The minister of National Defence (MND; French: ministre de la défense nationale) is a minister of the Crown in the Cabinet of Canada responsible for the management and direction of all matters relating to the national defence of Canada.

The King (represented by the governor general of Canada) is Commander-in-Chief of the Canadian Forces and has final authority on all orders and laws for the "defence of the realm".

[10] The Department of National Defence exists to aid the minister in carrying out her responsibilities, and acts as the civilian support system for the Canadian Forces.

The air and naval post was reincorporated into the portfolio of the minister of National Defence following the Second World War.

The affair involved Gerda Munsinger, a German citizen who had been convicted in Germany as a common prostitute, a petty thief and a smuggler, who emigrated to Canada in 1956 in spite of a warning card dated 1952, and who was in 1960 the mistress of the former Associate Minister of National Defence Pierre Sévigny.