Per ardua as astra (DND participation in Star Wars).

As CTV News reported on September 8th, the Department of National Defence (DND) is quietly laying the groundwork for Canadian participation in Star Wars through the joint US-Canada North American Aerospace Defence Command, NORAD. Throughout the 1980s, the Canadian government never ruled out the possibility of Canadian involvement in a ballistic missile defence system, but it wasn't until the 1994 Defence White Paper that the government went beyond affirming the possibility of future involvement and actually authorized DND to contribute to the development of such a system through direct participation in Star Wars-related research. In 1995, a Canadian NORAD Region Headquarters document revealed DND's private view on ballistic missile defence, referring to "the necessity of having such a capability" and stating that "NORAD's leadership views missile defence as a logical extension of NORAD's current mission." To help pave the way for Canadian involvement, DND plans to spend as much as $600-million on research into "space-oriented defence capabilities" through its new Joint Space Project.

A major hurdle was passed in March 1996, when the NORAD agreement was renewed and "aerospace control" added to NORAD's mission. For the purposes of the NORAD agreement, aerospace control "currently includes" only the surveillance and control of North American airspace. But in normal military use it also includes the surveillance and control of space, and it was undoubtedly for this reason that the new version of the NORAD agreement also added a provision specifically allowing for future changes to the NORAD mission on the agreement of DND and the US Department of Defense.

The US is already looking towards "aerospace control," with or without Canadian involvement. In August, the retiring Commander of NORAD, General Joseph Ashy, stated bluntly: "It's politically sensitive, but it's going to happen. Some people don't want to hear this, and it sure isn't in vogue ... but - absolutely - we're going to fight in space. We're going to fight from space and we're going to fight into space ..." [Aviation Week and Space Technology, 5 August 1996]. That same month the Pentagon's Joint Requirements Oversight Council agreed that future missile defence forces should be assigned to NORAD, subject to Canadian agreement [Defense News, 26 August-1 September 1996].

It is still far from certain that such forces will ever be deployed. But Canadians cannot afford to be complacent. Decisions are being made now, without any public or parliamentary discussion, that will all but guarantee Canada's participation if such a system does get deployed. And, quite obviously, that is just the way DND likes it.