Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. St-Amand, thank you for being here today and for your service to our country.
We heard a little bit about the control part of surveillance. We've been talking a little bit about surveillance. I'm going to ask the question about the elephant in the room. As parliamentarians we have a responsibility to our citizens for their safety, and also a fiduciary responsible.
In terms of procurement, we've been hearing a little bit from witnesses about replacing our fighter aircraft and interoperability. Regarding current infrastructure in Canada, our landing strips in the north and so on and so forth are not currently long enough for certain aircraft.
We've heard that our tanker refuelling capacities are currently working very closely with our CF-18s. We've heard in the news recently that the U.S. Congress is split over funding the air force base in Alaska. I understand that for their F-35s, they are going to have to spend $500 million to retrofit the base in Eielson. We've heard that Australia is expecting to spend $1 billion for its base in Williamtown.
In your expert opinion, how important is it that any replacement fighter jet, whatever it may be, is able to work with our current infrastructure? In the event that something is chosen that cannot work with our current infrastructure, how many more millions, if not billions, will be required to retrofit our current infrastructure?