Experts call for an overhaul of Canada's national security policy to cope with an 'angry' world

Rarely has the world intruded so viscerally — and with so little apparent effect — upon the great national conversation that we call a federal election.

Launched just as two decades of nation-building efforts in Afghanistan were collapsing, the election (which produced a Parliament strangely similar to the one dissolved in August) also saw what some observers have described as a strategic snub by Canada's closest allies: the establishment of a new U.S.-U.K.-Australia alliance to contain China.

And yet, questions about Canada's current place in the shifting sands of the global order barely rated a mention on the campaign trail.

That could change quickly as the new (old) Liberal government faces a bevy of pressing international commitments and crises, ranging from the benign but significant gathering of world leaders at the United Nations to the slow-rolling humanitarian disaster afflicting Afghan refugees.

The newly re-elected minority government of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau will have to hit the ground running. On Tuesday, U.S. President Joe Biden mapped out a strategy for confronting authoritarian states without triggering a new Cold War.

He did so a week after surprising the world with a new security alliance — AUKUS — involving two of Canada's closest Commonwealth allies, the United Kingdom and Australia.

Events in the world beyond our borders did come up during the 36-day campaign. More often than not, however, they were used by campaigning leaders as a cudgel with which to beat down their opponents.