When I joined the Canadian Forces in 1980, the common perception was that the prime minister of the day, Pierre Trudeau, was no friend of the military.
Trudeau, so we serving men and women were told back then, had starved the Forces of funds and the necessary new equipment we needed to fulfill our responsibilities.
Back then, you either simply believed this to be the case or you tried to rationalize it.
Not surprisingly, those on the political right insisted that they and they alone were the true friends of the Canadian military. A tradition that continued with Stephen Harper coming to power in 2006.
But with an election upon us and military spending — new fighter jets, ships, international engagements — looming over our future, maybe it is time for a hard look at these perceptions.
Just how supportive has Harper's Conservative government been towards the Canadian Forces compared to, say, Trudeau's Liberals?
The historical reality may surprise you. Trudeau was the greater spender, by a long shot, on both soldiers and big equipment, including fighter jets, which the current debate over the uncertain cost of the proposed new F-35s would appear to obscure.
But Trudeau lost the political perception battle, which in the long run may prove not to be a good thing for our armed forces.
The big slide
When Trudeau became prime minister in 1968, defence spending stood at 2.5 per cent of GDP. Today it is only about 1.1 per cent of GDP, the equivalent of $597 per Canadian.
In the 1950s, we Canadians spent just over six per cent of GDP on defence. Not surprisingly, it was going to fall off in the push for post-War prosperity and it reached its lowest point under the Jean Chretien Liberals in about 2001.
But now, five years into a Conservative government, military spending as a percentage of GDP is still considerably lower than even at the lowest point of the Trudeau era.
From 2006 to 2009 defence spending was between 1.2 and 1.3 per cent of GDP, according to several sources, including the respected Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.
The forecast for 2010-11 was that it would drop to approximately 1.1 per cent — a low for the Harper government.
Does size matter?
In my time in the forces we were also reminded, over and over again, how embarrassingly small our numbers had become.
From 1968 to 1976, the number of regular force personnel decreased from just over 100,000 to what was considered a pathetically low 77,000.
Under Harper, the regular forces saw an increase but only to 67,742 in 2010, according to Treasury Board figures.
In Trudeau's era, there were also more Canadian Forces serving abroad than today, a total of 6,645 in 1975 for example in Europe, Cyprus and the Middle East.
Fast forward to 2010-11, pretty much all we have overseas is the 2,922 military personnel on the ground in Afghanistan.
As far as peacekeeping goes, we were down to 62 — yes, 62 — military personnel serving on peacekeeping duty with the UN, as of February 2011. The majority of Canada's peacekeepers today are civilian police officers.
Yes, I realize that we are currently in the midst of a hot war in Afghanistan and Europeans are more than capable of looking after their own backyard in this post-Cold War period.
But when our allies talk about Canada not always shouldering its weight on the world stage, or being prepared for future conflicts, these are the numbers they are referring to.
Big guns
When it comes to a down payment on future security, Harper has certainly staked out a distinct position in this campaign with his planned purchase of utility support aircraft, 65 fighter jets, as well as six to eight Arctic patrol vessels and two or three large support ships.
Actually, that is not bad for four years in office. But the Conservatives still have a way to go to catch up to Trudeau's procurement of large military assets.
Under Trudeau, Canada acquired four new Tribal class destroyers in 1972, three of them still in operation. His government also approved and began work on our fleet of 12 patrol frigates.
We also acquired 138 top-of-the-line CF-18 fighter jets, which were added to the 135 CF-116 light attack strike and reconnaissance fighters that came into operation under Trudeau in the late 1960s.
Just considering Trudeau's CF-18 fighter purchase alone, that is more than double the number of F-35 stealth jets on order by the current government.
It makes you wonder, has our airspace shrunk or only our willingness to protect it?
The Trudeau Liberals can also be credited with the design and building of 18 CP-140 Aurora maritime patrol aircraft, which became operational in 1980 and are now being deployed, together with the Trudeau-era CF-18s to support the no-fly zone in Libya.
If you are keeping a tally, the score for the number of front-line combat/patrol aircraft by era is: Trudeau 291, Harper 65.
The perception
Why am I concerned about the often erroneous perceptions we have of our political leaders when it comes to defence matters?
It is because perception is everything in politics and the common view today on both sides of the political spectrum is that the Canadian Forces under Harper are a bigger and far more generously equipped military that is, especially numerically, playing a far larger role overseas.
None of that is true.
Still, the myth that we are now "big military spenders" with an overbuilt army could well make the Canadian Forces an easy target for future cost-cutting if voters become convinced that there is fat to be trimmed and some sort of peace dividend to be paid out post-Afghanistan.
When it comes to our national security, do we really believe the world is a safer place now than it was in the 1970s?
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