You realize, sir, that this could lead to Greece employing…
… the Yanni Option.
Hmm… This may be an arms race we can’t win. The Americans have Ashlee Simpson AND Kenny G.
Mainly because the navy is going to be the premier role in our future foreign policy, when power projection is required.
While its not like we are going to clone copies of the HMS Hood and stand off coast lines on the gun line , providing NGSF to some special forces operating in the boonies, there is a market for moving huge quantities of heavy armor divisions from point A , say Rotterdam or Kiel and then transporting them to some vacation resort country , where you meet new and exciting people and kill them.
Alot of American power projection is slated to be staged out of North America , rather than forward pre positioned locations that were counted on to reduce the amount of reaction time in a future conflict.
Whats missing in that is the sealift element that has to be leased , rented , outright purchased , during the lead up times. Back fill the American logistics pipe line and we get a seat at the table , for no appreciable need for casualties that we might see in Kandahar, and Bush might even have returned Creticiens phone calls ,back during OIF.
Declan
Disclaimer:when I read thread title, before getting to the op, I naturally thought it was OUR conservatives at issue, and that they were tooling up an expeditionary force to cross over into the soft undrbelly of Alberta…finally vindicating the remaining revanchist ambitions from the war of 1812…
that said, who are you cranking up to defend against (if not us…)? The tlingit, I believe, are in repose, and we stand between you and the russkie.
Perhaps we’re dealing with some Angry Canadians? 
as I understand the plan, quebec’s secession is a prelude to the dismemberment of the confederation, and saskathawan, alberta, and BC become states 51-3, or else wholly owned subsidiaries of Halliburton, or both.
No, no. Canada breaks up, the U.S. is annexed by Alberta and becomes Lesser Albertastan, and all worship his majesty, King Ralph.
The national sport? Chuckwagon racing.
Would he be King of all Albertastan or would Albertastan be a principality under Alberta’s benign rule, nominally run by Prince George? (Or, come 2009, Princess Hillary?)
Nah. Prince George is a city in BC. It’ll be direct rule. 
I don’t claim to be any kind of expert on naval matters, but I was under the impression that at sea, “power projection” = “big ass carrier”.
Eh, I’m really not convinced by this argument. It’s only useful when our allies need to make a massive deployment somewhere. How often does that happen? If we follow your plan, we’re left with a massive transport capability that we can’t use on our own. And do you really think that our allies will appreciate us trying to get out of supplying troops on the ground?
I think they’d have to pay to pay the employees a little more than minimum wage, though!
“‘Work at Tim Horton’s’ they said. ‘See the world’, they said”
Heh, I thought “The US to invade Canada? Just after the “What will Bush be remembered for thread?”” 
Canada seems to be the first Western nation in a while to find its own territory directly under threat (what with the new sea lanes apparantly coming into use with global warming)
Canadian SAS? What Canadian SAS? So far I was aware, only Britain, Rhodesia, Australia, and New Zealand had SAS units.
One of the things I want to wait and see with the Conservatives, is whether they are better able to manage CF procurement than previous Liberal and Conservative governments. If the army’s trucks are starting to wear out, will they:
a) look at what military trucks are in production, determine which model best fits Canadian requirements, and set up a procurement plan to purchase trucks at a rate adequate to replace worn-out vehicles and keep ongoing truck replacement needs filled until the decision is made to change to a different model, or,
b) avoid actually making the replacement program decisions until the majority of the truck fleet is falling apart, hastily pick an unsuitable model from a company located in Canada, build a factory specifically to manufacture just that truck in a Cabinet minister’s riding, go all out to replace every truck in the Army over a 2 year period, then shut the factory down while the manufacturor goes bankrupt, and repeat in another 15-20 years when the whole truck fleet reaches the end of its service life at the same time.
Option b) seems to be the model of choice for goverments over the past few decades.
What you are describing is a problem common to all smaller militaries-the desire to equip forces with domestically produced equipment. Suppose canada were to build its own nuclear powered submarines? the start-up costs would be enormous, and the fact that costs would only be spread over a small number of subs would make producing them a dubious option. The decisionn to buy submarines from the UK was probably the cheapest option, but given the finite hull life, makes the acquisition expensive in the long run. better that canada do as England once did-"outsource’ the army to the gurghas-you could get a force of 30,000 gurgha soldiers very cheaply, and no start up costs. What’s wrong with mercenaries, anyway?
An Overview of Canadian Special Ops
So there was a Canadian SAS, but it was shortlived.
Hell 'a cool. Does the National Health Service reimburse for sensually therapeutic massage?
What difference would it make to King Ralph’s subjects in Lesser Albertastan if British health care pays for sensually therapeutic massage?
Yeah if you do it american style, but other nations project power in different ways , Canadian naval units have always had a standing patrol in the carribean, we joined other naval units in enforcing middle east waterways ,and we will probably be doing anti piracy patrols in the south seas.
Depends on what you mean by massive deployment, but in essense yes. As for trying to get out of deploying actual troops , thats a political decision based on the pinhead in office, when Mulrooney committed forces to Desert Storm, the Hornets flew patrols out in the gulf , the ground forces never left Canada Dry, in that incarnation , the only real fighting units that took part was the navy.
We got our place in the history books for essentially being just part of a coalition and not really doing anything, compared to the American , British and French , plus a host of smaller countrys.
So if we are gonna be wimps , we may as well do something useful, rather than trying to project that we may be small , but punch above our weight.
Declan
beefing up the canadian military is a way to show the u.s. that we truly are behind them in the war on terrorism (kissing ass). the flip side to this is, that we also signal to their enemies that we’ve joined the fight, at least in principle. meaning, we have more to worry about regarding terrorism today than we did last week, if only marginally. today we may be able to defend against an invasion from botswana or luxembourg, but might not be able to defend against the congo or uganda. it seems silly to join an arms race with uganda, doesn’t it? we certainly aren’t joining in an arms race with china.
i definately see that advantage of being able to maintain our sovereignty.
imo, the most effective security tool in today’s economy is a stable economy where we are able to pay our bills. no better money could be spent than to pay down our national debt.
rick
Wow, our very own SAS! I never knew that. Another blow against ignorance for the Straight Dope! 
ralph124c, I wasn’t commenting so much on the desire for domestically produced equipment as the incredibly inefficient and money-wasting way it is being done under the current process. In the example I gave, surely there was a better way to get trucks produced in Canada than to have a new factory built and subsequently shut down? (I don’t know how much of the factory cost was paid for by the government, but expect it was a good chunk if not all of it. Maybe this sort of thing should be funded out of the Industry or applicable Economic Development Agency budget, with DND charged only for the actual vehicles?)