Canadian Ships Mark Time in Sicily Amid Hot Debate at Home

With bands playing and women and children crying, two Canadian destroyers steamed out of Halifax last month and headed for the Persian Gulf. But now they are lying at anchor in a Sicilian port, throwing a spotlight on the way domestic discord can influence the best-laid plans of America’s northern ally.

Canadian doves are complaining that Prime Minister Brian Mulroney tried to time the ships’ deployment to evade public debate--both on the deployment itself and on an array of domestic woes.

At the same time, the Canadian Defense Department insists that politics is not to blame for the ships’ slow passage and that the delay is the result of an innocent misreading of the calendar.

To understand the Canadian warship flap is to appreciate the political forces that have been at work in Canada this summer: It has not been a good season for Mulroney. His government was seriously weakened by the failure of a key constitutional initiative in June, and when Parliament recessed soon afterward, he seemed to welcome the chance to disappear from the public eye and recover in peace.

But events have not conspired to help Mulroney keep a low profile. For week after week this summer, his government has been plagued by Indian uprisings. His economic policies have been unpopular; recession looms. Throughout the summer, opposition politicians have clamored for Mulroney to reconvene Parliament early and submit to the daily on-camera questioning that is a staple of the Canadian political diet in the cooler months of the year.

“The prime minister has been in hiding this summer,” said Bill Blaikie, foreign affairs spokesman for the opposition New Democratic Party.

The left-leaning New Democrats wanted Mulroney to appear even before the Persian Gulf crisis erupted to explain the government’s ineffective response to the Indian uprisings.

“Mulroney has no interest in being in Parliament every day, answering questions,” Blaikie said. “That’s the thing he wants to put off as long as possible.”

And then, on Aug. 2, came the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait and the call for an international blockade.

Canada, which prides itself on a non-bellicose foreign policy--and which exports wheat--was not particularly comfortable with the idea of using food as a weapon against Iraq. When Mulroney returned from a meeting with President Bush on Aug. 10 and announced that two Canadian destroyers and a supply ship would be sent to the Persian Gulf, the Canadians who had already been seeking an early parliamentary session stepped up their demands.

Mulroney, however, pointed out that Parliament wasn’t due back in Ottawa until Sept. 24 and said he saw no reason to hurry the members back. That angered his critics even more. In 1987, after all, Mulroney had recalled Parliament to discuss the arrival in Nova Scotia of a shipload of Sikh asylum seekers. Surely, Canadians said to themselves, the possibility of Canada going to war was more worthy of debate than the arrival of a few seemingly peaceable South Asians.

The ships crossed the Atlantic in good time, however, and were due to pass through the Suez Canal by today. And that, it turned out, was what ruined Mulroney’s low-profile plans. By law, once the ships exited the canal and entered the Red Sea, they would be on active duty. Also by law, troops cannot go on active duty without the authorization of the Cabinet.

And finally, by law, the Cabinet cannot give such authorization without submitting to the scrutiny of Parliament within the following 10 days. If the warships kept to their schedule, two unpleasant possibilities loomed: either the ships would be outlaws, or Mulroney would have to reconvene Parliament early.

Evidently realizing all this, the Canadian Defense Department slowed the ships when they entered the Mediterranean. First the ships took two days for refitting and training at Gibraltar. Then they moved on to the Sicilian port of Augusta, where still more training has been undertaken.