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He had pledged to this deployment (with a dual firing authority — the government of Canada and the NATO command both had to approve use). This was a breach of faith with our principal allies and the alliance system that assured Canada’s security. It was a monstrous falsehood about what Kennedy and MacMillan agreed, was unutterable nonsense in straight military terms (without such warheads, the Bomarc missile would have had warheads of sand). The government fell, the Liberals under Lester B. Pearson came into office, and the warheads were deployed.

The problem has festered for two weeks as the federal government fumbles and obfuscates

The present impasse over the blockades in sympathy with some Indigenous opposition to the Coastal GasLink natural gas pipeline in northern British Columbia is comparably absurd, and although it does not directly involve Canada’s relations with other countries, it is now bringing us into widespread contempt and ridicule in the world. The federal government’s sanctimonious fumbling and posturing is despised by everyone: the First Nations, the majority of Canadians and international opinion, as the prime minister beseeches support for Canada’s elevation to two years on the United Nations Security Council. To refresh memories, the majority of the Wet’suwet’en natives, five of six elected native councils among 20 native councils along the 670-kilometre pipeline, support the project. These are the leaders in the specific reservations. Five Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs, who govern larger territories, are opposed. In sympathy with the opposing Wet’suwet’en, but contrary to the majority of them and contrary to the other 15 native councils along the proposed route from Dawson Creek to Kitimat, protesters, a mix of Indigenous and non-Indigenous citizens, are blocking rail traffic for cargo and passengers at many points in B.C., Alberta, Ontario, Quebec and New Brunswick, and scattered other places. Nearly one hundred thousand Via rail passengers have been terribly inconvenienced, as well as many thousands of motorists and local commuters who have been blocked or forced into lengthy detours, and thousands of freight trains involving billions of dollars of commerce have been cancelled or lengthily delayed.