Is War Addiction Really Something to Celebrate?
By Yves Engler
We won. But please don’t ask exactly what.
For the foreseeable future a major Canadian city is set to be a central node in linking global finance to arms production. Montreal, Toronto, or whichever city ‘wins’ hosting rights for the global war bank will become a symbol of militarism for decades to come.
Last month Canada was formally selected to host a new multilateral war bank. It’s now up to the federal government to decide which city will host the Defense, Security and Resilience Bank.
The DSRB will further marry investment agencies and major banks to arms producers. One aim of the multilateral financial institution is to draw the major commercial banks and large investment agencies, like the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan, into closer ties with the arms industry. The war bank, explains Palestinian Youth Movement campaigner Umer Azad, will “raise capital on global markets, issue bonds, and extend loans to governments and defense companies. That means funding for military supply chains, weapons systems, and defense infrastructure would increasingly flow through financial markets rather than direct public expenditure. In doing so, war itself risks being transformed from a political decision subject to public scrutiny into a financial product embedded in portfolios.”
Think ‘military-industrial-financial complex’ as Canadian capitalists get increased profits from the financial part.
The DSRB will offer low-cost loans to ‘allied’ countries to facilitate their military buildup. The war bank is part of retooling Canada and most NATO economies to a perpetual war economy. It is designed to assist a historic increase in war spending. In discussing the project, the Canadian president of the DSRB Development Group, Kevin Reed, said NATO military spending is expected to grow from $1.6 trillion to $4 trillion annually over the next nine years. For its part, Canada has agreed to the Donald Trump-inspired target of 5% of GDP (3.5% direct and 1.5% associated) devoted to the military that will grow spending from $40 billion last year to $150 billion in a decade.
In his first year in office Mark Carney has radically boosted military spending. He’s also laid out a long-term plan to further link economic development to war, establishing a $6.6 billion Defense Industrial Strategy.
At the same time, Carney has slashed health transfers and spending on pharmacare. Thousands of federal service jobs are being cut while the Department of National Defence workforce will grow.
Irrespective of the social programs it starves or the violence it will likely spur, all politicians support the War Bank. The NDP premier of BC, the former NDP MP who is now Toronto mayor, and Quebec Solidaire have all joined in the effort to bring the war bank to their respective cities. The new left-ish NDP leader Avi Lewis has kept silent on the DSRB -- despite the fact that it is generally easier to stop a project before it has taken root.
While social democratic politicians back their cities’ bid for the war bank, some resistance is brewing. Some educators have protested the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan’s support for the bank. A coalition involving the Council of Canadians, 350.org, Canadian Federation of Students, and dozens of other organizations was launched to “Stop! The Global War Bank”. Its statement notes, “we reject the DSRB war bank. Not in Toronto, not in Canada, not on this planet.”
But we need a massive resistance to prevent the economy becoming ever more addicted to war. Because that growing addiction is what Canada actually ‘won.’
Yves writes: "Quebec Solidaire have all joined in the effort to bring the war bank to their respective cities." Wrong, completely wrong. See "Selon Québec solidaire Le Québec doit avoir sa part des milliards en défense, mais pour investir dans autre chose." https://www.lapresse.ca/actualites/politique/2026-05-19/selon-quebec-solidaire/le-quebec-doit-avoir-sa-part-des-milliards-en-defense-mais-pour-investir-dans-autre-chose.php#
English translation:
According to Québec solidaire Quebec must have its share of the billions in defence, but to invest in something else
A solidarity government would demand Quebec's share of the massive defence investments that the Carney government wants to make, but would not invest a penny of this money in the defence industries.
Published on May 19
Pierre Saint-Arnaud
The Canadian Press
In addition, Québec solidaire parliamentary leader Ruba Ghazal is opposed to the Banque de la défense, de la sécurité et de la résilience setting up in Montreal and says that Quebec should not pour any public money into this institution if Montreal were ever chosen to host it.
In front of a hundred guests who came to attend a luncheon conference at the invitation of the Montreal Council on Foreign Relations (MCFR) on Tuesday morning in Montreal, and at a press conference afterwards,Ms. Ghazal firmly entrenched the pacifist positions of her political party.
"At Québec solidaire, we were very clear as soon as the Quebec government announced that it wanted to participate in the new rearmament race encouraged by Mark Carney. We believe that a much broader public debate must take place and that no public money should be used for this purpose."
Mark Carney's government has announced that it intends to spend $58 billion over the next five years on the defence sector and that it wants to increase this spending to $150 billion per year starting in 2035.
No consultation or debate
"Has there been a poll that says they [Quebecers] want us to go into defence? That this is where we would like to put our money dearly earned by Quebecers? There has been no debate," she said, arguing that shifting the economy towards defence for several years would lead to a major setback to the development of renewable energies such as wind or solar.
At a press conference afterwards, the spokesperson for Québec solidaire was very clear that Quebecers should not have public money in defence. "The Carney government that wants to pay, that wants to invest, there is a part of it that it's Quebecers' money, we don't want Quebec to pay for these companies. So, this would be an avenue that we would look at to see: could a Québec solidaire government, could we have our money to invest it in industries that are economically profitable and that are the industries of the future? This means clean energy, the ecological transition of our economy. »
Quebec will want its share
There is no question, however, of abandoning Quebec's 22% share of the federal billions, which represents its demographic weight in the Canadian federation. "Of course, we need this money, we lack it, so yes, we would ask to have our money here to invest it in the real development of our economy."
Ruba Ghazal also invoked American studies according to which "when you invest in defence, for every dollar invested in defence, the number of jobs is much lower, 50% less than if you invest in renewable energy, in health, in education, in public services".
And then in the long term, she wondered, "when we have turned our economy towards war or defence, what is called the war economy, when the war factories are running at full capacity, when the warehouses are well stocked, when whole swathes of our economies depend on this new logic, what will happen if the demand is not there? Are we just going to pull our marbles and close the factories saying: phew, we narrowly escaped, we invested all our money and our economy in the defense economy, in the end we didn't use it, let's close it and move on? Or rather, does supply always end up somehow creating its own demand? »
No to the Defence Bank
As for the Defence Bank,Ms. Ghazal says she is in favour of the arrival of international institutions in Montreal, but not this one. "It's not true that they're going to have public money that is going to be put into defense to go and sell weapons, which always leads to the same place."
She says that "if a Québec solidaire government is elected, we will be against it. We are not going to work to have the headquarters of this bank that finances international armaments. »
Quebecers, she repeats, have never been consulted on these issues. "Right now, they're struggling. They pray to each other to be able to pay their rent, groceries, mortgage, do Quebecers want their money to go to defence? That's really it, this debate has not been done. This question has not been asked of Quebecers. »
Agreed that a militarized economy is not the productive nor efficient economy that will deliver what Canadians need.
In fact, the militarized economy is a fictional economics where weapons manufacturing is disconnected from what weapons are manufactured for. Disconnected from who the weapons are sold to. Disconnected from the lack of oversight, regulation and enforcement to end the tradition of a deceptive weapons market intentionally leaking (intentionally selling) weapons to the worst of humanity's violent political movements.
This weapons economy will not deliver affordable, not-for-profit public housing where accommodation is matched to income. Weapon sales will not provide universal public health care of an excellent quality. Weapons manufacturing will not deliver an accountable and transparent democracy but further empower private marketeers, banksters and financiers with anti-social interests. The politics pushing this deception is resolutely against a democratic electoral mechanism, intra-party accountability, freedom of information, etc.,...
In this connection, with "critical minerals" being pushed as part of this militarization parade, i heartily recommend BC Mining Law Reform's report - The Data Deficit: Canada’s “Critical Minerals” Dilemma Closing Information Gaps for a Resilient, Responsible Mineral Future.
Briefly, this report comprehensively researches and summarizes the almost complete lack of data upon which to advance critical minerals as 'necessary' nor related to 'national security.' (Apologies - i can't provide a working link!)
In other words, the critical minerals push is a state propaganda which advances private markets driving the public into a wasteful and unproductive economics that repeatedly fails to resolve the fundamental problems created by authoritarian political economics. This seems to be connected to the aggressive push by an extremist militarism south of our border forcing the expansion of the MIC (military industrial complex) to the financial/political benefit of one of our world's most aggressive and violent nations. An MIC economy is not a productive nor efficient economy. It does not serve the needs of citizens. It is not a peace producing economy. It corrupts politics as the U.S. budget fully demonstrates!