By Asa McKercher

April 1, 2026

The recent news that Canada has crossed the threshold of 2% of GDP spent on defence is welcome.

For decades, Canadian political leaders talked a big game about “punching above our weight” or of Canada being “back” on the world stage. But as evidenced via the metric of military spending – and with it, the ability to defend our sovereignty and contribute to collective security – successive governments fell short of backing up that talk with fiscal action.

Importantly, this 2% benchmark is just a start: Canada has pledged to meet the new NATO annual defence spending target of 3.5% by 2035 (plus another 1.5% on defence-related infrastructure). One hopes, then, that the current spending can be sustained, thereby giving Canada’s military the capacity to defend against threats from our newly aggressive southern neighbour and play a role elsewhere alongside friends and allies in deterring aggression, keeping open the sea lanes to global trade, and myriad other tasks.

Yet, as commendable as it is that Prime Minister Mark Carney has put the government on course to reverse decades of military decline, it is alarming that, in the same week, Global Affairs Canada revealed that it is being subjected to a 20% budget cut that will result in layoffs for many of the country’s most experienced foreign service officers and trade commissioners.

The mismatch between the building up of the military and the hollowing out of diplomatic capacity speaks to a fundamental weakness in Mr. Carney’s much ballyhooed pursuit of a renewed middle power foreign policy.

Last June, speaking at the Munk School, Mr. Carney first outlined his commitment to increased military spending. As he then said, although we had reached a “hinge moment” in history with the “unravelling” of the rules-based international order, Canadians had “agency in determining what comes next.” In a turn of phrase that he has come to enjoy, the prime minister warned middle powers, that “if they are not at the table, they will be on the menu.”

When he expressed the same sentiment at Davos six months later, the world, and many Canadians, took note. As Carney seemed to indicate, he was committing Canada to playing a significant role alongside other middle powers in pursuit of what he termed “variable geometry”, that is, coalitions of willing states formed to tackle specific international issues, from free trade to support for Ukraine.

This approach is sensible enough. After all, China and the United States are predatory powers, and smaller states would do well to balance against them in pursuit of their collective interests. Increased military spending is of a piece then, with the foreign policy vision Carney outlined: a Canada that will work alongside other states in constructive fashion.

At the same time, Mr. Carney has committed to a major push to diversify Canada’s economy by seeking out new trade and investment opportunities. This goal, too, is a worthy one, long championed by Canadian governments both Liberal and Conservative, and of increased importance given the year-long economic war waged upon Canada by the Trump administration.

Overall, Mr. Carney’s foreign policy strategy amounts to creating a more sovereign, secure Canada that is less reliant on the United States and more integrated with like-minded middle powers across the globe. Pursuing that strategy will take considerable work, of the kind done by professional diplomats and trade commissioners, not just military personnel.

One need only look to the United States today to see the geopolitical limitations of a $1 trillion defence budget alongside a gutted foreign service.

As such, the trimming of Global Affairs Canada’s budget from $9.05 billion in 2025-26 to $7.22 billion in 2026-27 is an undeniably short-sighted move by the federal government.

The cut will result in fewer experienced personnel with the necessary connections with foreign governments and international organizations, or with the knowledge to assist Canadian businesses with the difficult tasks involved in building export markets. To butcher the prime minister’s metaphor, the cuts to GAC’s budget amount to firing the cooks and wait staff just as dinner is about to be ordered. Further, the GAC cuts follow the slashing of Canadian development spending, a traditional means of buying friends and influence on a par with the Trump-gutted USAID.

As evidenced by his frequent travel abroad, perhaps Mr. Carney feels that he is best positioned to carry Canada’s message to the world and engage in negotiation with his international counterparts. Certainly not since the days of Lester B. Pearson has a Canadian prime minister had such an impressive international Rolodex (or its 21^st century equivalent).

Yet, Mr. Pearson was most effective as foreign minister to Prime Minister Louis St. Laurent. And at that time — the so-called golden age of Canadian foreign policy — Mr. Pearson relied on an expert foreign service, one that John F. Kennedy praised as the best in the world. Critically, it was during the St. Laurent government, beginning in 1950, that Canada embarked on a military spending splurge to meet its newfound NATO and continental defence commitments while also contributing to the war in Korea.

During a fateful Cabinet meeting in late 1950, Pearson championed this spending, just as Defence Minister Brooke Claxton supported funding Canada’s foreign service. When it came to confronting the stark realities of the emerging Cold War, there was no robbing Pearson to pay Paul. Rather, both ministers, and St. Laurent too, recognized the complementary nature of a well-funded military and diplomatic service.

Further, 1950 saw Canada begin in earnest overseas development spending via the British Commonwealth’s Colombo Plan. It’s no coincidence that this same period was one during which Canada ranked highly among fellow middle powers.

“Nostalgia is not a strategy,” Mr. Carney has noted. But without being overly nostalgic for Canada’s golden age of middle powership, it is worth stressing that it was an era during which Ottawa developed a diverse international toolkit that it deployed to advance the country’s interests. One need only look to the United States today to see the geopolitical limitations of a $1 trillion defence budget alongside a gutted foreign service.

At the same time, the mismatch between increased Canadian military spending and reductions at Global Affairs Canada speaks to a larger limitation: the lack of an overall defence and foreign policy strategy, one that marshals Canadian means in pursuit of Canadian ends.

If Mr. Carney truly wishes to enact his foreign policy vision, he’d be wise to reconsider the cuts at Global Affairs Canada before presenting his strategy to Canadians.

Asa McKercher is Steven K. Hudson Chair in Canada-US Relations at the Brian Mulroney Institute of Government at St. Francis Xavier University.