Um, we all recognize this as crazy, uh, the question, the chance that it would happen, but m- I, I was surprised to how many people today have a bit of a reasonable response, uh, being, yeah, you'd be an idiot if you did not, uh, you know, run this up the flagpole and, and at least give it some second thought.

Yeah.

And I...

Look, I'm, I'm not gonna try and, um, explain what the prime minister was, uh, trying to say or meant to say.

Um, but I think, you know, there's some legitimate, uh, concern here from a responsibility perspective.

It would be irresponsible of any government in the current context of the kind of crazy things that we've been seeing over the last, uh, 12 to 18 months to not consider some possible scenarios, what they might look like, how would we deal with them, those kinds of things.

That is what we would describe as prudent military planning.

But at the same time, is this a message for America or was it a message for Canada or am I reading too much into what the intent would've been if it was a question that sounds like he didn't necessarily prepare for?

Mark Norman, where are you on all of this?

Yeah, so that's probably a good place to start.

I think I can offer a couple of perspectives.

First thing is, we know we have a longstanding poll record that anything that aligns us with the underlying anti-Trump sentiment is generally well-received.

And that, you know, it's understandable, but it's also a little dangerous because, A, it's kind of an unconstrained or undisciplined approach that, you know, far too many things can fall into the category.

And, you know, that doesn't mean that they're automatically good.

And my second comment would be that I think that the nomenclature is interesting.

Yeah.

That's just not how it's done.

Right, and that's the right answer.

I mean, you could rotate a few key people, and I'm sure there are some people who are being rotated for possibly for probably some, you know, no doubt there's some mental health issues that they're dealing with, but those would be sort of in less than 10% of the crew on any given time that they'd be moving around for that.

So, yeah, your crew, typically you don't change a crew out at sea in a situation like that.

It's logistically impossible.

So yeah, these folks have regrettably been forward deployed.

So it's not just at sea, but they're downrange, dealing with some very stressful situations.

i don't know if you've ever been in halifax where i'm not talking to you i'm talking to our listeners where there was a time when i was in halifax it was always a big thing when the american aircraft carrier was in town because there was a whole bunch of rowdy kids having a great time spending american money in all the bars and for the most part it was fun but you could see that it was a big deal for them to finally be ashore and have a good time with their friends

So by choosing this sort of joint European NATO bid, so the German-Norway bid over an Asian bid, South Korea, what kind of broader geopolitical signals is Canada sending to its allies? And as we know, of course, the prime minister is heading straight from this announcement to Turkey for the NATO summit.

Yeah, no, I mean, there are some clear signals here, but before I offer my opinion in response to your question, I think it's really important that we avoid the tendency to treat this as some sort of binary framework, okay? So, you know, that it was either or because there were two options and they were both great options.

Okay.

But just because we chose one doesn't mean that, um, we're, we're not necessarily supportive of or interested in working with the other.

It just means that on this particular initiative, we've made that decision.

This doesn't mean that we're rejecting Korea and, and anybody who would, um, frame it that way, I think is oversimplifying the situation.

And, and I, I go back to what Luke and I had said about in response to your previous question.

Yeah, I mean,

So What does this fleet of 12 new submarines, once we have them all, give Canada the potential to do?

Well, a couple of things for you and your listeners.

First of all, let's put it in the term of bench strength.

So now we're not capacity limited because we have a limited fleet of arguably hard to maintain submarines, which is what we're saddled with right now.

So as we grow the capability, obviously we're going to have to grow the human resource component of this, the crews and everything else, and the maintainers and everything.

But we will get there.

If we build it, they will come, is my view.

Do we look different to the world, to NATO, to America, now that we're the country that has made the announcement that we're going to have 12 submarines for the next 10 years versus actually having them?

For the sake of argument for a moment, if in fact it is Admiral Norman, the German-Norwegian company TKMS, how important to the bid do you think is the integration, the NATO ally aspect of it, the further integration aspect of it?

Well, yeah, it would have been one of several factors that were taken into account.

You know, the submarines are very similar.

They do things a little differently, but that's not really a big distinction.

I think it really would have come down to the nature of the economic benefits, so the direct benefits of the actual procurement itself and then whatever indirect benefits that were farther removed from the actual purchase but would have had economic advantages for Canada.

It's not just how they quantify.

One might have actually been larger than the other, but I think it would have come down to the more subjective and qualitative interpretations of the government in terms of what kind of relationships, what kind of investments they were looking for.

What do you think we're realistically looking at?

So where do you fall on the F-35 question then to whether we should have a split?

I'm on the record as having said that we should.

As much as I understand the challenges, okay, the human resource challenges, the pilot shortages, all of these very real considerations and the fact that the infrastructure costs, et cetera, et cetera, I'm on the record and I still maintain the best solution for Canada is a hybrid fleet.

I don't like the notion of a split fleet because it automatically starts the conversation from the 88 airplanes that were in the order, or not in the order, in the requirement.

And I'm not sure 88 is the right number.

It's especially not the right number if you're buying two fleets.

I think it should be significantly more than that.

Mark, I know you don't like to weigh in on all the nitty-gritty Ottawa politics, but the other thing behind this issue, and this is where we get to this sense of Canadianism, that we're already seeing this, that Quebec... separatism and their issues are somehow more legitimate than those people that are feeling aggrieved in Alberta, that somehow they're just greedy oil people and that's not the same as culture and language and founding nation, which to Tasha's point, when they read that stuff in the newspapers, it just makes it worse that This division about your separatism is legit, but your separatism isn't, is a big problem.

Admiral Norman, what does so-called protecting the Strait of Hormuz or trying to ensure that ships can pass through free from attack or free from being the target, what does that actually entail?

Yeah, so from a material perspective, Ashley, you've really got two continuing threats to the safety of navigation through the strait.

One would be... a surface-launched missile threat or potentially small vessels operated by the Revolutionary Guard who could attack shipping on the surface or missile attacks, as I mentioned.

And then the second one, which is, in my opinion, the bigger concern, because it's harder to see and much harder to manage, is the underwater threat from mines.

And so The support that the president is looking for would come in a couple of forms.

It would come potentially through larger vessels that would be used to escort vessels through the strait.

And that's an extremely risky and arguably operationally inefficient way of doing it.

And just could I quickly follow up, how viable is the second part of what you just described?

If we separate for a moment, Admiral Norman, the strategy and the tactics, what is your impression? What do you think those of us who don't have the expertise both of you do have need to understand about the tactics that are being employed by the US and Israel?

Yeah, so the first thing is, just to pick up on General Lawson's point, I mean, this took a lot of planning to initiate.

And notwithstanding the difficulty of planning and executing those early stages, it's easy to start a conflict.

It's really hard to end it.

And so what we're observing now is they're transitioning from the initial blunting, if you will, of the Iranian military capacity both in terms of their air defense, their missile capability, and their naval capacity.

And now we're seeing, because the US have air superiority, we're now seeing them bring in larger and more vulnerable, traditionally vulnerable aircraft to do traditional bombing attacks, which allow them to, regrettably, to more impact cheaper.

I don't mean that in a good fashion.

What should we know about the Strait?

I wanted to get your take on that, given that it happened hundreds of kilometers from the Persian Gulf.

Yeah, so clearly they've identified a number of priority objectives with respect to neutralizing or at least reducing and mitigating the possibility of the Iranian forces being used.

The Navy is important in the sense that It is one of the mechanisms that the Iranians can use to choke off the Straits, if that's one of the strategies they would pick in response to what's happened.

The fact that they, I don't know whether they pursued the vessel or whether they were able to attack it using intelligence in the area, it's really irrelevant.

The point is that if the Americans deem that to be a combatant in the context of of this current conflict, then it's a legitimate target.

I don't necessarily share the celebratory reporting of it, but I think, you know, all is fair in the context of the kind of conflict that we're seeing emerging here, recognizing that we're only, what, five days into it at this point.

Mr. Norman, what is your sentiment on that and the feeling of where we are right now, even though, as you said, this is day five or six?

Yeah, well, I agree completely with Dennis' assessment.

the

net result, Laura, is that the organization is understaffed.

It has a lot of old equipment that needs to be replaced it has hollowed out many of its sort of background business processes and and the like spare parts maintenance all these types of things and and and as a result of that those have they have kind of a a compounding effect if people want to join They want to join an organization that is vibrant and exciting.

And, you know, it's seen to be important to not just them, but to fellow Canadians.

And so this, you know, as we're trying to correct all of these problems, the good news is we're starting to go in the right direction.

The bad news is that we still have all the baggage, if I can put it that way, of the preceding couple of decades.

Now, as far as the macro sort of geostrategic situation, been very fortunate that we've had this incredibly constructive and arguably unrivaled relationship with the United States, integrated defense, integrated economics, and that's really served Canada well from a purely Canadian perspective.

Yeah, absolutely.

to Ukraine existed, But will they is the secondary part of the question, right? And I wondered from where you sit, if you think, you know, the differences in where different European countries sit or even Canada in some instances, like a video like this or an event like this is enough to shock them into coalescing.

Well, I think there is still a very strong underpinning of support for Ukraine.

Yes, there always have been varying degrees of support, and there's never been unanimous consent, if I can describe it that way.

But basically what we're observing, or what we did observe, is... that the ultimate in uh coercion bullying and some have even gone as far as described this as you know mafia-like uh behavior and so i don't think the the major capitals in europe are going to respond positively to this we saw both the leaders of france and the uk make visits um but One was extremely deferential.

The other was polite and respectful, but made it clear that Trump wasn't necessarily accurate.

So I think there's enough support there.

And I think that they will be unified in the sense that the problem is in their backyard.

I think that the problem that we come up against for Canadians is that when we listen to the president, it doesn't appear to be the case that even if we were to do all the things that would rectify that, it would relieve us from whatever he wants to enact on us.

Do you buy that? It's possible.

One of the elements of the discipline of military training is that we look at things through a variety of different scenarios, including the least threatening, the most threatening, the most likely, the least likely, all these different scenarios.

it's entirely possible that that could play out.

And that could lend itself to a strategy where you kind of wait and see.

But waiting and seeing isn't a particularly dynamic strategy, and it doesn't really put you in control of many of the factors that you're The deeper concern I have, and I alluded to it in the piece, is this goes beyond himself.

I'll call him Voldemort for this discussion.

You know, there are not just a bunch of people around him.

the coexistence It's a viable approach.