SOVEREIGNTY --
THIS LAND IS OUR LAND

Sept. 11 should not be an excuse to give up our country and to blindly
follow the U.S. into battle. It's time Canada stood up for its
principles.
-----------------
By David Orchard

In the aftermath of the World Trade Center attack in New York we are
witnessing some very disturbing developments in Canada. Prominent
politicians, academics and media spokespersons are demanding that
Canadians, as evidence of their solidarity with the United States, give
up their border and their sovereignty, give up Canada in effect.
Newspapers announce "the end of Canadian nationalism." We are all
Americans now, we are told.

Canada was not responsible for the terrorist attacks in the U.S. and no
Canadian link has been established for those involved. Yet Canada is
being implicated and Canada's immigration policy is singled out. Canada
is being requested, by no less a figure than the U.S. ambassador, to
consider a North American perimeter, meaning one North American power
centre, or in other words a Greater U.S.A.

At the same time a form of McCarthyism appears to be sweeping the
continent. Almost overnight, only certain things are safe to say. Even
defending our own existence as a nation has now become almost
subversive.

My mother gave several years of her life overseas during World War II;
as an officer and nurse she tended the wounds of those brave enough to
fight fascism and defend this country and its freedom. A million
Canadians joined her in uniform in a six year war that took some fifty
million lives. Now an horrific event in New York is enough for some to
tell us their efforts were in vain, that we no longer even deserve a
country. This is also a betrayal of all those who fought to keep the
border there and preserve our sovereignty, from Isaac Brock, Tecumseh
and de Salaberry in 1812 on down through the years.

Along with our country it appears we are being asked to give up critical
thought. In the U.S., journalists who dare to raise questions are being
fired, casualties of an atmosphere which has prompted Walter Cronkite to
urge  his fellow Americans to wake up to this danger. "When [the
Germans] yielded up their free speech so easily [to Hitler], they became
responsible for what their government did in their name," he warned
recently.

In Canada, those saying "wait a minute, let's think this through," are
instantly labelled anti-American. Two theories predominate concerning
the New York/Washington events. One that they were the acts of madmen,
incapable of comprehension, or alternatively, that they were a reaction
to U.S. foreign policies. Those who examine the latter are being quickly
attacked and silenced, even their patriotism questioned.

Yet the very logic that is unleashing bombs and cruise missiles on
Afghanistan presupposes a rationality to the terrorist attack. Why would
we bombard Afghanistan if the hijackers were merely madmen?

There are serious questions that need to be debated and answered before
our forces attack a foreign country. The first is the issue of legality.
A nation can ask another country for the extradition of a suspected
criminal. It can not bomb it if it asks for evidence, or if it insists
on certain conditions before compliance. Canada's Supreme Court recentl
upheld Canada's own right to impose conditions before extraditing
suspected criminals to the U.S.

Furthermore, the U.S. has informed the Uited Nations that it reserves
the right to widen this war, to attack any country suspected of
condoning or harbouring terrorists. This declaration falls far outside
any possible interpretation of Article 51 of the U.N. Charter. A
nation's right to self-defence in international law is little different
from the right of the individual in Canadian law. If my neighbour
threatens to kill me, or if I suspect he may do so, the law does not
allow me to shoot him first.

Law, domestic and international, is in place to prevent vigilante
action.  The Afghans, many starving and huddled in their cellars through
these nights of terror, never elected the Taliban as their government
and should not be made collectively responsible for its actions. Did not
the U.S., Pakistan and Saudi Arabia impose and maintain the Taliban's
rule upon the long suffering people of Afghanistan? Did the U.S.
government not train, sponsor, and finance the same terrorists we are
now condemning, when it was using them against the Soviet Union?

Most Americans have no idea what actions their government has taken
around the world, including in the Middle East, where some of the most
iron fisted dictatorships in existence retain their grip over their
populations only with U.S. and British support. (Most Americans also do
not know that their government and that of Britain have been bombing
Iraq on a virtually weekly basis since 1991, also in flagrant violation
of international law.)

Canadians pride themselves on being better informed, and Canada, as a
close friend of the United States, with a proud tradition as a
peacemaker, has a responsibility to its own citizens and to the world to
examine all these questions. Our law makers must do so before we join an
action which pits West versus East, rich versus poor in an
unpredictable, open ended war we may live to profoundly regret. The
bombing of war torn Afghanistan is already creating new victims and no
doubt a new generation of martyrs. THE END

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DAVID ORCHARD is the author of The Fight for Canada — Fourt Centuries of
Resistance to American Expansionism and was runner-up to Joe Clark in
the 1998 federal Progressive Conservative leadership contest. He farms
in Borden, Saskatchewan and can be reached at tel (306) 652-7095 and at
davidorchard@sk.sympatico.ca

=====================================

Calgary Herald, August 20, 2001

ERASING BORDERS WITH U.S. WILL ERASE CANADA FROM MAP
by David Orchard

[Also published as "Road map to victory; Tories should shun talks with
Alliance and fill vacuum on the Left of Liberals," Montreal Gazette,
August 18, '01; "Party that stands up against Americanization needed,"
Prince Albert Herald (SK), August 18, '01; "Is Canada facing
assimilation?," Saint John Telegraph Journal (NB),  August 22, '01 and
"Nation needs bold Tory vision," Regina Leader-Post (SK), August 21,
'01]

A recent newspaper headline informs us that "Canada and the United
States are poised to consider erasing the world's longest undefended
border." According to Canada's ambassador to Washington, "in the case of
Canada and the United States, the traditional concept of an
international border has lost its relevance."

Throughout Canada's history the push to see Canada absorbed into the
U.S. — continentalism in action — has been strong. From Confederation
until Pierre Trudeau took its helm, the Liberal party promoted the
economic union of Canada with the United States. The Conservatives stood
strongly in opposition, overcoming the annexationists to create an
independent country in 1867 and then defeating the Liberals' push for
commercial union with the U.S. in 1891 and their proposed Canada-U.S.
free trade agreement in 1911.

Sir John A. Macdonald famously summed up the party's position: "The
Liberals have as many aliases for their policy as a thief has excuses
for his wrong doing. It has been commercial union, unrestricted
reciprocity and latterly tariff reform; but there is another name by
which it must be known, and that is annexation — which is treason."

However in the mid 1980s, the Conservative party dramatically reversed
its historical position and adopted the traditional Liberal policy of
free trade with the U.S. Two elections later it was handed the most
sweeping repudiation of any political party in a western democracy —
reduced from governing to two seats.

Today the Liberal party has cast aside the positions of Pierre Trudeau
and John Turner — and its own electoral promises to stop the sellout of
Canada which brought it to power — and reverted to outright
continentalism. The escalating takeover of Canada's economy by American
corporations is reaching catastrophic proportions. The governor of the
Bank of Canada has stated that, if the economic integration continues,
adopting the U.S. dollar may follow. What in most countries would be
regarded as treasonous, namely that the nation might cease to exist, is
referred to openly.

Peter Lougheed, formerly a strong promoter of the Canada-U.S. free trade
agreement, now warns that "we're going to look at our country in about
three years and say what have we got left?" Former Supreme Court Justice
Willard Estey has added his voice: "I supported free trade a decade ago.
Now I am starting to suspect that Canada may have contracted out our
independence in those trade agreements... Let's examine what's happening
to us... while we still have a country."

If our nation is to maintain its sovereignty, there must be a political
party to defend it and Canada has perhaps never needed the Conservative
party as its traditional defender more than today. Yet at this moment
prominent members of the party appear lost and are engaged in "unity
talks" with members of the Canadian Alliance, a party which strongly
supports the Liberal policy of economic integration into the U.S.

The Alliance position is one of classic laissez-faire liberalism; it has
nothing to do with Canadian conservatism which, after founding the
country and its highly successful mixed economy, created the CPR, CNR,
Ontario Hydro, the Bank of Canada, the Canadian Wheat Board, the CBC and
the first national unemployment and social programmes.

What electoral purpose is there in having a fourth political party
saying "me too" to the continentalism of the Liberals, the Alliance and
the Bloc Quebecois?

There is a political opening today for a mainstream voice opposed to
merging our country into the U.S., to the escalating destruction of the
environment and to the wholesale and unsustainable give away of our
non-renewable resources and our industries under the guise of "free
trade."

The Conservative party has a proud tradition which defeated these
tendencies in the past. Under laissez-faire liberalism Canada could not
have come into being and cannot continue to survive today. Without a
national vision and a domestically controlled infrastructure, Canada,
next to the power of the United States, faces assimilation. Neither the
Liberals, the Alliance nor the Bloc (which favours a common currency
with the U.S.) has a national vision. The NDP record in defence of
Canada's sovereignty is mixed and its national reach remains weak.

The defining issues of the next election may well be those of
globalization and continentalism, provided of course there is a major
political party prepared to stand up to the Liberals on these questions.

With the Liberal party, whether under Paul Martin or Jean Chrétien, and
the Canadian Alliance under Stephen Harper or any facsimile thereof,
there is no room on the political spectrum for another right wing,
pro-continentalist party. There is however a large vacuum in the centre,
just to the left of the Liberals — the same opportunity John Diefenbaker
saw and seized.

Instead of romancing the Alliance the PC party should reconnect to its
roots and its timeless position in defence of Canada's right to be.
Taking this stand against the Liberal betrayal of Canada would be
consistent with the courage shown by Cartier, Macdonald, Borden, Bennett
and Diefenbaker; it just might also be the key to victory in the next
election. THE END