National Defence Committee on Feb. 27th, 2018

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

I'd like to welcome everybody this morning to our continuing discussion about Canada's involvement in NATO. Specifically I'd like to welcome the Honourable Bill Graham, former Minister of National Defence, and Vice-Admiral Robert Davidson, Canada's former military representative to NATO.

Gentlemen, thank you for coming and thank you for your patience.

Mr. Graham, I'll give you the floor for your opening remarks.

[William C. Graham, Former Minister of National Defence (2004-2006) and Former Minister of Foreign Affairs (2002-2004), As an Individual]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you very much for having me and for being willing to listen to what I have to say. I'm so far out of things now, but I've had an opportunity to look at some of the transcripts and seen the evidence of Ambassador Buck and General Hainse and others who have come before you. I don't really think I can add anything of significance, any up-to-date knowledge of NATO, the way they were able to. Therefore, I thought that maybe I could just share a few personal experiences with you and give you the odd political perspective I have, from my experience.

Certainly, from my perspective, having participated in the exercise of the defence review, where I was one of the four members of a panel along with Louise Arbour, General Henault, and others, to help the minister with the defence review, I totally subscribe to what the defence review says, which is that NATO has been a central pillar of Euro-Atlantic defence and a cornerstone of Canadian defence policy and security since 1949, and I expect that it will remain a cornerstone of our defence and security policy for the foreseeable future.

It's not something that we would remember around this table, but there have been times when NATO's relevance to Canada has been questioned. It certainly was not when I was in your place, and particularly when I was chairman of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade. At that time, in the early nineties, NATO was in full expansion, and Canada was a strong proponent of expanding NATO, including into the former Soviet satellite countries in Europe, such as Hungary, Latvia, Estonia, etc. NATO was seen not only as a way of providing security but also as a way of establishing an appropriate civil military relationship and strengthening democracy in the aspirant countries.

With that, I'd like to make a couple of comments about Russia. The Russians didn't see it that way. Now, I don't say this as an apologist for Russia, but I've always been a great believer that if you understand your opponent, if you understand a little bit about where they're coming from, it's always helpful to you. I had very good relations with my counterpart, Vladimir Lukin, who was chairman of the Russia Duma foreign affairs committee, and I had a very good relationship with Gennady Seleznyov, who was the chairman of the Duma at the time. I met with them regularly, often at the OSCE parliamentary assembly. They and other Russian contacts always said that NATO expansion was directed against Russia, and we would say, “This is crazy. It's not directed against you. The Hungarians understandably want some security. It's really about security for them, for the Poles, and for the Latvians, and everything. It's not against you.”

However, it seemed to me that it was ingrained in their psyche that this was directed against their security. That's something I've always had difficulty with, understanding the extent to which it was just rhetoric, and the extent to which it was real angst on their part. You'll recall that in respect of ballistic missile defence, they took exactly the same position. It was directed against them when we assured them it was directed against a rogue state. It couldn't possibly be focused that way.

As you know, we sought to allay their fears with the Russia-NATO Council, and I was there in Rome with Mr. Chrétien and Mr. Bush and Mr. Putin when that was established. Probably some mistakes were made on both sides, but I think it would be naive to think today that Putin's policies haven't changed dramatically since that time.

So while it's important to keep a dialogue with Russia—and I read what Ambassador Buck said about that, that dialogue should remain open—it would be very naive not to recognize a renewed Russian threat, given Ukraine and Crimea; threats to the Baltic states; and interference in elections in Finland, the United States, and, as the chairman just mentioned, even possibly Canada today.

I therefore am a strong proponent of our deployment of Canadian troops in Latvia, in conjunction with our other NATO members, as a means of deterrence of any asymmetrical warfare activities such as those that occurred in Ukraine.

That said, I think Canada must strive to have a flexible enough foreign policy that we can collaborate as much as possible with Russia in the Arctic on search and rescue and other common objectives. This is a tricky foreign policy posture for Canada, but it's not above our ability to do it. The Arctic is a different space than the European space, and I think when it comes to Russia it's worth bearing that in mind.

Maybe I could just say something about my experience as a minister because I was both foreign minister and defence minister. As foreign minister I was very conscious of the fact that NATO was as much a political alliance as a defence alliance. Its rhetoric is about similar minded countries having values, etc. Now we have to come back to that because I think there are some cracks in that facade at the moment. Nonetheless, there was a strong political dimension to our relationship, and it was my privilege to be at several summits in Prague and Rome with Mr. Chrétien. Then I was a representative of Canada for the Istanbul summit, because it took place in the middle of the election. Mr. Martin couldn't go, so I went to represent Canada at that summit. I talked to Mr. Chirac beside me and then he'd sit beside Bush and then he'd sit beside somebody else. It's a very political organization and it's one where Canada plays that role very well and is in the middle of things, but I think you bear in mind that these are politicians. They respond well to political messages.

I can't tell you the warmth. We were in the middle of the election, and I can tell you that every leader in that room came up to me and asked if we had won last night, if I had won my seat, with some noting that we were a minority now. Everybody was fascinated by the politics of it, and that's part of it. I think it's less so at the defence minister's level, because it's more operational there, but at the foreign ministers and leaders level, there's a lot to do at NATO that is not necessarily just about NATO. It's about politics and relationship building, and I think that's important. That's a bit of a hobby horse of mine. I wrote a book in which I argue strongly in favour of collegiality built over time.

I would like to say one thing about Afghanistan and NATO. That political nature of the relationship with NATO was illustrated in Afghanistan. When Canada was approached to join a NATO mission with our Dutch and British allies in the south, President Karzai strongly urged us, and strongly urged me on many occasions, that Canada should take the leadership of that NATO mission because he wanted to see a NATO flag rather than an American flag over that part of his country. Now Karzai had difficulties with the Americans at times, as you'll know from your history, but I think that was in early days. It was a nationalist thing with the Afghans. They would prefer to see a multilateral flag, and the Americans appreciated that. They didn't see this as a threat to them in any way. They thought this was a good political manoeuvre, which I think it's a good example of how NATO plays a strong political role.

My criticism of NATO in Afghanistan would be that as Canadians I think it was our understanding when we went in there that we could rotate in for two years and rotate out again, and then possibly rotate in, etc. As you know, that never happened and we were very disappointed by our NATO allies. For future missions, I think we need to make sure that we've got those exit strategies nailed into place so we don't get trapped as we did in that case.

One last thing—and I saw it came up in one of your earlier meetings—is the issue of detainees. It seems to me NATO should have known there were going to be problems with detainees. The Canadians, the Americans, the British had them. Anybody who had to deal with detainees had problems. If it has a multilateral mission of this nature, why wouldn't NATO consider having one of the NATO countries deal with the corrections aspect of this? Somebody should be responsible. You can't just dump everybody in, and in the middle of the fighting try to deal with this issue. NATO's organized enough that maybe this should be considered for them to deal with.

Now, I'd like to turn to Canada on the 2% issue. I know you've talked a lot about it and I know that we're committed to the 2% goal from the NATO Wales summit. I'm not a big fan of these metrics of 2%. I don't believe in the 0.7% either. Indeed, GDP goes up and down. These things move around. People can game the system. Accounting wise, there are all sorts of issues.

I think the defence review, “Strong, Secure, Engaged” deals pretty well with that issue on page 46 because it points out that it depends on what factors are included in the calculations. Ambassador Buck pointed out that while there are agreed upon principles, clearly, some people put some things in, and some people put things out.

The defence review did make a big point, and that is that our participation goes up when our capital expenditures go up. When I was on the Ministerial Advisory Panel on Canada's Defence Policy Review with the minister of defence, I spent most of my time in meetings with them saying that our percentage of capital investment was too low. We were down around 17% or 18%. The Australians told us we should be at 25%.

Mr. Chairman, I believe you're a pilot yourself. In a highly complicated world of high-tech, expensive equipment, Canada as a country shouldn't be below 23% to 25%, in my view. You can see that it's coming with the growth, with the new review, but I would argue strongly that that percentage is something the committee needs to keep an eye on.

I would also point out that the contribution of our special forces is often not looked at. It's what you have in capabilities and what you do. When I was there, George Robertson, who was then the secretary general, used to say—and he said it often in public meetings—“Well, Canada's a bit low on its inputs, but it's very big in its outputs.” We were big in outputs. We've been big in outputs.

You go through cycles. The last time I was in Rome, a couple of years ago, I said we were down. We were very unpopular, and Ambassador Buck told me we were very unpopular. Then we agreed to go to Latvia. Suddenly, we were popular again, so you know, you go through these cycles. We shouldn't be discouraged by that, but our outputs generally have been good.

Mr. Chair, may I conclude by making a couple of comments on my experience since government? I've had the opportunity of being the chair of Atlantic Council of Canada—now the NATO Council of Canada— and the Canadian International Council. I teach some courses in security at university. I think there's a concern about the level of knowledge of Canadians about security, defence issues, and if I could say so, the education we have amongst our public. I think the public support for the acquisition of the necessary assets and budget for our military is dependent on a better-informed public.

A recent poll done by IPSOS for the NATO Council was pretty discouraging. It showed that seven in 10 Canadian women were unable to identify NATO by its mission. Of millennials, 71% are unaware of NATO or its role. I think these numbers tell us something about what we have to do in terms of public education. I think that the defence review talked about more in that respect, but I think it's something for you to consider.

Last, as far as future challenges are concerned, the reading I'm doing at the moment shows that the traditional three domains of military activity—air, sea, and land—have now been extended to cyber and space. What is the role of NATO? When I left, NATO's role in cyber was considered just about its own cyber. It seems to me, with all these asymmetric activities of the Russians, I don't know that NATO can maintain that anymore.

Certainly, the president of Estonia—he used to speak to us about the Estonian attack—would not take that position, so I'm sure you're looking at the issue of cyber. Space is a very interesting, complicated, political issue, but the United States has now described space as a domain. What is NATO's role?

In Europe, what will be the consequences of Brexit? I'm very concerned about that. In my time, we were always concerned that the European defence initiatives be complementary to and not competitive with NATO. I would think that with Brexit and the complexities that are going to arise there, the new buzzword is PESCO. It is the European thing that is to be watched.

The issues of Hungary, Poland, and Turkey have come up with a couple of your members, so I won't raise that, but that certainly flags on my radar.

I would then leave it by saying that the NATO Parliamentary Assembly is a place where a lot of dialogue could take place among members of Parliament with those countries particularly, with Hungarian politicians, Turkish politicians. You can find out what they're thinking in their parliaments. I think it's very valuable.

Mr. Chairman, I would ask indulgence for something that is not directly relevant to this, which is that I've just come from a conference on Korea at Trinity College. It's been a very good conference. As one of the panellists said, with the present level of bellicose talk on both sides, there is lots of room for miscalculation. I would argue strongly that we should be looking at ballistic missile defence. This is a possibility. An explosion on Seattle would destroy Vancouver. This is something that I would strongly urge the committee.... It's time. It has strong bipartisan support, I understand, and I would argue it is a time of emerging threats where it should be done.

I will end there. Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

Thank you, sir.

Admiral, the floor is yours.

[Vice-Admiral, Retired) Robert Davidson (Canada’s former Military Representative to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, Royal Canadian Navy, As an Individual]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Ladies and gentlemen, it's a real pleasure to be here this morning and have an opportunity to share some of my ideas on the subject of NATO and more broadly on national defence.

My ideas and my thoughts are largely formed from a period of five years in Brussels watching our diplomats in action, watching the reactions around the table as we spoke, so it probably won't surprise you as I speak that I may say a few things where I would disagree with my esteemed co-witness this morning on some areas.

I will speak in English to go a bit faster, but if you have questions in French, I am ready to answer them in that language.

I understand that your interest here is largely to get me to talk about NATO. I know we'll get into specifics of NATO in questions, but I'd like to start a little more broadly on Canada's role and some of what I would call our national mythology or national faith in what we think the world thinks of Canada.

We all know Canada is a G7 nation, and it's a relatively wealthy nation, a member of both NATO and NORAD, a nation that aspires to influence the direction of global affairs. One of my favourite expressions is that with wealth comes responsibility. Let me repeat that: with wealth comes responsibility. The world might expect that Canada would accept its responsibilities and be a significant contributor to global security. Frankly, we are not. We are largely a consumer of security rather than a provider. We do not do our fair share. We allow the United States and others to be our guarantors. Consequently, our voice, our influence, is much less than we think it is.

We consistently fail to achieve agreed NATO and G7 targets on either security investment or international aid. At NATO, we like to brag that a nation's outputs, such as its contributions and oversees missions, are more important than its inputs, such as its defence budget. We've heard comment about that already this morning. My view is that we do this as a means to defer criticism from our key allies over our meagre levels of defence investment. When we develop our defence plans, we future load defence spending in the out years so that we can brag now about planned investments that rarely materialize when the time comes to put our money where our mouth is.

One might argue that the times are tough, that we do what we can, that spending is needed in other Canadian priorities such as health and education. Indeed, that's all true. However, the world is not getting any safer. When our allies talk about the world needing more Canada, as President Obama did, I don't think they mean that the world needs more Canadian words, more expressions of our values, no matter how eloquently our leaders might put them. They really mean that the world needs more Canadian actions, more contributions to security and international development. We can produce the best-trained military personnel in the world, and frankly, we do produce the best with what we have. It's remarkable what the Canadian Armed Forces does produce. However, without the equipment, the investment, and the resolve to contribute those forces when needed, frankly, we're a hollow force that is unable to sustain a meaningful and persistent contribution.

When we fail to live up to our foreign investment targets, we miss the opportunity to build meaningful relationships and to address the poverty that is often at the centre of emerging insecurity. Our allies want more Canadian action, more investment, more money, and frankly, less self-righteous talk. When we talk without making commitments, honestly, I really don't think they're listening.

We do some things well. Our commitment in Afghanistan was well appreciated while it lasted, and it's been quickly forgotten.

We could talk about that. I have some slightly different views on that.

Our contribution in Latvia is a particularly welcome addition for our eastern European allies. It's not meant to be a self-sustaining fighting force, so it's not a deterrent in terms of its military might, by any stretch of the imagination. Rather, it's a demonstration of commitment and an assurance that we will come if called. That's really what it's for. You might call it a bit of an international speed bump: if the Russians were to roll over it, we would all come at the call, but it isn't going to slow them down very much.

If we all lived in eastern Europe—and it suffered most of the last 100 years under foreign occupation—we would all share their continuing concern about Russian adventurism. We too would want such a demonstration and such assurances on our soil, so it's a good thing, and it is a clear affirmation of the principles upon which the alliance rests.

However, the world has changed, or at least our perception of it should change. In the last 50 years, we in the west have deluded ourselves with a belief in the inevitability of the spread of western liberal democracy, western-style freedoms, and social justice. Surely everyone just wanted to be like us—that was the view.

Most pundits expected that the Arab Spring would bring such liberalization to the Middle East and North Africa, and it obviously hasn't, has it? Huge parts of this planet simply do not want what we have or what we believe in.

Human rights are no more universal than religious, conservative, or political beliefs. Even in the west, populism and a return to narrow values are putting democracy to the test. The last U.S. presidential election and Brexit are both fine examples where it seems democracy is no longer a fact-based exercise in political choice. Democracy itself is under siege.

For many people outside Canada, collective rights and security trump individual rights and freedoms. That's at the very centre of Russian thinking. That's why they don't think the same way we do. That's why they perceived the expansion of NATO closer and closer to their border as a security risk: it was bringing freedoms and open expression that would bring the instability that they saw, for example, in Chechnya. When free speech is viewed as destabilizing, how can freedom be preserved?

As a result, here we are in this challenging global dynamic. Vigilance and readiness have never been more important. State-on-state conflict has sadly re-emerged alongside terrorism as an existential threat. We could talk at length about the impacts on western security caused by recent Turkish actions, both domestically and in Syria, by China in the South China Sea, by North Korea with its ballistic missile capability, and by Russia in Crimea, the Ukraine, and let's not forget Georgia as well.

Yet, in the face of this crisis, the Canadian Armed Forces are slowly being disarmed. We don't even use the term Canadian Armed Forces all the time in our public speaking. Our naval capability has diminished. We have fewer ships, and certainly no area air defence capability any longer—something that was critical—and you know what the state of our tanker fleet is. The air force lacks the resources and fighter jets for a modern fight. The CF-18s need replacement with modern capability. We are lacking in areas like unmanned aerial vehicles, in surveillance assets, and in ballistic missile defence.

Let me also point out, this isn't just about defending Canada, although obviously it's well past time we started to do that. We've also made a commitment at NATO on deployable ballistic missile defence for NATO-deployed forces, and we have zero capability to do that.

We lack sufficient army personnel and equipment. Our capacity for urban warfare is limited. We have to rely on our allies for combat search and rescue, for attack helicopters, and for strategic lift, to name just a few.

We lack agility, flexibility and technology. We cannot operate meaningfully in the littoral, across the beach for example. I'm not talking here about an ability to do amphibious assault. I'm not suggesting that Canada should be able to do beach landings against other forces. Rather we don't have the simple ability to get resources across the shore in a humanitarian situation such as in our response to the earthquake in Haiti. I was the director of the Strategic Joint Staff during the response to Haiti. We had to get help from our American allies to get stuff across the beach. We did a lot of great things there but we lack key capabilities in that area.

If Canada were to chose to be a meaningful contributor to global disaster response, which I think is a great role for our nation, we need proper investment and we don't have the right investment in those areas. Our DART is very limited.

Our shortfalls in capability are simply across the board. Before anyone tries to lay the blame—I'm going to say this in this political environment—before anybody tries to lay the blame on any particular political party, let me say that the current and previous governments, and those that went before, all share the blame for letting domestic politics keep us from doing the right thing in foreign and defence policy.

Buying some more old fighter jets is another symptom of our inability as a nation to get our act together on foreign and defence policy in a comprehensive, multi-partisan way.

Finally, let me say this, our defence dialogue in this country is needlessly constrained by the tradition of keeping senior military leaders from speaking their mind publicly. Every serving general and admiral who has appeared before this committee and other committees around this Hill, with the possible exception of Rick Hillier, has been hamstrung by the government and the defence department of the day. You simply cannot expect to make well-considered policy choices in the absence of proper public discourse informed by frank military advice. I think Canadians deserve better.

I look forward to your questions. Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

Thank you.

We'll start up with seven-minute questions. Then I'll turn the floor over to Mr. Robillard.

The floor is yours.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to welcome the witnesses.

What is the importance, for Canada and for NATO, of the Canadian government's recent decision to participate in NATO's airborne warning and control system, or AWACS?

[William C. Graham]

As I am not familiar with that system, I cannot answer you. That is more of a technical matter.

[VAdm (Ret'd) Robert Davidson]

The decision related to AWACS was made while I was in Brussels, and only for budgetary reasons. Nevertheless, NATO could not use those airplanes because some countries among the many participants felt that those operations were not appropriate for NATO, especially those against refugees in the Mediterranean.

So I am not sure that our contribution to those multilateral or multinational missions is appropriate. For a few decades, our contribution was about $1 billion, but the operational capacity deployed was not at the same level.

[William C. Graham]

May I add something?

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

Yes, go ahead.

[William C. Graham]

There have been a number of examples of this in the past, while I was minister.

NATO said it wanted to promise all its member countries certain operational tools, but as soon as the countries wanted to use those tools, they could not, since the country in question was already using that tool in its local operations or, as the vice-admiral was saying, disapproved of the mission in question for political reasons.

This is a major problem the entire NATO is facing. For NATO, it is difficult to plan this type of thing because, when the time came, the tools were often not available.

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

Okay.

Do you think Canada's role within NATO is likely to change further owing to the country strengthened engagement in Europe thanks to NATO's increased presence in Eastern Europe?

In that regard, why are Canada's ongoing military operations on NATO's eastern flank important from a geostrategic and security perspective?

[William C. Graham]

As I said during my presentation, I think that what we are doing in Eastern Europe is very important. According to what I understood after my visit to Brussels, there are many logistical issues involved. We have to try to figure out whether it is really possible to carry out this mission.

I am not convinced everyone understands that the nature of the asymmetrical war, which is currently being discussed, is the answer. A number of nations are part of this mission. If the Russians come, that will bring in the Italians, the British and us. That's the theory. We will see whether it will work or not. We are on fairly new ground that is pretty difficult to understand.

[VAdm (Ret'd) Robert Davidson]

NATO is founded on the principle of

One for all, and all for one.

The proof is in the action. For them, this is not something they can trust. We need to do something to show that we intend to be there if a threat arises. That's necessary after what happened in Georgia, in Ukraine and in Crimea.

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

Thank you, gentlemen.

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

Mrs. Gallant.

[Cheryl Gallant, Conservative, Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Admiral Davidson, there's talk in the news that our new supply ships—and the one that was just launched—are unarmed. To what degree will our navy be restricted in NATO naval missions as a result?

[VAdm (Ret'd) Robert Davidson]

It's not uncommon for AORs, tankers, not to be armed. Some of our allies operate their vessels in that way, and sometimes they've had to, as one might say, “button on” capability to a particular vessel if it has gone into an area where there's been a particular threat.

A decade ago I would have said that it was not a problem at all to have unarmed tankers, because we had destroyers that provided area air defence capability, and so one of our destroyers could have provided adequate protection for the tanker. We don't send our tankers anywhere without other ships.

Today, we only have Canadian patrol frigates available. They only have a point defence missile capability, and unless they're on the axis of the threat—between the tanker and a particular threat—they're really not able to defend the tanker.

In the short-term, absolutely, it will limit the ability to put the vessels in any kind of threat area. In the long-term, if we move forward with replacement ships that return that capability to Canada, then it wouldn't necessarily be a problem. But that may not be within the budget at the moment. We'll see.

[Cheryl Gallant, Conservative, Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, ON]

Okay.

Reports as long as eight years ago were in the news, of Russia marketing a cruise missile system which can fit hidden inside a shipping container. Any one of these vessels containing one of these shipping containers could wipe out an aircraft carrier with what was available eight years ago.

How well equipped is our naval defence to deal with this kind of threat to our country?

[VAdm (Ret'd) Robert Davidson]

Well, I would say wholly inadequate.

Quite simply, we just don't have.... We have 12 Canadian patrol frigates, the world's longest coast line, a desire to contribute to deployed operations around the world. Our navy, I would say is, in my personal view, ridiculously small for a G7 nation.

[Cheryl Gallant, Conservative, Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, ON]

All right.

How important is it for us to have functioning submarines, to be a full participant in NATO naval missions?

[VAdm (Ret'd) Robert Davidson]

In my opening remarks I spoke about Canada aspiring to leadership. We aspire to leadership of military operations as well. So that's one aspect of why submarines are very important.

If you want to produce senior military or naval leaders who have a broad understanding of how to do warfare across the whole range of domains of maritime warfare, then they need experience in those areas. It's important that we have submarines from that perspective.

It's also important to have submarines from the perspective of information sharing. The submarine community is, I hate to put it this way, but it is a bit like a club. Information is shared if you're a member of the club; it isn't shared if you aren't. I found in many of the previous iterations of my career, it was remarkable the amount of information we had on the movement, not only of our own submarines, but of all of our allies' submarines, and where they were going. We had shared intelligence on the threats against submarines by being part of the club. That's also an aspect.

The other aspect as well is that of sovereignty. There is no other platform that we have in Canada that is as strategic in nature as a submarine. Why I say that is because a submarine has the ability to do what's called “area denial”. You put a submarine into a patch of water and nobody wants to go there. I can give you some examples of how we've actually used submarines in that respect even by Canada's standards. But when you put a submarine somewhere, even an aircraft carrier won't go there unless they have sanitized the area before they put their high-valued asset in.

Other nation's submarines don't want to necessarily go there. Because you don't know where the submarine is, and you can deploy it anywhere in your own sovereign water space, you have the capacity to deny anybody entering into those areas just simply because they don't want to get caught if they are violating territorial waters, for example.

On all of those areas, I'd say it's critically important that Canada continue to operate submarines. I've been a big proponent. I'm a submariner. I commanded a submarine. I've spent a lot of my career in submarines. I'm a very big fan of that capability. I think it's critically important that we retain it.

[Cheryl Gallant, Conservative, Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, ON]

Okay.

I have two quick questions for Mr. Graham.

You have the Russian background, so the Republic of Georgia has met the NATO standards—well, Ukraine is working towards them.

What do you believe is the barrier to their finally joining NATO? In fact, they participated in the Afghanistan missions. What more do they have to do?

Secondly, with respect to cyberwarfare, what threshold needs to be crossed in order to trigger article 5?

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

Sir, before you launch off on that, you have very little time, less than 30 seconds, please.

[William C. Graham]

Well, to be brutal, the barrier to Georgia is article 5 of NATO. Georgia's engaged in one Russian war in circumstances that we felt were rather.... I don't know who to point the blame to on both sides. I happen to know some of the Georgian politicians quite well. There was a little push and shove in both directions. I don't think that, had I been defence minister at the time, I would have been anxious to be looking at going to nuclear war with Russia in the circumstances of the last South Ossetia operation, and I would think that's foremost of mind of anybody looking at Georgia today. That's certainly an issue. Georgia's a wonderful country, and we should certainly try to encourage it, but I think that's a realistic political assessment, and I can't answer the cyber-threshold issue because the attribution problem is so horrendous in the cyber-realm that that's what's worrying me about trying to come to grips with it.

But they're great questions.