National Defence committee  Burnout is an extremely serious matter. As you well know, we're 10,000 personnel short. There's a rule of thumb for deployments. In Latvia, for example, it's one-third deployed, one-third training and one-third resting. We are not in a combat situation in Latvia, unlike in Afghanistan, where we were in a combat situation.

National Defence committee  I think Canada has done everything it is in a position to do. Everything is relative. The strength of the Canadian Forces is a relative balance with Canadian government budgets, so it doesn't get everything it needs or wants. As we have traditionally done, we have put our forces in what I call the front window.

National Defence committee  Mr. Chair and members of the committee, thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today to provide an update on the current situation in the Russo-Ukraine war. As of today, the war may be described as being in a strategic stalemate. The last Ukrainian offensive action was last fall when Ukrainian forces pushed back Russian forces in the areas of Kharkiv in the northern sector of the front and Kherson, specifically Kherson city, in the southern sector of the front.

National Defence committee  I would suggest that we stay the course. I think we have it right between balancing our interests in Europe with taking care of our Arctic space, and I think that given our resource limitations, that's probably it. You can make intellectual arguments to address the China option, but there's a resource issue there.

National Defence committee  Vastly. I mean, it's hard to imagine how to conceptualize how you would bring Ukraine into NATO while it has a hostile relationship with Russia. In fact, a portion of its territory is occupied by Russia or its proxies in the Donbass, and then there's the whole issue of Crimea. I guess, to be literal, that if we brought them into NATO we would immediately go into war-fighting mode to defend the Donbass and to buffer off the Crimean peninsula.

National Defence committee  This is the big question, the question of Ukrainian neutrality. I won't take up too much time, but the Ukrainian ambassador in London yesterday, Vadym Prystaiko, who I know, said Ukrainians might consider neutrality to avert a war. This was immediately withdrawn by the Ukrainian foreign ministry as a misunderstanding and speaking out of context.

National Defence committee  It's realpolitik. The question is, are you going to fight a war over something that's not going to happen anyway? Ukraine is not coming into NATO. There is no consensus to do that, so you're fighting on a point of principle that it has a right to come, but it's not going to come.

National Defence committee  I didn't get a chance to talk about the Minsk agreements in my comments because of the time issue, but the Minsk agreements, if they're implemented, call for a system of federalization in terms of a special status for the Donbass to return to Ukraine proper as semi-autonomous. That's a question of federalism.

National Defence committee  This will get us into a huge debate, so let me trot out my territory on this one. I believe that the Russian position.... After the Cold War, we were not all that nice to the vanquished. Yes, the west won the Cold War, but this is the classic case of how to deal with your opponent when you defeat your opponent.

National Defence committee  I'll speak from a Canadian point of view on that one. We're stretched. The Canadian military deployments that we have now in Latvia and in Ukraine are basically pushing the envelope for us in terms of how many forces we can deploy. In Afghanistan we had roughly 2,000, and that was our limit, given the number of forces we have.

National Defence committee  I would agree with Mr. Colby on that one. Europe and the Arctic would be very good Canadian areas of focus. That's where we've been historically, and I believe that it remains logical. The question is going to be, as is always the case, how much money we can put up. You, the politicians, have to deal with that, in terms of competing demands for the Canadian budget and the Canadian tax dollar.

National Defence committee  I will just follow up on the Canadian position and its military deployments. We've been involved with deterrence operations, as we are now in Latvia. We have a ship that's part of the NATO force cruising into the Black Sea, and we have air deployments in Romania. Of course, we met our roles in Afghanistan.

National Defence committee  Yes, it should be, particularly with climate change and the greater utility of the Northwest Passage. Canada was sensitized to this in the 1970s with the passage of the American ship, the Manhattan. At that point, Canada recognized that in order to enforce its sovereignty and the Canadian jurisdiction over the Northwest Passage—which is a dispute Canada has with the United States in terms of whether these are international or Canadian waters—it must show it has a capability in the Arctic.

National Defence committee  I will pick up on that, if I may. The Canadian effort, as I've said in my remarks, is fundamentally.... We're very Eurocentric in terms of our current deployment. This is very much part of our history. We've always defined Europe, and the current situation in Ukraine is one of the strongest importance from our national perspective.

National Defence committee  Mr. Colby has outlined an American perspective on China. There is a long American history there, and I fully respect that. From the Canadian point of view, the European connection, for the time being, certainly in the short to middle term, should remain our priority. I believe we are where we should be.