National Defence committee  I think one of the most important things to bear in mind is that the NATO council, 28 countries around the table, chaired by the secretary general, is all civilian at the top. The summits are our leaders, prime ministers, presidents, and so on. Ministers are on the next level, an

National Defence committee  I fully endorse what Dick has just said. I have a variety of ways you can come at this. One way that has been used in the past in the area of international security is to introduce some form of white paper or discussion paper. It used to be called a green paper, at one time. I

National Defence committee  I'll take a run at that. There's no provision for that in the Washington treaty. A country could in theory elect to leave, provide notice and so on, but there's no provision for other members of NATO to remove a country from the alliance. With regard to Turkey, if I might, ther

National Defence committee  I agree. I mean, it would be very damaging. However, I don't think it would actually get to declaration of article 5. The way this works is that a country comes to council and says their homeland has been attacked from abroad and here's the evidence. They then ask that the allia

National Defence committee  I agree completely with that. Norway regularly seeks NATO exercises in and around its waters. You have to know that it's a long-standing Canadian policy not to have exercises anywhere near Canada's waters or territory, so it would require a policy shift on the part of the governm

National Defence committee  We have refused even to refer to the Arctic or the north as a NATO area of preoccupation.

National Defence committee  This is why we have not gone down this road. The prospect is to have British, French, Italian, and German frigates somewhere off our coast in the north in an exercise, and every government under which I've served has not wanted to go there. That's their judgment of public opinion

National Defence committee  In fact, I don't have a different view. I notice that General Mattis met with his Turkish counterpart on the margins of the meeting today in Brussels, and it was very much.... The U.S. approach is frankly exactly what Dick described, which is hold them as close as you can, say

National Defence committee  Well, the conversation has changed over the last year, because there is now an edge to it. As I said, there is a kind of quid pro quo: if you don't pay, you don't get the U.S. In a public statement in Pensacola in December, President Trump said, “I told the people of NATO standin

National Defence committee  The consequence of this public discussion about payment and collective defence is that it completely undermines deterrence. In the past, it was always assumed that there was a political commitment, let alone article 5, that if an ally was attacked, they would have the support of

National Defence committee  Our best friend right now in Washington is General Mattis. He was the strategic commander in Norfolk when I was at NATO. I spent years on—

National Defence committee  He understands Canada, and he understands the quality of the Canadian contribution. You'll notice that the sharp criticism which has gone to Germany has not necessarily come our way, and I would say this is in large part because of, as Denis has talked about, the quality of the

National Defence committee  They're not strong enough. I'll just go right to the point. NATO has a liaison office in New York, for instance. It's staffed at a very junior level. It's very modest. Certainly Afghanistan demonstrated that although NATO and the UN can work together effectively, those relation

National Defence committee  It's frightening. If I might, I'll just put a fine point on it. It would take about a week for any of us, including the U.S., to know if one of those deployed weapons in the back of a truck went missing in a period of crisis. That's scary. Then, as Dick has said, there is North

National Defence committee  It is an issue that was raised with Russia when there was a NATO-Russia council. Since the invasion and acquisition of Crimea, the first time since World War II that a European power has grabbed a piece of territory of another country, the NATO-Russia council doesn't exist anymor