Commentary

At the end of one year and the beginning of another it is customary to look back at what happened and speculate on what is to come. With that in mind, here is an overview of national security as we enter 2025, a year in which we may (very?) likely have a new government. If the polls are to be believed (although if U.S. polls tell us anything, it is to treat these numbers very carefully), odds are that the Trudeau Liberals will be replaced by the Conservatives under Pierre Poilievre.

There’s a good number of security risks that the new government will inherit and will have to tackle:

The People’s Republic of China was allowed to run riot with election interference and transnational repression, and the government labelled any criticism of its inaction as “anti-Asian racism”;
CSIS intelligence on these activities was ignored, roadblocks were put in place to ensuring its delivery to the prime minister, and the organization’s information was dismissed as nothing more than “suspicion”;
The government failed to condemn anti-Semitism in our streets and on our campuses, allowed “protesters” to fly the flags of listed terrorist entities, and mistakenly claimed that “Islamophobia” was on par with hatred of Jews;
Canada dodged two ISIS-inspired terrorist attacks, one in Toronto and one in New York (the latter would have had much more of an impact, especially given the Trump election victory), thanks to allied tip-offs; and
The government finally admitted that its immigration quotas were way out of proportion, but it still told its security agencies to hold off on the usual checks that would ensure the wrong types were not entering the country.

With that record, it is not surprising that the new government has its work cut out for it. Here, then, is my wish list for 2025:

1) Give CSIS, CSE, and the RCMP more resources to do their jobs, listen to what they have to say, and don’t make their tasks harder to execute by having to waste time on DEI considerations for new hires.

2) Get serious about China and its interference/aggressive harassment of Canadians; if this means expelling diplomats, so be it.

3) Get serious about Russia and raise defence spending to make Canada a serious NATO member, ready to stand up for its allies and Western democratic values.

4) Bring immigration numbers down to a manageable level and ensure that every security check is carried out before allowing anyone entry to Canada.

5) Go back to meaningful language on terrorism (Islamists, white supremacists, First Nations violent extremists) and deep-six the meaningless IMVE (ideologically-motivated violent extremism) and other similar weasel phrases (oh and ditch “gender-based + analysis” in the intelligence field).

6) Promote Canadianness in an attempt to stop homeland conflicts from manifesting themselves violently here, such as those between Sikh-Hindu, Palestinian-Israeli, etc., and dig a hole to bury the ridiculous notion that we are a “postnational state“ (and bring back the teaching of Canadian history, warts and all).

The coming year will be a challenge for any government that happens to find itself beside Trump’s America. The president-in-waiting has already threatened massive tariffs and called out Canada for its pathetically low defence spending. He has also accused us of allowing drugs and terrorists to cross into the United States. Even if these allegations are largely untrue, Canada has no choice but to up its investment in national security and public safety (and yes, that includes defence, NOW, not by 2034).

A single incident in which the United States is targeted from an individual or group based on our soil will be catastrophic for Canada, as a new president who is not shy to punish those he sees as having wronged him will act precipitously.

The fiscal mess the country is currently faced with means that making needed injections of cash and resources into national security will be very difficult, but savings elsewhere, including the painful ones, will have to be made. It is not as if Canada has any choice in this regard.

My Wish List for a Safe and Secure Canada in 2025

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