Madam Speaker, I want to quote fairly precisely the minister's colleague, the Minister of National Defence, who speaking as an economist talked about the interest that Canada has in order because we are a smaller country. I believe that was his argument.
We have a particular interest in an orderly world. Put against that the historic reality that among the most persuasive proponents of organizations achieving international order in the last 60 or 70 years has been the United States of America. It is important for us to make the point that when we speak of the American tradition, building international regimes that are rules based is also very much a part of the American tradition.
When it looks at questions of regime change and thinks of consecrating that with congressional authority, it would be well to remind the Americans of the reasons that led them to encourage international arrangements not only in trade, not only in the commercial side, but again very much even in the establishment of the United Nations, certainly in the establishment of NATO and other multilateral organizations. There is a strong multilateralist tradition in the United States that those of us in other countries which share that tradition should emphasize perhaps more than we do.