National Defence Committee on April 14th, 2016

[LGen Michael Hood]

I don't know the source of your information on directed landing, but I can tell you there was one case with a Korean airliner on April 11, 2012, where there was a bomb threat on board that aircraft. That aircraft was met by a NORAD response, which happened to be U.S. F-15s out of Washington state. It was escorted and landed in Comox. That's the only one that I'm aware of, so you'd have to provide me more specificity.

We train for Operation Noble Eagle weekly. I have been in scenarios, and there are public office holders in government who have trained on these scenarios as well, because we could conceivably make a recommendation to government to shoot down an aircraft. We train regularly with our U.S. counterparts that I'm involved with. I would say, from an aerial perspective of domestic terrorism, we take that into account. Our F-18s will be part of that response, but NORAD has other tools in place.

I don't have an assessment of domestic terrorists as our largest threat. When I think of threats—and I tend to look at existential ones above that—I don't see that as the largest threat. I see the threat of the business that I'm in, and that's responding in support of Canadian sovereignty.

The domestic threat piece is not unique to Canadian Armed Forces. It's a law enforcement responsibility, by and large.

[Sven Spengemann, Liberal, Mississauga—Lakeshore, ON]

General, how would that threat assessment work its way up into the air force? Would you make your own independent threat assessments of a shifting environment, or would you take it from the Canadian Forces as a whole, or with our U.S. partners?

[LGen Michael Hood]

I think within the armed forces, we have an agreement on the future security environment.

How threats are seen through lenses is essentially a government decision that comes through. I gave you my view of how I saw the threats. If you were to have the national security adviser here, or the Minister of Public Safety, you would perhaps have a different view of that threat than I do, but we all contribute. Those threats are assessed, and those are the tasks that fall to us from that broad assessment.

[Sven Spengemann, Liberal, Mississauga—Lakeshore, ON]

It's fair to say that with a shifting threat assessment you have lots of capacity to move air assets, as you've already said to my colleagues.

[LGen Michael Hood]

I think so, but it's not limitless, as you point out. If we got to a situation where we would want F-18 CAPs flying over one of our major cities, that would take a much larger investment in the RCAF than presently exists.

[Sven Spengemann, Liberal, Mississauga—Lakeshore, ON]

Could you elaborate quickly on the changing risk and threat assessment in the Arctic, with the seaways opening up and lots of interest in our resources? You made reference to the oil platform. If somebody puts up an oil platform and starts drilling, is that a common threat? Is that seen as a common threat to Canada and the U.S., or are we on our own?

[LGen Michael Hood]

No. I mean that's a Canadian sovereign issue to deal with undoubtedly. That's not part of NORAD's mandate right now.

NORAD has maritime warning and North American aerospace defence. Those are some sovereign issues. What we have to think about when we're buying platforms, or configuring the armed forces, is that it's not worth just thinking about the threats of today. My number one job is to build the air force of 2030, because I can't change anything between now and the next five years. We can reconfigure, but we're going to deal with a situation in this country with the air force that we have right now in the next five years. We're not agile enough to acquire a new fleet. We may be able to bring in a new weapons system over a few months' period, but when I look at 2030, and I look at the broad range of threats that could be, we have to be ready. That's why there are important decisions to be made.

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

Thank you for that.

Mr. Garrison.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

We have heard the term “interoperability” used a lot today. I would say that usually means with the United States, as our main ally, and it usually doesn't mean with our other allies. I have a question about the balance between the interoperability and maintaining Canada's independent capacities.

We had the example of a Polaris refuelling aircraft this morning. Truthfully right now we're dependent on the U.S. to refuel in North America in the air. Right?

[LGen Michael Hood]

No, not completely. I was using the example that on a NORAD standby posture right now there's always a couple of U.S....quite often we have a tanker, a C-130, out of Winnipeg that's available. To get to your point, interoperability is important, and with the U.S. in particular, because of our NORAD role, which is pre-eminent, in my view.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

I guess my concern would still be if that we overemphasize interoperability at the expense of independent capacity, we may come to times when we perceive a threat to Canadian sovereignty that the U.S. doesn't perceive as a joint threat. Do our agreements for co-operation cover those cases where we perceive the threat to Canada alone? Or are they predicated on it being perceived as a joint threat?

[LGen Michael Hood]

I think that if there were a uniquely Canadian view on a threat to Canadian sovereignty, it would be up to Canada to decide how it would be addressed.

Let's talk about a navigable Northwest Passage, for example, which the Americans don't recognize. How are we going to posture uniquely to surveil and to act? Those are uniquely Canadian decisions.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

Right.

[LGen Michael Hood]

With respect to air forces, there are very few air forces that have all the capabilities you would need to prosecute very complex scenarios. That's why we're so embedded with our closest allies, the Five Eyes, which I know you're familiar with.

For Canada—and this has been since the beginning of NORAD—being interoperable with the U.S. Air Force is number one. We continue to operate with the United Kingdom and with France, but if I were to invest anything, it would be with the U.S.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

You went exactly where I was going to go: the Northwest Passage and the United States not recognizing that. I'm still going to restate the question. Do our co-operation agreements with the United States apply when it's not considered a joint threat to the sovereignty or the safety of the U.S.?

[Brigadier-General Todd Balfe, Director General, Air Readiness, Royal Canadian Air Force, Department of National Defence]

If I could answer that one, sir, you could give your voice a rest.

I've done two tours with NORAD, so I'm intimately familiar with it, and I was the deputy commander of the Alaskan NORAD region, just to show the bi-nationality of the arrangement. There is nothing in the NORAD agreement, for example, that precludes sovereign action. The joint action is by design in the agreement; however, Canada can act in whatever capacity Canada wants to, as can the U.S. in the exact same circumstances.

To give one more example of that, with Operation Noble Eagle in terms of the directed landing piece and the ability to do shoot-downs, that's a sovereign decision. It's usually in the NORAD architecture to enable sovereign decision-makers to make sovereign decisions.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

The co-operation applies, then, even if Canada makes a unilateral decision?

[BGen Todd Balfe]

It can apply. You can use the architecture if the country decides to do so.

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

That's the 10 minutes. We're going to go to a free round. I have a lot of questions, and I'm going to take one.

I wasn't going to ask about this, but based on what we heard today, I'm going to throw it out there. I want to talk about the engine situation, very quickly. I think most people would agree that for modern engines on airplanes the probability of engine failure is greatly reduced. I think it's safe to say that's the case.

I think we might be a little too dismissive with regard to technology. I'm going to make a couple of statements, and I want to get some feedback. The newest airplanes being built in other countries right now as far as fighter airplanes go, in Russia and China with the PAK FA, the J-31, and the J-20, are all two-engine airplanes. They have the latest technology and they're moving forward. They're not building single-engine airplanes; they're building two-engine airplanes.

In Bagotville in 2008, as was mentioned earlier, we did deploy to Alaska to cover off when the entire fleet of F-15s was grounded. Certainly CONAR could have covered that; they have F-16 assets, more than we could ever imagine. NORAD chose to take those resources from Bagotville and put them in Alaska. We demonstrated incredible flexibility in doing that, but CONAR could have done it with F-16s, and they made a conscious decision not to do that.

The F-35 has had an engine failure already and actually has burned to the ground. The A380 airplane is brand new, with a Trent 700 engine, and it has failed.

I was talking to Billie Flynn recently, who said—he's not DND but Lockheed Martin—that the airplanes going into Eielson, as originally announced, won't be participating with NORAD, not today, although that may change in the future.

All that said, the probability of engine failure in a single-engine airplane is greatly reduced. If it fails, the outcome for a pilot in the Canadian north will be catastrophic. I've been up there. Mr. Balfe's been up there. I would like some reaction to that. In light of the fact that the newest airplanes being built on the fifth-generation side are all two-engine planes, I'd like you to respond to that.

[LGen Michael Hood]

In correction, Mr. Chair, to your last point, the newest fifth-generation aircraft has only one engine on it.

The facts state themselves. Since 1991, the U.S. has not had engine failure on a single-engine F-16. The technology of where we're at... It's our considered opinion, notwithstanding your comments, that the decision to deploy the F-18s in NORAD had nothing to do with one or two engines, I suspect, but I could perhaps look and get that answer to you. The fact of the matter is that most of the U.S. F-16s are not involved in NORAD. Even in the south they use other aircraft for it, so I suspect they're using NORAD assets in replacing that.

The facts stand for themselves about engine reliability with one-engine aircraft, so I have no reason to ever say that I would require that replacement to have two engines, because I can't. And as I said to you, that was not a mandatory requirement in the initial F-18 competition in 1981. It may well be a rated requirement. Perhaps we'll have a requirement that says that if you have two engines, you'll get more points, but on the basis of the facts as they stand right now, I wouldn't support that position.

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

Okay, yes, and I'm not suggesting I know the answer to the Bagotville deployment; I don't. I'm just saying that did happen, and CONAR does have the resources to cover it.

But with regard to the other statements, the PAK FA is a real airplane. It's flying and so are some of the other Chinese ones, and they do have two engines.

[LGen Michael Hood]

Yes, I'm not familiar with the reasons behind the one or two engines that they've chosen. In fact, Chinese mostly use Russian technology in their engines. It's not an independent capability that they've been very successful at, but I suspect that's only a matter of time. Why they chose the two-engine aircraft over one is immaterial to our decision moving forward, quite frankly.

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

Right, and again, I'm just suggesting that the probability is greatly reduced, I agree, but the outcome, should it occur, is catastrophic in the Canadian north, given our territory and our inability to put search and rescue resources everywhere we need to be in a timely fashion, given the inclement conditions that we experience in the north, which is probably where we're going to be spending a large part of our time in the next 50 or 60 years.

The next questions go to Mr. Paul-Hus. You have the floor.

[Pierre Paul-Hus, Conservative, Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

You have five minutes.