September 17, 2002
Kamloops Daily News



The bad news is that Canada's Arctic is melting.   The loss
of habitat will spell doom to a Canadian icon, the polar
bear.  The good news is that Canada's Arctic is melting and
the dream of a Northwest passage will soon be realized.

Not that most Canadians would know. Canada's Arctic rarely
appears in the consciousness of southern Canadians except as
a frozen apparition.  

The Northwest passage was very much on the minds of European
explorers.  They were trying to find a way around the
barrier of the Americas that stretched almost from north to
south pole.   The fascination  with Canada's Arctic was what
lay beyond - - the riches of the orient.

Some things have changed since the early explorers but North
and South America are still a formidable barrier to world
shipping.   Even with a hole punched in the middle of the
Americans,  the Panama Canal provides only slight relief.

The Northwest passage is the shortest distance between
Europe and Japan, and all the countries of the northern
Pacific rim.   And even in cases where the Panama Canal is
the shorter, the Northwest passage allows ships twice the
size.

The Northwest passage is also shorter than the Suez Canal in
many cases.  For example, a ship traveling from London to
Yokohama, Japan, through Canada's north would travel 4800
nautical miles less than through the Suez Canal, according
to the Canadian Arctic Resources Committee.

Last winter the Bering Sea was effectively ice-free, which
is unprecedented, and if this big melt                        
continues the formerly ice-locked Arctic could have open sea
lanes as soon as 2015.  By 2050, the summertime ice cap
could disappear entirely.

"Although recent terrorist events keep our minds occupied
elsewhere in the world, what a navigable Arctic means for
our national security is significant," says Dr. Dennis
Conlon, Program Manager for Arctic Science at the Office of
Naval Research. "Geographical boundaries, politics, and
commerce changes would all become issues."

Consciously and physically, we hardly know that our Arctic
exists.  No Canadian radar watches our northern skies and no
Canadian coast guard patrols its waters.  We don't even have
a plan for development or policing the Arctic, let alone
protect it from environment disasters such as oil spills.

Unless they tell us, we don't even know when foreign ships
are traveling through our sovereign waters.   Even when they
do tell us, we are often surprised.  In 1999, the Chinese
told  Canadian embassy in Beijing that a research vessel was
going to Tuktoyaktuk, N.W.T.

The visit was a big surprise to local Canadian officials who
were not told, and only learned of the Chinese vessel as it
sailed into Tuktoyaktuk. The incident would have been a big
embarrassment for Canadians if they had been paying enough
attention to know.

A foreign tanker could go to Canada's Prince Patrick island
and load up with fresh water and we would be blissfully
ignorant.  Water pirates are not the only problem, says
Pierre Leblanc, executive for a diamond mining company in
Canada's north.  "Diamond mining has a history of attracting
organized crime," he says.

The nations of the northern hemisphere - - U.S., Japan,
China, Russia and Europe - -  are watching with keen
interest as the Arctic barriers to international trade melt
away.  Most, except Canada.  In typical fashion, we will
wait for others to validate our riches so we can believe in
them.

Northern countries could rightfully challenge Canada's right
of sovereignty in these hinter lands that we care so little
about.   While we promise to stand on guard for the "True
North, strong and free," we have been reluctant to display a
real commitment to the region.
   *   *   *
  
In response to my last column, T. Bruce McNeely says in his
letter to the editor (Charbonneau Logic Seriously Flawed,
The Daily News, Sept.7) that I "hint at a conspiracy." He's
referring the financial gain of U.S. president George W.
Bush's family from the promotion of war.

No conspiracy theory is required - - it's a matter of public
record.  The elder George Bush's employment with the arms
manufacturer Carlyle Group can be found in articles such as
this one in the New York Times: 
www.nytimes.com/2001/03/05/politics/05CARL.html

When Bush goes hunting Arabs, he does so with weapons made
by his father's employer.  It's a clear conflict of
interest, a serious lack of ethical judgment.   It's the
kind of business practice that president Bush condemns when
he preaches to the crooks of Enron and WorldCom. 

go back to my Columns in the