National Defence Committee on Oct. 28th, 2014

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

It's for either of you.

[Dr. James Fergusson]

Whatever “sixth generation” means relative to “fifth generation”, I would suggest to you that when we talk about those, we're talking 20 years down the road. The F-35 fifth-generation fighter is the only capability that exists out there, not only for Canada and the United States, but also for all our major allies.

It's going to proceed, but I would add for you that, in my view, this will be the last manned fighter that any of the nations buy. We will move in a different direction as drones and the technology related to them become more and more capable of replicating what fighters do.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Dr. Charron, do you have any views?

[Dr. Andrea Charron]

No. I would leave that area of expertise to Jim.

[The Chair, Conservative, Peter Kent]

Your time has expired.

Thank you, Mr. Davies.

Mr. Williamson, please.

[John Williamson, Conservative, New Brunswick Southwest, NB]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

It's good to see both of you here today, Dr. Charron and Dr. Fergusson.

Dr. Charron, you've mentioned—and it was interesting—that NATO strives “to remain relevant”. We've talked a bit about some of the things that have to happen in order for this to happen, but tell me, looking at it from the other side of the coin, what are some of the challenges that are perhaps causing NORAD to be less relevant?

Excuse me. I might have said “NATO” earlier, but I meant NORAD.

Look at it from the other side: what are some of the things that are pulling it in a direction that we should be concerned about?

[Dr. Andrea Charron]

We can't underestimate the impact that 9/11 has had on NORAD. Whereas NORAD was focused on the assumption that it would be a foreign-based threat coming from outside of North America, 9/11 proved that it could be a threat coming from within North America, and it wasn't a defence threat: it was a plane, which isn't a threat normally and which became a weapon.

When you go to Colorado Springs, what you're hit with is the number of reminders—pictorial reminders, statues—commemorating the events of 9/11 and the association with USNORTHCOM and their motto, “We have the watch”. There is this real concern that something—call it Rumsfeld's “unknown unknowns”—is going to come out of nowhere and attack the homeland.

Now that the focus is squarely on the homeland, NORAD is making sure that they consider all possible scenarios for what could be a threat to the defence of North America.

[John Williamson, Conservative, New Brunswick Southwest, NB]

That's interesting.

Could I summarize this? It's almost a situation in which the Americans, because of 9/11, are less focused on NORAD as the singular focus—I guess because they have so many priorities now—and are a little less engaged in NORAD, or that NORAD is perhaps seen as the institution that is not the focus. Is that fair to say?

[Dr. Andrea Charron]

No, I wouldn't want to give that impression.

The U.S. is still by far the biggest supporter of NORAD in terms of resources, financial and otherwise. It's simply a unique relationship now that USNORTHCOM and NORAD are housed in the same building—indeed, the commander of NORAD is also the commander of USNORTHCOM—and we in Canada are getting more insight into the concerns of U.S. vis-à-vis the homeland.

NORAD, of course, is still charged with looking for traditional foreign defence threats, but now 9/11 has shown us that you can't only look for the missile coming from outside of Canada. You also now have to be far more aware of what's happening. Really, that was the impetus behind the addition of maritime warning to the NORAD missions.

[John Williamson, Conservative, New Brunswick Southwest, NB]

Thank you.

Beyond the threats from 9/11—I'll call it a bit of a shift in the U.S. posture—what do you think are the emerging threats? Or what threats have emerged over the last decade since 9/11? If the missile threat is the traditional concern, how have threats to North America evolved over the last decade?

[Dr. Andrea Charron]

We've seen increased concern about and attention to things such as: criminal gangs; terrorism, both foreign and homegrown; maritime threats that could potentially become more than a search and rescue scenario, where the actual event could threaten North America in some respect; and cybersecurity threats, in regard to making sure that any of the information being gathered or pushed towards NORAD or pushed from NORAD is being protected and can't be manipulated.

Slowly but surely—and this is not unique to NORAD—security agencies and military departments are having to increase the size of their in-baskets for all the possible scenarios that could fall within their mandate.

[John Williamson, Conservative, New Brunswick Southwest, NB]

Is NORAD the organization to deal with some of these threats, cyber threats in particular, and even gangs for that matter? That's a unique example that I'm not sure I've heard before. How is NORAD positioned to deal with those two very different threats, the cyber threat and the threat from gangs, or groups, or agencies?

[Dr. Andrea Charron]

We're dealing with defence matters versus constabulary matters. One of the issues we have to keep in mind is that the military are not mandated to deal with constabulary issues per se; however, because NORAD has this air picture and now the maritime picture, they can often provide an all-North American picture that can be very helpful to the constabulary agencies and other civilian agencies. That's the real benefit of NORAD.

Also, NORAD is really the model for how Canada and U.S. organizations can work well together. The amount of trust, training, and partnership that we have via this binational agreement is really the envy of many countries around the world, and it has a lot to teach us about dealing with the Americans.

[John Williamson, Conservative, New Brunswick Southwest, NB]

Do I have time for one more question?

[The Chair, Conservative, Peter Kent]

You have just under a minute.

[John Williamson, Conservative, New Brunswick Southwest, NB]

Could you assess how the maritime warning mission is working? Is it getting the resources it needs and the attention it needs, or is it a bit of an orphan? How do you describe its overall functionality?

[Dr. Andrea Charron]

This is the reason that Jim and I really want to look at it. One of the things that struck us when we were interviewing people, especially military and other agencies, and we asked exactly your question about how the NORAD maritime warning is going, many responses were sort of like this: “It has this mission? I didn't realize this.”

NORAD has always been very air-centric, and now with maritime warning we're talking about more of a navy focus. But also, other agencies like Transport Canada, the coast guard, the police, etc., have the remit for maritime surveillance, so it is very new for NORAD to try to integrate not only different military personnel, but now also different agencies in terms of the information that's collected, and who to pick up the phone and speak to.

Maritime warning began in 2006. It certainly isn't as well mandated and resourced as the air warning and control. Mind you, NORAD has only the maritime warning mission, not the control mission, so that can also speak to the reason that there is a slight inequality in terms of resources. It may be significant, however, that the new commander of NORAD is Admiral William Gortney, and he is with the United States Navy. He is a pilot, but is with the U.S .Navy.

[The Chair, Conservative, Peter Kent]

Thank you very much, Professor.

Mr. McKay, please, for seven minutes.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

Thanks to both of you.

In another life, I was down at Colorado Springs and, as part of the committee, talked to General Jacoby, and I think it was General Perraut at the time, about this strange relationship we have over ballistic missile defences. It got to be some sort of theatre of the absurd that once it was identified as a threat, somehow or other our guy had to leave the room and it would be handled by the Americans and only by the Americans.

I was struck by Philippe Lagassé's comment that “Canada's current abstention acts as an obstacle toward closer cooperation”. Ferry de Kerckhove says: “To me, it's...very simple.... We are [all] in it together.” Then Lagassé said that, really, we could get into it at no cost to Canada, and de Kerckhove said no, that there are going to be cost implications, let's get real here—I added “let's get real here”.

So the threshold question is, should we at this point decide that we should go back in? Second, is it going to be costless? In 25 words or less....

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[Dr. James Fergusson]

In 25 words or less?

Well, we're not going to go back in, because we've never been in. Let's start with the one basic assumption that we all start with. Somehow we all believe the Americans want us. Well, perhaps the Americans don't. They're not interested in Canadian involvement. In all the indicators I've had, in looking at this issue for many years, it's that the Americans see that there's nothing additional that Canada is going to bring to the table on this issue.

So what do we want? As I think Professor Lagassé said, do we simply want to be able to sit at the table and find out as much as we can about the system? If we do, what's the best way to do it? Is it through NORAD? Is it through perhaps negotiating a research and development memorandum of understanding with the United States on missile defence? Are we going to try to find out if the United States will defend us even if we don't do anything? Are we defended?

These are a lot of important strategic questions that may or may not be answered by simply saying that we want to play.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

It's interesting that you should say that, because I got exactly the opposite impression from General Jacoby, in that he was interested in Canada playing, for want of a better term, in Canada being involved, and that he respected the decision to not participate in 2006 but thought that really needed to be reviewed.

[Dr. James Fergusson]

General Jacoby is the commander of NORAD. He has a North American perspective. What I would say is that he drank the NORAD Kool-Aid. Missile defence is a U.S. Strategic Command mission. His role in NORTHCOM NORAD is direct command of one part of what will become the global U.S. missile defence system.

So who are we engaging here? Is it STRATCOM? Is it the senior levels of the Pentagon? Is it NORAD? I can understand General Jacoby, given the way it is structured at the operational headquarters. I've never been in there so I don't know exactly, but you have a Canadian sitting there doing ballistic missile early warning and beside him is the American doing missile defence, and you don't look at that screen because you are not allowed....

But of course most of the missile defence isn't going to take place in that venue anyways. The command and control systems are located in other places.

So I'm not convinced. I think you always get the answer out of the commander of NORAD, no matter who it is, including the new admiral, that yes, they would like Canada to participate and they'd like to cooperate more and more with Canada. But that person does not speak for Washington. They do not speak for the other major combatant commanders and other commanders in the United States, and there are other vested interests.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

I don't wish to take issue with you, but over the two or three days we were there—and we were in the Pentagon as well and had some really interesting briefings and luncheons and casual conversations with some pretty senior people—my impression was that they were pretty enthusiastic about maximizing Canada's participation.

[Dr. James Fergusson]

But did they tell you what they meant by “participation”?