Defense Against Help: Explaining Canada-U.S. Security Relations

Abstract

A core concept in international relations theory, especially among realists, is survive in an anarchical world, states must rely on self-help. As John Mearsheimer explains, [S]tates cannot depend on others for their own security. Each state tends see itself as vulnerable and alone, and therefore it aims provide for its own survival.... This emphasis on self-help does not preclude states from forming alliances. But alliances are only temporary marriages of convenience: today's alliance partner might be tomorrow's enemy, and today's enemy might be tomorrow's alliance partner. (1) Self-help may apply great powers, but it loses its explanatory force when extended smaller states. As Robert Rothstein points out, lesser states are not simply Great Powers writ small. (2) John Holmes observes foreign policy ... of a middle power is generically different from of a great power, let alone a superpower. (3) Small states, Rothstein adds, think and act differently, and any analysis which fails take fact into account is bound be simplistic and inadequate. (4) What sets lesser states apart from their great-power counterparts is that they cannot obtain primarily by the use of their own resources and they have rely fundamentally on outside maintain their independence. (5) It is clear self-help does not reflect Canada's reality. Canada shares a continent with its superpower neighbor, the United States, against which war is inconceivable. In fact, the United States serves as a powerful deterrent external threats Canada's safety. But while Canada relies on American power for its protection, the United States also depends on Canada--with its crucial land, air, and maritime approaches--for its own safety. In short, Canada-U.S. is interdependent. It follows Canada cannot ignore U.S. safety requirements, nor can Canada easily isolate itself from the consequences of American decisions. Canada, therefore, participates in North American not only deter possible external threats but also to ensure national control over the Canadian territory in the face of possible demands from the United States. (6) Canada does so through defense against help, a strategy articulated by Nils Orvik, by which a mid- or small-sized state maintains a sufficient level of unilaterally, or in cooperation with a large state is committed its safety, avoid unwanted help from the large state. (7) Defining Defense Against Help In Canada, against is a policy response nation's somewhat unconventional security dilemma, the essence of which is the United States, in the process of guaranteeing Canada's safety, could itself become a threat. If Canada were become a strategic liability the United States through military weakness or otherwise, Washington could take any measures deemed necessary for its own defense, regardless of Ottawa's preferences. (8) Moreover, if Canada failed contribute North American defense, Ottawa would forfeit opportunities affect U.S. strategic policy decisions on which Canada's safety ultimately depends. The significance of the against strategy in Canadian policy is evident in what can be called the U.S.-Canada security bargain, the elements of which were first publicly expressed in statements exchanged between President Franklin D. Roosevelt and Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King in 1938. These statements, which still constitute the core of U.S.-Canada strategic obligations, reveal both similarities and differences in the two countries' priorities and preoccupations. President Roosevelt expressly committed the United States the of Canada, giving the assurance that the people of the United States will not stand idly by if domination of Canadian soil is threatened by any other empire. …