On 26th March, Mark Carney, Prime Minister of Canada, participated in a virtual meeting of the Joint Expeditionary Force (JEF), the ten-country rapid response coalition dedicated to security in the High North. Following this, Gen. Jennie Carnigan, Canadian Chief of the Defence Staff, met with counterparts from JEF nations in London in early April.
These actions suggest an increasing likelihood that Canada will join the JEF – a possibility discussed amid tense relations with the United States (US) and growing adversarial interest in the High North, as well as the expanded ‘Wider North’. This provides the foundation for this week’s Big Ask, in which we asked nine experts: Should Canada join the JEF?
Analyst, Stockholm Centre for Eastern European Studies (SCEEUS), Swedish Institute of International Affairs
The JEF is currently the best military cooperation instrument available to like-minded countries in Europe and beyond, given that it does not necessarily require participating countries to be either European Union (EU) or North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) members. Finland and Sweden were already members of the JEF before joining NATO, and the United Kingdom (UK), Norway, and Iceland are not EU member states. As Canada contributes to NATO presence in Latvia, Canadian forces are already on the ground in the Wider North.
The expected reduction of American contributions to NATO’s defence plans makes it imperative that Northern European countries and Canada ensure that they are able to defend the wider High North and North Atlantic on their own. Given that the Nordic countries and UK are directly exposed to Russian interests in the North Atlantic, they need to ensure strategic depth, reinforcements, and supplies from across the Atlantic. Canada’s inclusion is therefore long overdue.
Another country that should be upgraded from enhanced partner to full member of the JEF is Ukraine. There is currently no institution in the European security architecture that could integrate Ukraine in any short timeframe, but membership in the JEF would help it to become interoperable with Northern European NATO forces and give JEF nations invaluable insights into Ukraine’s battlefield experience. Red teaming in exercises with Ukrainian drone operators, such as in the Swedish-led Aurora 26 exercise, is a resource which the JEF should make more structured use of.
Honorary Fellow, Council on Geostrategy, and Professor of Geopolitics and Faculty Dean, Middlesex University London
Canada should be invited to join the JEF immediately. Ottawa enjoys a close military relationship with many JEF members, including Britain, and has already worked closely with the group. Membership could – and should – be framed as graduated recognition of operational and strategic realities.
The fundamental reason for Canada’s membership is twofold. Firstly, the relationship between Ottawa and Washington has been turned upside down as a direct consequence of the repeated belligerence of Donald Trump, President of the US. Carney’s speech at Davos in January 2026 spoke of ‘rupture’, and did not need to cite Trump directly. The US is no longer a ‘reliable’ security partner for Canada, Denmark, and the UK.
Secondly (and because of the first reason), a coalition of like-minded northern hemispheric countries stretching from Canada to Finland addresses both the persistent unreliability of Washington and the ongoing threat posed by Russia.
The creation of an expanded Euro-Atlantic coalition will enhance interoperability and deterrence capabilities, tempered by a recognition that Ottawa is embarking on a defence rebuilding process; the ‘Build at Home’ Defence Industrial Strategy. Currently, dependence on the American security umbrella remains high.
However, even enhanced participation by Canada would signal a collective recognition that the North Atlantic and Arctic are part of a shared Wider North. Russia is a common foe. Full membership of the JEF would come later, with guarantees that Ottawa could meet operational requirements.
It is worth noting that Canada was invited to join JEF in 2013 but declined. 13 years later, the strategic optics and operational realities appear very different in the Wider North.
Senior Lecturer, Department of Defence and International Affairs, Royal Military Academy Sandhurst
There is strong mutual strategic and operational logic to Canada joining the JEF. Its flexibility in dealing with sub-threshold threats and its specific focus on maritime security, critical infrastructure protection, and rapid deployment in the High North and Arctic are mutually beneficial.
With Canadian membership, the JEF would become the transatlantic operational framework for High North and Arctic activity, addressing the existing geographic gap across the North Atlantic and Arctic Circle. Canadian membership would increase the JEF’s deterrence credibility, and signal to adversaries that Euro-Atlantic security remains deeply connected across the High North, Baltic, and North Atlantic theatres.
Formalising Canadian membership cements already deepening military collaboration across domains. From a British Armed Forces perspective, Canadian membership would enhance existing Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR) and basing capabilities essential for Arctic security. In the land domain, Canadian forces are recognised for their proficiency in sub-zero temperature survival and warfare, maintaining dedicated Arctic training units.
Canadian JEF membership would also bring potential future benefits, such as increased force pooling with a culturally aligned partner (with operational experience of American Command and Control) and cutting costs on critical kit procurement.
However, there are caveats. High North security is increased if the JEF possesses credible, deployable capabilities. Although Carney recently announced that Canada is now investing 2% of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) into defence, this is well below the JEF average. In addition, Canadian procurement and warfighting modernisation lag behind JEF counterparts, leading to concerns that Carney can only virtue signal rather than offer real capability or military readiness right now.
Canadian membership of the JEF is logical. However, it needs to address significant deficiencies in its current military capabilities and warfighting readiness, and increase its military commitments if it is to contribute meaningfully to the coalition.
Research Associate and Deputy Editor-in-Chief, Arctic Institute
The question should not be whether Canada should join the JEF, but why it has taken this long to consider it seriously.
Canada is more than just a capable Arctic nation; it is Europe’s most steadfast North American partner at a moment when reliability cannot be taken for granted. As the US retreats from its traditional role as guarantor of the international order, Canada has signalled a clear-eyed pivot towards deeper European engagement. JEF membership would formalise what is already a natural strategic alignment.
The military case is compelling. Canada brings world-class Arctic capabilities, a sophisticated understanding of High North maritime operations, and an armed forces culture that is deeply interoperable with existing JEF members. The Greenland-Iceland-UK (GIUK) gap and the increasingly contested High North are precisely the domains where Canadian expertise and assets would strengthen the framework’s collective posture.
There is also a political dimension that matters. Expanding the JEF to include Canada would send an unambiguous signal – to Moscow, Beijing, and Washington – that European security architecture is deepening rather than fracturing. At a moment of transatlantic uncertainty, such a signal has value beyond military utility.
The JEF was built to secure the northern maritime environment. Canada belongs in it.
Chief Executive Officer, Geopolitics and Security Studies Centre
Canada joining the JEF could make strategic sense, but the real question is whether it would produce more deterrence – not merely one more political format.
What is seen today is a wider search for new security arrangements. Countries are adjusting to changing geopolitical realities and less predictable American priorities. This explains the renewed interest in the JEF, deeper EU-Canada cooperation, and even the debate in Canada about closer links with the EU – strikingly, Abacus Data found that 48% of Canadians support their country becoming an EU member, even if this remains politically and legally remote.
From a Lithuanian and Baltic perspective, Canada’s interest in the JEF is not abstract. The Baltic Sea, the North Atlantic, and the Arctic are now part of the same strategic theatre. Russian military pressure, sabotage risks, ‘shadow fleet’ activity, and threats to critical infrastructure connect these regions.
Canada would bring Arctic knowledge, Atlantic geography, maritime capabilities, and political weight. It also maintains an important military presence in Latvia. For the JEF – especially after the enhanced partnership with Ukraine – this could add useful dynamism. However, formats do not deter Russia by themselves. Defence spending, readiness, ammunition, air defence, military mobility, and political will matter more than the organisational flag under which leaders meet.
International Fellow, Council on Geostrategy, and Assistant Professor of International Relations, University of Waterloo (Canada)
Joining the JEF would align with Carney’s efforts to diversify Canada’s security relationships away from the US while tightening existing bonds with key allies and partners. Geographically, the arrangement makes sense for Canada. Aside from being an Arctic country like the Nordic states, Canada leads the multinational brigade in Latvia. That the JEF has a maritime and expeditionary focus thus complements what Canada is already doing on land in the Baltic region.
For European allies, Canadian participation is attractive because it helps to implicate North America further into their own continental security. Participating in the JEF also lends greater coherence to Canadian defence and foreign policy than some of the other efforts that Carney has made to broaden Canada’s strategic relationships, most notably the recent deals with the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and Qatar.
That said, although being part of the JEF might make sense for Canada, Canadian defence planners cannot sidestep the important question of what sort of force posture their country should have, and should support financially. Trying to have everything while being everywhere all at once will amount to little if attention is still spread unevenly and capability gaps remain wide.
Unfortunately, such has been the general tendency in Canadian foreign and defence policy – even when times get difficult, as they are today. The JEF is a worthy venture, but some experts have observed that it has already suffered from insufficient attention and resourcing from its existing members. On its own, Canada cannot address those possible shortcomings – and it may yet contribute to them if its own participation ends up being an afterthought.
Postdoctoral Fellow, Finnish Institute of International Affairs (FIIA)
JEF membership is appealing for Canada. At Davos, Carney announced an ambitious vision to lead an evolution in multilateralism in cooperation with other ‘middle powers’. Membership in the JEF would be another step towards realising this vision.
Politically, this would galvanise Canada’s links with the UK and the Nordic-Baltic region, an already effective network in defining the European security policy agenda. Canada faces similar Arctic security challenges as the Nordic states. JEF membership would offer Canada some extra military benefits beyond NATO, through more multinational exercises in cold weather operations and Arctic warfare.
However, it is doubtful that Canada currently holds the military capacity to commit effectively to the JEF, although Ottawa does understand that it must rebuild its military before taking on further transatlantic commitments. Unable to rely as much on its alliance with the US, Canada’s independent defence capacity is under pressure to cover serious security challenges in the Arctic, the Atlantic and the Pacific.
Canada already leads NATO’s multinational Forward Land Forces (FLF) battlegroup in Latvia. Therefore, while JEF membership is politically attractive for Canada, Ottawa has other pressing military priorities, which means that committing to additional JEF commitments is a challenge. More broadly, the JEF holds political attraction as a function of an influential Northern European security community.
However, this must not overtake the need for JEF members to commit sufficient military resources. Developing military capabilities remains key if the JEF’s strategic relevance is to continue.
Adjunct Fellow, Council on Geostrategy
The short answer is a very tentative yes.
Caution must be expressed when it comes to the expansion of minilateral organisations like the JEF. The JEF’s strengths come not just from its flexibility, but the like-mindedness and, importantly, the geographical proximity of its members. While not originally focused on Northern European security, it has naturally moved in that direction as a result of geographic logic and Russian aggression.
The JEF’s structure is also fundamentally based on the UK as by far the largest power; being the primary framework nation into which other JEF allies plug in. For this reason, alternative proposals of inviting other large nations such as Germany or Poland are unwise, as it would complicate the structure and politics of the organisation. It should also be remembered that, fundamentally, the JEF is a medium-sized military headquarters. With expansion might come greater responsibility, which would require an increase in resource and authority.
If another NATO country was to join the JEF, Canada would be by far the most likely candidate. A growing area of focus for the JEF is arctic security, in which Canada has both significant interest and expertise. The flexibility of the JEF would allow Canada to participate in an Atlantic security architecture outside NATO, and without American involvement. Furthermore, the JEF’s flexibility would allow for broader engagement of European nations in Canadian maritime security if required. However, clarity on what all parties expect to receive and contribute to an expanded JEF would be crucial in order to avoid strategic drift and diluting the core purpose and advantages of the organisation.
Policy Researcher and Susan Strange Fellow, Helsinki Geoeconomics Society
Canada commands the longest Arctic coastline, yet, for decades, Ottawa has neglected this geostrategic asset. Carney’s CA$40 billion (£21.7 billion) northern rearmament and preparation for ‘large-scale conflicts’ mark a paradigm shift in Canadian defence policy. Canadian accession to the JEF as a full member would bring the Wider North into an integrated geopolitical space, binding the Arctic, GIUK gap, and North Atlantic into one theatre of deterrence under British leadership.
Canadian sovereignty is now under strain from three directions. Washington’s coercion of Canada and Greenland, including Trump’s refusal to rule out use of force, has destabilised the Article 5 security guarantee. Russia’s remilitarisation of the High North projects the power of its Northern Fleet through the Bear Gap, while sub-threshold warfare targets critical undersea infrastructure across the Euro-Atlantic.
The PRC poses the least-confronted long-term strategic risk. Its entrenchment through dual-use hydrographic mapping of submarine corridors and Polar Silk Road shipping exploits vulnerabilities in Canadian surveillance and investment screening infrastructure. NATO’s consensus architecture was not built for this convergence of threats, which is why Canada is turning towards the middle-power coalitions called for in Carney’s Davos speech.
Canada needs Europe, and Europe needs Canada. Canada’s Arctic Archipelago and strategic position over the Northwest Passage would extend the JEF’s maritime reach across the North Atlantic into North American Arctic waters. In return, Ottawa would secure a minilateral coalition where shared threat perception is matched by defence spending and hard-power commitment, strengthening transatlantic economic security.
Beijing’s ‘near-Arctic’ posture is designed to exploit the fault lines between North American and European command structures. Only the JEF, with Canada as its 11th member, can close them. Accession would formalise the end of Arctic exceptionalism, stake the first claim in Canada’s Arctic power ambition, and open the door to deeper economic integration with the EU.
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Interesting. Will need to ponder the arguments.
Yes, Canada should join JEF. More widely, Canada should co-operate with countries both in and outside Europe to create an alliance of middle powers, something a bit like NATO or the EU, but without vetoes (because when you have lots of countries collaborating, if every one has a veto, it will descend into futility).
https://pontifex.substack.com/p/european-defence-policy-how-europe