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Canada - irrelevant and weak???
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| ShadoWolf |
http://www.canoe.ca/NewsStand/Colum.../01/565034.html
Canada's bark lacks international bite
By TED BYFIELD -- Calgary Sun
Canada's foreign affairs minister Pierre Pettigrew, we were told last week, has "put Iran on notice" over the state murder of an Iranian-born photographer who had become a Canadian citizen.
This came after the Iranian prison guard accused of fatally beating photographer Zahra Kazemi was acquitted of murder by an Iranian court after a two-day trial.
Kazemi had been arrested for taking pictures of a student protest.
The court said the evidence against the guard was insufficient, so the Iranian government offered her family something between $12,000 and $18,000 in compensation. The family turned this down and demanded an appeal. An exiled Iranian journalist simply scoffed.
"Nothing will happen," he said. "Their whole aim is to close down the file."
Canada has already recalled its ambassador from Tehran over the case and now must consider what further steps can be taken.
You can easily imagine the reaction of the Ayatollah-run Iranian government when it received "demands" from Canada.
"Canada?" they would have sneered.
"Canada is going to get tough with Iran? What a joke. Canada can't get tough with anybody."
They know that there's not one significant thing, beyond recalling our ambassador, that Canada can do to Iran.
Thanks to endless years of Liberal government, we have almost no army or air force left, and the B.C. Ferry Service has more ships than our navy.
Pettigrew talks vaguely of imposing "sanctions," but what sanctions? What does Iran buy from Canada that it couldn't buy in a dozen other places?
Iran knows this, and so, surely, does Pettigrew.
So why all this issuing of demands and threats with nothing at all to back them up?
Because, of course, Pettigrew isn't talking to Iran. He's talking to Canadians.
He's trying to reassure us that Ottawa could really do something about it, if one of us were arrested by a totalitarian government. What we're discovering is that it can't.
But that, of course, is the optimistic view. The pessimistic view is that Pettigrew, himself, doesn't understand this. He actually thinks that, when he mouths off like this in the name of a place called Canada, that totalitarian governments will listen. That is, he's been so imbued with the values of the '60s that he genuinely believes that cries for human rights and justice will be heard and respected by places like Iran.
This would be very sad, because it would mean that Pettigrew has not discovered the facts of international life -- any more than his fellow-Quebecois, the Great Buffoon Jean Chretien, understood them. Facts like this:
1. The respect paid a country on the international stage varies directly with the competence and strength of its armed forces.
No guns, no respect.
2. Small countries, of which Canada is one, can acquire international protection only by leaguing themselves with larger, more powerful allies. Thus Canada, for the first 80 years of its existence, allied itself with the British Commonwealth, and thereafter with the American commonwealth.
3. However, to sustain the protection of the larger nation, the smaller one must contribute what it can to assist the armed forces of its protector. This, Canada for many years did, until a succession of smart-ass Liberal prime ministers, starting with Pierre Trudeau, began to play the field, dabbling with other alliances.
He flirted with Soviet Russia, for instance, they of the Gulag who, at the time, had some 20 million slaves in prison, and he made friends with Cuba's Fidel Castro. Then came the Great Buffoon, one of whose paid flacks publicly proclaimed the American president a "moron" and was never disciplined for it.
The Americans put up with this for years, chiefly because they never thought much about their pipsqueak northern neighbour anyway, and when they did they would dismiss us as a kind of spoiled-brat child.
However, you get the impression that they are now becoming more aware of the brat and are beginning to lose patience.
Maybe they're saying: If they want to go it alone, let' em try.
Well, one of the first things we discover as we go it alone is that other countries such as Iran can walk all over us, jail and murder our citizens, and then laugh at our absurd protests and demands. They know we're powerless.
The question is: Do we? |
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| Carney |
| i think we are one of the few countries in the world that can acually support our selfs and many other countries with our resources. So we do have a lot to offer..... the only problem is that we live next to the ty states.... and they seem to get all the attention, mostly negative though now. |
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| starsearcher |
| I don't think that the fact that we are next to the US has anything to do with the fact and most people don't care or know anything about Canada...it's time to stop pointing fingers at others and look at ourselves. If Canada was anywhere else in the world it wouldn't have made much of a differece...look at any other neutral country...how much do you know about it? Do you really think it's powerful...We as a country are doing a pretty crappy job at showing who we really are to the rest of the world...a lot of people think we live in igloos and have wild white bears walking around us... :rolleyes: |
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| Form&Funktion |
^^^^^^^
Look around us........we live in one of the most free and cultural/religiously tolerant countries in the world. That is a strength and success that cannot be ignored. If, in fact, our collective impression on the world psyche, is one of ice and polar bears as you suggest, then our obscurity IS our strength. We are free to develop our society and education and daily lives without the envious eyes of foriegn powers itching to invade our lands.
I do however think the above idea is false or at best; the thought of the uneducated foreign person alone. I say this based on the fact that Canada has one of the highest immigration rates in the world. How can this be unless people in the troubled and seemingly uninformed parts of the world know our Country offers a rare standard and freedom of living. I agree, our physical military power has degrated to an embarrassing and unacceptable state but that alone does not equate as the sum of a countries worth or relevance.
Our power may not lay in the barrel of a gun but it most certainly emanates through the common world as the power of hope. |
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| crazedcanuck |
^^^^^^^
Guys, this has nothing to do with dealing with people's impressions of Canada, but other governments.
We are terribly dependant on the US economically and militarily.
As citizens of Canada, we are accorded some respect in other lands, however that doesn't translate to the governments/regimes that abuse their citizens, and our when visiting. Our Government isn't even an active part militarily in those old alliances, thus we have very little support in situatons like what happened in Iran.
Our Foreign Ministry has a recent history of being limp-dicked. This issue, as well as the man in Syria I believe that was working there, imprisoned as being a spy for Israel, sentenced to death, and essentially abandoned by the ministry, even after it became clear he was being railroaded. If it wasn't for the Brits, he'd be dead. |
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| bass drive |
Canada might not be a :strong" country, but it is well repected world wide. I think other countries would feel guilty to upset Canada lol
on the other hand, I never understood the lack of "all Canadian" industries/brands here, eventhough Canada is among the richest in natural resources and is one of the G8
I guess this is what happens when the US is your neighbor |
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| tw1tch |
| To even bring our countries military into this situation in Iran is moronic. The insinuation is, if we had a powerful military, they would somehow listen to us? If they didn't we would do something, like attack them? What the hell does our military have to do with this, big or small, it would never be used. I agree, more should have been done, I don't know what that more is, but it certainly isn't a threat that is re-enforced with military power. |
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| tw1tch |
| quote: | Originally posted by Form&Funktion
Our power may not lay in the barrel of a gun |
And I for one, am glad it doesn't. |
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| Form&Funktion |
| quote: | | Guys, this has nothing to do with dealing with people's impressions of Canada, but other governments. |
Yes, to the original point, this is true. My point though was that there is a balance. For every abuse and indifference that occurs due to our lack of might and weight with other governments, positive mindsets are also attributed to our country based on it's relative pacifisim and peace-keeping neutrality.
There are two very different layers one must look at here. The impression of government, and the impression of common humanity. In the first, we indeed lack much of the needed weight to enforce our need for justice and fair treatment abroad in (I might add) a very small list of countries... but in the second we are almost without equal as a place where "we got things right".
Like I said, our power in militeristic circles has horribly been emaciated but our power to effect change in the world is not so inept. Bear in mind also, that the cry by our ministry is backed by the UN since Iran closed the case, thus if, in this environment, nothing can be done to pressure for justice, then the UN is just as inept and powerless as our internal call and we should relook at the benefits of being a UN member. |
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| starsearcher |
F&F you are correct but I'm also an immigrant and as one I can tell you that before comming here I knew nothing about Canada nor did most of my firends...and not because of ignorance and not because of stupidity but because not many people care...there's nothing REALLY exciting here that people are just jumping to learn about. For ages Canada prides itself with hockey and etc...so that's the image that most people have...and the problem is the fact that (like someone else said above) the foreign ministry is doing a ty job...
Besides...we are a neutral country and as a neutral country there's not much going on here...and if there's not much going on here then the rest of the world doesn't care. People watch the news on TV and read the newspapers...is there anything going on in Canada that is significant on the world scale? Rarely ever...and that's what I'm talking about ;)
Sure we have lots of great things here, and I'm learning about more and more of them every day...but most people around the world don't know or don't care about them - the average person i mean. Canadian government should be doing a better job promoting Canada around the world...unless they actually don't want to promote it for some reason and want to lay low...then okay. |
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| malek |
| that editorial is pure bs, conservatives are jumping on every story to push their agendas... :rolleyes: |
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| starsearcher |
| quote: | Originally posted by malek
that editorial is pure bs, conservatives are jumping on every story to push their agendas... :rolleyes: |
Yeah that can also be true :) |
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