The hostile debate over the future of the Nanoose Military Testing
Site on Vancouver Island is getting hotter. Ottawa has launched a
court action to expropriate part of British Columbia.
Perhaps it is time for some of the issues to be framed in a way that
informs the public rather than reports on the hostilities.
First is the simple fact that the base is almost entirely utilized by
U.S. military vessels. This is not a Canadian security issue.
There are U.S. citizens at the Nanoose base and it is directly linked
to the Keyport and Bangor U.S. military bases in Washington. The
site has been under lease since 1965 and that lease expires this year.
In 1984 the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that the seabed at
Nanoose falls under provincial jurisdiction.
After 35 years it is time to decide whether to renew the lease or to
ask for the site to be returned. Some three million Canadians now
live in the Georgia Basin.
Hundreds of thousands of small vessels ply the waters in the Gulf
Islands and Georgia Basin waters. A Canadian sailboat was struck
in these waters by a submarine using Nanoose in 1994 and sank.
Certainly the risk of accident is low from the nuclear propulsion
systems and from the on-board nuclear weapons. However, as Dr.
Michael Wallace of the University of British Columbia pointed out
on CBC on Monday, should there be a serious accident it would be
like a mini-Chernobyl in the air or water in the midst of three
million of us.
This raises the question that military spokesmen hate most. Who
exactly is the enemy that requires such a potentially catastrophic
risk to be taken? Is it China, or Iraq or France?
It is certainly not Russia anymore. Most of their nuclear fleet is
rusting at dockside generating their own nuclear contamination
problems already.
The fact is we are taking a risk to prepare the U.S. military to fight
an unknown enemy. Intelligence dictates that a new base be located
away from a concentration of human population. That is why the
testing base is not located near Seattle or San Diego, where most
U.S. nuclear vessels are home based.
This brings me to the politics of the federal land grab.
During the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s there were nuclear weapons in
Canada under the control of the U.S. This fact was withheld from
Canadians by prime ministers from Lester Pearson to Pierre
Trudeau.
On Oct. 21, 1998 Canada's Minister of National Defence Art
Eggleton wrote and told me that U.S. military vessels in Canadian
waters are free of nuclear weapons. Last week the hostilities with
B. C. reached an apex and Anderson confirmed the obvious. The
U.S. never informs the public whether U.S. military vessels are
nuclear armed or not.
In 1992 the B. C. legislature, in respect of a widely held view in B.
C., passed a resolution calling for the province to be nuclear
weapons free.
So, three million British Columbians face a risk that, while remote,
could be catastrophic if there is a nuclear accident. Since the legal
lease has expired, now is the time for the testing base to be
relocated.
What about the secrecy and deliberate misinformation about nuclear
weapons in Canada?
Perhaps more Canadians should stand on guard and confront
dishonest federal politicians that carry out the interests of the U.S.
military, against the expressed democratic vote of a duly elected
legislature. For three decades Canadians were told we were nuclear
weapons free. We were not.
In October 1998 the minister of defence said our waters were free
of U.S. nuclear weapons. In May 1999 Anderson says they are
not.
It is not rocket science to conclude that the base should be moved.
Jim Fulton was the member of Parliament for Skeena
from 1979 to
1993. Since 1993 he has been the executive director
of the David
Suzuki Foundation.