1. From NORAD to NOR[A]D: The Future Evolution of North American Defence Co-operation
- Author:
- Andrea Charron and James Fergusson
- Publication Date:
- 05-2018
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Canadian Global Affairs Institute (CGAI)
- Abstract:
- The North American defence environment is in the process of a major transformation, occasioned by dramatic changes in the geostrategic/political landscape and the development of new generations of weapon systems. As a result, the requirements to deter, detect and defend North America from a variety of new threats are transforming. In this context, Canada and the United States, through the Permanent Joint Board of Defense (PJBD) established the Evolution of North American Defense (EvoNAD) study, and tasked its execution to the North American Aerospace Defense (NORAD) command. EvoNAD considers a long time horizon and has been broken into subcomponents reflecting six domain priorities: air, maritime, cyber, aerospace, space and land. The overarching factor which binds the six components together is the recognition that the single-domain threat environment is evolving into a multi-domain one. In the past, the threat to North America resided largely on a single axis (north-south), within a dominant domain (air, combined with ballistic missiles), met by a bi-national structure. While this threat seemed to collapse with the end of the Cold War, NORAD continued and evolved to adapt to new threats as well as to continue to monitor the Cold War-styled air and aerospace threats. Subsequently, 9/11 created a new threat environment and forced NORAD to consider threats emanating from within North America as well as outside of it. In addition to a number of changes, including direct feeds from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and NAVCANADA, NORAD expanded into the maritime domain via a maritime warning mission. Roughly at the same time, NORAD’s attention also turned to the cyber-domain and its common threat to North America. The air threat has now returned with the resumption of long-range Russian flights across the Arctic, and down the Atlantic and Pacific coasts. This threat, however, is of a different character because of the development of a new generation of Russian long-range air-launched cruise missiles, as well as sea-launched cruise missiles, which have direct implications for NORAD’s capacity to deter, detect and defend, as well as for its current area of operations and mission suites (air/aerospace warning and control and maritime warning). Not only will these new long-range capabilities diffuse to other potential adversaries, generating a global threat environment, but also the first generation of hypersonic weapons has set the conditions for the merger of air and missile defence, and the air and outer space domains. Finally, the consequences of an attack against North America, alongside potential catastrophic natural disasters relative to the role of military forces in support of civil authorities, raises issues for both Canada and the U.S., and thus NORAD, regarding the most efficient and effective means to respond. The multi-domain/multi-dimensional North American threat environment should drive both Canada and the U.S. towards deeper defence co-operation, and the functional demands of this new threat environment could lead to NORAD’s ultimate transformation into an integrated, multi-domain and dimensional North American Defense Command solution. Of course, this outcome is not inevitable, and numerous barriers exist. Nonetheless, the same logic which led to NORAD’s creation in 1957 (with the agreement signed in 1958), remains valid. Driven by the common recognition that the defence of North America is indivisible, a North American Defense Command would be a natural evolution in Canada – American defence relations.
- Topic:
- Defense Policy, International Cooperation, Regional Cooperation, Maritime, Land, and Cyberspace
- Political Geography:
- Canada, North America, and United States of America