The rising toll of natural disasters in Canada demands a new approach — so here is an idea. Let’s give Canada’s armed forces a fully supported national mission to lead natural disaster response. This mission would extend …to actually fighting fires on the front line and mitigating natural disasters. The armed forces’ engagement in a situation would be triggered by a severity scale approved in advance by federal and provincial governments. Once an agreed severity level is tripped, the armed forces would engage and take control. The real question going forward would be not if support from the armed forces is needed, but when and where it would be deployed. …The increased risk and prevalence of forest fires is a direct product of the climate crisis. So too is our carbon tax response. …Why can’t some of the carbon tax revenue be allocated to a new firefighting mission for Canada’s armed forces?