Quick Hits – Episode 207: Why bother have an intelligence service when it is ignored?
Canada has a woefully inadequate intelligence culture and that undermines the efforts of the women and men who work in national security. Furthermore, it now appears that intelligence has become subservient to political whims. If so, maybe we can close these agencies as their independence is under question. Borealis looks at the egregious behaviours of senior intelligence officers and the inability of government officials to use intelligence properly.
No intelligence briefing happened on Chinese funding of candidates: Trudeau | CBC News
Olaf Scholz leads a blue-chip business delegation to China | The Economist
By Phil Gurski
Phil Gurski is the President and CEO of Borealis Threat and Risk Consulting Ltd., a 32-year veteran of CSE and CSIS and the author of six books on terrorism.
2 replies on “Quick Hits – Put up a ‘for sale’ sign at CSIS: its mandate has been compromised”
Hi Mr Gurski big fan of the show and a fellow Canadian and agree with you that it seems the government did perhaps bend the rules to their favor. But just for the sake of consistency just wondering what a former member of our intelligence would have done i.e., what do you think were the existing laws could have been used and why so few voices have spoken about this as an example of government overreach. I believe the invocation of the emergencies act is still thought of positively among the public, the government and maybe even unfortunately possibly members of our intelligence community (though you’re free to disagree). Thus, I worry a) more conspiratorial minded people to have this narrative of government overreach, or b) our public understanding of legal precedent is now capable of being influenced by politicians. And while some may say that this may be an overexaggerating, I think that Chinese election interference (and other such issues) might be an ugly wake up call for Canadians. Curious on your thoughts.
Hi Keval and thank you for taking the time to comment. I appreciate the feedback There were existing tools, as law enforcement made clear, which had not been deployed and these should have been used before the EA was invoked. I do worry about precedent setting and political interference for sure and I a happy to no longer be in that milieu: my tendency to speak honestly would not have gone well in today’s environment. Re China – check out my columns in the Epoch Times. Thanks again!