Elbridge Colby Freezes Canada Military Budget Board Over F-35 Review
Elbridge Colby said the U.S. government froze the Permanent Joint Board on Defense with Canada after Ottawa failed to present a detailed military budget road map and kept reviewing its F-35 purchase. The move cuts off a long-running defence forum that had not met since 2024.
Colby and Canada
Colby, the U.S. undersecretary of defence for policy, said Canada had “failed to make credible progress on its defense commitments” in social-media posts announcing the suspension. A Pentagon official said the freeze followed Ottawa’s lack of a detailed strategy for lifting military spending to 5 per cent of GDP by 2035.
The same official said Canada’s reconsideration of dozens of American-made F-35 fighter jets also drove the decision. Canada announced in March of last year that it was reviewing the purchase, and it has still not said when it will decide.
Ogdensburg Board Since 1940
The Permanent Joint Board on Defense was created in 1940 at a summit in Ogdensburg, N.Y. It is a Canada-U.S. forum that makes recommendations to government, and it last met in 2024.
The freeze lands while Canada is already moving on other military projects. It is modernizing the NORAD early warning system with over-the-horizon radar and buying 12 under-the-ice submarines.
Canada’s Spending Reply
Canada fulfilled its NATO commitment to spend 2 per cent of GDP on defence last year and announced $80-billion of new money for the military over five years. Last year, Canada and most other NATO members also agreed to a 2035 target of 3.5 per cent of GDP for direct military spending, plus another 1.5 per cent for infrastructure and industrial spending tied to defence and national security.
David McGuinty’s spokesperson, Maya Ouferhat, called Canada’s investments a “generational uplift” and said in an e-mail on Thursday that “Canada has made historic investments in continental defence, Arctic security, and military readiness.” The suspension now leaves the two countries with a frozen bilateral channel even as Ottawa faces pressure to show how it will bridge the gap between current spending and the 2035 target.
