2021

"Canada's Back"ing Away: A Call for Renewed Commitment to Peacekeeping
(Sgt Jonathan Carson)

Following his election in 2015, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau proudly announced that Canada would be returning to their tradition of significant involvement in United Nations peacekeeping operations. But since the early fanfare, precious little has materialized. A specific promise of up to six hundred Canadian Armed Forces members remained only a promise, as the number of CAF personnel deployed as peacekeepers dropped to an all-time low. Our lack of meaningful contributions to peacekeeping missions undermine the rules based system on which Canadian security is founded; fails to live up to our espoused national ideals; and hinders the achievement of our foreign policy goals. A renewed commitment to peacekeeping is not just an ethical imperative, but also a means to support Canada’s broader strategic goals.

The Code of Silence, the Statement of Defence Ethics and the Canadian Armed Forces
(Marc Imbeault)

Reflection on the need to defend ethical principles in the context of a culture change within the Canadian Armed Forces.

Between promise and peril: Can fake meat save the planet?
(Andrew Heffernan and Ryan Katz-Rosene)

The rise of cell-cultured and plant-based meat alternatives are increasingly promoted as new agri-food technologies that can help mitigate climate change, protect ecosystems, and support global Food Security and Nutrition. This perspective sifts through the arguments made by fake meat proponents and critics to highlight the ways these agri-food technologies offer promise, but also where their application might generate new problems for society.

Cyber Operator: Are you sure you want to do that?
(Sgt Lee Lunn)

Canada faces an array of challenges (and opportunities) in the cyber domain. This essay identifies how the Department of National Defence’s (DND) disposition towards (and approach to) developing and sustaining a cyber-capability is inefficient, and counterproductive to the need. The nature of the Profession of Arms (POA) may be the critical vulnerability facing cyber capability development in Canada’s military. The CAF’s hierarchical command structure, universality of service, terms of reference, and even the general composition of the military are factors which contribute to challenges facing the development of a cyber-capability in the CAF. These factors inhibit the CAF from harnessing the full spectrum of technical talent from society that would be capable of meeting Canada’s cyber defence needs. As a remedy, it is suggested that the CAF look to the officer corps, to leverage Civil Military Cooperation (CIMIC) and cooperation in a whole-of-government response.

e-Intelligence; La clé de la bataille technologique
(French only)
(Eric Dion)

Partant d’un cadre d’analyse multidimensionnel composé de six dimensions intégrées, fondamentales et implicitement employées en gestion, soit: le contexte situationnel, la société et culture, la structure organisationnelle, les procédés systémiques, la stratégie politique et la dynamique de synergie; nous analyserons notre évolution technologique. Ce faisant, nous démontrerons que l’e-intelligence est la clé de la bataille technologique. En effet, c’est la combinaison savante des capacités technologiques et humaines qui doit prévaloir si nous voulons maintenir un équilibre de vie sain, qui soit aussi plus efficient. Or, cet article soutien que du point de vue de la sécurité nationale et de la défense globale, la technologie se présente comme un couteau à deux tranchants, qui peut être à la fois une opportunité et une menace, et que c’est fondamentalement aux acteurs d’être e-intelligent.

Russian Bias in the coverage of the post-George Floyd/Black Lives Matter movement
(Élève-officier Thomas Turmel)

As an ever-growing proportion of the North American public turns to social media for news, the threat of foreign influence through foreign publicly funded media has to be assessed. The objective of this research is to determine if Russia pursues political objectives through its media Russia Today (RT). RT’s portrayal of the American government and nationwide police force in relation to the Post-George Floyd/Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests, during the summer 2020, was compared with the coverage of these events by the German state media Deutsche Welle (DW). It was found that RT attempted to undermine US institutions through the use of question raising theory, directed reporting, and biased coverage.

All Eyes And Ears: Exploring the Use of Technology in Securing Crowds
(Agnes E.Venema)

Crowds and crowded spaces are a fluid concept but they play an important role in security. Crowds can be the threat to security themselves, or provide cover for criminal or hostile actors that are mixed in with unsuspecting citizens. This article discusses the advances that have been made in the field of technological tools used to help secure crowds, whether they are predicted gatherings or spontaneously occurring. A distinction is made between the preparatory stages of security crowds (ante factum), the monitoring of crowds in real-time (in situ), and the use of technology in investigating and responding to a security incident that involves a crowded space (post factum). Lastly, this article will highlight some of the more recent technological advancements in the field of securing crowds and the adverse effects some of those technologies can have on human rights.

Données massives, intelligence artificielle et algorithmes : le mirage de l’automatisation du renseignement
(French only)
(Simon Hogue)

Over the past two decades, the Department of Defense and security institutions more generally have massively turned to digital technologies to ensure American national security. Yet, despite the promise of maximizing and accelerating processes, including intelligence production, these technologies are met with strong criticism. By exploring different security and defense initiatives, this article suggests that digital technologies function as a distorting prism that shapes intelligence production and creates risks to civil rights and democracy.

A review of applications in Artificial Intelligence (AI) on the Security and defense field
(Fabián Garay-Rairán, Miguel Bermúdez-Melo, Hernando Guerrero-Gómez et Carlos Peña-Lucumí)

Military and police industries continually strive to enhance processes of training, health care and communications. This involves the successful use of existent technologies and developing new technologies, such as computational intelligence or artificial intelligence (AI). This paper will conduct an extensive review of AI technologies considering sources from scientific bibliographies, data bases and specialized journals. It aims to reveal new approaches, tendencies, and applications of AI by different armies around the world. The comprehension of such vanguard tendencies and the implementation of these technologies within innovative of security and defense products, constitute an opportunity for less technologically developed armies and police departments to enhance their current capabilities.

L’extrême droite et l’armée au Canada et au Québec
(French only)
(Marc Imbeault)

This text presents the result of research on the presence and influence of the extreme right in the armed forces in Canada and Quebec, conducted as part of the Centre d’expertise et de formation sur les intégrismes religieux, les idéologies politiques et la radicalisation.

This research has benefited from the support of Public Safety Canada.

Date modified:

2022-10-21