National Defence committee  Absolutely.

National Defence committee  It's only a decision that can be made after discussing with our allies, because if the United States tells us that they will take care of the sea lanes, and that therefore it would be much more helpful for them, when they're doing that role, if we took care of the Arctic, then yo

National Defence committee  I am very strongly of the view that we should preserve the crown's prerogative to deploy the military without necessarily having the approval of the House of Commons. That being said, there is the question of what role the House of Commons does have in debating these missions an

National Defence committee  I'll begin the comment by noting the following. One of the reasons Canada has weathered this economic crisis better than other countries is because in the 1990s severe cuts were brought to federal government spending. One of the results of that was that the amount of money spent

National Defence committee  No. To my mind, it's a policy question. If the government chooses to have a more ambitious defence policy—

National Defence committee  My view is that the current level of spending is sufficient, provided that we undertake a serious consideration of smart defence, and that we work with our allies. I don't believe.... As a number of you in the room know, we are not going to be spending all that much more on defen

National Defence committee  The first point to make is that capability is not simply equipment, it's also people. One capability we're honing now is the ability to train local allies, as we're doing in Afghanistan. When we speak about conflict prevention, as we look to the future one thing that seems clea

National Defence committee  You are absolutely right. That is what concerns me. The time to talk about smart defence is now. As you said, procurement contracts are just getting under way. We have not yet signed any major contracts for the fleet or the F-35s. Right now, we are thinking about acquiring new ar

National Defence committee  That is precisely the reason why NATO's Secretary General is telling us what an urgent priority this is. He recognizes that NATO's defence budgets are going to shrink. He knows that, and as the secretary general, he is concerned. NATO's operational capability in the decades ahead

National Defence committee  That might indeed be the case, but it's a discussion that we must have with our allies. We could learn that they would be in favour of making the Arctic our area of concern and having us protect the region on their behalf. If we work alongside the Danish, the Americans and others

National Defence committee  We are already seeing Great Britain and France slowly beginning to share certain resources, particularly when it comes to naval capacity. Those countries recognize that they can no longer afford, on their own, all the resources they would like. What's more, the U.S. has already s

National Defence committee  It is enough to protect Canada, and only Canada. That would not necessarily be enough to undertake a major overseas operation. So that is where the question comes into play. It all depends on how ambitious we want to be.

National Defence committee  That is an interesting argument, when you consider that the U.S. was spending 4% of its GNP on national defence but was still unable to protect itself from the attack. So you can't draw a direct link between military spending and a country's ability to deal with all possible th

National Defence committee  I don't think we should have offensive cyberwarfare capability. We have to eliminate that from the outset. That being said, this is a responsibility that, by its very nature, requires cooperation among Public Safety Canada, Transport Canada, Industry Canada and the Canadian Force

National Defence committee  I am always a bit leery about setting up new agencies or new commands. I would say it is preferable to start by creating an advisor position at the Privy Council Office. If it subsequently comes to light that we need a new structure in place to adequately protect our networks and