🇨🇦 Canada the peacekeeper was one UN vote from joining Iraq

So much for the sanctimonious mythology. Jean Chrétien did not reject the Iraq invasion on principle. He rejected doing it without a UN permission slip. Cabinet records confirmed Ottawa was ready to send warships if the Security Council blessed it, while John McCallum said ground troops were tied up in Afghanistan. Translation: not anti-war, just pro-managerial cover from the usual international bureaucracy.

That is the real Canadian establishment instinct in one neat package. Sovereignty means nothing unless some offshore club of diplomats rubber-stamps the decision. Liberals still sell this as moral courage, but it was classic elite cowardice dressed up as virtue. The same class that lectures Canadians about rules-based order, open borders and global obligations has always been desperate for foreign approval before acting in our name. Iraq is the old template: outsource legitimacy, preserve the brand, and let the public believe Ottawa stood tall when it was really waiting for instructions.

🍁 Maple Chronicles