Strangely enough, I want to follow on with Mr. Bezan's concern, because this is where the rubber hits the road.
Admiral Robertson, I want to go back to your original remarks about the budget. The Conservative Party just released a paper that says that in order to create a stable, predictable, long-term budget for the Canadian Armed Forces, the ultimate goal being meeting NATO standards, it would take a minimum of 2% of GDP. There's not really much to disagree with in their paper.
The problem, as I see it, is that if in fact you are to meet your 2% standard within a decade, that's about a $2-billion or $3-billion increase in the budget on an annual basis. If you say that publicly, then you hear this gagging sound on the part of the Canadian public, and that gagging sound is reflected in their politicians.
I would be interested in your thoughts as to how to get beyond the “we want to matter” rhetoric, “showing up when we show up” sort of thing, and how to convince, if you will, the Canadian public, and therefore the people who will vote on the budget, to get past this stall point? We are in a genteel decline, as we speak, given the current budget parameters, even with the escalator. It's just a glorified way of covering off inflation, military inflation, for the time being.
I would be interested in your thoughts with respect to getting off this dialogue of the deaf.