Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague for his excellent presentation. There may be many issues we disagree on, but I have always greatly admired how he articulates his thoughts, as well as the passion and emotion with which he delivers his speeches. I also consider him as a friend at committee, and I would respectfully submit to him that it might happen from time to time that we cannot agree on things. This is happening in a democratic arena, and I am happy that it takes place here.
Rick Hillier's statement was made two weeks ago, one day before the government's position was made public. According to him, providing training without accompanying trainees on the theatre of operations is almost impossible.
Does my colleague think that every effort has been made to try to develop a plan of action designed to deal with the fundamental issue of Afghanistan as it is now?
What we are seeing, which is something we found disappointing on the part of the Liberal Party at the time, is the constant introduction of the military aspect. The solution is always to sent more troops. In that sense, I personally feel that we are departing from Mr. Pearson's liberal philosophy of looking for solutions other than military. Since 2007, and still today, we can see that the solution applied is primarily a military one.
I want to know if it is not somewhat of a problem to depart from the philosophy of the peacekeepers and that of Mr. Pearson.