let's get the basic facts on the table: there were no canadian troops in vietnam or iraq, although we did provide peace-keeping or training forces after the fact. the reason we did not participate in these invasion forces has nothing to do with pacifism or anti-war rhetoric, but was rather solely because the invasions were not agreed upon by the united nations.

chretien has been crystal clear from the start that he would have sent troops to iraq if the united nations had backed the invasion, and we have a testable way to demonstrate the accuracy of this claim, because he did send troops to afghanistan, under the united nations mandate.

this is not an original idea that i'm espousing, but is rather the central thesis of any book written after the second world war on canadian foreign policy. i'm not letting anything out of the bag. the americans understand our position, or at least what it used to be. and, if you don't understand what i'm saying, then you don't know what you're talking about - it's that basic, that fundamental, to canadian foreign policy.

our position on venezuela is consequently a dramatic break from our historical position, because it for the first time in our history (as a british colony until 1982, and a sovereign state since) acknowledges the primacy of the monroe doctrine, over the supremacy of the un charter. that does not mean that it is the first time that we've aligned with the united states, and it clearly is not. but, it is the first time we've acted as a client state, disinterested or unaware of our own interests, and focused solely on the promotion of washington's, in the hope we'll get some kind of reward from the white house. we have never, ever, ever done that before. at all.