THE WEST BLOCK
Episode 19, Season 2
Sunday, January 20, 2013
Host: Tom Clark
Guests: John Baird, Robert Fowler, Bob Duncanson, David Jacobson
Location:Ottawa
Tom Clark:
Welcome to The West Block from the nation’s capital on this Sunday, January the 20th. I’m Tom Clark. On today’s show, as the conflict in Mali escalates, how deeply should Canada become involved? Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird is here.
And, are water levels in the Great Lakes at a crisis point? One expert says yes and that the cost of doing nothing will be in the billions of dollars.
Plus, from Hope and Change to the reality of politics, Barack Obama is about to be sworn in for his second term.
But first, the crisis in West Africa, where the once vibrant country of Mali is ground zero. The gold rich nation is under assault by Islamic terrorists and the fight has already spilled over to neighbouring Algeria where a retaliatory hostage taking has come to a bloody end this morning. How did it all come to this? Well here is your weekly West Block Primer:
Just more than 7,000 kilometres from Canada lies Mali, in the northwest corner of Africa. The country, once lauded as a success story, has fallen victim to the African branch of Al Qaida, the Islamic Maghreb. It is in control of more than two thirds of Mali’s land mass, that’s an area about the size of France. The Mali government is trying to fight back. After a request from the Malian government,France agreed to send troops to help fight the Maghreb. It’s expected that a total of 2,500 French troops will eventually be engaged. And, some 3,300 troops from West African countries are also expected to join the battle. Other countries are taking a backseat approach. Canada is loaning the French government a giant C-17 transport plane for the next few days, but the French government has already asked Canada to extend that, and to ramp up financial aid. The biggest concern now is that the country could turn into another Afghanistan, with a long drawn out war, one that could draw in other countries in the region.
And joining me now from Washington DC is Canada’s foreign minister, John Baird. Mr. Baird, welcome to The West Block. Good to have you here.
John Baird:
Good morning Tom.
Tom Clark:
You were in Washington of course for the inauguration tomorrow of President Barack Obama and I want to get to that and talk about the future of Canada-US relations in the next four years but I want to start with the unfolding situation in Mali. The C-17 that we have committed to that operation to help the French was a one week commitment; that’s coming up, that expires on Thursday of this coming week. What happens at that point? Will the mission be extended or will the plane come home?
John Baird:
Well listen, the French have asked for an extension and as well, has made a number of other requests. We’ll take a reasonable amount of time to reflect on those requests before we respond. The only commitment we’ve made is for the one C17 for approximately a week. Obviously we’re not looking at a combat mission with Canadian soldiers joining the French on the ground in Mali.
Tom Clark:
So it is possible then that our commitment could be open-ended at least as far as the C-17 is concerned?
John Baird:
I wouldn’t say open-ended, I mean obviously we’ve received a request from France which is a good friend and close ally. And the prime minister and the government, the cabinet, will take you know a reasonable period of time to consider their request before we make any decision.
Tom Clark:
Whatever the extent of our commitment is, nevertheless we have made some commitment to what’s happening in Mali and in Western Africa at this point. What is Canada’s national interest in all of this?
John Baird:
I think we’re deeply concerned that an international terrorist organization affiliated with Al Qaida could take control of more than half of a West African country. Listen, the great struggle, the great challenge of our generation is to fight against international terrorism. That causes us concern. Obviously, Canada can play a role. That role might be very well humanitarian, it may be supporting diplomatic efforts, and it may also be supporting efforts to encourage Mali to return to the track for democracy, after their coup this past March.
Tom Clark:
Let’s shift venues for a moment and go to where you are, Washington DC. A very big day tomorrow, Barack Obama is going tobe sworn in yet again as the President of the United States; 44th President of the United States. I’m wondering when you take a look at the landscape of Canada-US relations, are things going to be any different in the next four years than they were in the last four years?
John Baird:
Well I think over the last four years, certainly under the leadership of Prime Minister Stephen Harper, that we’ve established a good professional working relationship with the Obama administration. We’ve made great progress on a number of key areas. The Beyond the Border deal trying to ensure that Canada’s economy is more economically competitive for our manufacturing sector and othersfacilitating legitimate travel between the two countries of goods, people is tremendously important. At the same time we’ve still got a number of challenges and we look forward to tackling them with the president and his administration in the days and weeks ahead.
Tom Clark:
Well you know one of the challenges is the Keystone pipeline. You’re down there, you’re talking to people, are you hearing anything about Keystone? Are we near an approval?
John Baird:
Well there certainly is a significant amount of support for Keystone on both the democratic and republican stiles of the aisle in congress. At the same time, the Nebraska and the federal reviews are nearing completion and so we obviously will make this the key priority to push for this initiative. It’s good for North American energy security and it’s tremendously important to the future economic prosperity of Canada that we have markets to sell Canadian energy.
Tom Clark:
John Baird, Canada’s foreign minister, thanks very much for your time today – appreciate it.
John Baird:
Thank you Tom.
Tom Clark:
Let’s just return for the moment to the conflict in Mali for a unique perspective on all of this, I’m joined by former diplomat, Robert Fowler. He was kidnapped by the very same Al Qaida group involved in the Algerian hostage taking this week and of course, Mr. Fowler, you’ve worked in that region for many, many years. Guide us here a little bit, because I think a lot of Canadians are still confused as to a: what our national interest is in this area, and secondly and more importantly, what this Al Qaida group wants. What is their end game?
Robert Fowler:
Perfect. Well, as in so many of these situations, it’s not a question of good options versus bad options, it’s sometimes a question of bad options versus worse options, and that probably is what we’re talking about here. Canada has great friends in Africa that we’ve nurtured over 60 years. Africans tend to get along well with Canadians like Canadians, we have no colonial past and we speak both of their languages and we have established very special friendships and our African friends need our help. So right off, I think friends help friends, and they’re in bad shape, and they risk being in much worse shape. If Al Qaida succeeds in doing what they told me repeatedly, they wanted to do…
Tom Clark:
Told you while you were…
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Robert Fowler:
While we were…
Tom Clark:
Kidnapped…
Robert Fowler:
Kidnapped…indeed the teller is a guy much on television. A fellow called Omar Hamaha, who happens to be the uncle of one of Belmokhtar’s wives; he’s known as Red Beard on TV. He’s a very charismatic guy, threatening us with all kinds of horror. If they have their way, it will create a humanitarian disaster to which we will have to respond. Our people, the people in the West will require, if they required a response on Darfur they’re sure gonna require a response here. So what they want, they would say, they hate governments, they hate al the concepts that we hold most dear. They hate liberty, they hate equality; they hate equal rights because all those things are things that are the province of God rather than the province of men in their view. So they don’t want to take over Mali as astate, they want to take over an area and they want to expand that as much as they can. And they say, quite frankly, they want to expand it to include the entire world. The latter day Caliphate will be everything and everybody and their mission is to bring everybody into the thrall, into servitude of their God. So, they very specifically would say, we want to take the chaos of anarchy of Somalia and spread it from the Indian Ocean to the Atlantic Ocean; 8,000 km across that sub Saharan strip, which I would argue is probably the most volatile in the world. It’s a strip that we have in part caused to become more volatile with the spread of Libyan weapons over the entire area. They believe that within the chaos of anarchy that that would produce that their Jihad will flourish; will be nurtured and flourish,and then they can extend it further.
Tom Clark:
How much of a threat though, and let’s assume that they are successful in Mali to start off with and we know that Somalia is a failed state. There’s no shortage of failed states in Africa for them to deal with. But how much of a threat does that pose to us?
Robert Fowler:
Okay, well first of all, they make very clear that their interest is global. The fellow I mentioned, who in my book I call: Omar One; says very clearly, first Africa then you. And he’s saying very clearly on television repeatedly, we will follow you to London, we will follow you to Paris, we will follow you to North America and you will be safe nowhere. If they get a huge area, and if as the secretary general of the UN says, foreign fighters, like minded guys keep flowing in to that area, they will have a base from which they can launch the kind of operation that could take them to us.
Tom Clark:
What should Canada be doing right now, above and beyond the one plane for one week?
Robert Fowler:
Happily resolution 2085 of 20 December of the Security Council answers that question precisely. In paragraph 14, it lays out a laundry list of the things that it calls all member states to offer. So I think we’re still a member state of the UN and I hope we would offer. And our plane for one week is a modest beginning. So we’re asked to offer support to improve the Malian Army. We’re asked to offer support to help organize, equip the multi-national African force that will assist the Malian Army. We’re also asked in a great big other category to provide anything that could be useful to defeat the Islamist threat in the region, and that’s a pretty wide open offer. Look we have outstanding Special Forces that could be useful. It could be useful in gathering intelligence. We have logisticians that could help not only provide what these various forces are going to need to sustain them in some of the most hostile areas of the world, but we could use them negatively against the Al-Qaeda guys. I mean, look they’re up there in the desert. They need water, they need diesel fuel, they need tires, they need spare parts; couldn’t we organize ourselves to ensure they got fewer of those things?
Tom Clark:
Bob Fowler very good talking to you; thanks so much for your time.
Robert Fowler:
Thanks very much Tom.
Tom Clark:
And coming up, the water around Lake Huron is at its lowest level since we’ve started keeping public records almost 100 years ago. Can we turn the tides? That’s coming up next.
Break
Tom Clark:
People living around the Great Lakes are starting to wonder who pulled the plug. In the last few years, waterfront properties are all of a sudden becoming beachfront properties and there’s no more diving off of these docks. Lakes Huron and Michigan have been hit the hardest.
1987 marked the highest water levels on record, but a lot has happened since then. Today levels in Lakes Huron and Michigan have dropped below the lowest ever recorded in 1965. That means water levels are now more than a metre and a half below the 1987 levels. And they’re forecast to go down another 2-3 centimetres in the next month alone.
Joining me now to talk about this is Bob Duncanson, the executive director of the Georgian Bay Association. Welcome to the program. Good to have you here. Tell me something why anybody should really care about this? Lakes go up and down all the time. It seems that, is this just an inconvenience for a lot of people in Georgian Bay that you represent?
Bob Duncanson:
Now Tom, this is a frightening continuation of a trend we’ve seen over the last ten years where all of the Great Lakes are trending down, but the Middle Lakes: Michigan, Huron, which Georgian Bay is attached to are at an all-time low and it looks as though it’s going to get lower before it gets better. The reason people should be worried about this, why Canadians should be worried about this, is that the economic wellbeing of Ontario largely hangs on the ability to get product to market, and that relies on shipping, shipping relies on water.
Tom Clark:
Okay, and so this would also seem to indicate that those freighters themselves, with the water going down, can’t carry as heavy a load as they could in the past.
Bob Duncanson:
Last summer they were about a quarter off their maximum loads and that was during the middle of the summer and we know the water has come down 20 inches more or less since the summer. So coming into next summer, they’re going to be even less than a quarter empty.
Tom Clark:
How did this happen? Where did all the water go?
Bob Duncanson:
Well it’s a factor of two things; nature. I mean clearly nothing happens if nature doesn’t smile on you. And we’ve had a very dry wintera year ago, a very dry summer, in fact record droughts through the summer. So the middle lakes have been hit hard by nature. But, when we created the St. Lawrence Seaway, we excavated the connecting channels between the lakes and in the case of Lake Huron and Michigan there was never any stop put in to allow those lakes to hold back water. There is a dam at St. Mary’s that helps Superior. There is a dam just down river from Cornwall that helps Lake Ontario but the middle lakes are at the whim of mother nature, and we, mankind, have dug out that connecting channel that empties those middle lakes that has cost us between 9 and 18 inches of permanent water loss, according to the engineers.
Tom Clark:
Let me read you something that was given to us very recently by Adam Sweet who’s a spokesman for the environment minister, Peter Kent. And this is in part what he wrote us. He said: “…The low water levels we are seeing today are within the range of fluctuation that the lakes have experienced in the recent past.” He seems to be suggesting here that there’s really nothing out of the ordinary.
Bob Duncanson:
I don’t know what chart he’s looking at, but the charts I see which come out weekly from the US core of engineers shows you that Michigan, Huron are one inch below recorded history. That’s not within the range of normal fluctuation. What we were pitching to the Canadian government is that we want the lakes to be returned to a healthy range of water levels. Back in ‘93 they spent tens of millions of dollarsstudying water levels in the middle lakes and came up with what they deemed to be a healthy range and we’re 14 inches below what they deemed at that time to be the crisis level at which action should be taken.
Tom Clark:
What do you do? Do you build a dam at the bottom of one of the lakes to prevent the water from leaving?
Bob Duncanson:
The St. Clair River is ground zero for the middle lakes. That’s where we’ve done so much excavation; hardening of the shorelines. You’ve basically created a super highway for water conveyance through that point. We think that that’s where the engineers should be applying their smarts. Back in the sixties when the last dredging took place, the two governments had a healthy discussion about putting sills in as a compensating measure. Nothing happened at that point. Back in the ‘93 study that I just referenced, they talked about the governments putting aside $50 million bucks to throw rocks into that river to bring the water levels back up if they ever got to a crisis level, which is 14 inches higher it is today, and then have the money to take those rocks back out again when the water levels got back into a healthy range. Those are fairly basic solutions. I think that there’s gotta be a more creative solution in this day and age but hey, I’ll take rocks if that’s all they’re going to give me.
Tom Clark:
How much time have we got left before this becomes irreparable in terms of its arm?
Bob Duncanson:
It’s there. I mean this summer; the shipping companies are going to be hurting badly. Their customers are going to be hurting badly; every year that we let this go on unaddressed is going to cost this Canadian government.
Tom Clark:
Bob Duncanson, executive director of the Georgian Bay Association thanks very much.
Bob Duncanson:
Okay.
Tom Clark:
Well coming up next, how will Obama’s second term differ from his first and will it change Canada’s relations with the United States? We’ll talk with Obama’s ambassador to Canada right after this.
Break
Tom Clark:
Welcome back. Well at noon tomorrow in Washington DC, Barack Obama will take the Oath of Office as the 44th President of the United States. His second term is already marked by crisis as a gridlock Washington struggles with debt ceilings, spending cuts and tax increases. Earlier, I spoke with American ambassador to Canada, David Jacobson about the road ahead.
You know almost exactly four years ago today, President Obama stood on that podium outside of the Capital building and the mood inWashington, and in fact almost all around the world at that time was one of “hope” and “change”. When he stands at that podium tomorrow, how’s the mood gonna be different?
David Jacobson:
Well first of all, I agree with you Tom. Four years ago, it was one of the most special days in a long, long time in the United States. Obviously we’ve been through four tough years. The economy has not responded in the way that anyone, including the president had wanted it to. We’re on the right path but we’re fighting back. And four years ago it was “hope”. I think we’re still hoping that things will get better. People are feeling better about the direction it’s going but I think there’s trepidation. There’s some fear but the president was elected with a significant majority, particularly in the Electoral College. I think he’s got the people behind him. The people like him and I think we’re going to do okay.
Tom Clark:
When you take a look at Canada-US relations, specifically what is the right tone for Canada to take in this very polarized political environment in Washington?
David Jacobson:
Well my best advice, whether it is Canada and the political environment in Washington or for that matter, the United States and the political environment in Canada is, we don’t interfere with each other’s politics. We have a political process. The political process has to work its way through. I try very hard not to interfere with the political process here. And so at the highest level, I think that’s the case.
Tom Clark:
Extend that if you could for the next four years, for the president’s next term. If you can project over that full term, what is the single greatest challenge for Canada-US relations?
David Jacobson:
I would say our economy and getting our economy going. And you know I know often times that’s not what people focus on in the relationship. In the relationship, people focus on the border, they focus on trade, they focus on the environment, on energy moving back and forth, but the single thing that has the biggest impact on this relationship is the strength of our two economics, is that engine that allows everything else to work. Is it going in the right direction? And when it’s going in the right direction in the United States it tends to go in the right direction in Canada. So that’s the biggest thing.
Tom Clark:
How tough is it going to be for the president to get stuff done in the next four years, considering the badly divided and polarized Congress that he has to work with?
David Jacobson:
Well look, it ain’t gonna be easy and the president understands it’s not going to be easy. You know yesterday he was talking about the problem with gun violence and the steps we need to take and he acknowledged this is going to be a hard fight. Obviously the taxes and spending issues that we’ve been wrestling with for a long time are going to be a hard fight. But one of the things that I take comfort in personally, is I study history, I study American history. We have been through these things before. This is the way our government was set up to work and what happens often times is we go through significant periods of deadlock and then people kind of come to their senses and they decide, you know what, we gotta attack these problems. We have periods of great progress and then we’re able to live off that for quite some time. And I think we are very close to that but only time will tell.
Tom Clark:
Ambassador Jacobson thanks very much for your time. I appreciate it.
David Jacobson:
It’s always a pleasure Tom.
Tom Clark:
Well it may be the dead of winter but you can expect another busy week ahead in politics. This afternoon the Liberal Party kicks off its first Leadership Debate with nine contenders on stage. And also as you’ve heard today, Barack Obama will be privately sworn in for his second term. Tomorrow will be the big public event. And then on Thursday, the government here is expected to release a progress report on the promises that it made to Aboriginal groups, which according to some, could very well spark another round of widespread protests.
Well that’s our show for this week. Go to http://www.thewestblock.ca for all the latest information on this week’s events and get in touch. We read all of your comments, whether you send it by Twitter, Facebook or email. Thanks for being with us. I’m Tom Clark. Have a great week and we’ll see you back here again next Sunday.
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