Mr. Speaker, as I stand here today I share probably as much pain as any of the other members here, I believe, over the thought that there are innocent people in our world who are being killed. That is very unfortunate. In a way we are debating here that old philosophical question that we are asked at university. There are five people in a boat. One has to be pushed over. Which one goes, the baby, the mother, the old grandmother or the wretched old man who is in the back? Which one is taken? Then there is debate on what the value of human life is and how one makes these choices. I think the dilemma we face is in evaluating whether the loss of life in a short mission to stop this very evil person will result in fewer lives lost than if we were to allow him to continue with the kinds of things he has been doing for many years.
I think, for example, of our lack of involvement in Rwanda. My own son and his wife were in Rwanda as relief agents providing shelter and homes for 400 children whose parents were needlessly killed in the conflict in Rwanda while the rest of the world sat by and let it happen. We should have moved in and stopped it to prevent all of those innocent folks from being killed, but we did not. Perhaps this time we are saying that this is a tyrant who must be stopped and, as unsavoury as it is, we will stand between him and his victims.
Unfortunately, in every war there are innocent victims. Members of my own family were innocent victims. How many of us in this place have fathers, uncles and grandfathers who lie in graves in a foreign land because they were fighting not for Canada's immediate interests but for peace, democracy and lack of tyranny, for stopping people like Hitler and others? That is why we die. We do not do it only for what is immediately good for Canada. I share that as a dilemma. I know that people here have come to a different conclusion. When attacked I will do everything I can to stop it, but if that person is attacking others I believe I have an obligation to stand in between.