Donald Trump’s election has such wide-ranging implications for Canada that it is easy to lose track. One that is less obvious but that the government must prioritize is the coming politicization of the American armed forces.
Canada relies on the United States for defense and for pursuing its security objectives elsewhere. There is not much way around this. They are our continent’s colossus. Our armed services work with theirs every day: in NORAD with its integrated command structure, in NATO, among officers on exchange, in long-term planning.
We have not always been able to count on the United States to act responsibly or effectively. Nevertheless, one thing we have been able to count on is a relatively professional American armed forces, one that gives its civilian leadership the best advice it can and then implements those civilian leaders’ decisions, within the constraints of the Constitution and the law.
Like any enormous organization, this is hardly a well-oiled machine. The legal limits on its actions are debatable and at times clearly inadequate. But we have never had to deal with an American military riven by partisan divisions and finally unbound by the law.
Until, very possibly, now. Since his first presidency, Donald Trump has had it in for the Pentagon and its generals, whom he holds responsible for resisting his will. He has pledged since that time to remove “woke” generals concerned by diversity, equity and inclusion or climate change, and even invoked executing former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley.
And in the background is Trump’s express desire to use the armed forces in unprecedented domestic missions, to round up migrants and to repress protests. By custom and tradition, these are not supposed to be missions for the regular armed forces such as the U.S. Army, Navy, Air Force or Marines. Indeed, the Posse Comitatus Act is supposed to forbid their deployment in a domestic law-enforcement capacity. The Insurrection Act, however, permits the President to bypass Posse Comitatus legally. True, unlike the regular armed forces is organized by the states unless brought under federal control, the National Guard has a primarily internal, domestic role, including suppressing civil disturbances. However, Trump’s orders may well be unprecedented even for them, depending on the circumstances and rules of engagement. In any case, he and his allies have invoked both National Guard and regular forces.
Such orders may be unconstitutional. They will certainly be controversial. Soldiers can (and must) resist “manifestly illegal” orders, but what this means in practice is far from clear. A military bent to Trump’s will is a military that will bite back its objections, or hold none at all. And if senior civilian and military leadership at the Department of Defense and in the armed forces go along with such orders, refusal becomes much more difficult.
With these orders in the background, all signs show that the threatened purge is coming. A draft executive order is circulating that would create “warrior boards” of handpicked retired officers to toss out senior leaders deemed problematic, with a “wokeness” litmus test for MAGA loyalism. It would apply to three- and four-star generals (169 positions as of September 30, 2023). There are some legal limits at the margins, but in broad strokes, nothing can stop some version of this plan. The fact that Trump named Pete Hegseth for Secretary of Defense suggests his clear willingness to carry it out. Hegseth is a Fox News commentator who has no senior experience in national defense but who inveighs against senior military leaders as “woke”, and champions the January 6th rioters and convicted war criminals in uniform. Even if Hegseth does not wind up as Defense Secretary, his nomination speaks to Trump’s evident wishes.
Such a purge is entirely unnecessary. Trump could implement his major defense policy proposals without firing anyone. He has earned the democratic mandate to do so, a mandate that the armed forces are duty-bound to respect. He could have at least tested whether his plans were implemented, and then—legitimately—removed military personnel unwilling to do so.
But by installing loyalists from the outset, Trump will be creating a sea change. The rules of the game for becoming a senior leader could involve telling Trump what he wants to hear; serving as a political prop, as Gen. Milley did during the Black Lives Matter protests of 2020, unwittingly and to his regret; badmouthing your competitors as insufficiently MAGA; and implementing even Trump’s most legally and constitutionally dubious orders. In short, this is loyalty over competence. We know this because this is how Trump picks people to serve under him. The Hegseth nomination itself is proof enough.
Needless to say, this is no way to create trust, get the best military advice, or plan for the future. There will still exist an enormous reserve of professionalism and competence in the American officer corps. But the result then would be a battle between partisans and professionals, the entrenching of factions, and battles over promotions that are every bit as partisan as what we see in the Supreme Court.
Over recent years, norms of nonpartisanship within the armed forces have eroded: military officers now typically see nothing wrong with active-duty personnel insulting a political leader at the workplace or on social media, or retired generals speaking at political conventions. However, the coming purge would have the potential to blow all of this wide open.
And it could not be easily contained again. Future Presidents could attempt to swing the officer corps back to “their” own loyalists. And even an attempt by a future President to restore professional rather than partisan criteria for military leadership would necessarily attack the MAGA movement’s hold on the senior military leadership, and would be seen as itself a partisan move.
The consequences for Canada are potentially grave. For example, our National Defence personnel may have to doubt whether their U.S. counterparts’ analysis is as objective as possible, or just what sounds good to the boss. As quietly as possible, and depending on the scope of personnel changes, this skepticism may have to become part of the policy planning process.
The major risks, however, are in the medium and long term. The coming controversies in U.S. defense could have spillover effects on debates in Canada. On this issue, Canada’s political parties have a critical role. They must keep their distance from the coming battle in the Pentagon lest it take hold here. The war on DEI could exacerbate still further the controversies and challenges over culture change in our own armed forces. The parties disagree about this issue, as is legitimate and proper in a democracy with civilian control of the armed forces. But in service of these debates, they must resist any temptation to target Canada’s senior military personnel the way Republicans have done. That is a recipe for deepening mistrust and factionalism within the CAF, from which Canadians can only lose.
Further, political leaders in Canada should also approach the coming military debates in the United States with a great deal of discretion. If Canada is seen to intervene overtly, it risks blowback from Washington, becoming an American political football and coming under pressure to change its own military policies to suit American preferences.
Finally, over the long run, Canada’s chief military partner and ally looks set to become more divided internally, to have its personnel and policies shaped by rancorous partisan political debates, to further lose public trust, and to be less able to plan effectively and thus to manage the challenges of the 21st century for the long term. This will make it more challenging for Canada to maintain its continental defense and pursue its security objectives abroad. We must contemplate what it means not to be able count on the United States in defence as much as we once did. A time of major choices is coming.
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