Canada’s defence minister assured parliamentarians on Thursday that the federal government is well on its way to meeting NATO's old, politically charged spending target by next spring.

David McGuinty’s confidence that the country will meet the benchmark of spending two per cent of gross domestic product on the military was met with skepticism from the Opposition Conservatives who noted the Department of National Defence’s long history of having trouble spending all of its annual appropriation.

But separate from the minister’s remarks, a clear example of how the government will get there presented itself in public.

The U.S. Defense Security Cooperation Agency announced its approval of a $3.6-billion munitions sale to Canada on Thursday. The planned purchase involves thousands of bombs —

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