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“An emerging threat against western nations is that of ‘lone wolf’ terrorist attacks against targets of tremendous symbolic importance, such as those we have seen in Berlin, London, Paris, and Ottawa,” said Department of National Defence spokesman Dan Le Bouthillier. In October 2014, lone wolf attacker Michael Zehaf-Bibeau killed Cpl. Nathan Cirillo at the National War Memorial in Ottawa, then attacked the nearby Parliament Buildings, where he was shot and killed.

“Many of our allies have responded to this shift in the security environment by relocating their top-tier special forces units to within close proximity and rapid response time of their national capitals, and the rationale for doing so has proven increasingly convincing,” Le Bouthillier said.

As a result, the Forces are now considering keeping JTF2 in Ottawa — and according to one source within the Department of National Defence, the move has been all but shelved.

The Canadian Forces had talked about the need for a new base for JTF2 since 2005. Among the options considered over the years was an expansion of the existing Ottawa site at Dwyer Hill or moving the unit to CFB Petawawa, where there are already special forces training facilities and installations.

Photo by Lars Hagberg for the National Post/File

But the Conservatives decided that relocating the unit to Trenton made the most sense. They argued that positioning JTF2 at CFB Trenton, one of the country’s main military airbases, allowed the unit immediate access to aircraft for domestic and overseas missions. Another unit in the special operations command with which JTF2 works closely — the Canadian Joint Incident Response Unit, which deals with nuclear, biological and chemical incidents — is already there.