After repeatedly vowing to reduce Canada’s military spending with the United States, Prime Minister Mark Carney said on Wednesday that the Royal Canadian Air Force will buy a fleet of Swedish military surveillance aircraft.
Last year, Mr. Carney declared Canada too dependent on the United States for its defense and expanded military spending to a level not seen in decades. That ended Canada’s persistent failure to meet NATO’s minimum military spending target of two percent of gross domestic product.
He has said several times since becoming prime minister that less of that money will go to U.S. defense companies than in the past.
“The days of our military sending 70 cents of every dollar to the United States are over,” Mr. Carney told Liberal Party supporters in Montreal last month.
The Saab GlobalEye, which is based on a Canadian executive jet, was selected over two American surveillance planes including one from Boeing. The purchase comes as Canada is currently reviewing whether to continue buying up to 88 F35 fighter jets from the United States or to shift to the Gripen fighter jet, also from Saab. During a news conference after the announcement, Mr. Carney said the purchases are unrelated.
Canada has bought an initial round of 16 F35s. But Canada’s industry minister, Mélanie Joly has called for more manufacturing at home. Saab is promising to eventually build its fighter jet in Canada and raised the possibility that could include production for other countries.
On Wednesday at a defense industry trade show in Ottawa, Mr. Carney said that about 3,000 Canadian workers will be involved in the GlobalEye production and that about one third of the aircraft fleet will be manufactured in Canada. The airplane is a highly modified version of the Global 6500 executive jet made by Bombardier which is headquartered in Dorval, Quebec.
“This is an example of Canada’s defense and industrial strategy in action,” Mr. Carney said in his speech. “It builds Canadian strategic economy, creates Canadian jobs and reinforces Canada’s position as a global leader.”
The government did not say how many aircraft it will buy nor did it reveal the cost. A Department of National Defence document updated in December indicates that more than five billion Canadian dollars, or $3.6 billion, has been allocated for the project.
While Mr. Carney has committed to spending 3.5 percent of Canada’s gross domestic product annually on defense by 2035, the Trump administration remains dissatisfied. Last week, Elbridge Colby, the U.S. under secretary of defense, said on social media that the United States has suspended the Permanent Joint Board on Defense, an obscure group established in 1940 that generally met once or twice a year to review mutual military issues.
“Unfortunately, Canada has failed to make credible progress on its defense commitments,” Mr. Colby wrote on social media.
Mr. Carney dismissed the significance of the suspension, noting that the group has not met since 2024.
“I wouldn’t overplay the importance of this,” Carney told reporters last week. “We have many aspects of very close defense cooperation with the United States.”
