million people are wounded and killed at this war, I remembers in military they told us do not going out side of your camp in large areas because American satellites are taking photos from Iranian military and giving all this information to Iraqi to attack on Iranian by chemical booms, were also American, German and French and Russian are testing own weapon in this war by selling weapon to Iran and Iraq, Saddam Hussein became loser in this war and peace land between Iran and Iraq, Saddam lose large numbers of money and one of his best solders in this war, what we know saddam Hussein asking American for more money and advance weapon, like atomics bombs during war with Iran, and because American (CIA)didn’t support Saddam Hussein to have victory over Iran, He almost in two years to end this war was sold his oil to Russian to buy advance weapon from Russian and French, by end of this war saddam Hussein became close to Russian, and this can be worst for American, Iraq own the second largest oil in are world, and why Saddam Hussein attack on Kuwaiti to show to the American, give me money support me or he willing to take over the Arabs country and all oil, by the support from Russian, and why American are rush to sending troops and attack on Saddam Hussein regime, on golf war, saddam Hussein regime was close to claps by the revolution by the Shies groups and Kurdish at this times, was bad times to a regime go on powers in Iraq like Iran, which British and American are supporting Saddam Hussein to attack on this groups and save the regime of saddam Hussein, until September 11 happen and this is beginning for CIA and American ,British and others to go there and stop the Islamic fundamentalism to grow more. another reason American attack on Afghanistane because Taliban regime in Afghanistan are close and banded the %95 of the drugs and heroin in Afghanistan which this large of money drugs and drugs dealer was part of the CIA, operated in Afghanistan, billion and billion dolor’s easy money after oil,,,
Another reason Russian also having plane to have accesses in Taliban regime and in Iran to transport own oil and what they wishes from north to the south Persian golf.. Russian discovery new majors of oil and gas in Russian, were is the Caspian sea, after communist claps in Russian CIA didn’t want to this country back in power and have enough money to look after create new guns and so on…all those terrorist or better mojahidin ( free fighter) in Afghanistan also was part of the CIA plane to fighting and stop the Russian in Afghanistan and leather this mojahedin are became parts of the regime of Taliban… know I hops you understand why this war was created by CIA, and Israil and others, to stop the Islamic fundamentalism grow and also stop the Russian have accesses to those country, ( remembers Iran supporting Palestine by money and weapon to they are against the Israeli) and same in Lebanon, which Israel soldiers was attacking on this country to stop the Hezbollah’s have more access to this country,
This war not about the democracy or human right about to test new gun, accesses to the oil. And drugs, also to support Israelis to fight and against the Islamic fundamentalism.
They never build any school or hospitals or road in those country like Iraq and Afghanistan, just killing more civilians people in the name of war on terrorist,
I am sorry if my English grammar not strong as you are you figured out what is going on here and why oil or gas and cost of living became so expensive? The war I believe between American and Russian to which one going to run this world, control the gas, oil, money, and military, terrorist just name here to reason bring military close to the Russian ,and also support the Israel, 500.000 Iraqi murdered and 400 hundred billion dolor’s lost to stop the terrorist They are not terrorist they are free fighter are fighting for the freedom of own country, this money should spend in others place for poor, and homeless, in Africa in south America and were needed,
Iranian Former Hezbollah’s and revolutionary guard , journalist from 1984 to 1994 so many all this information are true, and took times for me in Iran or out, annalist this matter.
Comment by Amar Kr. Sinha, writing from on July 9th, 2007 at 1:13 am:
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