Mr. Chair and members of Parliament, thank you very much for the invitation this morning.
It's my distinct pleasure to address you and provide our views on threats to North America. I'm glad to be sitting here with my confreres to help you in your deliberations and study of this very important topic.
Before I talk about possible threats to Canada, as we see them, I would like to provide some background to my role as Chief Defence Intelligence and Commander of Canadian Armed Forces Intelligence Command. My team's role consists in helping the Department of National Defence and the Canadian Armed Forces make sound decisions in the exercise of their duties. Whether conducting operations in the Arctic, providing support to the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Games, responding to a terrorist threat, or carrying out oversees operations, the Canadian Armed Forces have need of the most accurate and up-to-date intelligence in order to achieve their military objectives and ensure the security and protection of their personnel.
Defence intelligence is also a key element in the ability of the Government of Canada to make informed decisions on defence issues, national security and foreign affairs. In carrying out our mandate, I can say with pride that our intelligence capability is world-class and offers the necessary tools—24 hours a day, 365 days a year—to give our leaders an intelligence advantage. Allow me to repeat that intelligence is the main factor in operational success.
Canada's defence intelligence relationship with the U.S. is one of the most important of our international defence partnerships. It is a long-standing relationship dating back to the Second World War and reinforced over the years through our binational command at NORAD, our partnership in NATO, and our participation in coalition operations like in the Balkans or Afghanistan.
A permanent liaison office in Washington manages the relationship for me. There are Canadian defence intelligence liaison and exchange personnel positioned in all the main agencies, components, and commands of the U.S. defence intelligence community.
I should also note here that we benefit from productive relationships with our national partners. You, and the Canadians whom you represent, may be certain that your intelligence organizations are promoting the interests of this country in the areas of defence and security.
Now I shall turn to the subject at hand, threats to North America.
Over the past year you have visited several defence-related locations, and I know that you plan to visit several more. I appreciate the opportunity to help situate the committee and your subsequent report in relation to what we see as the current threat environment. I focus the vast majority of my energy on foreign military threats and support to CF operations abroad.
We define threat as a combination of intent and capabilities. Having the desire to harm Canada but no capability to do so does not represent a threat from an entity. Once it has discerned the intent of a foreign actor to harm Canada, the intelligence apparatus will have as its job to track any advancement in capabilities and recognize when that entity becomes a threat.
Tracking or predicting changes in capabilities is sometimes challenging, but usually possible within a reasonable margin of error. Gauging current and evolving intent is more complicated, but still possible. Predicting future intent and staking one's security only on that prediction is highly risky. Whereas a state may not exhibit hostility while it is developing a capability, once acquired, that capability remains in its arsenal whatever changes happen in its political calculus and intent.
With that definition in mind, I can say that at this time we do not see a state actor that has both the capabilities and the intent to harm Canada militarily. We view the proliferation and potential use of weapons of mass destruction, including chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear and ballistic missiles against the North American continent, as worrisome. Such states of key concern as Iran and North Korea will likely continue in their attempts to acquire, develop, and improve weapons of mass destruction and the ballistic missiles capable of delivering them.
The dual-use nature of most biological and chemical-related technologies makes monitoring warfare programs and procurement involving these materials difficult. Furthermore, the ostensible civilian application of nuclear technology can mask its military application or intention.
Weapons of mass destruction attacks against North America could take many forms, including covert or non-traditional delivery, such as aircraft or vehicles by either states or non-state actors. It is important to note, however, we assess that only states could master the complexities of ballistic missile delivery systems.
In the case of lran, its current missile arsenal lacks the range and complexity to strike targets within North America. On the other hand, North Korea has expressly indicated that it wants to be able to target North America with its nuclear armed missiles. While it is actively developing ballistic missiles that could potentially reach North America, whether or not they have developed a practical nuclear weapon remains unclear.
My two areas of interest as CDI with regard to the cyber environment are the threats that affect the ability of the Canadian armed forces to operate and the cyber capabilities of foreign military actors. As mentioned earlier, the bigger picture of cyber threats, i.e., threats against Canada in general and threats emanating from non-military actors, are the purview of the Department of Public Safety.
The potential exists for foreign states to employ computer network exploitation capabilities in support of strategic intelligence collection. To be clear, they're using computers to spy on Canada. They may also use network reconnaissance in support of planned or anticipated computer network attacks, that is, looking at our computer system so that at the moment we would be defending ourselves or attacking, they would do a cyberattack, thereby rendering our command and control systems inoperable so that we cannot use the Canadian armed forces in an effective way. Also, they may use network attacks against private and government data and communications networks on which we rely. As CDI, we'd be interested in all such attacks, because they affect the ability of the Canadian armed forces to operate.
Mr. Chair, this concludes my presentation. Thank you very much for the opportunity. I look forward very much to answering your questions.