Canada is taking “positive” steps to boost its defence spending and military presence in Europe, but Canadians themselves need to take collective responsibility toward national security to counter growing threats from nations like Russia, Latvia’s envoy says.
In an interview with Global News in Vancouver, Kaspars Ozoliņš, Latvia’s ambassador to Canada, said “unfriendly countries” are not limited to geography as a means to influence or attack other nations, using everything from cyberattacks to disinformation. That requires businesses and civil society to defend critical infrastructure alongside government and military forces, he stressed.
“It’s not just about whether you spend two per cent or five per cent (of GDP on defence),” he said.
“There is an increased understanding (in Latvia) that it has to be a whole-of-society approach. So we do a lot of planning and training and exercise (with) businesses and institutions every year that has led to that growing acceptance and understanding.”
“I guess this is a relatively new concept for Canadians, and something that needs to be understood a little bit better.”
As a former Soviet republic-turned-NATO ally on the front lines of Europe’s defence from an increasingly hostile Russia, Ozoliņš said Latvia knows the risks posed to democratic allies like Canada firsthand.
“I’ve lived under the Soviet regime,” he said, describing the “influence of terror” that preceded Latvia’s independence in 1991.
“The Soviet regime was much milder than it is right now in Russia. And that scares me.”
Canada leading NATO brigade in Latvia
The Canada-Latvia relationship is a valuable one within the NATO alliance. The Baltic nation is home to Canada’s largest overseas military mission, Operation Reassurance, a multinational battle brigade led by Canadian troops since 2017.
Prime Minister Mark Carney announced in August while visiting Riga that Canada would extend the mission for another three years, keeping more than 2,000 Canadian soldiers at the border with Russia until 2029.
The Latvian ambassador said that, while the announcement was welcome, the government wants Canada to join the multinational division command structure alongside Latvia and Denmark in order to streamline the chain of command with the brigade.
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That would require high-level Canadian staffing at the divisional headquarters in Denmark.
“We certainly want Canada to join as a Framework Nation” that leads the overall division, not just the brigade, he said.
Ozoliņš’s comments come just over a week after Carney’s government released its first federal budget, which would allocate $2.7 billion toward that three-year extension of Operation Reassurance.
The budget overall proposes nearly $82 billion over the next five years toward modernizing and strengthening the Canadian Armed Forces, a massive influx in defence spending that Carney says will finally get Canada to meet its NATO commitments.
That money also includes more than $10 billion for digital infrastructure upgrades for military and Communications Security Establishment systems used in “modern warfare,” including cyber defence.
The new budget commits $28 million over the next two years to Canada’s updated cybersecurity strategy, which calls for a “whole-of-society engagement” to confront cyber threats. That means engaging with all levels of government along with law enforcement, the private sector, civil society, academia and Indigenous groups, in addition to partnering with international allies.
Ozoliņš noted Latvia is on track to spend 4.9 per cent of its GDP on defence by next year — more than twice the level Ottawa says it’s on track to hit.
Half of that spending in Latvia will go to defence procurement alone, he said.
“We are fortifying the border line between Russia and our country, as well as with Belarus,” which borders Latvia to the southeast and whose President Alexander Lukashenko is an ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Russia causing more ‘mischief’, envoy says
Ozoliņš noted the war in Ukraine has further underscored the danger Latvia faces as a bulwark for the wider European continent against Moscow — as well as the continued need for collective defence.
In recent months, Russian drones and fighter jets have been reported in the airspace of several NATO countries in Europe, increasing concerns in the region of a broader conflict.
Ozoliņš said such incursions are nothing new for Latvia, while also pointing to Moscow’s continued attempts to sow distrust in elections and democracy around the globe.
“When Russia is lowering the threshold of doing mischief, using force or anything … it’s very worrying,” he said.
Canada’s recent commitments are helping to achieve that deterrence, the ambassador added.
Ottawa aims to have a full cadre of 2,200 persistently deployed Canadian troops in Latvia sometime in 2026, a timeline Ozoliņš said is on track and may be achieved earlier than anticipated.
“Defence investment is very serious and takes a lot of years, but in that sense I think Canada is progressing really well on upscaling the brigade headquarters to full operational capacity,” he said.
“If we look at the pace from decisions made to implementation, it has been very good.”
The military modernization commitments in the budget, if achieved, will be reflected in the NATO Latvia brigade itself as well as in domestic military operations like Arctic security, Ozoliņš added.
Asked if another multinational brigade similar to the one in Latvia would make sense in the Arctic as well, Ozoliņš deferred to the Arctic Council of nations to make that decision, but didn’t dismiss the idea.
“What we like to see is the willingness of countries to work together,” he said.
“You cannot just slice up the Arctic pie and say you only control your slice. The best way to deal with the increasing threats is to work collectively.”
Public understanding of security necessary
Overall, the ambassador said there has been an increased urgency and commitment to defence out of Ottawa. He pointed to Carney’s Remembrance Day statement, which called for continued “vigilance” in an increasingly dangerous world, as proof of a shift in priorities.
He said all levels of government must continue to underscore the need for a collective approach to national defence across industry and civil society in order to gain support for continued investments.
“We don’t have the luxury of spending endless amounts of money,” Ozoliņš said. “We need support from society to confront these threats, and that requires more understanding.”
While defence spending was far outpaced by affordability concerns in an Ipsos poll on budget priorities conducted last month for Global News, the survey found support for investments in the military has risen since last year.
Ozoliņš said there’s a growing awareness of the need for a “societal resiliency” among young people he speaks to at universities across Canada.
“I tell them that history is not static, and that the speed of change is so fast that we can’t be thinking, ‘well it doesn’t concern us,’” he said.
“If you think you’ll be acting when the threat comes, then that would be too late.”