FALL 2008 NEWS & VIEWS

T H E O F F I C I A L N E W S L E T T E R O F C M S S

Centre for Military

and Strategic Studies

University of Calgary

2500 University Drive NW

Calgary, Alberta, Canada

Phone: (403) 220-4038

Fax: (403) 282-0594

Email: cmss@ucalgary.ca

www.cmss.ucalgary.ca

PROMOTING AND DEVELOPING EXCELLENCE IN MILITARY, SECURITY AND DEFENCE STUDIES.

NEWS:

Student Spotlight: Valerie Yankey-Wayne

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Community News Battle of The Bow 2008

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Observing Canada’s Combined Task Force 150—Arabian Sea Tour By Patrick Lennox

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EVENTS S3C Consortium 2009 Call for Papers

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PERSPECTIVES Taliban Propaganda or Promise? By Kris Tokarski

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PUBLICATIONS Journal of Military and Strategic Studies Calgary Paper in Military and Strategic Studies Other Publications

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Defence Minister Speaks at Luncheon

On September 2, 2008 The Honourable Peter Gordon Mackay, Minister of National Defence spoke to military and defence experts at a luncheon coordinated by the Centre for Military and Strategic Studies and the Canadian Defence & Foreign Affairs Institute. He also announced the Atomic Veterans Recognition Program which offers $24,000 "ex-gratia" payments to military vet-erans and technology workers from the Department of National Defence who participated in nu-clear weapons tests in the United States during the Cold War. It will also compensate those who participated in the decontamination of the Chalk River nuclear reactor following two accidents in the 1950s.

The following are recent Master of Strategic Stud-ies and PhD graduates from the Centre for Military and Strategic Studies at the University of Calgary:

Geoff Crookes (MSS – November 2008) Thesis: "Mozi on Warfare: A Critical Analysis of Mohist Military Thought"

Tiffany Farion (MSS – June 2008) Thesis: "The Security of Canadian and American Transportation Systems: Has Anything Changed Since 9/11?"

Derek Fung (MSS – June 2008) Thesis: "Respectful Vagueness: The Continual Utility of Strategic Ambiguity as the Primary Deterrent to Conflict in the Taiwan Strait"

Jeremy Lammi (MSS – June 2008) Thesis: "Rules for Victory: Analysis of the Malayan Emergency and the South Vietnamese Strategic Hamlet Program using Social Constructivism"

Jonathan Kent (MSS – November 2008) Thesis: "Canada After 9/11: The Economic Security of Anti-Terrorism and Border Security"

Andrew Sullivan (MSS – November 2008) Thesis: "Innovations in Strategic Communication: Memetics as a Basis for Tactical Information Operations in a Counterterrorism Context"

John Modinger (PhD – November 2008) Thesis: "Hegemony Over the Heavens: The Chinese and American Struggle in Space"

CMSS doctoral candidate Valerie Yankey-Wayne completed her MPhil in IR at the University of Cambridge, United Kingdom and BA in His-tory at University of Ghana. She is currently a research associate with the Armed Groups Project, specializing in the nexus between armed groups, narcotics trafficking, weapons proliferation and organized crime networks. She was a researcher and policy analyst at the United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research (UNIDIR), Geneva from 2002 to 2006. She has also consulted on a number of projects with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), OXFAM Great Britain Regional programme for West Africa and the International Action Network on Small Arms (IANSA). Through IANSA and UNIDIR, she has worked closely with many governmental experts and relevant multi-lateral and regional organisations on arms control and related international security issues. Here are a few highlights of her research ac-tivities in the past few months:

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Valerie Yankey-Wayne, a doctoral candidate at CMSS, had an interesting summer jet-setting between New York, Kampala and Accra presenting papers on Arms Control. With sponsorship from the Special Projects Fund at the Centre for Military and Strategic Studies (CMSS), Ms. Yankey-Wayne collaborated with the Armed Groups Project to present a paper at the United Nations in New York on 14 July, during the Third Biennial Meeting of States to Consider the Implementation of the UN Programme of Action on Small Arms and Light Weapons. The purpose of the seminar was to provide a constructive discussion on the controversial subject of limiting weapons transfers to non-state armed groups. The topic of the seminar was “Arms transfer and organized groups: challenges and opportunities”. The seminar was chaired by Ghana’s Minister of Interior; and distinguished speakers included Liberia’s Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs and Peru’s Deputy Ambassador to the United Nations. Papers were presented by Ms. Yankey-Wayne, Pablo Policzer, Director of the Armed Groups Pro-ject and Nicolas Florquin from Geneva Call (Switzerland). Participants came from different countries across the globe. They represented a broad range of institutions in the public as well as the private sec-tor and brought to the conference a valuable mix of experiences and perspectives. Follow-up discussions after the presentation gave a good impres-sion and understanding of the many perspectives that should be taken into account when transferring weapons between state armed groups and non-state armed groups, as well as how to build a regulatory mechanism for arms transfers. Feedback from the participants confirmed that the seminar was greatly appreciated and that there is a pressing need for more practical approaches to this controversial subject. Following the seminar, Ms. Yankey-Wayne was invited by the English-language Al-Jazeera International for a live TV interview on the subject of States’ commitment to stem the illegal trafficking of arms.

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In August, Ms. Yankey-Wayne was invited as a guest speaker by the African Center for Strategic Studies of the National Defense University, Wash-ington DC for a workshop in Kampala (Uganda) on "Enhancing Capacity for Tackling Small Arms and Light Weapons Proliferation in the Great Lakes and East Africa". The workshop participants included mid- to senior-level civilian security and military officers from across Africa, international ex-perts, and European and American government officials. The purpose of the workshop was to agree on practical steps and measures to enhance regional and national capacity to address the illicit proliferation of small arms and light weapons in the region. In September, Ms. Yankey-Wayne was invited to another regional meeting in Accra (Ghana) to speak at a workshop for West African civil society and government officials working to reduce armed violence. The meeting evaluated progress on the issue to date.

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T H E O F F I C I A L N E W S L E T T E R O F C M S S

NEWS

Student Spotlight: Valerie Yankey-Wayne

The Battle of the Bow 2008

NEWS & VIEWS T H E O F F I C I A L N E W S L E T T E R O F C M S S

NEWS

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Community News:

Recent MSS graduate Jonathan Kent accepted a PhD position in Political Science and the Dynamics of Global Change at the University of Toronto as of September 2008.

CMSS research associate Aaron Plamondon pre-sented a paper entitled, "The Future of Seapower and Naval Procurement" at the Maritime Security Challenges (MSC) Conference: Building the Navies of the Future, September 16-18, 2008.

PhD Candidate Craig Mantle presented a paper entitled "21st Century Coalition Operations: A Cana-dian Perspective" at the 50th Annual International Military Testing Association Conference, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, September 29 to October 3, 2008.

PhD Candidate Rob Barrett was a Faculty lecturer for the new Canadian Patient Safety Officer Course at the Canadian Patient Safety Institute on Septem-ber 25, 2008. The course was entitled, "Considering Organizational Change and Conflict for Canadian Patient Safety Officers". He also held a two-day consulting/instructor contract for the Canadian Forces for 120 NATO and non-NATO Majors and LCols at the Canadian Forces College, Toronto. Sep-tember 23-24, 2008. The topic was “Intercultural Negotiation and the Negotiation Environ-ment". Barrett lectured on "Leadership Tools for Highly-Effective Organizations" for FMC law firm; (58 lawyers in attendance) in July 2008, as well.

Dr. Gavin Cameron and PhD Candidate Doug Mun-roe presented a paper entitled, “Terrorism and His-torical Sociology” at the 2008 Conference of the Canadian Political Science Association, June 4-6, 2008 at the University of British Columbia. Doug Munroe, also presented a paper entitled “Crisis, Myth and the Essence of Decision: Revisiting the October Crisis, 1970” at the Strategic Studies Student Confer-ence, March 7-8, 2008 at the University of Calgary.

MSS Alumnus Rian Wall accepted a position as the Energy Security Analyst for the Energy Security Unit within the Alberta Solicitor General and Public Secu-rity. The Unit focuses on security threats to energy-related critical infrastructure and implementation of the Alberta Counter-Terrorism Crisis Management Plan within the mandate of the Energy Resource Conservation Board.

Violetta Clitheroe, CMSS Web Communications and Marketing Specialist has resigned from her position as of October 31, 2008. She will be focusing on her MSS degree and is looking forward to being a stay-at-home mom with her two young children.

On August 29, 2008, CMSS round up twenty sailors in four rafts to em-bark on the 8th annual rafting expedition down the Bow River with a final stop at the Barley Mill for snacks and libations. An annual event since the summer of 2001, the CMSS rafting trip brings together students, alumni, staff, professors, fellows and research associates to "battle it out on the bow" with one of the greatest icebreakers marking the beginning of the academic year. What happens on the Bow, stays on the Bow, one might like to say... There was a special German delegation that joined the "race" this year. As part of the new German/Canadian exchange program with the Helmut Schmidt University of Hamburg and the University of Calgary, CMSS wel-comed the new exchange students to this event. Former German ex-change student 1st Lieutenant (GER) Christian R.W. Mattern had such a great time last year that he coaxed the 2008/2009 exchange students Marian Corbe and Sebastian Schramm to witness firsthand the civility of the CMSS community. As always, the self-proclaimed winner of the race was Dr. David Bercu-son's raft, the only one that was actually racing to the finish line!

Making a splash on the Bow River — Calgary, Alberta August 2008

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NEWS

Sailing on HMCS Iroquois and Protecteur Observing Canada’s Command of Combined Task Force 150—Arabian Sea

August 19 - October 9, 2008 By Patrick Lennox, J.L. Granatstein Postdoctoral Fellow

The Security and Defence Forum in conjunction with the Canadian Navy recently provided me with the funds and the opportunity to observe first hand one of the most significant deployments of the Canadian Forces since 9/11. For one hundred and five days this past summer, a Canadian Task Group—comprising Her Majesty’s Canadian Ships Iro-quois, Protecteur, and Calgary—was deployed to the Arabian Sea to conduct Maritime Security Operations as part of a multilateral coalition known as Combined Task Force 150. Canadian Commodore Bob Davidson and his staff on board HMCS Iroquois took command of the coalition which was charged with securing these vital sea lines of com-munication from destabilizing forces such as piracy, terrorism, and the flow of illicit narcotics and arms. I met up with Protecteur in the Port of Fujairah in mid-August and transferred over to Iroquois in early September somewhere in the Gulf of Oman. In total (including a two week transit aboard Iroquois en route to the Caribbean to meet up with Protecteur and Calgary on the easterly side of the Panama Canal in late April at the beginning of the deployment) I observed 1/3 of the six month tour—a journey that took me through five of the seven seas. For spend-ing over 30 days in the theatre of operations, I was awarded the South West Asia Service Medal with bar by Commo-dore Davidson on September 28, 2008. My objective was to learn as much about the Canadian Navy and the nature of sea power in the 21st Century as pos-sible, so that I could produce a series of journalistic and academic articles that will contribute to the broader public’s understanding of these subjects and also be of service to future thinking about the role of the Canadian Navy in the realization of Canada’s foreign and security policy objectives. To this end I published articles in Diplomat and Interna-tional Canada Magazine, The Hill Times and Frontline Defence Magazine. On October 27th 2008 I will present a stra-tegically focused paper entitled “Chopping In: Sea Power and Canada’s Contribution to the Long War” at the Cana-dian Defence and Foreign Affairs Institute’s annual meeting at the Crown Plaza Hotel in Ottawa. I am following this talk up with a less formal discussion of my experiences observing Canada’s command of CTF 150 in early November at the Centre for Foreign Policy Studies, at Dalhousie University in Halifax. Ultimately, I hope to produce a book on this subject. All of this would not have been possible without the financial support of the Security and Defence Forum and the backing of the Centre for Military and Strategic Studies.

Dr. Lennox awarded the South West Asia Service Medal with bar by

Commodore Davidson.

HMCS Iroquois

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EVENTS

September 3, 2008—Mr. Arif Lalani, Canadian Ambassador to Afghanistan on “Defining Suc-cess in Afghanistan.”

October 16, 2008—Commodore Jennifer Ben-nett, Commander of the Canadian Reserve, on “The Future of the Canadian Reserve.”

October 16, 2008—Dr. Rob Huebert, CMSS Associate on “United States Arctic Policy: The Reluctant Power.”

October 17, 2008—Dr. Marc O'Reilly, Assistant Professor of Political Science and Director of International and Multicultural Academic Pro-grams Heidelberg College, Ohio. The topic was based on his recent book “Unexceptional: Amer-ica's Empire in the Persian Gulf.”

October 24, 2008—Ralph Sawyer on “Ancient Chinese Warfare: Methods, Modes, and Objec-tives.”

October 28, 2008—David Mulroney, Deputy Minister, Privy Council Office, “Canada in Af-ghanistan: A Snapshot.”

November 4, 2008—Dean Turner, Director, Global Intelligence Network, Symantec. “The Digital Underground Economy: Security Tech-nology and Response”. Co-sponsored with the Centre for Information Security and Cryptogra-phy (CISaC).

November 4, 2008—Dr. Martin Nassua, Helmut-Schmidt University, University of the Federal Armed Forces, Hamburg. “Gustav: The Story of the F-104G Starfighter in the Service of the Ger-man Air Force and the Political and Economic Consequenses for Today.”

November 6, 2008—Mark Zuehlke on “Canadian author, The Forgotten Campaign: Canada's WW II Invasion of Sicily, July 10-August 7, 1943.”

January 29, 2009—The Centre for Military and Strategic Studies (CMSS) will host a conference sponsored by the Department of Foreign Af-fairs and International Trade entitled “In the National Interest” at the University of Calgary.

The Strategic Studies and Security Consortium (S3C) provides a forum for discussion, debate and an intellectual network with other students, facul-ties, the military, and the larger international community. Suggested topics include: terrorism, resource security, human security, conflict and the me-dia, Asia-Pacific security, climate change and environmental security, mili-tary strategy, sociocultural issues in war, the United Nations and peace-keeping, intelligence, insurrection and revolution, violent fundamentalism, technology and conflict etc. This list is not exhaustive, and original ideas are welcome. Undergraduate and graduate students from all disciplines are encouraged to participate. Proposals should be no longer than 250 words and presentations should conform to a 20-minute format. To contact the S3C, please e-mail us at s3c2009@gmail.com or call 403-210-3898 or make an appointment and see us in the Centre for Military and Strategic Studies, MacKimmie Library Tower 701, 2500 University Drive NW, Cal-gary Alberta, T2N 1N4.

Date of conference: March 12-14, 2009 Location: UNIVERSITY OF CALGARY

DEADLINE FOR PROPOSALS: JANUARY 1, 2009

For more information contact: Nancy Pearson Mackie

CMSS Events Coordinator

Phone: (403) 220-4030 Fax: (403) 282-0594 Email: njmackie@ucalgary.ca

www.cmss.ucalgary.ca

On Aug. 19, 2003, some four months after U.S. President George W. Bush's “Mission Accomplished” speech on the deck of USS Abraham Lincoln, the Baghdad office of United Nations envoy Sergio Vieira de Mello was turned to rubble. A bomb, which detonated with such force that it was felt in the American-controlled Green Zone some five kilometres away, leveled the UN building, killing 22 people from 11 countries, including Vieira de Mello who was the UN's top diplomat in Iraq. Within UN circles, it took the bombing to drive home the fact that the trend to deliberately target UN staff, workers from western aid organi-zations and western civilians in general was on the upswing, and needed to be taken seriously. Five years on, after another bomb killed 17 UN staff in Algeria last December, there is still no solution in sight. However, unlike

Canada's Defence Minister Peter MacKay, at least the UN gives indication that it recognizes that it has a serious problem. On Aug. 13, 2008 Taliban gunmen ambushed and killed four aid workers (including two Canadians) from the International Rescue Committee, an international NGO committed to humanitarian, reconstruction and development projects. After the attack, the Taliban called the killings retaliation for the U.S. bombing of a wedding party in Jalalabad on July 6, 2008 and promised more to come. Speaking to the Globe and Mail after the ambush, a Taliban spokesman warned that "the coalition forces invaded Afghanistan and we know that women are very important to the forces that invaded Afghanistan. Our women and common people are important to us, too." He then released a statement warning Canadians the Taliban would be changing tactics. "Afghanistan has to try to have good relations with you, but if your government continues a reversed policy, the Afghans will be obliged to kill your nationals, in revenge for their brothers, their sisters and their children. Events such as Logar will happen again, because occupied Afghanistan looks at all actors that are established in the interest of America with an eye of hostility." Responding to the letter, MacKay told reporters that "we take any threat seriously, but let's be frank -- this is a very insidious and deceptive piece of propaganda. As a terrorist organization, they target innocent aid workers, their own civilians and they are involved in some of the worst forms of violence that we've seen. We're not going to be intimidated quite frankly." It's heartening to know that MacKay, who, it must be noted, responded to the questions from the relative safety of Winnipeg, is not intimidated by the Taliban's threats. It's also good to know that the government takes "any threat" seriously, although the only recent change in policy regarding the safety of aid workers was a move by CIDA to shield itself from liability for the death or injury of workers by changing the language of its contracts. As for the "insidious propaganda" claim, MacKay would do well to publicly distinguish between propaganda and a credible threat. Although our gov-ernment likes to paint the Taliban as a "terrorist organization" hell-bent on overthrowing the legitimate Afghan government, the Taliban is much more than that. It is an insurgency that now controls large swaths of the country, and which regularly uses terrorist tactics to achieve its ends. Rather than downplaying the threat by prioritizing moral outrage over sound policy, MacKay would do well to realize that the Taliban is easily capable of targeting aid workers again, and if this attack and this letter are a sign of things to come, then Canada needs to rethink its methods and its commit-ment to aid and development in Afghanistan. Strobe Talbott, a Clinton-era State Department official and the president of the Brookings Institution, made a very good point about the Russia-Georgia conflict. "Outrage is not a policy. Worry is not a policy. Indignation is not a policy. Even though outrage, worry and indignation are all appropri-ate in this situation, they shouldn't be mistaken for policy and they shouldn't be mistaken for strategy." These words can easily be applied to MacKay and the Canadian government, as the outrage, the worry and the indignation are all there. But where's the strategy? Where's the policy? Because without those, all we have is another “Mission Accomplished” banner, fluttering in the wind while innocent civilians remain in harm's way.

Kris Kotarski, a Master's candidate at the Centre for Military and Strategic Studies at the University of Calgary, has previously worked at the United Nations. This opinion piece was first printed in the Calgary Herald on August 25, 2008.)

PERSPECTIVES

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T H E O F F I C I A L N E W S L E T T E R O F C M S S

Taliban Propaganda, or a Promise? By Kris Kotarski

Disclaimer: All opinions expressed in Perspectives are solely those of the author and not of CMSS.

CMSS Descends to New Low Intrepid CMSS alumni Geoff Crookes and Christian Mattern joined their significant others and the daughter of a visiting professor in a tour of Rat's Nest Cave in Canmore in early September. CMSS PhD student Doug Munroe, who works as a guide in the cave, is pleased to report that every-one had a great time experiencing one of the last unexplored frontiers on Earth. The trip included a sixty-foot rappel and a crawl through the infa-mous Laundry Chute, none of which daunted the CMSS crew! The group made it down to the Grotto chamber, roughly 245 meters below ground, before returning to daylight. Due to many expressions of interest, a second CMSS trip to Rat's Nest Cave is in the offing. Caving in Canmore, Alberta

PUBLICATIONS

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T H E O F F I C I A L N E W S L E T T E R O F C M S S

Jonathan Kent, CMSS’ Alumnus. "The IBETs and Integrated Border Management between Canada and the United States", SITREP: The Journal of the Royal Canadian Military Institute. Vol. 68, No. 2, March-April 2008. Craig Mantle, CMSS PhD Candidate and Lieutenant-Colonel Jeff Stouffer, In Harm's Way: Leveraging Trust: A Force Multi-plier for Today, Kingston: CDA Press, 2008. Aaron Plamondon, CMSS’ research associate, Calgary Papers in Military and Strategic Studies, Occasional Paper No. 2. 2008 – “Equipment Procurement in Canada and the Civil- Military Relationship: Past and Present.” For more information, please visit: http://www.cmss.ucalgary.ca/publications/calgarypapers.

Other Publications:

COMING SOON! Fall 2008 Journal

(Volume 11, Issue 1)

ARCTIC SECURITY For submissions or further information contact:

Dr. Jim Keeley, Dr. John Ferris, and/or Nancy Pearson Mackie

Centre for Military and Strategic Studies

University of Calgary

Phone: (403) 220-4030 Fax: (403) 282-0594 Email: info@jmss.org www.jmss.org

VOLUME 2, 2008: MILITARY STUDIES AND HISTORY John Ferris examines the Revolution in Military Affairs with regard to how "The Biggest Force Multiplier?: Knowledge, Information, and Warfare in the 21st Century" affected discus-sions on military policy and the knowledge available to armed forces, thus shaping the na-ture of war.

In "Calculating Costs: A Critical Assessment of Verification Costs for a Fissile Material Cut-off" (a regime discussed at the Conference on Disarmament in Geneva, Switzerland, in 1995), George MacLean and James Keeley examine the often overlooked financial as-pects affecting the viability of a treaty crucial to the process of nuclear disarmament and arms control. Their article examines the estimated costs of verifying the cutoff, including analyses of configurations of the cutoff itself, and the varying verification systems that may be implemented.

Gavin Cameron's article, "WMD Terrorism: No Longer a Question of If, but When?" consid-ers the likelihood of terrorists using chemical, biological, radiological, or nuclear (CBRN) weapons after 9/11. He argues that massive conventional weapons remain a more realistic threat, in part owing to the difficulties of acquiring and using CBRN weapons. Past uses or attempted uses of such weapons by terrorists and the tactical choices made by the 9/11 at-tackers are considered, and the effect of the attack on other groups' tactical choices in the future are analyzed.

For more information or if you wish to order a copy, please

contact:

JoAnn Cleaver Production Editor

cmsspub@ucalgary.ca Fax: 403.282.0594

Calgary Papers in Military And Strategic Studies