US embassy cable - 03OTTAWA492

C O N F I D E N T I A L OTTAWA 000492 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/19/2013 
TAGS: MARR, PARM, PREL, CA, Missile Defense 
SUBJECT: CANADIAN CABINET TO DISCUSS MISSILE DEFENSE 
 
REF: 02 OTTAWA 3101 
 
Classified By: Political Minister Counselor Brian Flora, 
Reasons 1.5 (b) and (d). 
 
1. (C) Following up on high-level consultations held in 
Washington January 28, the Canadian cabinet will be meeting 
soon to discuss potential missile defense cooperation with 
the United States.  Missile defense is currently on the 
calendar for the February 25 Cabinet meeting (Cabinet 
normally meets each Tuesday), but this may slip to a later 
date.  Foreign Minister Graham and Defense Minister McCallum, 
who decided in October to accelerate dialogue with the U.S. 
on this issue (reftel), hope to get some guidance from Prime 
Minister Chretien on how to proceed. 
 
2. (C) Foreign Affairs (DFAIT) and Defense (DND) officials 
got a clear message in the January 28 meeting that the 
missile defense program is progressing rapidly, and that 
there are costs to delaying a decision on Canadian 
participation.  Vincent Rigby, DND Director of Arms and 
Proliferation Control Policy, told us that the GoC had always 
assumed that we would want to use NORAD as part of the 
missile defense command structure.  Now that the U.S. has 
decided on STRATCOM as overall command and NORTHCOM as 
executing command for North America, NORAD appears to be more 
of an afterthought.  While U.S. officials made it clear that 
we were leaving the door open for a NORAD role, Rigby's sense 
was that NORTHCOM was the natural choice as executing command 
for North America, and that it would be difficult to change 
that down the road. 
 
3. (C) Daniel Bon, DND Director General for Policy Planning, 
told us that the lack of a definable "need" for Canadian 
participation made it more difficult to sell this to Cabinet. 
 He noted the absence of U.S. plans for NORAD participation 
or for missile defense installations in Canada, although 
acknowledging that Canada's indecision had kept it on the 
sidelines.  Bon believed that Chretien did not want missile 
defense participation to be part of his "legacy" in his last 
year in office, and would punt the decision to his successor. 
 
4. (C) Ron Hoffman, Foreign Affairs (DFAIT) Director for 
Defense and Security Relations, told us that the GoC would 
have a lot of work to do with Parliament and the Canadian 
public in selling Canadian participation.  He noted that a 
recent Commons Foreign Affairs Committee report, specifically 
recommending that the GoC not participate in missile defense, 
was unhelpful in this regard.  The GoC's increased interest 
in missile defense was still largely under the radar, Hoffman 
continued, as there was little general awareness of a shift 
in Government policy. 
 
5. (C) COMMENT: DFAIT and DND are hoping that they will at 
least get a green light from Cabinet to participate in 
certain aspects of missile defense.  Given near-term 
decisions in the U.S. on missile defense industrial projects, 
and the Command decisions that have already been taken, DFAIT 
and DND would like to move forward on industrial cooperation 
and at least leave the door open to NORAD participation. 
Beyond that, it is not clear that Prime Minister Chretien 
will be ready to make a clear decision on Canadian 
participation.  Missile defense remains controversial in 
Ottawa because of arms control concerns (i.e., weaponization 
of space), and the Liberal Party is already divided over 
Iraq.  Given the likelihood that the GoC will be making a 
controversial decision to participate militarily in an Iraq 
campaign, Chretien is unlikely to give more than a muffled 
response on missile defense. 
CELLUCCI