Canada has done a poor job of exacting sovereignty in the Arctic as far as I can remember. We tend to take a "it's self-evident it's our territory" approach to protecting our national interests in the region. But as we've seen, Norway, Denmark, Russia and the United States beg to differ.
That's what you get when you don't develop a sound, comprehensive, mature plan of action to defend our national borders. While Harper talks of improving our stake in the Arctic, I'm afraid our fate is already sealed.
It takes manpower to govern that vast land and manpower costs money. It would take years before we could create some sort of police force not unlike the the old Northwest Mounted Police. The current Canadian Rangers (only 5000 strong of which only 1500 are deployed in the high Arctic. Just to give you some perspective about how little a force this is the Arctic spans 1.4 sq. million miles) made up of First Nations, Inuit and Metis are too small in numbers to take on the task.
The protection of the land is one thing, developing is another problem facing Canadian sovereignty. In short, we don't have the money or technology to capitalized on the resources in the region.
But I do know who does.
The Americans.
I'm afraid it's a matter of time before this happens. Look, we chose this path. We'll have to keep walking on it. It was naive - utterly naive - to think we could just assume other nations would accept our claims to the Arctic at face value.
Canadians nationalists will howl but as usual it'll be at the moon more than anything.
I wonder why Canadians need to exact sovereignty over the Arctic, being Canada so huge and with so little population. Of course, there's the future to think about. But, isn't the Arctic mostly ocean with ice upon it?
ReplyDeleteUn saluto da Roma. Vieni allora? E se sì, quando?
Precious resources: Oil and water my friend. And there's lots of it up here.
ReplyDeleteWill let you know!
Ok.
ReplyDeleteOil and water. Yes, of course, how silly of me.
Cazzo, sveglia! ;<)
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