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Canada to Recruit Foreign Nationals to Bolster Their Military

Brian Watt
@BrianWatt
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From Reuters (emphasis mine):

Immigration Minister Lena Metlege Diab said the 2026 changes to the Express Entry system will help to attract talent that can "contribute from day one" as Canada faces labour shortages in critical sectors.

The new categories include researchers, senior managers, transport‑sector workers such as pilots and aircraft mechanics, and foreign medical doctors with Canadian experience. They will also include highly skilled foreign military applicants recruited by the Canadian Armed Forces, including military doctors, nurses and pilots.

So, a country neighboring the United States, that is a NATO ally, will be recruiting foreign nationals to bolster the ranks of the Canadian military - including pilots. Will Canada properly vet these highly skilled foreign military applicants and pilots to ensure that they won’t come from or are agents of countries like China, North Korea, Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen, or other adversaries of the United States or NATO? Will Canada share the background information of these new recruits with NATO or American intelligence agencies?

What could possibly go wrong?

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Discussion (26)

  • Ekosj@Ekosj

    Regarding:

    Brian Watt (View Post):

    include highly skilled foreign military applicants recruited by the Canadian Armed Forces, including military doctors, nurses and pilots.

    Seems like an extraordinarily bad idea. Too bad that when it goes sideways it’ll probably America, not Canada who pays the piper.

  • Seawriter@Seawriter

    There is a word describing people like that: mercenaries.

    To quote the master (Niccolo Machiavelli)

    Mercenaries and auxiliaries are useless and dangerous. If you are counting on mercenaries to defend your state you will never be stable or secure, because mercenaries are ambitious, undisciplined, disloyal and they quarrel among themselves. Courageous with friends and cowardly with enemies, they have no fear of God and keep no promises. With mercenaries the only way to delay disaster is to delay the battle; in peacetime they plunder you and in wartime they let the enemy plunder you.

    and:

    A mercenary commander may or may not be an excellent military leader: if he is, you can’t trust him because he will always aspire to power himself, either by attacking you, his paymaster, or by attacking others against your wishes; but if he isn’t a capable leader, he’ll ruin you anyway.

    Good luck Canada.

  • Doctor Robert@DoctorRobert

    One of my grandfathers served in the US Army while a citizen of Greece in 1917. Green card holders can serve in the military today. This Canadian business looks like a similar, if looser, policy.

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