Documents reveal Five Eyes and US influence led to cancellation of Canada-China military training exercise
Photo Credit: (Asia Times/Google Images)
Written by: Aidan Jonah
Documents obtained by Rebel Media reveal the extent to which the Five Eyes security network and the United States hold sway over the Canadian government and military.
In January 2019, the Canadian government decided to pull the plug on a planned winter training exercise with China’s People’s Liberation Army. Six to eight PLA personnel were set to participate in the exercise at CFB Petawawa.
Only three months earlier, the Canadian Armed Forces participated in the seventh Military World Games.
While Meng Wanzhou’s arrest on charges based upon illegal US sanctions against Iran, and the subsequent charges levied against Michael Spavor and Michael Kovrig came in December 2018, they apparently weren’t the main cause of this decision.
In discussions partway through the month, diplomat Nichola Payne revealed that: “From our perspective it also perhaps to be related to a desire to be fully aligned with FEYS [Five Eyes], particularly the U.S., whose approach has shifted under the Trump Administration. We recall, for example, that back in December DND/CAF were keen to cancel the PLA’s participation in the winter survival training following the request from DOD [the American Department of Defense] to do so.”
The Government of Canada was at this point resisting further CAF attempts to cut off military engagement with China. The CAF was also seeking to cancel placed peacekeeping training with the PLA, but this request was refused in mid-February 2019. The peacekeeping training would result in “invit[ing] one PLA instructor and one student to the spring peacekeeping course.”
Notably, Five Eyes security network members were the first to raise concerns about “knowledge transfer risks” contained in the winter training exercise, during a “Five Eyes C-VEO CHODS meeting” in Fall 2018. However, as mentioned before, “the security concerns originated primarily from the US.”
Five Eyes and Canada
Five Eyes is a security network created in 1955, which is made up of Canada, the United States, United Kingdom, New Zealand and Australia. The security agencies which do the work set out in the accord are the US National Security Agency (NSA), Australian Defence Signals Directorate (DFS), New Zealand’s Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB), British Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) and Canada’s Communications Security Establishment (CSEC).
NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden described it as a “supra-national intelligence organisation that doesn’t answer to the known laws of its own countries.” Even before the internet, Target Nation: Canada and the Western Intelligence Network author James Littleton noted that, “almost the entire globe is monitored by the SIGINT [signals intelligence] agencies of the UKUSA countries.”
Respected author Yves Engler explained that “With major technological advancements in recent decades, the Five Eyes now monitor billions of private communications worldwide.”
Five Eyes agencies have worked together to get around restrictions on spying on their own citizens. The agencies also exchange technologies and tactics.
CSE
The Canadian government hid the existence of CSEC until 1983. In the CCPA Monitor Asad Ismi labelled it the “espionage arm of corporate Canada”. CSEC has repeatedly committed economic espionage on behalf of the Canadian government and corporations, including:
In 1985 the government asked CSEC to gather intelligence that could help a Canadian firm bidding for a major pipeline contract in India.
A few years earlier the CSEC overheard the US ambassador in Ottawa detailing his country’s negotiating position on a US$5 billion wheat sale to China, which helped Canada win the contract.
Potentially securing information useful to negotiating the mid-1990s North American Free Trade Agreement and World Trade Organization.
As part of the Snowden revelations the Guardian reported: “[CSEC] has participated in secret meetings in Ottawa where Canadian security agencies briefed energy corporations. Claims of spying on the [Brazilian mining and energy] ministry by CSEC come amid the Canadian government’s increasingly aggressive promotion of resource corporations at home and abroad, including unprecedented surveillance and intelligence sharing with companies. According to freedom of information documents obtained by the Guardian, the meetings — conducted twice a year since 2005 — involved federal ministries, spy and police agencies, and representatives from scores of companies who obtained high-level security clearance.”
The Snowden leaks revealed that Canadian diplomatic posts house SIGINT equipment as part of US-led spying efforts. One NSA document claimed CSEC operated clandestine surveillance activities in “approximately 20 high-priority countries.”
Since the start of the 1960s CSE has listened to Cuban leaders’ conversations from an interception post inside the embassy in Havana. In the late 1970s and early ’80s CSEC apparently spied on Parti Québecois communications with France. From 1987 to 1989, CSEC led listening operations in the Soviet Union, after US and UK listening operations were jammed.
In Spyworld: Inside the Canadian and American Intelligence Establishments, former CSEC officer Michael Frost described CSEC listening posts at a number of embassies or consular posts while two papers in the early 2000s cite Abidjan, Beijing, New Delhi, Bucharest, Rabat, Kingston (Jamaica), Mexico City, Rome, San Jose (Costa Rica), Warsaw and Tokyo as diplomatic posts where CSE (probably) collected information.
Canada and America
The US exerts a dominating influence in the alliance, and worked to modernize Canadian communications interception facilities. The NSA even handled the interpretation, storing and retention of intelligence collected by the CSE for decades.
An NSA history of the US–Canada SIGINT relationship released by Snowden labelled Canada a “highly valued second party partner”, which offers “resources for advanced collection, processing and analysis, and has opened covert sites at the request of NSA. CSE shares with NSA their unique geographic access to areas unavailable to the US.”
The Five Eyes network has worked relentlessly to block Huawei from playing any part in building 5G networks around the world, despite there being no evidence of any spying ever done by the company. The Wall Street Journal reported that Five Eyes officials agreed in Ottawa to contain the company’s global growth, in a July 2018 meeting. The USA has been vocally pushing allies to drop Huawei from any part in their 5G plans for years.
Canada blocked Huawei from participating in the building of 5G networks on August 25, 2020. On November 23, 2020, Telus was the last of Canada’s three telecom giants to confirm that it would build its 5G networks without Huawei.
A revealing memo
In a memorandum of action sent to Deputy Minister of National Defence Jody Thomas from the GAC, the background proves to be fascinating reading.
A focus was not providing the PLA “with any operational capability enhancements, including in areas such as Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Response (HADR). It’s absolutely understandable to not wish to share military secrets, but concern over China improving humanitarian assistance and response to disasters is quite peculiar and reflective of a militarized worldview.
This rationale for cancelling training is especially odd when the memo states that: “in general, DND/CAF ensures that all bilateral activities with China are non-sensitive, unclassified, evolve at a controlled an incremental pace, and do not enhance the PLA’s operational capacity.”
This logic becomes even more peculiar as the memo notes that “U.S. defence engagement with China has a long history of staff exchanges and joint military exercises, particularly in the area of HADR.”
The final decision to cancel the winter training exercises was made in late February 2019. It is important to emphasize that this decision seems to be made at the behest of Five Eyes partners and the United States. Their influence over the Canadian military should serve as a real concern to all Canadians.
Link to documents obtained by Rebel Media
Aidan Jonah is the Editor-in-Chief of The Canada Files, a socialist, anti-imperialist news site founded in 2019. He has written about Canadian imperialism, federal politics, and left-wing resistance to colonialism across the world. He is a second-year Bachelor of Journalism student at Ryerson University, who was the Head of Communications and Community Engagement for Etobicoke North NDP Candidate Naiima Farah in the 2019 Federal Election.
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