National Defence Committee on Nov. 6th, 2017

[Jazlyn Melnychuk, Student, Simon Fraser University, As an Individual]

Hi. My name is Jazlyn Melnychuk, and I'm a political science student here at SFU.

Just on that note, it is a very interesting point, and I think an important point because if this weren't the case, then Russia wouldn't be spending so much effort on actually countering allies within...and the west in terms of its foundation and its values.

That brings me to a point about strategic communications, which actually hasn't been raised yet. I think that's a key aspect, especially with Canadian troops that are deployed in Latvia. There is a great effort on Russia's part to spread misinformation about what NATO allies are doing there, and in particular what Canada is doing there, what the forces are doing.

I actually see RT sources coming up on my Facebook feed, even though I have no mention of that whatsoever. You actually [Technical difficulty—Editor] the smallest aspects of Canadian students. It may start with something relatable, like a viral video, and then goes on to spreading misinformation once you've caught their attention.

I think it's important that Canada actually puts some focus on [Technical difficulty—Editor].

[Darren Fisher, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Thank you for that.

Professor Moens, you mentioned that after the fall of the U.S.S.R., NATO continued. But did they continue, or were they merely a shell of...? There was a shrinking of NATO spending by all the countries, for the most part, with the exception of maybe the Americans.

Did they really continue, or did they continue in name only?

[Dr. Alexander Moens]

They continued in their political dimension. They continued in their political will, but they ended up doing what NATO calls “crisis management” operations—problems outside of Europe, often, for which the United Nations was looking for capability and a group of experienced countries to work together.

That's how you have NATO coming alongside the United Nations to help resolve problems. For example, for NATO officers in Rome, this is what is trained in their major exercise: how to learn to work with the United Nations and to merge the objectives of the United Nations with the capabilities of the alliance.

[Darren Fisher, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Chair, if I have any time left, I'll pass it on to Ms. Alleslev.

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

Ms. Alleslev can have a little more than 30 seconds.

[Leona Alleslev, Liberal, Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, ON]

I just want to ask the students, when you tell your friends that you're studying NATO, what do they say? Do they go, “Oh, yeah, cool, we know exactly what that is”, or not so much?

[Peter James Mckenzie Rautenbach, Student, Simon Fraser University, As an Individual]

My name is Peter. I'm also a political science student here at SFU.

They tend to know what it is, but there's this sort of.... It's not apathy with NATO, but there's just a general feeling, because there's this military and political aspect to it and Canada has sort of a peacekeeping mantra—which is a great thing to have—it just has this negative vibe. There's not even necessarily a real thought on it; it's just an initial rapprochement to the topic.

Now, everyone does think it's very cool that we have this great field school. It's a great thing to do and everyone wants to be part of it. But as far as NATO goes as an institution, there's just a push-back because of the military aspect.

[Jazlyn Melnychuk]

I can't overemphasize how important it is to have that direct contact. I have students coming to me actually advocating, “We're threatening Russia's buffer zone. That's their sphere of influence.” That would be shocking, coming from us, so I think it's really important to spread the message to students.

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

Rachel Blaney, welcome.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Thank you.

I thank you all for being here today.

Mr. Baines, perhaps I could have a bit of a conversation with you. I have the honour of representing 19 Wing Comox in my riding. I have had some very close-up experiences understanding the work done by the people I represent, but I find it a very big challenge to talk to a lot of everyday Canadians in my riding about the purpose of NATO and what our military is about. I find myself explaining things that I never thought I would have to explain.

The other thing I am happy to do is be part of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly. I find that I've learned a lot more that I get to come back and share with my constituents, but that's one constituency. From your perspective, is the NATO Parliamentary Assembly being used well? What else could we do to educate Canadians?

[Robert Baines]

I've had the pleasure in the past seven months of working very closely with the parliamentary association. Specifically, Leona Alleslev has been very supportive. I think there is a lot of room to make this into a very impressive and almost catalytic organization, especially with the 2018 Halifax summit or parliamentary meeting, as I guess it is.

If we're going to be bringing students from all over the alliance to this meeting in Halifax in November of 2018, it's a great opportunity for us to use the field school at SFU. I know that Calgary has a lot of interested students. Carleton University has some, and so does Université de Montréal. Getting all of these students to come here, perhaps with some kind of a remit to spread the message of the NATO Parliamentary Association and NATO generally, is how you utilize and leverage social media.

I'm not sure if any of you have been involved with the ice bucket challenge or anything like that. You create content, and you get the people who are involved with it to start creating messages for you. That's one of the things the NATO association really wants to do moving forward.

I'm hoping to—

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

I appreciate bringing in students. I think that's really important, but when you spoke, you talked about the biggest gap being with women, young people under 30, and people who are not university educated. How are we going to use this tool to reach out to those communities?

[Robert Baines]

By getting them to understand that we can associate NATO with peace as opposed to bombs. Honestly, it's the simplest message. I've seen, all over Toronto in the past 20 years, posters every once in a while that say NATO equals bombs, which is the strangest thing, but I think it's a legacy of the Yugoslavia campaign. Advertising works. If you see something enough, it starts to sink in.

Really, all we have to do is turn it around to at least begin to have a conversation. “Oh, but I thought it wasn't. I thought it was all about war, and I thought it was about military.” If you can actually start explaining it in The Three Musketeers way, “One for all, all for one”—just those simple messages—that's how you're going to raise consciousness about security.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

That was our formal round of questioning. We have time left, and very predictably, I will divide that time equally amongst the three parties. We will go for five-minute questions with the Liberals, Conservatives, and NDP.

I'm going to give the floor to Mr. Robillard.

You have the floor for the first question.

[Yves Robillard, Liberal, Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'd like you, as president and chief executive officer of the NATO Association of Canada, to tell us more about NATO's role in the Middle East.

What is the extent of NATO's involvement in the region, including North Africa?

Also, what measures has NATO taken to support anti-terrorism efforts by the Global Coalition against Daesh? How does Canada's contribution stack up against that of our other NATO partners?

Lastly, how do we communicate that information to our youth?

[Robert Baines]

There are a couple of points here.

Number one, I am not an expert on the disposition of NATO forces. Perhaps one of the other professors might be able to give a hand on that as far as troop numbers are concerned, but the Middle East and north Africa are very important to NATO. They are part of what's called the Mediterranean dialogue. They have always had representation at the NATO table. This is one of the tremendous values of NATO. It sees itself as a hub for discussion and for collaboration, no matter if participants are official members of the club, as it were, or not. NATO has always kept the lines of communication open—since 1994, I believe—specifically for some of the Middle Eastern dialogue countries.

You heard me mention projected security a few moments ago. What NATO is really trying to do at this point is to take a look at the migration crisis that is occurring all around the Mediterranean. They are taking a look at some of the regimes that are having a lot of trouble maintaining simple civil society through their security services, and they are trying to see how they can make sure that these do not escalate.

This could be an absolute tragedy. It already has been in Syria, but it could be very easily a tragedy in many of the other Mediterranean dialogue countries. I think that is what NATO is trying to do there.

How we can communicate that is a much more tricky situation as far as what our impact is. We won't be able to tell for some time. We could be training hundreds and hundreds of security personnel such as police or emergency services in Iraq, for instance, and things can still go south. It's very difficult.

We can show how we are participating with, say, individual stories of what we're doing and the individuals we have helped, but in the long run, showing how that's going to impact global peace is always a much more challenging situation.

[Yves Robillard, Liberal, Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

There are still a couple of minutes left, Ms. Alleslev, if you wanted to jump in.

[Leona Alleslev, Liberal, Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, ON]

I'd like to talk about money. I'd like to talk about how this communication mechanism can be funded. Do you currently receive funding for these education...? Talk to me about that.

[Dr. Alexander Moens]

I would like to say something about that. I believe it's very important for the Government of Canada to be involved, particularly the Department of National Defence to be involved, in creating opportunities for young Canadians, and diverse Canadians, to learn what this alliance means and its co-operation with United Nations. I think there is a fantastic opportunity for those branches within the Department of National Defence to assist in these programs so that Canadians have an opportunity, because the costs are enormous, to go through this learning experience.

[Leona Alleslev, Liberal, Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, ON]

Dr. Huebert.

[Dr. Robert Huebert]

One of the programs that used to have tremendous impact in allowing us to reach students was called the security and defence forum. It was created under the Pierre Trudeau administration and subsequently supported on a bipartisan basis. This was a five-year program from DND, with relatively small amounts of money from their perspective, big from our perspective, and this allowed the 13 to 14 universities across Canada to maintain programs that were dealing with this. It was reduced to the point that it was effectively cut. The new Liberal policy says that it's going to be somehow reinstituted.

I'd like to follow with what Alex was saying and make a plea saying it's relatively small amounts of money, but if monies can be provided, we are one of the sources that can actually engage and provide for that education.

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

That's our time. I'm going to give the floor to Mr. Bezan.

[James Bezan, Conservative, Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman, MB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'm going to pass my time on down to Ms. Gallant.