Question:
When is an "arms show" NOT an "arms show"?

(1) When it includes the "US Embassy Defence and Security Exhibition"?
(2) When it flogs the world's most advanced, major weapons systems but also a wide range of other military and police hardware?
(3) When organizers assure you that there won't be any actual "weapons or firearms" on display?
(3) When it goes against an almost 20-year old City Council Motion banning such shows on municipal property?

Ottawa City staff have now tried to explain, in writing, why they leased Lansdowne Park to two military trade shows ("Secure Canada 2008 and CANSEC 2009), inspite of a near-unanimous, City Council Motion passed in 1989 banning the presence of such events at all City-owned facilities.

The first line of defence used by Doug Moore, the A/Director in the City's Real Property Asset Management Branch, who oversees Lansdowne Park, is to argue that "Secure Canada 2008" and one of its components—the "US Embassy Defence and Security Exhibition"—is not really an "arms exhibition."

Mr. Moore posits three bogus, "red-herring" arguments to argue his case that this arms exhibition is NOT really an actual arms exhibition. His main points on this matter are summed up in the following quotations his letter to Councillor Diane Holmes' office:

(1) "We are advised by the show manager that weapons and firearms are not included in these exhibits."

(2) "It is the opinion of staff that given the range of products and services being marketed during this event, it does not meet the test of what one would reasonably expect to find in an 'arms exhibition.'”

(3) "Secure Canada 2008 focuses on technologies and products used for security, public safety and to a lesser degree, defence applications...."

Please click on the links above to read the initial response from the Coalition to Oppose the Arms Trade (COAT) to each of these arguments.

Read the COAT's letter to City Staff debunking their bogus assertions.

Email: Tell the Mayor, City Councillors and Staff what you think!