Outsourced PDP/PEP

When I leave Ottawa Airport for travel to the US, I can clear US Customs before I get on the plane. If I clear customs in Ottawa, then I can march right off the plane once I arrive in the States (suggesting that the plane can use a gate typically reserved for US dmestic flights). The desks in Ottawa are staffed by US Customs officers with the same suspicious glare, doing the same job they would do at at Dulles or O'Hare, they just happen to work abroad.

In the terminology of the SAML model, the PDP (Policy Decision Point) and PEP (Policy Enforcement Point) of the US government have been outsourced to Canada (hopefully with the permission of the Canadian government). It's at the desks where the decision is made to allow entry or not, and the hostered guns are there to enforce this decision.

I wonder what are the legalities of this set-up - am I considered to still be in Canadian territory when I stand before them with sweaty palms - wondering if they are going to be suspicious of a Canadian born in Russia working for a Japanese company travelling to the States en route to France?

Or is a little slice of America, i.e. by presenting myself to the officer am I considered to be in US territory, and governed by that country's regulations? If so, at what point do I cross back into Canada (because the gates beyond are presumably Canadian).