Liberal Leader Mark Carney says the leak by top U.S. national security officials of plans for military strikes in Yemen — and the shifting security priorities of the Trump administration — mean “we have to look out for ourselves.”
“My responsibility is to plan for the worst, is to think about the most difficult evolution of the new threat environment, what it means for Canada and how do we best protect Canada,” Carney said during a campaign stop in Halifax on Tuesday.
“Part of that response is to be more and more Canadian in our defence capabilities, more and more Canadian in our decisions.… We have to look out for ourselves,” he added.
Carney made the remarks a day after a report that U.S. Secretary of Defence Pete Hegseth and U.S. Vice-President J.D. Vance texted war plans for upcoming military strikes in Yemen to a Signal group chat that included the editor-in-chief for The Atlantic magazine, Jeffrey Goldberg.
The material in the text chain “contained operational details of forthcoming strikes on Iran-backed Houthi-rebels in Yemen, including information about targets, weapons the U.S. would be deploying, and attack sequencing,” Goldberg reported.
Hegseth’s first comments on the story attacked Goldberg as “deceitful” and a “discredited so-called journalist,” while alluding to previous critical reporting of Trump from the publication.
“Nobody was texting war plans and that’s all I have to say about that,” Hegseth said in an exchange with reporters Monday.
But Brian Hughes, a U.S. National Security Council spokesperson, later said the text chain “appears to be authentic and we are reviewing how an inadvertent number was added to the chain.”
‘Its a serious, serious issue,’ Carney says
Carney noted that he currently has top-level security clearance and has also enjoyed that access previously in Canada and in the U.K., and is aware that information can leak from time to time.
“It’s a serious, serious issue and all lessons must be taken from any of those, including in this circumstance,” he said Tuesday.
“What’s important is how people react to those mistakes and how they tie them up,” he added. “They don’t deny the mistakes, but they are clear and transparent and [are] progressing them.”
Carney said Canada has a strong intelligence and security relationship with the United States, but that association is evolving as the relationship between the two countries continues to change.
“Our world is changing, is becoming more divided and dangerous,” he said. “Our adversaries are increasingly emboldened, and the norms that have kept Canada and the world secure are in peril.
“The priorities of the United States, once closely aligned to our own, have shifted. Our sovereignty is under threat … President Trump wants to break us so America can own us,” he added.
Stephanie Carvin, an associate professor at Carleton University and a former national security analyst, told CBC News that Canada’s changing relationship with the U.S. means we are “going to have to do more with what we have,” and make significant investments.
“As the U.S. is clearly going into a new direction, as it no longer values Canada as a partner, we are going to have to look after ourselves because the United States has in the past looked out for us and provided us information that has been useful and helpful,” she said.
Going forward, Carvin said, Canada is going to need to consider not only strengthening its military but also its foreign intelligence efforts, because Canada can no longer be certain the U.S. will share vital intelligence with its northern neighbour.
Carney says more defence announcements to come
Carney’s campaign statement on strengthening Canada’s military was made Tuesday at the Irving shipyard in Halifax, which has built the navy and coast guard’s Arctic offshore patrol vessels and will soon begin construction on a fleet of destroyers to replace the country’s frigates.
Much of what the Liberal leader had to say was a rehash of existing plans and proposals, including the purchase of new submarines for the navy and a proposal to give members of the military a substantial raise.
There were, however, some interesting suggestions including a notion that Canadian steel and aluminum would be given priority in defence production, and that the coast guard would be given a new, perhaps para-military surveillance mandate.
There was no reference in his statement to earlier pledges to review and possibly buy only a handful of F-35 fighters and to pivot to another aircraft maker in order to meet the air force’s needs. He suggested the review was ongoing, but that the bottom line is how beneficial the deal with U.S.-based Lockheed Martin is for Canadian workers and the economy.
The navy’s new destroyers will contain a Lockheed Martin-built combat management system. Carney, however, declined to say whether that particular defence purchase would be reviewed along with the F-35.
Details of how the Liberals would like to overhaul, should they win on April 28, will be contained in the party’s platform, which has yet to be released, he said.
“We will have more defence announcements with the platform, before the platform comes out,” Carney said. “So we will lay all of that out as well. We will cost our broader … electoral platform so you can see … how we’re balancing the budget.”
