I'm not terribly comfortable responding to the third question, because I don't know that I can offer up any important insights. But on the first two, I have some ideas that may be of use to the committee.
On your first question, the issue of interoperability between the Canadian Forces and other government departments is a far bigger problem than the problem of being able to operate effectively with our NATO allies. The Canadian Forces have a long tradition of conducting multinational exercises, officer exchange programs, and joint training programs, with staff officers being sent abroad to other NATO partner countries. The problem is not there. The problem is certainly in trying to find ways to improve the cultural barriers that exist between the Canadian International Development Agency, the Department of Foreign Affairs, and the Canadian Forces.
At the times we have seen in the last 20 years when those three departments have worked well together, it has been, I think all the persons involved have suggested, because of the personalities involved at the time. Those individuals managed to work well together; the departments didn't work well together because they were structurally organized that way.
The greatest barrier seems to be in their approaches to military planning and their outlook on time and space and how long it will take to deliver on any given project. The Canadian Forces are by necessity focused on being able to create plans and deliver operations on a very short turnaround. Foreign Affairs operates on a horizon wherein effects are delivered over six months, a year, or two years; CIDA certainly over many decades.
I suppose the only one of those three organizations that has sufficient size to be able to send its senior officials on a focused and organized professional development program is the Canadian Forces.