Canada’s outgoing top soldier is a joyous pessimist, if such a thing is possible.

Chief of the Defence Staff Gen. Wayne Eyre warns that the world has entered a “pre-wartime security environment” with multiple threats and opportunities for countries to violently clash.

“If you’re in uniform, you learn to be pessimistic about the security situation because you’re trained for the worst case,” Eyre said in an end-of-term interview with the National Post on Tuesday. “Given the indicators and the trends that we see, I am pessimistic about the security situation.”