…
On Sept. 10, Prime Minister Mark Carney and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced a series of initiatives to expand Canada’s defence capabilities and support Ukraine.
Industry participants say Ukraine, now in its fifth year of war with Russia, has considerable battlefield experience Canada can learn from.
…
Six Canadian defence suppliers [aare] receiving federal contracts worth up to $50 million in total to produce drones and uncrewed ground vehicles.
Last week, Carney also announced a partnership between Ottawa-based General Dynamics Mission Systems-Canada and Ukrainian company Green Tech Harvest to produce drones and related technologies.
That partnership is the latest in a series of Canada-Ukraine drone arrangements. In May, Hamilton-based Sentinel Research and Development also announced a drone production agreement with Ukrainian defence company Airlogix.
…
The goal is ambitious: to give Canadian industry the capacity to produce “millions of drones over the next two years,” according to the Prime Minister’s Office.
Ottawa says the initial contracts will “increase the number of drones currently deployed by the Canadian Armed Forces tenfold.”
Much of this production will go to Ukraine.
“Thirty per cent of these drones will go to Ukraine immediately to [the] battlefield,” Zelenskyy said during the joint press conference with Carney.
…
Sergii Vlashchenko and Igor Kolosiuk, Ukrainian defence-technology experts and co-founders of Vancouver-based Snake Island Lab, say such qualities have enabled Ukraine to hold its own against a larger and wealthier Russia.
“Every large brigade, every army corps … has its own research and development laboratory, manufacturing capabilities, and financing capabilities inside the corps,” Vlashchenko said in a joint interview with Kolosiuk.
“It lets them face a challenge, invent to overcome it, and manufacture the response within weeks.”
…
A June study found that Ukrainian producers could move from prototype to deployment in weeks, with some minor fixes implemented within 24 hours.
The cost benefits of this approach are considerable.
Ukraine spends as little as US$200 to $1,000 on a typical FPV drone. Before Ukraine popularized these drones, the U.S. military could have previously spent as much as US$53,000 for the closest equivalent.
…
Kolosiuk says Ukraine is looking to Canada for a more secure supply chain. He says the two countries could build a scalable, non-Chinese supply chain serving both the Canadian and Ukrainian militaries.
…
Seems like a promising strategy. If we really must spend money on the military, there aren’t many better ways to do it than by getting good at drones. Our government may not have too many good ideas of its own, but at least they’re able to recognize one when it comes from Zelenskyy.
How to prevent these companies from then being purchased by USA interests and syphon the technology to them?
A very important issue that isn’t brought up often enough in discussions about investment into private assets that are supposed to increase our independence. The related one being foreign investment in such assets.
Inasmuch as we must invest in the military, this is a smart way to go about it. It’s clear that drone technology is a tectonic shift. In the same way that artillery made castles obsolete, tanks and planes made trench warfare obsolete, the aircraft carrier made the battleship obsolete, now the drone torpedo will make the aircraft carrier obsolete, as merely one example of the ways drones are changing how war is waged.
Of course, one of the ways drones are revolutionizing things is that they are relatively cheap. Iran spends something like 20 billion a year on defence and is getting a lot of value out of those dollars. So I’m skeptical that we needed to triple our military budget.
You people talk like there aren’t ample examples of this not being true. The US military has always had a technological advantage over its targets, and yet loses nearly every war it wages. They use that advantage as a threat because of its rapid destructive potential, not to win the actual fighting.
They’re doing this for private capital and to facilitate an automated fighting force as conditions worsen. It’s transparent.
and yet loses nearly every war it wages.
Yea because the USA keeps invading countries of people with no intention of leaving. The only win condition is genocide.
“You will kill 10 of our men, and we will kill 1 of yours, and in the end it will be you who tire of it.”
- Ho Chi Minh
“America has the watches, but Taliban has the time”
- Taliban
Mhmmmmmm, almost like they know that too. Reread my comment.
I haven’t read anything on this beyond this post but I hope a large part of this investment goes toward constructive drone technology, not just a destructive military focus. There’s a ton of overlap in developing the knowhow, manufacturing capacity, supply chains etc. There would be some unique requirements for defense applications but I’d rather us focus on developing things like agricultural or forestry drones with the ability to reassign those industries to defense if needed.
There’s a big emphasis on “dual use” technologies right now as a way to use military spending to have wider benefits. I’m not too worried.
non-military drones have the potential to completely change the logistics of the future.
Stoner idea that I low key hope someone steals: Bong Subscription. Basically a drone delivers you a clean bong and takes away the dirty one.
Clean your bong man.
OP’s post history is very similar to right-wing bots in the early days of the r/Canada takeover, interesting; wonder why.
deleted by creator
Lots of reddit users have come over in the past two years, which brings both the general chud culture of reddit, and politically illiterate liberals who merely need a nudge to embrace facsism.
Because overt bigotry and promotion of right-wing politics is typically frowned upon and easily moderated, it is popular for bad actors to simply post article links and headlines that promote those values, but aren’t openly advocating for them.
For example, you couldn’t say “trans women are pesos” on r/Canada (probably even now), but you can post a bunch of headlines about the few trans women who are convicted of CSV crimes. So, when you’re looking for chud or chud bots, you look for both spews of “news” posts, and what values are prevalent if not explicit in those posts I.e. OP’s constant spew of pro-Eu, anti-China news headlines with some safe anti-US (but not anti-imperialist) undertones.
The only reason to not see this as obvious promotion of right wing politics is if someone already subscribed to the EuroAmerican flavour of liberal rationalizations of capitalist and colonial violence, and therefore assumes that anything pro-Europe and anti-China/US is “progressive.” They are chud narratives that are intuitively true to Canadian libs who fancy themselves as “leftists” or “progressive” while appealing to their more authentically capitalist and fascist values.
Oh, well that is so much worse than what I expected. They want an automated army to protect the interests of capital as Canada increasingly strips its resources and land sovereignty.
What a fucking nightmare. Yet again, you people disgust me.
Exactly.
“No one should have defensive technologies.”
I very specifically said Canada, if that makes you feel better.
This tech could be used to reforest, clean pollution, and do any number of marvels, instead it will be used to kill civilians in the global South and probably the East.
This tech could be used to reforest, clean pollution, and do any number of marvels, instead it will be used to kill civilians in the global South and probably the East.
This tech is to be used for defense, in case hostile governments attack a country such as Russia does in Ukraine and China has been threatening against Taiwan …
You are arguing with a tankie
Yeah, they are trolling all the time … :-)
The US has been threatening against Canada
Removed by mod
If you think Canada can defend Taiwan from China with tech ultimately supplied from China, I have multiple bridges and an Empire State building to sell you.
You are missing the forest for the trees. The US is our single biggest threat and its not outside the realm of possible that Trump will threaten strikes on Canada. These drones are our best deterrent to the US. Just like Ukraine proved against Russia and Iran proved against the US. Its not about projecting overseas. Its about deterring the US.
I can’t decide if this group is full of provocateurs, or if this is just fantasy football with weapons.
You’re saying nothing and trying to sound smart. Respond to the issue at hand instead of making ad hominem attacks.
It’s not an attack, it’s an observation. A lot of these statements lack realism.
So you think it is not in the realm of possible that the US could threaten to strike canada? Honest question since you are claiming to talk observations and realism. Keep in mind the US is already engaging in economic warfare against canada, openly wanting to annex canada, and already engaging in illegal bombing of several all of its neighbours.
lack realism
How so? Are you able to be thorough?
Kolosiuk says Ukraine is looking to Canada for a more secure supply chain. He says the two countries could build a scalable, non-Chinese supply chain serving both the Canadian and Ukrainian militaries.
With what tech factories? We’re talking about “millions” of complex machines created with precious metals sourced from all over the world, built outside the purview of the 3 of the worlds biggest superpowers. Superpowers that control mining, shipping, espionage and technology.
Removed by mod
The people downvoting you are dishonest with others and with themselves.
The RCMP and settler groups were totally capable of doing horrible things to Indigenous people and curtailing people’s rights without needing to use drones. We have to catch, stop and outlaw the oppression, not the tech.
Ukrainian drone tech provides us with far more capability in an asymmetric defensive war scenario than the additional utility it might give oppressors, and I don’t think any would-be oppressors are only holding back because of lack of domestic drone production, you can show me otherwise.
Said production lines can be dual-purpose, to make domestic consumer and commercial drones for tree planting, fire spotting and firefighting. This would be helpful for self-managed Indigenous Nations and bands too. Once it’s up and running, production facilities can quickly do a large scale switchover to military types in the unlikely event we are invaded.
In what way does this read as a condemnation of the tech itself and not what it is obviously used for, which is settler-colonialism and extractive capitalism?
Also, “asymmetric” is an interesting term to use here, as it suggest the primary concern is Canada and its competition with more powerful imperialists, not oppressed peoples. There are examples of oppressed peoples using drones for as long as they existed – it was a popular cheap tactic in Iraq in the late 00s and early 10s – but that is not mass production scale infrastructure, that is a group of people purchasing and using these against imperialists like Canada (also, “were,” “would-be,” think you’re slick with that obscuring language?). I don’t give a fuck about Canada defending its ability to colonize, that is the exact shit I warned against in my comment.
Also, I’m sorry, but that is such a fucking lie to suggest that these would be used for tree planting when the federal government has expressed great interest in doing the exact opposite of that (https://natural-resources.canada.ca/forests-forestry/forest-industry-trade/canadian-forest-sector-transformation-task-force; https://thenarwhal.ca/carney-canada-net-zero-committee/; and it’s important to remember that Carney is one of the fucks responsible for formulating environmental marketing for privatized industry as a Brookfield ESG lead shill and a founder of the Taskforce of Scaling Voluntary Carbon Markets). Are there any good examples of that happening with any other military manufacturing system here in Canada?
I can see how this response would look legitimate to the average rube on this community, but those were some very selective arguments that employ the exact narratives that imperialists and neoliberals have for decades, wonder why you’d use something so specific.
People ITT are cheering the tech which is what the article is about, and you’re the one who is making it about settler-colonialism and capitalist extraction, and complaining about people’s reactions you are ascribing to as a support for something they never claimed to. So, I’m addressing your whataboutism in good faith while sticking to the topic.
Removed by mod
I’m fully aware of what kind of dystopia it can bring about, I’ve read too much about Israel’s use of it against Palestinians and it’s horrifying. But just because they use it that way, doesn’t mean we have to use or will be using it in the same way.
My principal point is that drone-based oppression is available with non-Canadian components already and through other means you’ve rightly identified like paramilitary goons, and plenty of examples over several centuries. Building a domestic supply chain for drones or not doesn’t make a big difference for horrible people to do horrible things, as much as it will make a big difference for us to defend ourselves if needed, and be useful in other ways when we don’t need to. *And to stop the export of the tech for oppressive uses is a legislative/political fix.
Removed by mod
