In the strip-tease game Ottawa is playing with Washington over whether we’ll join its National Missile Defence (NMD), we don’t have a lot of clothes left to shed.

Defence Minister Bill Graham peeled off one of our few remaining mini-garments last week when he announced Canada’s willingness to share information with the U.S. anti-missile system through NORAD, our joint patrol of North America.

If we’re going to say “no” to NMD — as common sense cries out that we do — why are we getting Washington all heated up, leaving the impression we’re going to acquiesce to its demands in the end?

One suspects, of course, that Ottawa has already said yes to Washington, but hasn’t yet got up the nerve to break this news to the Canadian people.

Prime Minister Paul Martin is faced with a stark choice: either disappoint the Canadian public — polls show seven out of 10 Canadians oppose joining NMD — or disappoint the Bush administration and the Canadian companies eyeing lucrative Pentagon contracts.

One fascinating thing about the Canadian debate over missile defence is how little it has to do with actual defence.

Just about everybody on this side of the border recognizes the shortcomings in George W. Bush’s plan to deploy costly and unproven technology in the wild hope that it will be able to shoot down long-range incoming missiles — the least likely method of attack a hostile nation would resort to.

Even advocates of Canadian involvement, like the Canadian Council of Chief Executives and prominent military historian Jack Granatstein, offer only a lukewarm defence of NMD as a useful military strategy.

Neither the chief executives nor Granatstein appear to regard missile defence as crucial to our security. Rather, their support for it seems to be largely about accommodating the United States.

“Washington’s capacity to inflict pain and enforce compliance on Canada is boundless,” Granatstein wrote in a 2002 paper for the C.D. Howe Institute. “Canadian policy must be devoted to keeping the elephant fed and happy.”

He points to the fact that 90 per cent of our trade is with the United States, while only 25 per cent of theirs is with Canada.

But 25 per cent is substantial; Americans can’t simply shut down the border without hurting themselves as well. Recall we were also told that our economy would be ruined if we refused to send troops to Iraq.

What is striking is the subservient role Granatstein is urging Canada to adopt. He’s suggesting we support NMD, not for its own merits, but because that’s what the U.S. wants us to do.

Those with a broader view of the world might consider other factors, like the near-certainty that the NMD will revive the nuclear arms race.

If the U.S. feels it can protect itself from incoming missiles, it will be in a position to launch pre-emptive nuclear strikes without fear of retaliation.

“Two warriors armed only with spears won’t attack each other. But if one acquires a shield, he’s free to attack the other,” explains Steven Staples, a defence analyst with the Ottawa-based Polaris Institute. Staples notes that Russia recently announced it’s developing a missile that can evade NMD.

It was the fear of setting off another arms race that led countries around the world to condemn Bush’s decision to pull the U.S. out of the 1972 Anti-Ballistics Missile Treaty and begin developing its NMD program.

That worldwide condemnation explains why Washington is so keen to involve Canada in the program.

U.S. policymakers aren’t interested in our military expertise or assistance. It’s our good name they want.

The involvement of Canada — with its long-time reputation for taking nuclear disarmament seriously — would help them dispel widespread criticism of NMD and deflect charges that it’s a springboard to developing weapons in space.

Granatstein is clearly irritated at the notion that moral concerns about a new arms race should be allowed to get in the way of Canada’s involvement with NMD.

He dismisses opposition as “irrational, emotional anti-Americanism” and scoffs at the way “Canadian parliamentarians and media talk as if the nation still matters in the world.” And he is downright contemptuous of “our pretensions” and “high-falutin’ morality,” noting “morality would only anger the Bush administration.”

So, rather than risk annoying Dick Cheney or Karl Rove, the solution is to drop our moral convictions.

The world community has no actual power to stop Washington from setting off a new arms race. Our only leverage is to signal our disapproval, which is therefore what we should do, even if it risks rankling the superpower next door.

But that’s just my irrational, emotional, high-falutin’ opinion.

Linda McQuaig

Journalist and best-selling author Linda McQuaig has developed a reputation for challenging the establishment. As a reporter for The Globe and Mail, she won a National Newspaper Award in 1989...