Liberal Senator Colin Kenny was quoted this week in a story by the Ottawa Citizen’s Richard Foot that he believed Canada’s defence spending was too low. If you’ve read the article, you’ll find this note, from Steve Staples of the Polaris Institute, of some interest:
Senator Colin Kenney’s (sic) comments reported today about Canadian military spending warrant close scrutiny.
In comparing Canadian military spending with other NATO members, the quotable senator likes to base his analysis on military spending as a percentage of GDP. But this method puts spending out of context with a nation’s defensive needs.
For instance, if strong global prices of natural resources drive our GDP upward, how many additional troops and planes do we then need to defend Canada? And if our GDP were to ever decrease, would senators be calling for less military spending? The answer is that Canada’s defensive needs are unrelated to the price of wheat or timber.
The often unreported truth is when you actually compare military budgets, dollar for dollar Canada is 6th highest in the 26-member NATO alliance. But even using GDP-based comparison, at 1.2% Canada is on par with Spain (1.2%), Germany (1.3%) and Denmark (1.4%).
The senator was also quoted today as saying the Dutch are spending $650 per capita on defence, and Canada about $340. In fact, according to NATO the Netherlands will spend only $440 ($376 USD) per capita, and Canada will spend $358 ($306 USD) per capita, making our country 10th highest in NATO on a per capita basis.