Thanks very much.
I have not looked at the 2001 paper; I've seen the papers basically from 2005 and onward with regard to the next generation fighter capability, the replacement of the CF-18. I always remark that the kind of discourse, discussion, and debate that's going on now, we actually went through in the 1970s and early 1980s, as we procured the CF-18.
The real issue at hand is whether Canada needs a manned fighter between now and 2050. That's really what we're talking about, and from my view as the Chief of Defence Staff, we do need a manned fighter for the next few decades.
With regard to whether we should have a UAV, an unmanned aerial vehicle that could do the same thing, and go down that path and get an unmanned aerial vehicle to be the next generation fighter, someone said to me that the day we can all go down to the Ottawa airport and get on a commercial airliner that is a UAV and feel comfortable about from flying to A to B, then we're ready for it. Unless we're ready to get into an unmanned aerial airliner, we should invest in a manned fighter. As we look to everything out there right now, we need to be able to cover the sovereignty of Canada, because, like every other operation I've seen in my career, the future is unpredictable—totally unpredictable.
I can remember when I was the director of operations in 1999. My first day of work was the November 23, 1999. I had just returned home from Bosnia, and my predecessor gave me keys to the room and said, "Things should be quiet today. Don't worry about it." By the end of that day we were dropping bombs in Kosovo with our F-18 aircraft—again in support of both a UN and a NATO mandate.
With regard to this Libya mission that just occurred, this past January I was in Brussels at a NATO chiefs of defence conference, and we were meeting with all of our Mediterranean colleagues. The meeting, frankly, was pretty quiet because not much was happening in the Mediterranean.