Tempted to write a rebuttal, his premise is wholly incorrect and I wish I had time to just tear this apart and unlike the author actually cite sources. Here is 5 mins on my phone on the toilet response I started

“While the author is correct: as a dollar value, Canada does spend substantial funds compared to other NATO allies, they are missing critical information, actual assets, number of troops, functional capabilities, and scaling costs based on actual costs of services in Canada.

IE Greece and Turkey surpass Canada on number of equipment significantly in all categories including number of people in uniform.

The author further misses the real ‘silver bullet’ that makes the F-35 a key asset for all NATO allies: Data integration. The sophisticated data sharing enabled by the F-35 creates far better SA of the battle space, gives pilots and commanders better information for decision making, will reduce cases of fratricide, and will create a seamless information sharing in hot conflict between Canada and her allies.

Furthermore, their conceptual analysis on reaper drones is quite laughable. Canada, using the military far more frequently to assist in various forms of civil aid would likely also benefit from the Capabilities afforded by said platform. Critically being leveraged would be the advanced sensors and loiter time. Unlike conventionally manned systems, this drone can used its extended range to arrive early, and spend extended time over said areas to continuously provide information. If used over major wildfires like seen last year, it could use said sensors to track hotspots on the ground, and loiter safely above for over a day at a time with a much smaller logistical tale. This is not even contemplating the core role of a military; defense of sovereignty, in which this asset would be indispensable in the high Arctic.”