Evidence of meeting #21 for National Defence in the 41st Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was canada's.
A recording is available from Parliament.
11:30 a.m.
Conservative
John Williamson Conservative New Brunswick Southwest, NB
I would agree with you on that as well.
Do I have a few more minutes?
11:30 a.m.
Conservative
John Williamson Conservative New Brunswick Southwest, NB
What are your thoughts about an institution that currently exists, NORAD, and moving it from air surveillance to maritime surveillance? Is that something we should explore, do you think? Is that an institution that we ought to build upon, or do you think it should be something else?
11:30 a.m.
Professor, École nationale d'administration publique, As an Individual
The committee went to Colorado Springs, so you have an idea of how looks now. There's a debate. Some people say, okay, the good old days of NORAD are over. It's finished, so we should we move along and find something else. I disagree with that. The problem is that there is still a need to assess what NORAD can do on the maritime side. It's not clear yet. Even after 10 years of giving a maritime mandate to NORAD, it's still not clear. NORAD cannot act, but can only monitor things. They don't have any control over the navy. They cannot act when they see something. The balance sheet is not clear yet. But some other people are saying, okay, we should go ahead, we should move along on this—and again, talking of the Arctic, we should give NORAD an Arctic mandate.
11:30 a.m.
Professor, École nationale d'administration publique, As an Individual
NORAD, to me, is something that we should save if only for political reasons, because it's the centrepiece in people's minds of Canada-U.S.—
11:30 a.m.
Conservative
John Williamson Conservative New Brunswick Southwest, NB
I'm not clear on your opinion. Do you think it should fall under NORAD or is NORAD strictly the air—
11:30 a.m.
Professor, École nationale d'administration publique, As an Individual
No. If we can expand it, we should try. It's worth it to try. That is my position.
11:30 a.m.
Conservative
John Williamson Conservative New Brunswick Southwest, NB
Okay. Finally, what is your view of NATO's involvement in the Arctic, if any, or it better to keep the Arctic under continental purview? That seems to be your preference, but I thought I'd ask.
11:30 a.m.
Professor, École nationale d'administration publique, As an Individual
Yes, it is clearly my preference, but it's hard to keep NATO out of the Arctic. The Norwegians, especially, are pushing for this. But if we can, if we want to limit the role of NATO in the Arctic, as the government seems to want, we must give more room to bilateral cooperation. I mean, we should do one of these things—
11:30 a.m.
Liberal
Joyce Murray Liberal Vancouver Quadra, BC
Thank you for being here.
I'm going to pick up on the conversation around the cadeaux strategy, or not. You’re saying, don’t give the present but respond to the request. As an example, would that mean you would have counselled the government to join the war in Iraq at the request of the United States?
11:30 a.m.
Professor, École nationale d'administration publique, As an Individual
The war in Iraq was a very special case, because there were a lot of strategic interests of Canada at stake. In that case, if I go back to 2003, I was one of those who were saying that when serious business happens, we don't have a choice, we will go. It was a surprise for all of us academics, and we're still trying to understand what happened then.
Retrospectively, I can say that when some crucial interests were at stake at the time, the problem for Canada being that its main allies were divided, with the French and Germans on one side and the Americans and the British on the other, that was probably good reason for us to try to stay away.
11:30 a.m.
Liberal
Joyce Murray Liberal Vancouver Quadra, BC
So it's on a case-by-case basis. You don't necessarily accede to American demands in—
11:35 a.m.
Professor, École nationale d'administration publique, As an Individual
Iraq proved that we can say no without serious consequences.
11:35 a.m.
Liberal
Joyce Murray Liberal Vancouver Quadra, BC
Okay, that's good.
When you were asked about the CF-18's replacement, your response was to ask what Canada's priority is. Is it the defence security of Canada and the continent, or is it overseas operations? That raises the question of the defence strategy that we have right now, with some criticizing it as basically a laundry list of equipment that we haven't been able to purchase. So there is a planned re-set of that strategy. What's your view of it? We've had the de Kerckhove and Petrolekas strategic outlook for Canada, in which they have been calling for a fuller strategy that includes defence, trade, foreign policy and so on, one would address that kind of question of what our priorities are.
Do you view that as the right way to go, with a more comprehensive role of government—
11:35 a.m.
Professor, École nationale d'administration publique, As an Individual
A grand strategy.
11:35 a.m.
Liberal
Joyce Murray Liberal Vancouver Quadra, BC
—or do you think we should have a defence strategy without trying to wrap it in with all of those other strategies?
11:35 a.m.
Professor, École nationale d'administration publique, As an Individual
My first reaction is that probably the grand strategy is the better. The broader your view is, the better it is. The problem that we have is that historically it's very difficult to do it. The example we have is the Martin government's approach to Canada's international politics in 2005, which was an attempt to have a very broad view of Canadian international relations.
It's very difficult to make such a strategy, it because you have to reconcile a lot of different interests and different views in it. For sure, in the ideal world this is what we should aim at, but it is very difficult.
11:35 a.m.
Liberal
Joyce Murray Liberal Vancouver Quadra, BC
Sometimes you have to make a decision as to whether something is ideal but impractical, or whether it is practical but less than ideal. Where would you sit on that?
11:35 a.m.
Professor, École nationale d'administration publique, As an Individual
In the practical world, we should have different white papers. Foreign affairs white papers could be independent, to give us an idea of how the government is viewing the world, what the fundamentals are in international relations. I say this because there are different philosophies and approaches to it. As long as we don't know exactly what the fundamentals are--who is the threat, what are the threats, what is the most important challenge that the governments thinks will happen in the coming years--as long as we don't have that data, there's nothing we can do. So we need to at least have some reasonable mid-term assessment of the priorities for Canada, in both defence and foreign affairs.
11:35 a.m.
Liberal
Joyce Murray Liberal Vancouver Quadra, BC
Are we in a position to make a commitment to a potentially $20 billion to $40 billion fighter jet replacement program in the absence of a strategy and clarity as to what the priorities are?
11:35 a.m.
Professor, École nationale d'administration publique, As an Individual
A good white paper on defence could be enough, as long as you're saying our priority in defence is defending the Arctic, defending Canadian territory, contributing to an international coalition, whatever. But you have to name it because your strategic choice will have a strong impact on the acquisition.
11:35 a.m.
Liberal
Joyce Murray Liberal Vancouver Quadra, BC
So we need a white paper first and then we can determine the capabilities we need and can go and seek the best possible procurement.
11:35 a.m.
Professor, École nationale d'administration publique, As an Individual
Yes, we need goals, we need strategy, and then we can decide.
