The move comes amid simmering tensions between US President Donald Trump and Carney, who is leading a push for the world’s “middle powers” to present a united bulwark to the influence of superpowers US and China, The Hill reported.
“A strong Canada that prioritizes hard power over rhetoric benefits us all. Unfortunately, Canada has failed to make credible progress on its defense commitments. DoW is pausing the Permanent Joint Board on Defense to reassess how this forum benefits shared North American defense,” Elbridge Colby, undersecretary of Defense for policy, said in a post on the social platform X, using an alternate acronym for the Department of Defense.
“We can no longer avoid the gaps between rhetoric and reality. Real powers must sustain our rhetoric with shared defense and security responsibilities,” Colby added, along with a link to Carney’s January address in Davos.
In that address, Carney sounded a warning about the risks of relying on global “hegemons” and called on middle powers to take a new approach to projecting strength.
“The middle powers must act together, because if we’re not at the table, we’re on the menu,” he said, in a speech widely seen as a shot at Trump’s alienation of US allies.
“We know the old order is not coming back. We shouldn’t mourn it. Nostalgia is not a strategy. But we believe that from the fracture, we can build something bigger, better, stronger, more just.”
“This is the task of the middle powers, the countries that have the most to lose from a world of fortresses and most to gain from genuine cooperation,” he added.
That speech largely ended the previously friendly relations between Trump and Carney, a former banker elected last year to replace former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
Trump has since threatened to block the opening of a new bridge connecting Canada and Michigan, while Canada has debated whether to reduce its military purchases from the US.
As of late April, Canada was still reviewing its planned purchase of 88 Lockheed Martin F-35 fighter jets.
In February, the US ambassador to Canada, Pete Hoekstra, warned that if Ottawa does not buy the F-35s, North American Aerospace Defense Command, a defense partnership operated jointly by the two countries, “would have to be altered”.
The Permanent Joint Board on Defense was established in August 1940 in an agreement signed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt and Canadian Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King, in the midst of World War II.
The board includes military leaders and civilians from both countries, meeting semiannually to provide policy advice and conduct studies.
Colby on Monday posted a photograph of himself meeting with Hoekstra at the Pentagon. He did not specifically reference the F-35s.
“We’re working closely to ensure every NATO partner, including Canada, reaches the Hague Summit’s 3.5% GDP defense spending target, a vital investment for North American and Arctic defense,” he wrote along with the photo.
Carney announced in March that Canada had hit its 2 percent defense spending target years ahead of schedule and was on track to hit 3.5 percent by 2035.
“Over the next decade, Canada will unleash half a trillion dollars in defense investment — from submarines and aircraft to drones, sensors, and radar systems,” Carney said in a statement at the time.
“In a more dangerous and divided world, Canada is taking full responsibility for defending our sovereignty and building our strength as a reliable partner and Ally.”
The Hill reached out to the Canadian Defense Ministry for comment on Monday’s announcement.
Erin O’Toole, the former leader of Canada’s Conservative Party, now the head of a risk and intelligence firm, criticized Colby’s move in a post on X.
“This is profoundly misguided and quite strange coming right after the President’s visit to China. Canada has been and will be an ally that shares values of liberty,” he wrote.
“As a Canadian whose grandfather deployed to Alaska for joint defense in WWII, I hope we don’t lose sight of that,” he added.
In reply to another X user, O’Toole said the US pulling out of the military board made it more likely that Canada would turn to other countries for major weapons purchases.
Colby’s thread on X concluded with an image of a map showing the US and Canada.