Thank you, Chair, and also congratulations on your election.
The issues that we're discussing today do not seem to be new issues, because I've heard them in the 1960s, post-Vietnam, and I heard them again in the 1980s in relation to the ill-fated Iran rescue.
I think from this level we need to look at security in two ways. Are we talking about internal security—what is within the borders of North America, between the borders of Canada—or are we talking about international security? International security has to do with this messianic complex that we have in saying “Listen, if we make the whole world safe, then we will be safe.” I think that's the U.S. strategy, but we have to also look at security in terms of whether this is for Canadians or whether for our position as a world citizen.
Now, as for our position as a world citizen, we can do one or two things. One is to do what we do well, and that is in areas of disaster mitigation, such as deployment of military assets to solve natural disasters or other man-made disasters. More specifically, it seems that from this tradition of Canada as the smallest of the G-7 powers, we should be looking back to our roots in peacekeeping, but we're also moving into other areas. Are we doing peacekeeping, peacemaking, or peace-building? All these impact, ultimately, on what kinds of assets we want to deploy and what kind of investment we want to make for first-strike capability, combat readiness, and mitigation of human conflicts.
I must say that this whole question of security is like crystal ball gazing. You cannot predict where the next flashpoint will be. We were not able to predict Crimea, we were not able to predict World War I—well, World War I was Archduke Ferdinand—and then we had inklings of Hitler coming on, and we had no idea that the Japanese were going to bomb Pearl Harbour. On that basis, I want to hear your comments regarding the overarching question of security. How do we put the assets into preparing for that?