Mr. Speaker, of course nations that value the freedom and safety of their citizens are going to always continue to achieve a peaceful world through negotiations and through multilateral talks with other countries, in particular those countries perceived to pose a threat to peace in our world.
It is one thing to be in denial of the dangers that exist in our world today from nations that obviously do not think the way we do or appreciate the freedoms we do. It is quite another situation to be sort of Pollyannaish about it and believe that everything is right with the world if we just smile and think good things about it.
This missile defence system is not to replace mechanisms already in place, such as our relationships with other countries and the ongoing diplomacy. This is to augment anything we are currently doing in the event that something we are currently doing fails.
When the member talks about going back to another time when the only defence we had was to threaten annihilation of any aggressor, and this still exists, this method alone means that if someone has a nuclear aggression against us we may very well annihilate that country, but at the expense of the tens of millions of lives in our country lost because their missiles got through. I personally would like to try to save some of those tens of millions of lives. While we do not have the technology perhaps exactly right today, there was a time when we did not know how to make a microwave work. The technology, the research, is in progress to make an accurate missile system work.
Incidentally, Mr. Speaker, I am sure that members in the House do not appreciate some of the anti-American rhetoric present in that last member's statement.
I just want to ask the member, as I asked the previous member, does she really believe that by just being nice to people who are by nature not nice we can preserve peace forever in this country or in this world?