National Defence Committee on Dec. 4th, 2014

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Jack Harris]

I'd like to call this meeting to order. My name is Jack Harris. I'm the vice-chair sitting in for the chair, who is unavoidably absent today. This is meeting number 42 of the Standing Committee on National Defence, pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), a study of the defence of North America.

Today, our witnesses are by video conference.

We have today appearing as individuals, Dr. Christopher Sands, senior research professor and director of the Center for Canadian Studies at the Nitze School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University, and Dr. Charles Doran, Andrew W. Mellon Professor of International Relations at the Nitze School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University as well. Thank you both for attending.

Our procedure, if it hasn't already been explained to you, is that you will each have about 10 minutes to make a presentation, to be then followed by a round or two of questioning from the members of our committee.

We'll be hearing from Professor Sands first.

[Dr. Christopher Sands, Senior Research Professor, Director, Center for Canadian Studies, Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University, As an Individual]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

I want to thank the honourable members of the committee for making the accommodation of letting us testify by video conference, which has certainly been much easier for us, and I'm very honoured to be able to participate in your examination of the future defence needs of the United States and Canada, and of North America.

Obviously, we are facing new threats as well as old threats. We have to defend not just the continent against traditional military attacks, but we are facing cyber-attacks, the danger to our citizens from pandemics like the Ebola virus, and homegrown terrorism, something which Ottawa knows too well. I know many of you experienced that just a couple of months ago. Our own citizens turned by a foreign ideology can become dangerous to us.

In many ways the idea of national defence has really metastasized to cross the line between what we traditionally think of as expeditionary or overseas military activity, and connected that to our traditional law enforcement and peace officer operations here at home. Everything from our border security guards and the Department of Public Safety to the RCMP are linked to the challenge of providing security and safety for our citizens and the businesses that they have and their interests both here and abroad. Particularly in the highly interdependent world that we live in, where the economy, the livelihood that we have, is linked by financial networks, linked by the movement of people, and linked by very dynamic supply chains, we really can't be indifferent to the things that are happening in all aspects of our domestic and international spheres at once.

In that regard, if there's one takeaway that I would leave with you, both the United States and Canada need to confront this by being willing to spend more on national security. I know that's never easy. There are many priorities for budgets, but both our countries have taken a kind of peace dividend without having the peace.

We've been cutting back on our security spending at a time when our security threats are mounting. That doesn't mean we have to go back to the old spending. We can spend smarter. Technology allows us in many ways to get a bigger bang for our defence dollar. I know as members you're very keen to make sure the taxpayers' money is well spent, but I do think that we are on the verge of a need to really reinvest in national security, both in the United States and in Canada. I think there's an opportunity to do so together, that is, to coordinate the improvements that we both need to make in our security, so that not only is the Canada-U.S. relationship stronger, but our ability to work jointly around the world in responding to these threats is also strengthened.

I want to talk about three particular areas, to call your attention to what I think are some of the priorities that we should have for our future Canada-U.S. defence relations, Canada-U.S. defence investments. The first is to improve our domain awareness. The second is to improve our capacity to work jointly. The third is to improve our ability to add capacity by making smarter investments and making improvements to our procurement systems. I'll talk about each of those briefly, and hopefully will be able to give back some of the time that you've generously offered me.

First, in the area of domain awareness, increasingly the war on terrorism has become an intelligence war, where it's extremely important for us to know what's happening with individuals who often do a good job of hiding their tracks. At the same time, because of the nature of cyber-threats we're often trying to operate in cyberspace to track down the fuzzy fingerprints of hackers who may be state-sponsored from Russia, China, Iran, North Korea, or elsewhere.

Also, when we're talking about pandemics, they may not be weaponized attacks, weaponized viruses. They can simply be a threat like the Ebola virus, which can come through because an aid worker has come home or someone who has been travelling to visit relatives comes home infected. The challenge is to learn when they enter our countries whether they pose a risk and make sure they get the help they need, but also to make sure that the public is protected.

When we're dealing with threats like homegrown terrorism, the kind of intelligence we need will come from trusting communities that are willing to work together with our law enforcement to alert us early that a young man or a young woman has been radicalized or may be thinking of committing a violent act, to try to catch them before they can do harm to themselves or to anyone else.

In this environment it's very important that we rely not only on traditional intelligence gathering, but we also rely on our domestic police forces and develop new capabilities to operate in cyberspace and elsewhere in order to know much more about what is happening in our space and to identify the threats before they become actual dangers.

This leads to the second point I would make, that we need to improve our capacity for jointness. As some of you will remember, in 1986 the United States enacted the Goldwater-Nichols act to reorganize our defence capabilities. In that act we focused on the importance of jointness. At that time that meant the navy works with the air force, the air force works with the army, and they all work with the marines, so we could coordinate attacks, coordinate the use of resources, equipment, and ammunition to enable us to operate in a more cost-efficient manner, with all forces of the United States working in a coordinated fashion.

That mission is as important as ever, but it's now extended. It's extended in two important ways. One is the need to coordinate between our domestic and our international forces. The setting up of U.S. Northern Command after September 11 was an important step in that direction. It remains a second responder in many domestic circumstances in the United States and is there to provide support for Canada and for Mexico, when requested. Particularly in the area of logistics after a hurricane or an earthquake, this can be crucial. It's also a coordinating mechanism to reach out to local first responders to make sure they get the information and have the resources they need to respond to anything from the Vancouver Olympics to the Superbowl when it was held in Detroit, whether the attack or the threat is on either of our sides of the border.

The jointness therefore goes in two directions: the importance of our ability to work across the Canada-U.S. border, not only at a top level but throughout our security systems, and also the ability to work with domestic resources and military resources hand-in-glove. This is about getting more by working together, more bang for every dollar that we spend, rather than duplicating effort or creating deliberate redundancy. There's a lot we can do to support each other in this regard.

I think members are aware that in 2006 the United States and Canada invested in a renewal of NORAD, but also in extending NORAD's surveillance mission to include maritime. At the same time, or in subsequent years, we've developed something called Shiprider, where the RCMP working together with the U.S. Coast Guard, the Canadian Coast Guard and the Canadian navy working together with the U.S. Coast Guard, have put officers on each other's ships so that when pursuing a threat or investigating a situation and they cross an international boundary, there's always a sovereign officer with arrest authority, investigation authority, even seizure of goods authority, to be able to act. This is the kind of jointness we need to see going beyond NORAD maritime surveillance, going into this action function.

Interestingly, those two initiatives are stovepiped. One is on the military side and the other is on what we would call homeland security in the United States, public safety in Canada. The need to link these two areas is an illustration of the challenge we face in the years ahead.

That leads me to the third area I'd like to highlight, and that is the need to acquire new capabilities. One exciting thing about the time in which we live is the amazing technology that's come forward, technology like drone surveillance, satellite reconnaissance, and of course, cyber protections that we've developed really through bringing hackers in from the cold and having them work with our governments to try to protect domestic systems.

There is a huge set of new resources coming on stream that are going to require us to add capabilities to our current military. Senator John McCain, who is the incoming chairman of the Senate armed services committee—he served in that role before—said in Washington this week that one of the key priorities for the United States in the years to come will be acquisition reform.

The United States certainly spends a lot of money, but like Canada, we face a shrinking, in fact shrunken, defence industrial base. With fewer companies able to compete for contracts, those companies are often coming forward with low bids on cost-plus contracts, so that we sign an agreement for something that looks affordable but when the cost-plus kicks in, we realize that in the end we pay quite a bit for the technology we're acquiring.

We have to make smart choices. Defence dollars will not multiply indefinitely, and as you know, there are other demands on our budgets, so we have to spend those dollars wisely.

As the U.S. undertakes fundamental acquisition reform and process reform, this is an opportunity to renew the principles of the Defence Production Sharing Agreement of 1956, in which Canada and the United States agreed to coordinate procurement and dip into each other's production bases to provide the defence needs that our military has. There's a huge opportunity for us to approach acquisition reform together to make sure our systems are mutually well informed, and that as the U.S. makes gains in its reforms, Canada is able to learn the lessons from what we've been able to do, and perhaps teach us a thing or two about how to spend wisely. That's something which I think Canadians are quite good at.

With that, sir, let me thank you very much for your attention and cede whatever is left of my time.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Jack Harris]

You went a little bit over your time, but thank you very much for your contribution.

Before questions, we'll ask Dr. Doran to make his presentation.

[Prof. Charles Doran, Andrew W. Mellon Professor, International Relations, Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University, As an Individual]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It is indeed an honour and a privilege to appear before the committee.

I will limit my comments to maybe three or four, and then we can get into the heart of this, the question and answer session.

There are three major observations that can be made about world politics today as it impinges on the United States and on Canada.

First, great power politics are back. This does not mean that the older issues, the more recent issues actually of economic considerations, environmental matters, the fight against terrorism, have been pushed aside. What we are seeing is that the great powers are beginning to grind against each other and sparks are flying. This is a quite different experience from what we've seen, really, since the end of the Cold War or perhaps, since the end of World War II.

Second, we are observing a situation in which conflict worldwide is really trifurcating. In the past there was a focus of conflict. During wartimes, such as during the Korean War, the Vietnam War, that was clear, but even in peace time it also tended to be clear.

Now we have three great conflict areas. One, of course, is along the littoral of Russia and involves Europe and indeed some Asian participation. The second area is the new and very serious challenge with ISIL in the Middle East, which is getting a great deal of attention and in some ways is a continuation of a very long conflict there. The third area is the confrontation between China and its neighbours in the South China and East China seas. This confrontation is something that none of us is directly involved in, but it affects all of us, especially in terms of transportation through those areas and in terms of our alliance relationships.

The third issue is that there is radical structural change going on in the system. In terms of our own research, we look at this in terms of the change of position states have on their cycles of relative power. For example, Japan has peaked in terms of its relative power and is entering clear decline. The Soviet Union collapsed in 1989 after the Cold War, and now Russia is attempting at the bottom of its cycle to climb up the cycle again.

The third possible major change will be when China, as it rises in its power cycle, goes through what we call a critical point of change, where the level of its power continues to increase but the rate of increase suddenly and abruptly begins to fall off. This will be a very difficult thing for China to cope with, to manage, for example, with regard to its relationship with Taiwan. Not only will China be affected by this, but the rest of us will. Canada will be affected. The United States will be affected in various ways, in terms of trying to manage the adjustments necessary to get us through these intervals.

These are big changes taking place in terms of world politics.

In terms of the bilateral relationship, there are many areas, I think, of convergence and coordination. Perhaps the largest difference that has some impact on the defence domain is in the area of oil.

In particular, of course, there's the issue of the Keystone pipeline. I think we will likely see some changes on this, because of changes in the participation of Congress after the mid-term elections. I think we're likely to see a vote that's in favour of the Keystone pipeline, but it's also possible that the President, who is very concerned about environmental matters in the long term and has just finished signing a very important agreement with China to try to stop increases in environmental pollution, particularly the impact on global warming by 2030.... The differences of view on the pipeline still exist, and the President could in fact veto what Congress decides to support.

Finally, I would conclude on the very important and I think very positive relationship regarding what is now dubbed maritime NORAD. I have been a long-term supporter of this; I argued for this before this terminology even came into place. I cannot say that I had any direct impact, but as a scholar I argued very vigorously for this, both in Canada and in the United States, and I'm delighted to see the movement in this direction.

We have, of course, a situation in which both governments are very actively involved in terms of the identification and the monitoring of movement of illicit traffic of some sort off our coastlines. This is all coordinated in I think a very effective way inside the larger framework of NORAD and NORTHCOM relations.

It is the case that the task of maritime NORAD is simply to report and to inform the governments in a timely way. The interdiction, then, is up to the individual head of government, the head of state, to act on, but in fact this is all coordinated in a way that I think is positive and essential. Indeed, there have been a number of alerts at this point.

I would simply conclude by noting that NORAD, which some thought was going to disappear as an institution of any significance, has suddenly become, once again, very much more important. How is that? Well, NORAD is oriented toward the so-called air-breathing threat. In the last year or so, Russia has sent some 400 sorties out against North American coastlines, but also against European interests and areas of defence concern. It is of course then up to us to scramble our own fighters and to respond to this. This is familiar territory for us. NORAD has the skill, the dedication, and the long-time experience in dealing with this and that is necessary to respond in a positive way.

If I could, I would just note a statement on the part of the individual who is responsible for the North American Aerospace Defense Command's maritime division, Captain Martin Beck. He put it this way: “We have the watch, and what we do is a no-fail mission.”

I don't think I could improve on that. I think we are in good hands. I now look forward to responding to questions.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Jack Harris]

Thank you very much.

Between the two of you, you used 20 minutes, so that was perfect. Thank you so much, both of you, for your presentations.

We're going to start with a round of questions at seven minutes per questioner. That seven minutes includes the questions and answers.

We'll start off with Mr. Corneliu Chisu on behalf of the Conservative Party.

[Corneliu Chisu, Conservative, Pickering—Scarborough East, ON]

Professors, thank you very much for your presentations.

I am very interested in the Arctic situation. The majority of our witnesses who have appeared before the committee have argued that the deterioration of relations with Russia over the ongoing crisis in Ukraine will not affect international relations in the Arctic.

As of Monday, Russia activated the new Arctic joint strategic command. Russia's new joint strategic command became operational on December 1. Northern Fleet Commander Vladimir Korolev has announced that the new command based on the northern fleet and headquartered in Severomorsk will acquire military, naval, surface and strategic nuclear sub to surface air force and aerospace defence units, assets and bases transferred from Russia's western, central and south but not eastern military districts, with which it will importantly be on par.

The creation of the new command was outlined by Russian President Vladimir Putin on November 24, one or two weeks ago.

The northern fleet will be absorbed in its entirety into the command, together with a substantial element of the first air force and air defence command. The official transfer processes will be conducted through the ministry of defence and will take several weeks. Subordinate to the new command will be freshly constructed and upgraded air bases, garrisons, and maritime docking facilities on mostly Arctic island territories, including Novaya Zemlya, the new Siberian Islands, Wrangel Island, and Cape Schmidt, which were amalgamated in the joint task force in October and with the most up-to-date coastal and air defence weapons system to protect these possessions.

The land component is comprised of two special Arctic brigades, the first to be combat ready in 2015, next year. That's very close. It is at the village of Alakurtti, 50 kilometres from the Finnish border. It was reopened in March as a large fleet with an intelligence unit with the strength of 3,000 specialist operators. The other is understood to be at a yet-to-be identified location in the northerly Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous District which will become ready in 2016. Work on both of these is said to be completed on a fast, non-stop basis.

The head of the National Defence Management Centre, General Mikhail Mizintsev, indicated on November 29 that the project will include 13 new upgraded airfields, air training and target areas, radar and air navigation sites, 150 northern fleet vessels, and some 1,200 units and subunits, including remote garrisons.

Russia is also expanding the Arctic special forces presence by more than 30%, with the garrisons of the revamped 61st independent naval infantry regiment stationed in the Sputnik base Pechenga inside the Arctic Circle, 10 miles from the Norwegian border and 40 miles from the Finnish border, where it will be co-located with the 200 independent infantry brigade that was reformed in May 2011.

To what extent do you agree with the assessment that Russia is not presenting any threats to the North American continent?

[Prof. Charles Doran]

First of all, I have to say that I am not an expert on Russia, but I'd like to support your remarks with two further observations.

The United States and Canada have both in the last year had smaller defence budgets for various reasons which are unique to each country. For example, we had sequestration here, which caused a reduction in military spending, while Russia increased its military spending by 18%. I said 18%.

The second thing I would say, which is congruent, I think, with your remarks, is that the Arctic is at a tipping point. We may not like this. I certainly don't. I worry a great deal about global warming, but global warming is happening at an enormously fast pace. The tipping point I'm talking about is that ExxonMobil and Rosneft, before they concluded their drilling operations, discovered the first major well with commercial deposits of oil estimated to be three-quarter billion barrels. This, in my way of thinking, is going to lead to an oil rush. With this oil rush will come much greater traffic in and out of the Arctic, not so much transiting the Arctic but in and out, all of which will require monitoring. The kind of deployments that you have described are deployments which Russia is taking very seriously because it has a long, open coastline in these areas. What in fact these deployments actually mean for the rest of us is something we have to take very seriously.

To conclude, I do not believe that we, that is Canada and the United States, or the Europeans, are taking the Arctic seriously in defence terms in the way that all of these developments suggest we should.

[Dr. Christopher Sands]

Let me just add to that very briefly. I think one of the real problems that we have is that we're spending our time between Canada and the U.S. arguing over boundary disputes in the Beaufort. We are duplicating efforts in terms of our ability to provide security in the Arctic, following President Bush's national security presidential decision directive at the very end of his administration. We're working at cross-purposes when we should be working together. It will be expensive to develop Arctic capabilities. We're going to have to move very quickly to keep pace with the Russians, and we should be doing this together, not fighting now and squandering this moment.

[Corneliu Chisu, Conservative, Pickering—Scarborough East, ON]

Thank you.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Jack Harris]

That's your time, Mr. Chisu, exactly seven minutes. Thank you.

The next questioner is Madame Michaud on behalf of the NDP.

[Élaine Michaud, NDP, Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

My thanks to the witnesses for their presentations. I will be asking my questions in French, and I hope that you will be able to hear the simultaneous interpretation properly.

My first question is about the missile defence system.

In Canada, this topic comes up from time to time. Various witnesses have talked about it in committee and have expressed differing views. One witness has told us that Canada might be able to participate in the missile defence system with the Americans without having to increase our financial or material contribution. However, other witnesses have told us that it is completely unrealistic to think that the U.S. government would agree to Canada's participation without further contribution.

Could the two witnesses tell me what they think about that?

[Dr. Christopher Sands]

Thank you very much for the question. This has been a perennial issue in the Canada-U.S. relationship. We have talked about missile defence since Ronald Reagan first proposed the idea of the strategic defence initative, and I think Canada's position has been skeptical that the technology could work.

Over time, however, the Americans have shown that they can make the technology work, not perfectly, but that ballistic missile defences are possible, and some of the arguments made against ballistic missile defences, that they may destabilize relations with other countries, have also not been proven out. Particularly as missiles are used less by Russia, and China, but more by irresponsible powers such as North Korea has become a matter of pressing concern.

What I think the problem will be is not a question of whether the U.S. would refuse Canadian participation; it's that Canada and Canadian governments, including the Chrétien government, the Martin government, even going back to the Mulroney government, have suggested that Canada might be open to some form of participation. This has led U.S. presidents and cabinet secretaries to propose formulas for Canada's participation, and each time Canada has declined ultimately to participate. That's your decision, and I think that's fine, but it will take a gesture from Canada to suggest that this time you really do want to participate, and if you do, I think you would be welcome to participate.

[Élaine Michaud, NDP, Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC]

My question was more about whether it is realistic to think that the Americans would accept Canada's participation without any additional contribution, without additional funding or material resources. That was the focus of my question.

[Charles Doran]

I would simply observe that whatever decision is made regarding Canadian participation, it is clearly a Canadian decision. That is the understanding here. There is no pressure here. There is no arm-twisting. There are preferences, perhaps, but there is nothing to try to encourage Canada to do something it doesn't want to do.

If the issue is merely—merely, I say, because we know how scarce resources are—a question of whether these funds would be available, I suspect the two governments could work out some kind of arrangement. My understanding is that the problems do not just lie with the funding issue. There is somewhat a difference of opinion with regard to how this joint effort might go forward, and even regarding the estimate of how successful BMD would be, and indeed, what the rules would be.

I would just conclude by saying what people should realize in the United States as much as in Canada is that for a very long time Canadians and Americans have shared strategic decisions to inform their respective governments of serious kinds of threats to the airspace in, as far as I can tell, a totally successful way. There doesn't seem to be much reason that this kind of cooperation and coordination would be stopped or somehow would be prevented from working in the defensive missile area if the two governments want to move in that direction.

[Élaine Michaud, NDP, Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC]

I will now turn to another topic and ask that you give me a brief answer because I don't have much time left.

We know that the U.S. government is already looking beyond fifth generation F-35 stealth fighters. They have already started working on sixth generation fighters.

What impact can that have on NORAD? In terms of harmonizing standards, what could the impact be on NORAD operations if Canada purchases F-35s or other fifth generation fighters?

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Jack Harris]

There's about a minute left.

[Dr. Christopher Sands]

If I can quickly respond, and very briefly, one of the stealth capabilities' big advantages is in more of a battlefield area. They're very important in areas like the Middle East, but in defence of the continent you don't need to be stealthy because you just need to be able to track down your opponent, so NORAD will be able to operate with fifth generation, even fourth generation planes in the air for some time while those capabilities are developed for much more hostile-fire situations where our presence would be more likely to be detected and counterbanded by forces on the ground.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Jack Harris]

You may go ahead, sir.

[Charles Doran]

Mr. Chairman, in my judgment, these planes are very fine planes and in fact have been demonstrated internationally to be wonderfully manoeuvrable and fast, and most important, they are stealthy.

There are, however, very substantial changes taking place in the technologies in these areas, for example, in terms of the ability to use firepower, but I don't think that's the central issue in the NORAD context. The purpose of these planes is first and foremost to identify and to avoid being identified by other air-breathing threats. The purpose that they were designed for seems to be one that they can fulfill very effectively.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Jack Harris]

Thank you, sir.

The next person is Madam Cheryl Gallant, on behalf of the Conservative Party.

[Cheryl Gallant, Conservative, Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, ON]

Dr. Sands, what measures should Canada be taking to defuse the threats arising from the technology that is becoming more commonplace, such as drones?

[Dr. Christopher Sands]

Thank you very much for the question.

I think the first thing that would be very important for both our governments is to develop a familiarity with the drones themselves. Canada's participation in our drone programs in Afghanistan was pretty strong. As Canadian military officials become comfortable with drones, I think that will be helpful.

Second, we are starting to see more drones in the civilian space as law enforcement uses drones to monitor situations, whether it's public protests or other things, just to get that eye in the sky that we used to use helicopters for. Being aware of that is very important.

Third, we've started to see drones that creep into airport locations, where they could pose a threat to civilian airliners. We saw an incident like that in Vancouver just last year. With those particular incidents, we'll have to think about what effective countermeasures need to be taken, and we'll have to think about domestic regulation. Should you have a licence to pilot a drone? Should you need permission to operate a drone in domestic airspace in the same way you would need a licence to fly a plane? I think we are catching up to this technology on the regulatory side, and we have a lot more to do.

[Cheryl Gallant, Conservative, Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, ON]

Dr. Sands, how would you rate the joint cooperation between our military and civilian security during a critical incident? For example, does the interoperability with respect to cybersecurity exist at the levels it should?

[Dr. Christopher Sands]

Specifically with regard to cybersecurity, the challenge is that we are usually playing defence, so we are reacting to an event. In so many of the incidents where the law enforcement and the military have had to coordinate, for example, the Vancouver Olympics, they've had the benefit of advanced planning to work through some of the issues, to war-game them, and to test procedures. However, with cybersecurity, both of us have been caught flat-footed or back-footed as we try to get involved too late, after an incursion has occurred.

This is particularly true with regard to civilian systems, such as systems of defence contractors or even public health systems that may be hacked by hackers from abroad, where we are not even monitoring what's going on there. We may be the last to know on the official side, and we need to play catch-up.

With regard to cybersecurity coordination, I think the key is for our officials on the cyber-defence side to talk to each other, do a bit more war-gaming, and try to prepare, because they are almost always going to be in that reactive mode, which I think is a disadvantage when going into a cyber-attack.

[Cheryl Gallant, Conservative, Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, ON]

You described capturing the Internet communications among terrorists, Dr. Sands. You made reference to that. ISIL is terrorism, but it's also a military issue. Should more effort and resources be put towards the monitoring of what is referred to as the deep web, the invisible web, the deep net, the dark net, the hidden part of the Internet?