More from the Myth Machine

The last caller on this afternoon’s Two-Hour Daily Hate With Bill Rowe, Bill Callahan, spoke about how France, through the medium of its anachronism called Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon, “seized” or some such a swath of maritime territory south of Newfoundland, with, of course “the blessing” of Canada.

Comrade Rowe, of course, nodded his agreement furiously.

Who needs facts when you have your comforting Newfoundland nationalist myths?

The Canada-France maritime boundary was set down as it was in 1992, not because of Canada, but despite Canada: the French claim was vigorously opposed by the federal government.

In 1989, Canada and France both agreed to send the long-running dispute to a specially-constituted international court for resolution.

The court consisted of five members; one each from Canada and France; the rest from Uruguay, Italy, and the United States.

The Canadian claim was that the French Islands were entitled to a maritime boundary 12 miles from their shoreline, or mid-way to Newfoundland, whichever distance was less.

France agreed that the boundary should be set at the mid-way point to the Canadian shorelines, but used coastal points as far away as Cape Breton and Sable Island as the baselines for calculation.

The panel rejected both claims. It granted the French Islands all the maritime territory which the Canadian thesis would have granted it, but used a more generous 24-mile limit to the southwest. At the same time, however, it rejected the much more generous baselines which France had claimed. (Both the Canadian and French arbitrators dissented from the panel’s award, for opposing reasons. But both countries were bound by it.)

The area ultimately awarded to France, at about 8700 square kilometers, was substantially larger than the 3600 square kilometers which Canada had argued for.

But it was also substantially smaller than the nearly 50,000 square kilometers claimed by France:

[Image source]

Somehow, that aspect of the decision has been lost in the mists of Newfoundland nationalist time. After all, it’s been fifteen years to the month since the St-Pierre-et-Miquelon decision, plenty of time for all the contemporary accounts to be burnt.

Similarly, the victory in 2001 on Gulf turbot awarded 18% of the quota to Newfoundland, and 82% to Quebec. Newfoundland had argued for 16%. Until the decision of the Laforest panel, Newfoundland had actually fished 12%.

A win, right?

Not according to the Myth Machine, which used the fog of world events to erase the collective memory of those figures and substitute their own reality: the Laforest panel was accepted by federal Fisheries Minister Herb Dhaliwal just days before September 11, 2001.

The Laforest decision, in the canon of Newfoundland Nationalists, is now a bitter loss and a national humiliation.

And of course, the same process has already begun in respect of the 2002 maritime boundary case which Nova Scotia lost in spades, to the benefit of Newfoundland:

Is the victim mentality that deeply ingrained in the Newfoundland nationalist mindset that even huge legal victories in respect of natural resources are almost instantly turned, by the fact-impoverished crypto-separatist echo-chamber, into losses?

What’s with the overpowering urge to snatch, at every opportunity, public humiliation and moral defeat from the jaws of legal victory?