Thank you, Chair and members of the committee, for the invitation to appear.
I will deliver my remarks in English, but I can answer questions in both official languages.
I won't belabour points that have already been made effectively by several other expert witnesses on this committee, but I do want to amplify what I see as a pretty broad consensus within the expert community. The Indo-Pacific strategy already gets a lot of things right when it comes to increasing Canadian presence, and beginning to overcome our capacity, reputational and knowledge deficits in and on the region. This includes, of course, putting additional resources where our mouth is. It should be clear to this committee that the core objectives of the strategy cannot reasonably be expected to be met within a five-year period, but this first phase has no doubt moved the needle in the right direction on balance.
Still, there remains significant room for improvement of what needs to be, in my view, a flexible approach that not only sends a coherent message but also allows breathing room to adjust over time. I want to make two key points here that can hopefully inform this next phase.
The first one is that we should keep calm and carry on when it comes to more win-win, co-operative aspects of the Indo-Pacific strategy, particularly when it comes to our successes in security-focused initiatives, where we can actually make a difference, have added value to offer and can meet regional demand. Key examples for me include dark vessel detection, maritime domain awareness, combatting illegal and unregulated fishing, disaster relief, non-proliferation, countering violent extremism, capacity-building in peacekeeping, and conflict mediation, among others.
These are issue areas that have received far less attention than clean energy, technology, supply chains, food security or critical minerals, yet this is also where we've been able to contribute in very concrete and, I would add, more sustainable ways. This is also where we can better align the IPS with the comprehensive approach of our regional partners on national and regional security, cutting across those unhelpful divides among security, the economy and, I would add, social development.
These contributions may not make as great a headline or a photo op as Operation Horizon—although they could, with a little more effort—but they have way more impact than we think in the long term, not only for people's lives but also for the Canadian brand, and in a much more cost-effective way. In this context, I feel strongly that Canada's support for ongoing regional efforts associated with, for instance, the implementation of the women, peace and security agenda in the region should not be downgraded but instead carry over this next phase.
The second point I wish to make is that there is, in my view, some room for adjustment in the more zero-sum dimensions of the Indo-Pacific strategy, particularly when it comes to mitigating some of the effects of China's rise that may conflict with Canadian interests or values and with those of our key allies and partners. Obviously, this is where the most substantial change, from the initial formulation of the IPS to whatever phase 2.0 is going to look like, needs to happen. Also, of course, this is against the backdrop of our evolving relationship with the United States and the broader moment we find ourselves in.
Ultimately, as others have suggested, this is really about the way we approach like-mindedness in a broader sense. A value-informed, pragmatic approach to like-mindedness requires more than just categorizing each country as like or unlike overall, of course. It should also be more than adjusting that distinction to specific issue areas.
What we actually need to be doing is looking at what specific aspects of a country's behaviour within each particular issue area align or clash with our interests and values, and to what extent, and then locating where it makes sense for Canada to draw the line by coordinating with others. Describing China as an increasingly disruptive power then and as a strategic partner now creates confusion on the part of our partners that our foreign service is now painstakingly trying to clear up. That's only because we came out with that kind of oversimplistic labelling in the first place to speak to a very particular low moment in the relationship, and now we have to adjust to reality.