Published in The Ploughshares Monitor Volume 43 Issue 4 Winter 2022
Cesar Jaramillo interviews the Hon. Douglas Roche, O.C. Edited by Wendy Stocker
The Hon. Douglas Roche, O.C., is a Canadian author, parliamentarian, and diplomat. He has served Canada as Senator, Member of Parliament, and Ambassador for Disarmament. He is an Officer of the Order of Canada and the recipient of major awards for his work for peace and nonviolence, including the Mahatma Gandhi Foundation for World Peace Award (Canada), the United Nations Association’s Medal of Honour, and the Sean MacBride Peace Prize.
Cesar Jaramillo: Who is Doug Roche? How would you characterize him?
Douglas Roche: Cesar, if you’re trying to find Doug Roche, I think two words would apply – the two words I used in my memoirs, which I published when I was 80. Now I’m 93, I still hold to the two words: creative dissent.
I have dissented virtually all my public life. This year happens to be the 50th anniversary of my first election to Parliament in 1972.
I’ve been in public life for 50 years as a Member of Parliament, an Ambassador, and a Senator. It’s a rare privilege for a single Canadian to have occupied those three high positions in our society. In all positions, I have dissented.
I’ve dissented from the perpetuation of the arms race. I’ve dissented from the militarization of our society and our culture. I’ve dissented from the gross disparities of humanity, in which billionaires, who are multiplying at a rapid rate, syphon off –dare I use the word “steal” – from the poor. I’ve dissented from despoilation of the planet. I’ve dissented from the hypocrisy of politicians that puts policies for their own good ahead of policies for the public good.
But dissent by itself is negative and corroding, leading to paralysis. Therefore, I have conjoined to my dissent creativity, working in various ways to build up organizations, add some strength to change policies. In the early 1980s, I was a founding President of Parliamentarians for Global Action, which tried to influence public policies for disarmament and development. We believed in what Swedish diplomat Inga Thorsson defined as the dynamic triangular relationship between disarmament, development, and security, in which, the more you do disarmament and transfer that money over to development, the more security you get. We pushed that very hard, in creative ways: seminars and meetings, delegations to governments.
Dissent by itself is negative and corroding, leading to paralysis. Therefore, I have conjoined to my dissent creativity, working in various ways to build up organizations, add some strength to change policies.
I also started the Middle Powers Initiative to help middle powers recognize that they could influence the major powers, particularly on nuclear disarmament. I had a good model, because in 1983, Pierre Trudeau, the prime minister of a middle power, went to the capitals of the five permanent members of the United Nations (UN) Security Council (P5) to get them to slow down the nuclear arms race.
In later years, I’ve tried to express my dissent in various civil society efforts. I dissent from policies today that feed more arms into Ukraine and dismiss negotiations. Creative dissent has marked my life.
CJ: I want to go back to creative dissent and ask you a very basic question: why? What is it in Doug Roche that has led to all the roles that you have held? Is it a personality trait? Growing up, were you a counter-power, a rebel? Are you personally offended by the many injustices that we see every day, by the nuclear threat, by the inability of policymakers to make better decisions? Are you motivated by a sense of hope that your work will yield benefits, however incremental they might be?
DR: You’ve touched on several things that would certainly apply to me.
In the late 1950s and early 1960s, I was a journalist. I worked for a religious magazine that sent me to Africa and Asia and Latin America. I interviewed a Communist labour leader in Venezuela, an Ibo teacher in Nigeria before the Biafra war, a farmer in Kerala in India. I saw a lot of humanity.
One day I woke up to a great discovery: most of the world is non-white, non-Western, and non-Christian. In other words, I’m a real minority in the world as a white, Western Christian. I learned then that we’ve got to get along with one another.
I was motivated strongly by economic disparities. When I first became an MP, I focused on development. In 1976, I was one of the first Westerners to travel around China. I also went to Indonesia and Bangladesh. Then I wrote a book about development models in those countries.
In Bangladesh, a Catholic sister took me around the rural areas. In a village, she took me to a home, a hut, with a woman and her six kids; her husband was out in the farm. They had hardly anything. When the interview was over, I left and headed back to the car. I looked back and this woman was running after me. She had in her hand a glass of warm palm date juice. While we were talking in her dwelling, she had been heating this to give to me, a strange white Western man whom she’d never see again. This woman who had nothing wanted to give Doug Roche something. I was overwhelmed and this became a turning point in my life.
I got into nuclear disarmament in the 1980s. I’d gone to Hiroshima by that time, and I saw what human beings can do to others. I interviewed the hibakusha. I saw all the museums. That, too, was a turning point in my life.
CJ: I’ve been to Hiroshima myself and it is transformational. But to wrap up who is Doug Roche: your faith. Does being a Roman Catholic give you strength, a sense of purpose; does it sustain you in some way?
DR: The answer to that is yes. I went to the Second Vatican Council as a journalist 60 years ago. I wrote a couple of books about the Second Vatican Council. I was immersed in it. The essence of the Second Vatican Council was that the Church is not just this institution on a hill; the Church is the people of God.
One day I woke up to a great discovery: most of the world is non-white, non-Western, and non-Christian. In other words, I’m a real minority in the world as a white, Western Christian. I learned then that we’ve got to get along with one another.
I was taken by that, but also by the social teaching of the Church, by Pope John XXIII, who wrote Pacem in Terris (Peace on Earth). You can’t get a better political philosophy than what is found in there, that we need strong institutions to guarantee peace and security.
Pope Francis has this great document, Laudato Si’ (Praise Be to You), which was addressed to the world, not just Catholics. And he’s followed that up with subsequent documents. I would have to say that my faith has influenced me as I work in the secular arena.
CJ: In today’s world, do you think that faith groups have a role to play in policy conversations and in crafting solutions?
DR: Yes, I do. Ecumenism has come a long way and interfaith work has come a long way. The Conferences on Religion and Peace, with which I’ve been involved for a number of years – now the Parliament of the World’s Religions – have made a great contribution in bringing out the best side of religion, which is interactive, respectful, and reconciliatory. However, it’s not strong enough to determine government policies.
CJ: Can you comment on the state of global affairs today? The crisis created by the invasion of Russia into Ukraine has people nervous, stressed, unnerved. Are those sentiments warranted?
DR: Yes. I was 16 when the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki took place and World War II concluded. Then the United Nations started and that was a turning point for humanity. The outflow of the United Nations to many agencies, and the adoption of the UN Charter and the international rule of law provided a framework on which I built my life. And now that framework is being challenged and undermined. So, I regard the crisis that we’re going through now as the gravest crisis in my active lifetime.
The United Nations today is being bypassed, which I oppose. If we give up on the UN Charter and the Security Council as legal guardians of peace and security in the world, then we’re just going to float. We may luck out, we may not. We need an institutional framework that is guided by dynamic people. Today that framework is being undermined and dynamic leaders are scarce.
Someone suggested to me that the period of the United Nations was an aberration and now we’re getting back to normal confrontation. I vigorously dissent. I believe that humanity, over the past 1,000 years – particularly the past 100 years – is ascending in its knowledge of itself and the planet, and that we have become more creative and built law. Thus, I would argue that the current attack on multilateralism is the aberration, and that we need to return to confidence in the United Nations.
CJ: You express a great deal of faith in the United Nations as an institution and in the figure of the Secretary-General as a voice of reason and moderation. Might the solution to this current crisis lie there?
DR: I just wrote a piece that compares the Cuban missile crisis with the Ukraine war crisis. The Cuban missile crisis was solved by negotiations between U.S. President Kennedy and Soviet President Khrushchev, spurred on by UN Secretary-General U Thant, who engaged in back-channel diplomacy. And he never got proper credit, as I pointed out in this piece.
The United Nations today is being bypassed, which I oppose. If we give up on the UN Charter and the Security Council as legal guardians of peace and security in the world, then we’re just going to float. We may luck out, we may not. We need an institutional framework that is guided by dynamic people. Today that framework is being undermined and dynamic leaders are scarce.
On several occasions, the UN Security Council has headed off war or successfully dealt with smaller wars. When the direct interests of the P5 that have the veto are at stake, then paralysis sets in. It’s easy enough to say we should get rid of the veto, but these states would never have come into the United Nations had they not received the veto. Even though the veto has been exercised more often than it should have been, it has not eviscerated the strength and the need for the Security Council.
Now the UN General Assembly has adopted a resolution that requires any state in the Security Council that casts a veto to come before the General Assembly to explain itself. That is a step forward.
I’m not certain what will come out of the Ukraine crisis. But perhaps some years down the line, the evaluation of the Ukraine war might lead to the implementation of a reform of the Security Council. I don’t want to give up on this.
I just noticed that President Obrador of Mexico, in calling for an international commission to conduct negotiations for the end of the Ukraine war, included in his international team the UN Secretary-General, as well as Pope Francis and Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India.
CJ: Many observers are commenting that the risk of nuclear weapons use in the war in Ukraine is intolerably high, even civilization-altering. Does this dimension of the Ukraine conflict keep you up at night?
DR: Sleep is not easy. I consider the possible use of nuclear weapons by Russia in Ukraine to be a greater crisis for humanity than the Cuban missile crisis, as great as that was. In the Cuban missile crisis, there was a framework that was adhered to – a recognition that there needed to be contact. Both sides accepted UN Secretary-General U Thant as intermediary.
The West needs to cooperate with China for our mutual survival, particularly in climate policies. We all need to have mutual survival as an operative goal, which we implement with respectful policies.
Today, the multilateral system has been weakened because not enough good leaders put money and energy into it. The West is not free of guilt in causing the conditions of acrimony and militarization that have led to wars. But let me be clear: I am not offering a defence of Russian policy.
Down through the ages, philosophers and theologians have told us that we must love one another. Now we are faced with a pragmatic choice: we get along with each other or we all die. We’ve got to find a way, and to find that way, we’ve got to sublimate ourselves and translate that sublimation into practical politics.
China is also emerging as a strong force after a century of being silent. The West needs to cooperate with China for our mutual survival, particularly in climate policies. We all need to have mutual survival as an operative goal, which we implement with respectful policies.
If that sounds like too high a reach, let me translate it into a UN emergency peace force that is capable of being deployed to stamp out crises as they develop. Or let’s have an annual meeting of the Security Council at the summit level. In 1992, the Security Council summit resulted in Boutros Boutros-Ghali’s An Agenda for Peace. I’m making a plea for respect that leads to realistic political policies that can reconcile the needs of people while protecting the planet.
CJ: Consider Canada – the country, the government. Is Canada pulling its weight? In these dangerous times, could Canada be doing more?
DR: If you look at a map of the world, you see a great huge section of it called Canada and huge sections called Russia and China. Canada is the second-largest land space in the world. It’s true that we’re only one-half of one per cent of the population of the world – 38 million of 8 billion people. So we should have no delusions of grandeur, but we should accept some responsibility.
In my view, we are not living up to that responsibility. We have so much: our freedom, liberty, our ability to use opportunities. God has blessed Canada enormously.
I do not wish to create the impression that Canada would solve the crises of the world if it opened its doors and took in millions of immigrants and refugees. We’d be in chaos. But we need to do much more to solve the problems of the world so that not as many people are destitute and forced to find a new place to live because of poverty, the climate crisis, wars. Canada should have the United Nations as the centre of its foreign policy. The UN came into existence to resolve such problems and it should play a much stronger role.
For a long time, Canada’s foreign policy was based on the United States and the United Nations. The UN was considered the vehicle by which we reached out to the world. We sent our best people there. Today, we’re not doing that. Canada has now succumbed to the lure of being a member of the G7 and G20, which are discriminatory clubs. We are now under the sway of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), a military alliance.
Yet the enlargement of NATO has itself been a strong factor in causing the conditions that have led to the present war. While I condemn Putin’s aggressive invasion of Ukraine, I must acknowledge that enlarging NATO to the degree that it encircled Russia and kept on encircling it has increased the paranoia of Russia. In 1992, I went to a conference at the Carter Center in the United States on the question of the enlargement of NATO. There I argued that NATO should not expand; however, if it did expand, it should take in Russia. I wouldn’t say that I was laughed out of the room, but my proposal was not adopted.
We’ve got to avoid World War III. It’s true that the use of nuclear weapons will lead to World War III. But we can get to World War III without nuclear weapons, as more and more countries pile in behind NATO and NATO takes a more aggressive position. The situation could evolve into a war between NATO and Russia. That will be World War III, with its heightened risk of nuclear weapons.
CJ: I share your view on the expansion of NATO. However, nuance is lacking in many analyses today. Solidarity with Ukraine has left people with black-and-white visions of the conflict, even though there are many factors at play. Is there a way out of this mess, including a defusing of the nuclear possibility?
DR: I think an international commission, very high level, in which the United Nations plays a significant role. I would like to look to the Security Council, but as the Security Council is blocked by the instigator of the war, we’ve got to go around it. Also, we should not underestimate the influence of China. China wants this war to end.
All wars end, usually in negotiations. It’s better for a war to end sooner than later. The number of people being killed is horrendous and the suffering extends into the developing world. I don’t like the NATO focus on beating Russia. There can be no real winner.
We’ve got to avoid World War III. It’s true that the use of nuclear weapons will lead to World War III. But we can get to World War III without nuclear weapons, as more and more countries pile in behind NATO and NATO takes a more aggressive position. The situation could evolve into a war between NATO and Russia. That will be World War III, with its heightened risk of nuclear weapons.
CJ: It sounds like a slow-motion train wreck. I share your fear. I sometimes get the impression that the international community will draw all the wrong conclusions from this crisis. Rather than doing everything to avoid conflict, both sides will redouble on arming and just increase the risk.
DR: Pragmatically speaking, I think that the Biden group and the Putin group recognize that such a war is not in their interests. As for Putin’s launching nuclear weapons, as you well know, it’s not a simple matter of pushing a button. He’s got to go through procedures and chains of command. I count on those guys stopping him.
CJ: If there can be a silver lining to this crisis, it’s that it brings to the fore the insanity of these nuclear deterrence-based policies by verbalizing them. We knew that Russia would consider a first nuclear-weapon strike before Putin said it. We knew that the West reserved the right to retaliate. Maybe humanity is now being confronted with the ugliness of nuclear deterrence.
DR: The Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) is right when it outlaws the possession of nuclear weapons, not only the use. Possession of such weapons is an immoral act and, consequently, nuclear deterrence is an immoral doctrine.
CJ: I want to bring NATO and Canada together with a question on Canada’s stand on nuclear disarmament. You’ve said that NATO is a strong influence on Canada. My impression is that Canadian foreign policy is most closely aligned with some U.S. policies and those of its nuclear-armed allies, while the rest of the international community is demanding more concrete progress toward nuclear abolition. Many of those in the rest of the international community have rallied around the recent TPNW; Canada has not. Are you frustrated with Canada’s position?
DR: I’m tied up in knots.
People like me are called idealists, but I maintain that I’m a realist. I’m a realist for peace. Idealists think that they can keep the present unfair, unjust, and militaristic system going without a great calamity. Realists believe that there are practical approaches to solving the world’s problems, including climate change (the Paris agreement), the abolition of nuclear weapons (the Non-Proliferation Treaty on Nuclear Weapons [NPT]), and economic and social disparities (the Sustainable Development Goals). We need to put all our political energy and capital and money into solving these and other problems. But we don’t.
Canada’s track record in international development is abysmal. It has almost no involvement in peacekeeping. It has so far rejected the TPNW. Still, its position has evolved. Canada has moved from rejecting the treaty to declaring that it understands the reasons for the treaty. Canada would have supported the final document of the recent Review Conference of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, had it been successful. It at least acknowledged the existence of the TPNW.
But if you consider that the P5 of the Security Council, the ones charged with peace and security, are the ones who have nuclear weapons, won’t give them up. and reject a treaty that wants to prohibit them, then you can judge where we are.
CJ: Could Canada challenge that reality or would it be too costly?
DR: Yes, Canada should challenge this present cartel on nuclear weapons. I maintain that it would not be costly. When Pierre Trudeau went around the world in 1983, challenging the P5 to slow down the nuclear arms race, he didn’t have to pay a price. As a matter of fact, he was praised by the international community. When Prime Minister Jean Chrétien said no to Canada’s joining the Americans’ war on Iraq, there were no repercussions, no economic penalties. The same was true when Prime Minister Brian Mulroney informed the United States that Canada would not join SDI (Strategic Defense Initiative or Star Wars).
It’s a myth that Canada can’t say boo to the United States without endangering our economic and political relations.
CJ: So what’s the hurdle? There have been overtures to the Canadian government from civil society and progressive governments to do more, to move more quickly, to challenge nuclear weapons possession, to embrace the TPNW. But Canada is just not there.
DR: First, the lack of vision at the highest political levels inhibits expression of vision at the lower levels. Second, the bureaucracy in the Canadian government is structured to work for promotion by not rocking the boat. Such a structure encourages compliance, not innovation.
CJ: Canada’s position on nuclear disarmament has not changed substantially in the last several years, even with the change from a Conservative to a Liberal government. Are there any realistic prospects of changing gears, perhaps initiating a debate within NATO, as the House of Commons Standing Committee on National Defence has recommended?
DR: Canada wouldn’t even attend the TPNW’s Meeting of States Parties as an observer. We’re influenced by the United States, which is controlled by the military industrial complex. After President Barack Obama got the Nobel Peace Prize for giving a speech in Prague on a nuclear-weapons-free world, he went back to Washington, where the military industrial complex people tightened their chains on him. They locked him down. (My imagery, for literary purposes usually, allows a little exaggeration, but it’s not far from the truth.)
My book on Biden’s ascendancy included quotes from people who said that Biden will not challenge the military industrial complex, which is driving U.S. policy. And that’s what’s dominating us. And we can’t get out from under because we don’t have any leaders who will stand up to it.
CJ: What about small to medium-sized states, like Mexico, Costa Rica, Austria, New Zealand, Ireland, which have embraced the relatively recent humanitarian disarmament movement, and led processes on the TPNW and the arms trade and protection of civilians. Do you find hope in these new players?
I’m 93; I’ve had a good life. I’m not afraid of dying; I’m afraid of living too long. And I feel that I’ve tried to make a contribution. But I regard myself as one grain of sand on a very large beach. So, I don’t have any delusions of grandeur. I am only one person. I’ll die and people will give me a couple of paragraphs and say he wasn’t that bad a guy and life will go on.
DR: Several years ago, the New Agenda Coalition came into existence, led by Ireland and Sweden. This group was meant to gather important middle power states together to advance an agenda that would take nuclear disarmament forward in concrete ways and certainly stood for the abolition of nuclear weapons. It made a significant contribution to the 2010 NPT Review Conference, which was the last successful review conference.
But what happened to the people who led these efforts? Ireland is a very strong player, but the official who really invented the New Agenda Coalition and worked most diligently at it was suddenly transferred to a diplomatic post in France. The Mexican official who stood up to the big powers found himself transferred to Spain. I happen to know that the United States government put pressure on the governments of these two countries to transfer their leading spokespersons out of the field of nuclear disarmament.
Diplomat Alexander Kmentt has the good fortune of working for the Austrian government, which is not subject to this kind of U.S. pressure. So, we’re not without leaders. But most diplomats working in the disarmament field will not rock the boat. They concentrate on such processes as the Non-Proliferation and Disarmament Initiative and the Stockholm Initiative. But these initiatives are based on the inevitability of the maintenance of nuclear weapons and seek to mitigate the damage.
CJ: Let’s turn our talk to you as a person. You’re 93 years old. Reflect on your age. Are you anxious about time, about the prospects for nuclear disarmament? Are you at peace with the notion of passing the torch to a new generation?
DR: Thank you, Cesar. I appreciate the way you put the question.
I’m a mix. I’m full of anxiety. I also have peace in my heart. I’m 93; I’ve had a good life. I’m not afraid of dying; I’m afraid of living too long. And I feel that I’ve tried to make a contribution. But I regard myself as one grain of sand on a very large beach. So, I don’t have any delusions of grandeur. I am only one person. I’ll die and people will give me a couple of paragraphs and say he wasn’t that bad a guy and life will go on.
How am I at peace? It’s hard to describe. I’m surrounded by chaos in the world. Is it God who’s guiding me? Is God keeping me alive to write the piece that I just wrote on negotiations in the Ukraine war? Is God keeping me here for a purpose? I feel very blessed that, at 93, I have my physical and my mental health. I’m fortunate.
To the extent that I can, I help people grasp the concepts of love and peace and how we live them and extend them while we’re surrounded by and dealing with chaos. This brings me back to my faith. Faith is, by definition, a mystery. I can’t pretend to explain it all to myself or to you. I know what I’m experiencing and I hope the people I interact with – the people that read this – will know that life is not hopeless.
Humans have more resources and more ability and more knowledge than we ever had before. We have serious problems, but still there is hope. But you have to do something to extend yourself in order to feel it. You can’t just sit down in your chair in your living room and say, now I’m going to be happy and have hope. You’ve got to get out there and do something. A residual effect of exerting yourself beyond yourself gives you more love, peace, and hope.
CJ: Have you found happiness in your life?
DR: In my personal life, definitely. I like good movies and I like good music and I like to entertain my friends. If you lived in Edmonton, you’d be on the guest list for my annual Christmas party, which was interrupted by COVID. My Christmas parties are legendary.
CJ: I was a guest twice at your birthday celebrations in New York. At one, you were going to give remarks and said that your speech was going to be essentially one word. And the word you said was love. Even in this interview, you’ve explicitly referenced love. Why is that essential, even for something as technical as arms control and disarmament?
DR: Jesus said to love one another and love your neighbour as yourself. And the neighbour is the woman in Bangladesh, not just my neighbour across the hall. I just find it a healthier way to live. You can’t go around being mad at everybody and torn with anxiety. Love is such a powerful, driving force. Of course, to love expansively and to love your enemies is very hard. To pray for Mr. Putin is hard.
CJ: And when will Doug Roche stop? Do you ever say, I’ve done more than enough, I deserve a break?
DR: No, never. I stop to rest when I’m tired and hungry, not because I’ve finished my work. Until I can’t, I keep going. I’m happier about myself when I’m working. If you have your health, there’s quite a bit that you can do.
CJ: Can you offer some final thoughts about hope?
DR: The title of my memoir, Creative Dissent, itself reflects hope. Hope relates to the advancement of humanity. We’re on a path toward God. John F. Kennedy used to say, here on Earth, our job is to complete God’s creation. Just the execution of that generates hope. There are lots of avenues that are open to us, whether we’re interested in the environment, in human rights, in disarmament, in economic and social development. Millions upon millions of people are working in those avenues. The cumulative effect of that is to lift up the standards of humanity. That’s all we can do. I’m a grain of sand, but I’m still here. That’s the hope.
CJ: We’re all grateful. Thank you so much.
DR: I pay my respects to the readers and members and supporters of Project Ploughshares. I’m a supporter myself, reflecting my hope in your work and my deep respect for you and your predecessors, not least, Ernie Regehr and Murray Thomson for having the vision to start Project Ploughshares. I encourage the churches that provide basic support to maintain that support, because you are having an effect on the people who think.
