Adam Zivo: The Canadian who helped set the stage for the war against Iran

Although Canada officially refused to join the United States’ springtime war against Iran, new information suggests that Canadian personnel indirectly assisted the campaign while embedded with American forces. This is nothing to be ashamed of. If anything, Ottawa’s support should have been more fulsome, consistent and overt.

When American bombs began to pummel the Islamic Republic of Iran in March, Prime Minister Mark Carney denounced the campaign as “inconsistent with international law,” and claimed that Canada was “not a party to those actions.”

However, Ottawa and Washington have a longstanding policy of exchanging service members to enhance allied cohesion and intelligence sharing. Through this integration, Canadian personnel have occasionally fought in conflicts that Ottawa is officially uninvolved with — most notably the 2003 Iraq War.

This spring, a handful of media reports suggested that some of these American-embedded Canadians might have been involved in the Iran war. A former senior Canadian general, Denis Thompson, even told the CBC that it was highly likely that some of these personnel helped plan airstrikes against the Islamic Republic.

In response, the Department of National Defence (DND) claimed that American-embedded Canadian service members had been assigned other duties that would keep them out of the conflict, despite otherwise remaining at their posts.

We now know that this statement, even if technically true, was somewhat misleading.

Late last month, the Government of Canada announced it would be awarding a Meritorious Service Cross to Col. David K. Turenne for his “extraordinary leadership and diplomatic skill as director of the Combined Air Operations Center during the Israel-Iran conflict.” He was specifically commended for “synchronizing multinational air operations and enabling the safe evacuation of 10,000 personnel from the Al Udeid Air Base, Doha, Qatar, June 2025.”

The medal, according to its official description, recognizes military deeds “performed in an outstandingly professional manner, according to a rare high standard that brings considerable benefit or great honour to the Canadian Forces.”

This is the first public acknowledgement of Turenne’s involvement in the Israel-Iran conflict, although few details of his service are known. When National Post requested more information on what he did to earn his medal, DND failed to provide it and claimed that an interview with him would not be feasible.

To be clear: while Turenne’s award confirms that he was involved in last year’s 12-Day War, no evidence suggests he was involved in this year’s expanded campaign against Iran. His actions do not appear to have contradicted Carney’s claim that American-embedded service members were kept out of the ongoing conflict.

Still, the award illustrates how Canadian talent helped set the stage for the current war, which, in turn, complicates Carney’s moral and political stance.

To understand why this is the case, one needs to understand the significance of the Combined Air Operations Center (CAOC), which Turenne directed from June to December of 2025.

The CAOC is the U.S. air force’s “nerve centre” in the Middle East. Originally established in Saudi Arabia during the Gulf War, in 2003 the centre was relocated to the Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar, where it stayed put for roughly two decades as an anchor of America’s regional power.

However, for some time, American military leaders have feared that the base, being located beside Iran, was highly vulnerable to the Islamic Republic’s ballistic missile strikes. So they started shifting operations to a base in South Carolina, gradually moving personnel there and operating the two locations in parallel.

These precautions proved prudent. Just before last year’s 12-Day War, the CAOC, under the directorship of Turenne, moved its personnel to South Carolina while maintaining regular operations. Al Udeid, meanwhile, was partially evacuated. When hostilities broke out, Iran launched 14 missiles at the base — one got through and inflicted minor damage, prompting a full evacuation of remaining personnel.

Having learned from this experience, the United States once again evacuated a significant portion of its personnel — including all of the CAOC — from Al Udeid Air Base in January. As predicted, the Iranians subsequently struck the base with ballistic missiles, severely damaging the CAOC’s facilities and rendering them inoperable. The attack had little effect on American co-ordination, though, thanks to the duplicate South Carolina location.

Taking all of this together, it’s clear that, even though Turenne was not directly involved in the join U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran, his leadership helped set the stage for the campaign. Not only did he direct the United States’ most crucial “nerve centre” during the 12-Day War, his successful management of the 2025 Al Udeid evacuations likely provided invaluable lessons for this year’s campaign.

While some might want to compartmentalize these two waves of conflict, they are militarily, politically and morally inextricable from one another.

In this light, Carney’s denunciations of the war, and his emphasis on Canada’s non-involvement, ring hollow. Canada cannot publicly condemn the United States and Israel’s pre-emptive wars against Iran while quietly honouring a Canadian colonel for aiding their execution.

Rather than downplaying Turenne’s extraordinary work, the correct position for the Canadian government would have been to publicly laud him, and to use his story to show Canadians that crippling the Islamic Republic is the morally correct thing to do. There is no reason to be ashamed of our heroes, and no reason to be ashamed of any efforts to thwart the Islamic Republic.

National Post