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From: fred@mnetor.UUCP (Fred Williams)
Newsgroups: can.politics
Subject: Re: Canada's defence : Doesn't anyone care?
Message-ID: <2005@mnetor.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 5-Sep-85 11:02:42 EDT
Article-I.D.: mnetor.2005
Posted: Thu Sep  5 11:02:42 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 5-Sep-85 12:14:04 EDT
References: <833@utcs.UUCP> <764@lsuc.UUCP> <5906@utzoo.UUCP> <774@lsuc.UUCP> <1952@mnetor.UUCP> <3501@garfield.UUCP>
Reply-To: fred@mnetor.UUCP (Fred Williams)
Organization: Computer X (CANADA) Ltd., Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Lines: 43
Keywords: Polar Sea Incident: Why?
Summary: 

In article <3501@garfield.UUCP> robertj@garfield.UUCP (Robert Janes) writes:
>In article <1952@mnetor.UUCP> fred@mnetor.UUCP (Fred Williams) writes:
>>    Furthermore, there was no need to do much.  The US gave us a
>>letter, according to Macleans, that states that the voyage in no
>>way affects Canada's claims on the area. 
>>....  The only problem was that the press blew 
>>everything out of proportion in order to improve their ratings.
>
>******
>	Here we go: let's shoot the messenger. I mean like wow how
>can we doubt our American FRIENDS I mean like they gave us this neat
>little note saying that would be nice people and not rub our noses
>in the Polar Sea four or five years from now. These people in the
>press are so icky poo to point out that our FRIEND the US doesn't
>recognize our claim up there  in that there Artic and that they 
>are never going to recognize our claim unless Canada kicks up
>a stink.
>********
>
>	Sorry for the sarcasm above but those were my feelings
>upon reading Mr. Williams note.

    Apology accepted.  I realise it is difficult to communicate
over the net when body signals & facial expressions are absent.
"Shoot the messenger" was not the message I was trying to convey.
Yes, our sovereinty in the north *is* important and I am strongly
in favour of building a couple of year round ice breakers, (even
at the cost of $450 million each, which has been quoted). Yes, I
would even go as far to arm them with rocket launchers or some such
system. (Anti-sub weapons as well)!
    In addition, I am not ignorant of the fact that our relationship
with the US tends to be a bit one sided to say the least.
    Having said all that, I just want to point out that all this fuss
over the Polar Sea seemed to lead many people to think that our
claims to that area had been sucessfully challanged. With the exception
of Macleans, I saw no mention of letters exchanged between the US
and Canada stating that the voyage in no way affected the validity
of our claim. This was *somewhat* irresponsible in my opinion, but that
is not to say that the press in general in no good, etc.  I have seen
the members of the fifth estate do excellent work on occasion.

Cheers,		Fred Williams