Briefings with Tessera: Canada’s Strategic Defense Transformation and Procurement Challenges
Canada is undergoing a fundamental strategic shift in its defense posture, moving from decades of minimal investment toward active modernization and increased continental security engagement. This transformation is driven by escalating threats from Russia and China, particularly in the Arctic, alongside evolving NATO commitments and Indo-Pacific security concerns. However, this strategic reorientation faces significant challenges: a complex multi-departmental procurement system that generates delays and cost overruns, transparency gaps in military-industrial integration with the United States, and the impacts of recent amendments to the U.S. Buy American Act on non-defense sector access. Concurrently, the Department of National Defence and Canadian Armed Forces (DND/CAF) are addressing
Analysis with PhD(c) Justinas Stankus: The Strategic Imperative for Western Engagement with Myanmar’s Democratic Forces
Myanmar’s sovereignty has been fundamentally fragmented since the military coup of February 2021, leading to a complex multi-polar conflict and Balkanization of the country along ethnic and religious lines. While the military junta, enabled by China, maintains control of the capital Naypyidaw and major urban centers, recent advances by opposition forces are significant. Various democratic resistance forces, commonly identified as the People’s Defense Forces (PDF), often acting alongside established Ethnic Armed Organizations (EAOs), have seized control of substantial territory, including some border regions with India, Bangladesh, China, and Thailand. The State Administration Council (SAC) controls approximately one-third of Myanmar’s territory—primarily urban centers and strategic infrastructure—while opposition forces hold significant portions of the remainder, though estimates vary and the situation remains fluid.⁵ This creates a critical but time-sensitive window of opportunity for Western states to recalibrate their approach to this political crisis.