Mr. Speaker, it is with pleasure that I rise to take part in this debate. I will be sharing my time with the member for York North.
As I read the motion that is before us, I find much that I like, particularly when it comes to Norad, and I will be speaking about that. Unfortunately, the motion contains a huge and fatal flaw. It is one word. The word is any, which means that I must oppose this motion. First, let me begin with the part I like:
That this House affirm its strong support for NORAD as a viable defence organization to counter threats to North America, including the threat of ballistic missile attack;--
I like that part because I was in Colorado Springs last week for three days to visit Norad headquarters and saw the amazing complex in Cheyenne Mountain. I came back hugely impressed by the skill, talent and dedication of the Canadian men and women of the armed forces who serve in the joint Norad command. I support Norad and those people.
After my discussions with them, I am of the view that Norad has an increasingly important role to play in the defence of North America after September 11, 2001. In the first place, as we discovered, the aerospace defence of North America is no longer about the perimeter, about armed bombers coming from some other continent, or from inter-ballistic missiles only. The defence of the continent is now about hijacked civilian airliners and the fact that Norad is speaking with our own Canadian civil aviation authority, Nav Canada, and with the American FAA, to ensure the internal defence of North America is an important strong and vital step. Of course, it is logical because we share this airspace with the United States.
Second, there is a very important activity going on right now in Norad called the binational planning group, which is looking at a variety of other threats to the security of North America based on our new understanding of the way in which international terrorists operate. That binational planning group is asking itself whether there are things we can do together which are not simply about aerospace, but are about land based threats because we share a common land base with the United States separated only by a frontier. There is also the issue of sea based threats because ships may move in and out of Canadian or American water, and they may constitute a serious threat to the security of North America.
I give the example of some kind of tramp steamer off the coast of the eastern seaboard within 100 kilometres of a major American city that has a fairly low tech cruise missile. Currently, the whole question of it being a ship means that it is under a maritime operation and surveillance, but the moment a cruise missile leaves that freighter and heads toward North America it becomes a Norad task. The only problem is that with about a seven minute period of time to react there is no way we can counteract a cruise missile under the current divided structure between maritime surveillance and air surveillance. Therefore, we may see ourselves, quite apart from national missile defence, with these clear and present dangers, with a Norad which deals with air, land and sea so that we can have an integrated and more pre-emptive approach to the defence of the continent. I think that is an important and useful direction for Norad to evolve.
The problem is, of course, what happens when we get to national missile defence? Where does that fit in to our catalogue of risks to the continent? Let me begin by speaking of the ways in which I agree with the Minister of National Defence in his statement this morning.
Though I have much to criticize in the whole concept of national missile defence in terms of the geopolitical questions it raises, I agree with the minister that it is important that Canadians take charge of the defence of their own space in North America and that they share in a sensible way that duty with the United States; hence the importance of Norad.
I agree with him about the importance of improving our ability to detect incoming intercontinental ballistic missiles from whatever source, whether that is from Russia, China, North Korea, or any other rogue state.
I agree with the minister on the importance of insisting, in our discussions with the Americans, that we will not participate in any scheme which involves the weaponization of space. In saying so, of course, the minister was reiterating what the Minister of Foreign Affairs had said in the House before that.
Finally, it is possible and appropriate that we should proceed with discussions with the Americans on that basis, understanding the limitations of the discussions and the possibility that we may not come to agreement. That is where I agree with the Minister of National Defence.
I, however, disagree with this particular motion. I indicated at the beginning of my speech that my disagreement focuses on one word, that we would support giving Norad responsibility for the command of any system developed to defend North America against ballistic missiles, any system. Unfortunately, this is a blank cheque motion. It says in effect, as long as a new weapons system is under Norad control it does not matter whether it involves the weaponization of space or not. It opens the barn door. It opens a huge possibility and therefore, I cannot support it.
The weaponization of space is a great deal closer than people have given it credit. Last week President Bush released a confidential national security presidential directive which had been signed in 2002 in which the national missile defence was described. It said:
We are pursuing an evolutionary approach to the development and deployment of missile defenses to improve our defenses over time. The United States will not have a final, fixed missile defense architecture. Rather, we will deploy an initial set of capabilities that will evolve to meet the changing threat and to take advantage of technological developments. The composition of missile defenses, to include the number and location of systems deployed, will change over time.
Then the President listed some of the things that were being looked at and ends with:
Enhanced sensor capabilities; anddevelopment and testing of space-based defenses.
Space based defences is the weaponization of space. How likely is this? Let me turn to the hearing of the senate armed services committee in Washington held on March 18, 2003, and an exchange between Senator Bill Nelson and Lieutenant General Ronald Kadish, Director, Missile Defense Agency.
Sen. Nelson: All right, General Kadish, your budget documents show that you are going down parallel paths to acquire the ground-based boost phase and a space-based phase.
Gen. Kadish: It is our intent, as far as at least my internal discussions, that that test bed that we would space-base would serve two functions. One is to demonstrate intercepts from interceptors that would be on orbit, so we'd actually do an intercept, and to work out all the difficulties involved with having a constellation of that size potentially on orbit.
Then there is more discussion and Senator Bill Nelson asks:
Well, let me--let me ask a policy question to the secretary over there. That would be the first time that we would be weaponizing space, and there has been a policy up to this point that we are not going to weaponize space. Tell me about your thinking with regard to that change of that policy.
General Kadish does not answer that question. It is answered by Pete Aldridge who says:
Now, once you've accomplished that, then you look at various ways to do boost phase, and we are looking at airborne lasers, we are looking at ground-based interceptors, and we are looking at space-based.
And then he says whether they do any of these things depends on whether there is any money or not. We might say if they do not have any money they will not go there.
I happen to have the Missile Defense Agency 2004-05 fiscal year biennial budget estimates. Under space based tests, the Missile Defense Agency will begin developing a space based kinetic energy interceptor test bed in fiscal year 2004, one year from now. Initial on-orbit tests will commence in block 2008 with three to five satellites. The test best capability will be expanded in two year blocks.
The money will be in next year's budget, fiscal year 2004. Money set aside for these interceptors is initially $14 million, and for fiscal year 2005, $119 million with the first satellite launch in 2008 and the first flight test in 2009.
Here is the problem. Weaponization of space is real. We are moving in that direction. It would be naive to think that when we are having these discussions that might not end up being the killer, the end of the discussion, because that is where the United States is going.