'Thrown under the bus': Former defence chief's memoir lays bare his battles with the Trudeau government
Posted: Mon Sep 28, 2026 11:14 am
Wayne Eyre says he considered resigning 'several times'
Eyre says he was about to resign on a phone call with Trudeau before the prime minister told him he still had confidence in him.
He stayed, but says resignation crossed his mind "several times" as the government's handling of defence funding and military readiness wore on.
"You can fall on your sword, but generally it hurts and you can only do it once," he said.
On Ukraine, Eyre says the Trudeau government's reluctance to send lethal aid was "a collision of ideology with reality."
"The ideology being, we are Canada, we don't supply weapons to a conflict zone," he told CBC.
His book is full of frustration with the government's "inability to make decisions at the speed of war.
When Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visited in 2023, Eyre says Trudeau and Freeland gave "bellicose, impassioned speeches" about standing with Ukraine.
Behind the scenes, they had just cut the military's budget.
"I, like the handful of CAF senior leaders present, had a hard time reconciling these otherwise great speeches with both the billion-dollar budget cut that they had just inflicted on us and their lethargy to approve a new defence policy."
Eyre says the Trudeau government announced a $38 billion NORAD commitment in 2022 with no one able to say where the money would come from.
"Most galling was the 'smoke and mirrors' funding approach, with billions already allocated for other military equipment taken away and reallocated, with most investments only coming years into the future," he wrote.
When he told a journalist the source of funds "wasn't clear to me," he says he drew government ire.
Asked if Canada is ready for a possible major conflict later this decade, Eyre said no.
Eyre says he was about to resign on a phone call with Trudeau before the prime minister told him he still had confidence in him.
He stayed, but says resignation crossed his mind "several times" as the government's handling of defence funding and military readiness wore on.
"You can fall on your sword, but generally it hurts and you can only do it once," he said.
On Ukraine, Eyre says the Trudeau government's reluctance to send lethal aid was "a collision of ideology with reality."
"The ideology being, we are Canada, we don't supply weapons to a conflict zone," he told CBC.
His book is full of frustration with the government's "inability to make decisions at the speed of war.
When Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visited in 2023, Eyre says Trudeau and Freeland gave "bellicose, impassioned speeches" about standing with Ukraine.
Behind the scenes, they had just cut the military's budget.
"I, like the handful of CAF senior leaders present, had a hard time reconciling these otherwise great speeches with both the billion-dollar budget cut that they had just inflicted on us and their lethargy to approve a new defence policy."
Eyre says the Trudeau government announced a $38 billion NORAD commitment in 2022 with no one able to say where the money would come from.
"Most galling was the 'smoke and mirrors' funding approach, with billions already allocated for other military equipment taken away and reallocated, with most investments only coming years into the future," he wrote.
When he told a journalist the source of funds "wasn't clear to me," he says he drew government ire.
Asked if Canada is ready for a possible major conflict later this decade, Eyre said no.