National Defence Committee on Oct. 4th, 2022

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

I call this meeting to order. This is the 32nd meeting of the defence committee.

Joining us today is Mr. Fadden, former national security adviser, deputy minister of national defence and director of the Canadian Security and Intelligence Service. He's worn many other hats as well.

Welcome to the committee once again. Thank you for sharing your time with us.

Before I ask Mr. Fadden for his five-minute opening statement, I'll bring to the attention of members that the Conference of Defence Associations has a Canada submarine capability series on November 22, which may be of interest to some members of the committee. I wanted to bring that to your attention.

With that, I will call on Mr. Fadden for his opening statement, and then we'll go to our round of questioning.

Mr. Fadden, you're on.

[Richard Fadden, As an Individual]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

It's a pleasure to be here. I understand I'm one of your first non-Zoom witnesses in a while. If you're as sick of Zoom as I am, I am particularly pleased to be here.

I'm going to base my remarks on my experiences as the deputy of defence, but also as someone who has had some involvement in emergency planning and the machinery of government, because I think that's relevant to your order of reference. I want to start by making a couple of relatively general comments, which, I think, should form part of your deliberations.

The first one deals with time. I believe the past practice of the CF assisting with domestic disasters after the war, during the Cold War and afterwards should be set aside. These practices may or may not have been appropriate for the time, but the environment today is different. You must consider both the domestic environment—which you're mandated to do—and the international environment, because both will have an impact on what the Canadian Forces can and can't do. I think there's virtual unanimity today—think tanks, governments and everybody else—that crises and disasters will occur more frequently in the future than they have in the past. You have to accept this as a given. The last four or five years have demonstrated this in spades.

What does that mean in practical terms? That's something we have to talk about. I want to be clear that I'm talking about natural disasters in Canada, but also geopolitical and natural disasters around the world. The three of them are relevant to what the Canadian Forces could and should do in the context of your review.

If I can make a “machinery of government” point, the Canadian Forces are a specialized and closed organization. That's not a negative comment. It's a reflection of reality. Boys and girls join at the bottom and stay until they go at the top. It's a relatively specialized organization. They have their own culture.

One important thing, I believe, about organizations like that is unity of function. Asking the Canadian Forces, for example, to run a railway would be a mistake. Asking the Canadian Forces to become overly involved in disaster assistance, in my view, is also a mistake, because it affects the culture, but also because—as you know as well as I do, or better than I do—it affects their capabilities in an operational sense. Unity of function, I would argue, is very important. I think adding more natural disaster assistance, or confirming it, is problematic, at least. The idea of formally adding this kind of responsibility, or creating an appendage to the CF to do this....

I saw a press conference the other day. I think it was the CDS saying that a new sort of organization, attached to the defence portfolio, was under consideration to do this sort of thing. I think this would be a significant mistake. The Canadian Forces, right now, are under all sorts of pressures. They're not doing as well as they could be. Adding another function or organization to the portfolio would be a real mistake.

This is not to say the Canadian Forces shouldn't be the tool of last resort. The issue is that we're defining “last” rather loosely. I was saying to the chair, before he convened us, that it is becoming too easy for prime ministers—not this one, in particular, but prime ministers, generally—to simply say, “I'm going to send in the army.” We do this without talking to the provinces, municipalities and civil society about what they could and should do. I'll come back to this in a minute.

Having said all of this, what can the Canadian Forces do when dealing with disasters? I think, logically and intellectually, you have to divide this into three real components: logistical support, administrative support and manpower—manpower being the most immediate draw these days.

This is a really large country, and moving emergency supplies across the country is something the Canadian Forces can do. However, even if they can do it in the context of disasters, using attack helicopters to move bedding supplies across the country is not the best possible use of that very specialized resource. You have to do it in the absence of another capability, and that's something I want to stress. In this country, right now, we probably don't have another tool. I think this is problematic for a sophisticated, complex government like the Government of Canada today. When a disaster occurs, the only thing available to prime ministers....

I want to repeat it again: This is not a partisan comment. I would say the same thing under Mr. Harper or anybody else. If a prime minister only has one tool in the context of dealing with disasters, it's a problem, because I profoundly believe that we're going to have more of these issues over the course of the next little while.

In looking at your order of reference, it occurs to me that it's very difficult for you to deal with this holistically in the absence of knowing what Canada's broader emergency capabilities and plans are. How can you advise the government or how can you advise the House on what the CF should do in the context of disasters if the country doesn't know what the provinces have available to them and if you don't know what municipalities have available to them?

I was saying to the chair just before I came to the meeting that I was listening to the news. The Premier of Nova Scotia was very politely rapping the federal government on the knuckles for not making 1,000 troops available right now in Nova Scotia. I think he has 400.

To my mind, that should give rise to really serious consideration of the relationship between the responsibilities of the provinces and the federal government. To use the vernacular, I ain't arguing against using the Canadian Forces as a tool of last resort, but it's becoming far too easy to make use of them.

I think you need a general review of emergency capabilities in this country. It's something that we should have done 10 to 15 years ago. Again, it's not a partisan comment. Governments move on after disasters, and they don't often take the time to deal with these sorts of reviews. At a minimum, if you can't get such a general review, careful consideration, I think, should be given to the impact of increased Canadian Forces disaster assistance on its operational capabilities.

I am not a military person, but I don't think you need to be the chief of the defence staff or the chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff to realize that there is not enough operational training. There are not enough exercises right now. It is short of criminal to send our troops into potentially harm's way if they're not as trained as we can possible make them, and I don't think they're doing enough today. If they're chopping wood, which they may well need to do, and doing other things to fight forest fires and whatnot, they're not doing operational training.

If many of us who believe that the geopolitical environment in the world is going to get worse are correct, these troops are going to have to be used internationally. I'm not saying that there's going to be a world war, but we already have a considerable number of people in Latvia. We have troops hither and yon across the world. They are susceptible of being attacked. They need to be trained. They need to be exercised. If we don't look at all of this in the context of disaster planning, then I think it will be a mistake.

I mentioned that it's sometimes too easy for prime ministers to say, “We're sending in the troops.” I think that's true. I've noticed recently that when the Prime Minister has made these kinds of announcements, he has said, “I'm going to send in the troops and the Canadian Red Cross.” It seems to me that somebody somewhere needs to look at what the Canadian Red Cross and other civil society organizations can do or should do in the context of disaster relief to relieve the Canadian Forces from having to do what they're doing today.

Lastly, I think every policy file in this country has a federal-provincial component. This one is no exception. The principle here is that municipalities, provinces and then the federal government involve themselves in disasters. There is not enough coordination. There's not enough understanding. Also, it's too uneven between the provinces as to what can be done.

In summary, I think you should take into account the median domestic and international environment. Look for as much unity of function as you can with the Canadian Forces. Break down CF assistance into manpower, admin and logistics. Look at how this fits into the Government of Canada's broader emergency planning capabilities, and on desirability, look at the desirability of a national review of emergency planning, of which the assistance of the Canadian Forces in disasters is but a relatively small component. If we don't know what is available or what can be made available, then it's not reasonable to ask the Canadian Forces to train or not train for this function.

Thank you, Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

Thank you, Mr. Fadden, for your always insightful and articulate views that I believe are very helpful to the committee.

If there has to be an argument about the need for operational training, we need only look at Ukraine. The reason Ukrainians are putting up such a terrific fight is that Canada, over the last number of years, has trained those soldiers. They are really good soldiers now. We need to apply the same logic to our own people.

With that, we'll go to our six-minute rounds.

Ms. Gallant, you have six minutes, please.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Fadden, to the best of your knowledge, does Canada have an actual playbook or a plan to coordinate an immediate response when a national disaster, be it aggression from a belligerent or a natural disaster, happens? Do they possess one?

[Richard Fadden]

I don't think they possess a holistic one. There are subplans for natural disasters, public safety disasters and public security disasters. I don't believe there's a holistic one; there's a comprehensive one. That's one thing that I believe is missing.

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

After 9/11, I thought that was what they were trying to pull together and almost mirror the United States—their Homeland Security and our Public Safety.

Do you perceive that there's an actual military threat to Canada? Does one exist?

[Richard Fadden]

It depends, I guess, on how you define military threat. I think there is a threat from the activity of Russia in the north, not that they're going to send tanks over the polar ice cap, but simply an increased Russian presence, possibly under the ice cap. I think we need to worry about this sort of thing, but we have three oceans and the United States. I think we need to be practical. The chances that we're going to be invaded are pretty slim.

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

Okay.

To the best of your knowledge, does the government as a whole or do even individual departments rehearse disaster response?

[Richard Fadden]

In my experience, irregularly.

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

Do they do tabletop exercises?

[Richard Fadden]

It happens. Absolutely. I don't think there are enough national ones. There are not enough federal ones in the sense that they combine all of the provinces. DND definitely does. They do. I think Public Safety does. I believe the Mounties do.

Do they have a consolidated federal one often enough? In my experience, they did not. Are there enough national ones involving the federal government and the provinces and the large municipalities? I think that virtually never happens.

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

Did that happen when we had an emergency preparedness college formally in place training municipalities and various agencies thereof?

[Richard Fadden]

I think it helped at the medium to lower levels. It didn't really have an impact on the higher levels. It did provide the municipalities and some of the provinces with better-trained people. I think it's a bit of a shame that we don't continue doing that.

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

When 9/11 hit, was a government-coordinated disaster response executed?

[Richard Fadden]

That's a difficult question to answer, because initially we were pretty preoccupied with dealing with the reality on the ground. That was the case for some time. I do think a number of reviews took place within departments and between departments, so I think the short answer is yes. My preoccupation, if I can say that, is that we don't pull all of them together as well as we should, and they have to be kept evergreen. There's no such thing as a national disaster plan that's good for 10 years. They need to be updated yearly or every couple of years.

Again, I want to be clear that I'm not being partisan here. I think all governments become preoccupied with the problems of the day. You need somebody to be set aside at the ministerial level and at the public service level to say, “You have to worry about emergency planning, not about what's worrying you today”. Governments, all governments, find this hard to do, because there are plenty of problems for today. But if we don't do more of this, I believe we're going to regret it given the environment that I talked about.

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

What about when SARS hit? Mind you, it's the purview of the province to respond to something like that, but was there a more coordinated effort in place, or was it even needed at the federal level?

[Richard Fadden]

I think there was. I think the Department of Health actually galvanized itself relatively well. It did deal with the provinces fairly effectively. Afterwards, they did start a policy planning process to try to be better prepared in the event that we have epidemics of that sort. That was to some degree, I think, the first awakening call on the non-public security and non-national disaster side. I think some progress has been made there.

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

Okay.

Does Canada have an effective early warning system in place to detect threats by land, air, sea, space or cyber-incursions on our territory, and the ability to know soon enough to be able to protect our populations?

[Richard Fadden]

Chairman, if you're willing to extend this session for about three or four hours, I can answer.

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[Richard Fadden]

It's a very tough question, ma'am.

You know, we use NORAD for air and maritime incursions, and I think it's as good as they have for the United States. I think on cyber-incursions, like most countries on the planet, we could do far better. In particular, I think governments need to collaborate much more with the private sector and civil society. The attacks today, unlike during the Cold War, are directed not only at government but at the private sector and civil society.

Is progress being made? I think so, but it's pretty slow.

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

Having been a public servant for Canada since the 1970s, you will have seen trends. You saw the steady attrition in the military after Lahrs was closed, so we were going down towards 60,000 and I understand that the goal was to get down to 40,000 troops. Then 9/11 happened and all that changed.

Right now we have a recruitment crisis going on, and the people who are in the military, as soon as they've done whatever their contract is, want out. They can't deal with this wokeism in the military, and the domestic deployments for some are tedious and not what they signed up to do.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

Unfortunately, you're out of time. I know you were just getting wound up there.

It's unfortunate, because I'm sure it's an important question. I can't extend it three or four hours without unanimous consent, which might be helpful for a response to Ms. Gallant's question.

Ms. O'Connell, go ahead for six minutes please.

[Jennifer O'Connell, Liberal, Pickering—Uxbridge, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you so much for your testimony here today. It was actually incredibly helpful.

I think in our last meeting, I asked the major-general whether he had a line of sight or there was someone within CAF who understood the capabilities of provinces and territories. You mentioned municipalities, and I didn't even go there, but certainly that would be a big factor.

I can also appreciate that in his role, he's dealing with the crisis on the ground in the current situation, and that looking at what provinces and territories are doing probably isn't at the forefront of his thinking. I also wonder—and I wonder if you have any insight into this or if it is part of what you think this review of emergency capability should be—whether that definition of “last resort” is getting stretched further and further.

Are we seeing provinces and territories just not increasing capabilities because the expertise is there when they call on it? Do you have any commentary on that, or is that part of the review that we should look at?

[Richard Fadden]

I certainly think a review would be very useful.

You will know as well as or better than I do that one of the challenges in government is making choices. I think without a shadow of a doubt that governments, including provincial governments, over the course of the last little while have cut back on their operational capabilities because they don't have enough money. They don't have enough money to spend on this sort of thing because it's not happening now. That's the point I was trying to make.

Every single province, if I remember correctly, has an emergency management capability or coordinating function, but a coordinating function and real operational capability are two different things. I think Ontario and Quebec have rather more than some of the smaller provinces, but do the federal government and the provinces talk periodically about this? Yes, they do. I would wager you a good lunch that nobody in the federal government right now could give you a comprehensive compilation of the capabilities across the country. That's true today, and it was true 10 or 15 years ago.

When there's a crisis, I think, generally speaking, we're very good at ratcheting ourselves up—we really are—comprehensively, but as soon as the crisis goes away, it stops.

Do the Canadian Forces have relationships with some of the provinces as to what they can and can't do? Sure they do, but if there's not much there to begin with, it's a problem.