TAMARA LORINCZ, [now in D.C.] tlorincz@dal.ca, @tamaralorincz
Lorincz is a member of the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom International-Canada and the Canadian Voice of Women for Peace. She has done extensive work on the effects of NATO militarization on the environment. See her recent article “Canada’s militarization of the Arctic threatens Indigenous communities and the climate.”

While major media have recently run story after story about Canada not paying “its fair share” to NATO, Lorincz tells a very different story.

She said today: “NATO has militarized Canadian foreign policy. Canada no longer does peacekeeping. Canada is at its lowest level in 30 years for peacekeeping with only 49 Canadian soldiers on United Nations peace support operations. Instead, Canada has over 1,000 soldiers leading a NATO battle group in Latvia. Over the 25 years, Canada has participated in aggressive NATO operations against Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya. Canada is in the NATO Ukraine group supplying weapons to Ukraine and refusing to use diplomacy to end the war. Canada is joining the U.S. militarization of the Asia Pacific and provoking war with China.” See her 2022 piece in the Toronto Star: “NATO’s new Strategic Concept is a dangerous plan to preserve western power through global militarism.”

“The Canadian government has not consulted Canadians on a new foreign policy statement in 20 years. The government gets its ‘marching orders’ from Washington and Brussels and follows the dictates of the U.S. and NATO, which has led to the militarization of Canada’s role in the world.

“NATO, the U.S.-led military alliance, has also militarized the Canadian budget. To meet NATO’s 2 percent GDP target, Canada has increased military spending 100 percent over the past decade from $20 billion to $41 billion this year. The federal government is buying F-35 fighter jets, attack helicopters and armed drones and spending less on social programs. More Canadians are using food banks.

“In Canada, peace and anti-war groups are calling for the federal government to withdraw from NATO because of NATO’s demand to increase military spending and its promotion of weapons, war and militarism over diplomacy and peace. Canadians have a parliamentary petition calling on the government of Canada to withdraw from NATO and to work cooperatively with all countries on peace and development.”

Lorincz is a PhD candidate in global governance at the Balsillie School for International Affairs at Wilfrid Laurier University.