Evidence of meeting #58 for National Defence in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was sanctions.
A recording is available from Parliament.
1:45 p.m.
Liberal
Yves Robillard Liberal Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC
Thank you.
I will share my time with my colleague Mr. Gerretsen.
1:45 p.m.
Liberal
1:45 p.m.
Liberal
Mark Gerretsen Liberal Kingston and the Islands, ON
Mr. Byers, in response to a question from Mr. Garrison, you said that signing on to BMD would be a signal that we're losing our ability to use diplomacy.
I'm curious to see if you can expand on that. BMD is a program about defence. How can preparing yourself to defend your country be seen as an aggressive tactic? It would be one thing if we were engaged in offensive behaviour, but we're talking about defending our country. We're not talking about being aggressive.
1:45 p.m.
Professor, Department of Political Science, University of British Columbia, As an Individual
I can't put myself in the mind of the North Korean leadership any better than you can. What I can say is that they are likely following developments very closely, including testimony from this committee, and they would be aware that Canada has a somewhat different posture. We chose not to have nuclear weapons. We chose not to have ICBMs. We chose not to have that capacity to strike at countries such as North Korea—
1:45 p.m.
Liberal
1:45 p.m.
Professor, Department of Political Science, University of British Columbia, As an Individual
We can choose to defend ourselves, absolutely, but we would be choosing to defend ourselves by buying into and joining a weapon system that is primarily controlled by their arch-enemy. It's a U.S. weapon system. Yes, it is for striking warheads coming at them, but it is still a weapon system.
1:45 p.m.
Liberal
Mark Gerretsen Liberal Kingston and the Islands, ON
Okay. I appreciate that.
Earlier this morning during the discussion—I believe you were in the room—there was another exchange when Mr. Garrison was asking questions about whether or not the United States would respond on our behalf. I think a number of people asked the question and continued to push the point by saying, “But wouldn't they respond?” and “Surely, they would respond.” Of course, the folks who were sitting here before really do not have the capacity to weigh in on rhetorical questions like that.
At what point, in making these assertions that you are relying on somebody else to respond, do you start to lose your sovereignty and your autonomy? Your whole argument is to say “don't worry” because somebody else will take care of it, but aren't you basically giving up your sovereignty by doing that?
1:50 p.m.
Professor, Department of Political Science, University of British Columbia, As an Individual
During the Cold War, did we give up our sovereignty by allowing decision-making on nuclear deterrence to rest with the United States instead of Canada? I don't think so. We participated in the gathering of surveillance through NORAD.
Right now, we're in a situation where the question—a hypothetical question, because the United States hasn't asked us—is whether we're going to join in their weapon system. The last time we came this close to having a discussion like this was when we accepted U.S. nuclear warheads on Canadian soil, which would probably have been put on Canadian missiles in the event of a breaking out of war—
1:50 p.m.
Liberal
1:50 p.m.
Professor, Department of Political Science, University of British Columbia, As an Individual
This is a U.S. weapon system. It's a step beyond what we've done before.
1:50 p.m.
Liberal
Mark Gerretsen Liberal Kingston and the Islands, ON
I appreciate that, but I'm really limited on time.
Would you agree, at least generally or philosophically speaking, that if you are depending on somebody else to respond on your behalf, you're essentially giving away your sovereignty?
1:50 p.m.
Professor, Department of Political Science, University of British Columbia, As an Individual
We depend on other countries all of the time, right? We go to Afghanistan and we're getting air cover from the U.S. Air Force. We depend on other countries all the time. That's the whole point of being in an alliance—
1:50 p.m.
Professor, Department of Political Science, University of British Columbia, As an Individual
Well, we work with the—
1:50 p.m.
Liberal
Mark Gerretsen Liberal Kingston and the Islands, ON
That's in a joint operation when we're somewhere else—
1:50 p.m.
Professor, Department of Political Science, University of British Columbia, As an Individual
Even here, we're part of the Five Eyes system for intelligence sharing. That's protection of North America. We rely on other countries all the time.
1:50 p.m.
Liberal
Mark Gerretsen Liberal Kingston and the Islands, ON
The difference is that we're not in an agreement with the U.S. that they would take care of us. We're just assuming they would. That's the difference. In every other example that you're using, you were in an alliance, and people are assuming that when they make these assertions. I'm not weighing in one way or the other. All I'm trying to get at is, do you see it as a concern with respect to our sovereignty?
1:50 p.m.
Professor, Department of Political Science, University of British Columbia, As an Individual
What I heard this morning was that the United States has told us that we would not be involved in the decision-making. They have not explicitly said that they would not strike at a missile coming towards Canada, if one were in fact coming towards Canada, which is unlikely, given that North Korea doesn't regard us as a threat.
Yes, you can run down every single hypothetical, and if you had an unlimited defence budget and the desire for perfect protection, you could go there, but this sort of question should be part of a discussion with the United States. You're just hypothesizing. I'm hypothesizing, right? We don't know what the U.S. position would be—
1:50 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Stephen Fuhr
I'm going to have to kibosh the hypothesizing for now and give the floor to Ms. Alleslev, who can continue that, if she wishes.
1:50 p.m.
Liberal
Leona Alleslev Liberal Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, ON
Thank you very much, and thanks to you guys for being here and giving us such a broad perspective.
I'd like to return to the conversation on diplomacy. We've talked about what the potential cost of diplomacy might be in terms of becoming engaged in missile defence. What would the cost be of not being involved in diplomacy, pragmatic security, and economic and other relationships?
Mr. Robertson.
1:50 p.m.
Vice-President and Fellow, Canadian Global Affairs Institute, As an Individual
Right now, I'd say on diplomacy that you would have the current situation, where we do not really have a relationship with North Korea. If we were to change the policy, it would involve probably more frequent trips by our ambassador. It's not that far up to Pyongyang, so the cost would be marginal, but at least we would have Canadian eyes on the situation and would be able to bring a Canadian perspective to the table, and potentially—but I would say it is a very limited potential—might be able to be helpful in an instance.
Dr. Byers has talked about the relationship with China. That's all true. I think that's correct, but you have to be able to be there first. I might say that first we would have to change the current policy so that we had greater engagement for Canadian interests. We're not doing this for the United States. We're doing this because there are Canadian interests at stake, just as recently, for example, our national security adviser went to help secure the exit of Pastor Lim. There potentially will be other situations—
1:50 p.m.
Liberal
Leona Alleslev Liberal Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, ON
That's from one aspect. What I mean, though, is that we've made the decision at this point to not be involved in ballistic missile defence. Is there a cost to Canada for not being involved in it, and what is that?
1:50 p.m.
Vice-President and Fellow, Canadian Global Affairs Institute, As an Individual
In terms of the relationship with the United States or others? No, I don't think so.
1:50 p.m.
Liberal