One of the hallmarks of NATO—and obviously I will speak to the maritime domain explicitly, but it applies to all the domains—is the very issue of interoperability, as you indicated in your question. Certainly the ability of Canada or any other country—but we're talking about Canada—to train, generate, and then deploy a ship that can seamlessly integrate into a NATO battle group or a U.S.-led battle group of whatever type is an incredibly powerful and flexible capability to have.
In the deployment of Toronto, you saw a couple of things. First of all, having the ship forward deployed in the first place represented a strategic decision, a real representation of forethought. We didn't know exactly what might or might not happen, but we knew we were going to need a reactive capability in that eastern Mediterranean Gulf region.
So, that's the first thing. To be able to redeploy the ship in very short order speaks to the flexibility of the capability itself and, in essence, to the value of forward deployed sea power to be able to react at fairly short notice. Then there is the ability to actually integrate into a NATO command structure that is pre-established, incredibly flexible, and adaptive. Having a Canadian warship in the Black Sea for the first time in over 20 years—22 or 23 years—was a significant event in and of itself, demonstrating the very solidarity that we were there to demonstrate. We worked with the U.S., Spanish, and other partners in a fully integrated battle picture, with fully integrated procedures, communications, and everything. Being able to work with some new partners, some emerging partners, and to, in essence, export our competencies at basic and intermediate levels to bring the ships and those sailors into fairly basic exercises is a very powerful indication not just of technical competence and tactical ability but, I think, of strategic solidarity.
I would like to go back to a previous question on readiness. As it relates to the events themselves that were reported in the media, I would simply say that as the admiral responsible for the calibre, the quality, and the readiness of that ship and her crew, prior to the deployment, I expressed complete confidence in the readiness of that crew and the materiel state of the ship. I indicated that to Minister Nicholson when the events transpired, and I stand by the fact that not only am I proud of how that ship is conducting itself but I have absolute confidence in her readiness as a front-line war-fighting capability for Canada.