Divining the right role, capabilities, structure, and Regimental System for Canada's Army Reserves

[Remius]

Dom ops exercise.

Road move to another town or city without the use of GPS or the internet. Convoy drills, manifest lists, broken down vehicle SOPs, route cards.

Set up a CP at the location then have sections conduct operations. Collect information on infrastructure, man a VCP, QRF/rest, local security, point, area and route recces. Practice self-recovery. Officers practice meeting with and speaking to local police, fire, EMS.

Reservists won't deploy overseas without a few months of training (in most cases). They may be called upon for domestic operations last minute. If you're creative you can check off a whole lot of IBTS boxes with domestic operations.

We did something like that for OP Abbacus. 

 

[Haggis]

We did something like that for OP Abbacus.

But how many times since then?

I retired as the Ops O of a P Res Infantry unit in December last year.  It was a constant battle to find white space to conduct unit training once all the annual IBTS, Battle School and TBG/Bde activities were overlaid unless you used a stat holiday weekend (which was pretty much verboten by higher).  Shifting L1 and L2 priorities often meant shifting activity dates.  Competition with Reg F units for equipment and training areas was ongoing.  The process for use of civilian land was cumbersome and inflexible.

Late notification of collective training activities meant little time for the most basic Battle Procedure in a Class A world.  This last point was particularly irritating as it is exceedingly easy to pass information today in the Class A world.  Far too easy, in fact, that it almost encourages 'just-in-time" planning and passage of information.  That makes command and battle staffs lazy and fosters procrastination.

 

[Remius]

Off hand maybe two or three times that were of any value. 

Definitely not enough.  But that sort of training is possible.

But how many times since then?

I retired as the Ops O of a P Res Infantry unit in December last year.  It was a constant battle to find white space to conduct unit training once all the annual IBTS, Battle School and TBG/Bde activities were overlaid unless you used a stat holiday weekend (which was pretty much verboten by higher).  Shifting L1 and L2 priorities often meant shifting activity dates.  Competition with Reg F units for equipment and training areas was ongoing.  The process for use of civilian land was cumbersome and inflexible.

Late notification of collective training activities meant little time for the most basic Battle Procedure in a Class A world.  This last point was particularly irritating as it is exceedingly easy to pass information today in the Class A world.  Far too easy, in fact, that it almost encourages 'just-in-time" planning and passage of information.  That makes command and battle staffs lazy and fosters procrastination.

 

[MilEME09]

Haggis you might be able to relate, another headache is when 80% of the units in the brigade decide to go on ex the same weekend, makes it potentially hard to get enough vehicles amd equipment.

 

[Eye In The Sky]

Yes they are different beasts, not saying previous experience in Afghanistan would of been better if Pres units could be called up amd deployed. Not in their current state any way. To make PRes units deployable a reality would require a reorganization, and a shift in training focus and intensity from the PRes. For example if say the Seaforth Highlanders, Regina Rifles, and Loyal Edmonton Regiment were called up to form a mixed battalion for over seas. Assuming each is at company strength, how well would this deal with burn out among the reg force with the current deployment cycle we have? It would also help create a more operationally ready reserve force because of that experience.

Does the average Pres "Regiment" have the experience to deploy and command a Coy or equivalent size on deployed ops?

You've stated the avg Res member is only showing up 2 times a month; and the Cl A trg year is approx 10 months long.  Using those numbers, that's 60 hours of experience/year and all at an Armouries.

 

[Eye In The Sky]

Dom ops exercise.

Road move to another town or city without the use of GPS or the internet. Convoy drills, manifest lists, broken down vehicle SOPs, route cards.

Set up a CP at the location then have sections conduct operations. Collect information on infrastructure, man a VCP, QRF/rest, local security, point, area and route recces. Practice self-recovery. Officers practice meeting with and speaking to local police, fire, EMS.

Reservists won't deploy overseas without a few months of training (in most cases). They may be called upon for domestic operations last minute. If you're creative you can check off a whole lot of IBTS boxes with domestic operations.

This;  I've said before "do what you can with what you have".

We used to do creative stuff;  Tp Leader would issue a Wng O on a Class A night (was Thursday for us back in the day) early in the night for a tasking, say Estab Mounted Ops covering the harbour entrance or something.  That night would then be spent doing BP.  That night would usually end with Patrol Commanders issuing their orders.

Next trg night, crews went to the Veh Garage to kit out the callsigns, comms checks, etc.  Crew Commanders went to confirmatory orders, troop mounted up, and moved off to occupy the Mounted Ops.  once the final Op Report was sent in, End Ex was called, returned to the armouries, Stables conducted and then a hot-wash in the mess (we had an All Ranks one) and usually pizza's showed up.

Best use of 6 hours, got people doing the real stuff, found out what kit worked, what needed to be fixed, trained newer people in some basic tasks.  No extra funding required.  We had 90% attendance rates as a rule.

 

[FJAG]

Does the average Pres "Regiment" have the experience to deploy and command a Coy or equivalent size on deployed ops?

You've stated the avg Res member is only showing up 2 times a month; and the Cl A trg year is approx 10 months long.  Using those numbers, that's 60 hours of experience/year and all at an Armouries.

That's an interesting question and I'll answer as far as it relates to an artillery regiment where the sub-unit is a gun battery.

Essentially you can train a battery and conduct live fire exercises with as little as one gun, one CP, one FOO party and a battery commander with an FSCC. Artillery officers will learn the the essential skills for their jobs at their various DP level courses and as such one can say that a PRes artillery regiment can field a functioning battery (albeit that doesn't mean they have the numbers or equipment to field a full battery). In fact most units carry out some extent of live fire training several times per year.

What is missing from the equation is that PRes artillery regiments have none of the A or B echelon staff or equipment (veh, weapons and rad techs, medical or kitchen) required to actually be capable of deploying.

Equally important is that a number of the higher end functions of fire support coordination (such as air integration) is nowhere near as well learned or practiced as they need to be.

The short answer is that while a PRes artillery regiment has the fundamental ability to "deploy and command" a battery on "deployed ops" it has neither the equipment, personnel, or experience to do so successfully without major augmentation and predeployment training.

:cheers:

 

[childs56]

That's an interesting question and I'll answer as far as it relates to an artillery regiment where the sub-unit is a gun battery.

Essentially you can train a battery and conduct live fire exercises with as little as one gun, one CP, one FOO party and a battery commander with an FSCC. Artillery officers will learn the the essential skills for their jobs at their various DP level courses and as such one can say that a PRes artillery regiment can field a functioning battery (albeit that doesn't mean they have the numbers or equipment to field a full battery). In fact most units carry out some extent of live fire training several times per year.

What is missing from the equation is that PRes artillery regiments have none of the A or B echelon staff or equipment (veh, weapons and rad techs, medical or kitchen) required to actually be capable of deploying.
Equally important is that a number of the higher end functions of fire support coordination (such as air integration) is nowhere near as well learned or practiced as they need to be.

The short answer is that while a PRes artillery regiment has the fundamental ability to "deploy and command" a battery on "deployed ops" it has neither the equipment, personnel, or experience to do so successfully without major augmentation and predeployment training.

:cheers:

Although a Regular Force Regiment might have the support behind them in theory, they are heavily augmented to fill a deployment especially sustained operations. Usually taking all three Gun Btys/ HQ Bty and using Soldiers from each to full fill their lines for each deployment. When a Bty deploys from the Regiment the gun lines look pretty empty. Its a sad reality in some of the Regular Force and Reserve units that at times they lack the manpower to deploy even a small number of their equipment.
I remember back in the late 90's My Reserve Sub unit could deploy 90 soldiers in the field (we had 100-120 on paper). Our Parent unit 40ish, The other sister Regiment was around another 40. Plus With our local Service Battalion we could field our own Mechanics,Techs, Medics and such.
We had 6 guns, two working command posts and everything else was usually bailing twined together between the two Regiments. 
At times We lacked much of the working technical equipment such as survey, Op Equipment,radios etc  That limited us severely for training and retention.

As for the Higher Integration We could have filled that gap very quickly if we had the training allotment to do so. As much as a Bty can deploy, its assets are seldom far from full Regimental support.

Its a topic that is sore point for many. To compare a Reserve Unit to a Regular Force one for training and skills has many on edge to favor the Regular Force. My expirance has been both have their short comings that can be over come fairly quick with proper allotment of training and equipment along with engaged recruiting and retention.

 

[Haggis]

This;  I've said before "do what you can with what you have".

I tried as much as possible to make the IBTS exercises challenging and fun but was often defeated by the higher HQ requirement to have all my IBTS done by end October despite the fact that a lot of my equipment hadn't returned yet from RST or had come back broken and every unit in the Bde and 2 CMBG were trying to book training areas and ranges at the same time.

In my three years as Ops O, at least in my Div/Bde, training direction and required BTS were proscribed by higher and units had certain IBTS and collective BTS gateways to attain by certain dates before all unit collective training became focused on preparing members for TBG led/directed collective training. In my unit, I was able to find one free weekend of white space every quarter to do "fun" unit stuff and that sometimes disappeared when Bde or TBG either moved or added activities. (I lost one late spring DOMOPS/IS exercise that had taken months to plan due to the urgent need across the Bde to support Op LENTUS 17-2... clearly not the Bde's fault)

I even went to Quebec for an excellent range and IBTS exercise one year but the process changed the following year making training in Quebec almost as cumbersome as going OUTCAN.

 

[brihard]

I even went to Quebec for an excellent range and IBTS exercise one year but the process changed the following year making training in Quebec almost as cumbersome as going OUTCAN.

I know the vote was pretty close, but...

 

[Haggis]

I know the vote was pretty close, but...

I'm a dual citizen so I just went to l'ambassade.

 

[daftandbarmy]

Does the average Pres "Regiment" have the experience to deploy and command a Coy or equivalent size on deployed ops?

You've stated the avg Res member is only showing up 2 times a month; and the Cl A trg year is approx 10 months long.  Using those numbers, that's 60 hours of experience/year and all at an Armouries.

Yes. Given the right numbers, and enough of the right trained people, I have successfully run a Coy CP (usually dismounted) on field exercises. Usually, it was me with a radio on my back as I wanted to make sure that everyone had a chance to get some section attacks etc done, and were not stuck watching a radio all weekend. On patrolling focused exercises though we usually had a CP and briefing area set up in some MOD tentage somewhere.

As for your training time calculation, you forgot to subtract the hours required to deliver 'mandatory' training, and other fastballs. These are usually Army mandated briefings, that add nothing to the infantry skills of your average 18 year old Private, and usually have to be paid for out of our manday budget with no chance of recouping the loss.

 

[FJAG]

Does the average Pres "Regiment" have the experience to deploy and command a Coy or equivalent size on deployed ops?

You've stated the avg Res member is only showing up 2 times a month; and the Cl A trg year is approx 10 months long.  Using those numbers, that's 60 hours of experience/year and all at an Armouries.

Just one more comment about the above. Most artillery weekend exercises (most Army ones for that matter) start on a Friday night and run through until Sunday afternoon with a bare minimum time for sleep. That's usually around 30 to 35 hours of training time on any given weekend alone.

It's the same for summer concentrations. Training days are not 9-5 but generally a 24 hour day with minimal sleep. The Almighty created the nighttime so that gunners could  practice night moves and fire illumination missions.  ;D

:cheers:

 

[Colin Parkinson]

That's an interesting question and I'll answer as far as it relates to an artillery regiment where the sub-unit is a gun battery.

Essentially you can train a battery and conduct live fire exercises with as little as one gun, one CP, one FOO party and a battery commander with an FSCC. Artillery officers will learn the the essential skills for their jobs at their various DP level courses and as such one can say that a PRes artillery regiment can field a functioning battery (albeit that doesn't mean they have the numbers or equipment to field a full battery). In fact most units carry out some extent of live fire training several times per year.

What is missing from the equation is that PRes artillery regiments have none of the A or B echelon staff or equipment (veh, weapons and rad techs, medical or kitchen) required to actually be capable of deploying.

Equally important is that a number of the higher end functions of fire support coordination (such as air integration) is nowhere near as well learned or practiced as they need to be.

The short answer is that while a PRes artillery regiment has the fundamental ability to "deploy and command" a battery on "deployed ops" it has neither the equipment, personnel, or experience to do so successfully without major augmentation and predeployment training.

:cheers:

Our ops tasking solved that with the addition of kitchen trailer, sigs truck, 2nd CP, REME truck and a ambulance, along with full FOO parties. Eventually all taken by brigade, mind you we also had 6 functioning guns and tractors back then.

 

[FJAG]

Our ops tasking solved that with the addition of kitchen trailer, sigs truck, 2nd CP, REME truck and a ambulance, along with full FOO parties. Eventually all taken by brigade, mind you we also had 6 functioning guns and tractors back then.

That raised a number of questions for me Colin.

1. What and when was the op tasking?

2. Did the tasking cease when brigade took the equipment?

3. What did the brigade do with the equipment?

Back in the day, 26th Fd had six guns, gun tractors, a CP, recce vehicles, FOO vehicles as well. On exercise the ambulance came from the District's med coy or 3rd Horse, the local Sig Sqn (in those days belonging to the Comms Gp) frequently provided extra rad op CP vehicles. Extra ammo 2 1/2s from the Service Bn. We never saw RCEME or kitchen vehicles. (IMPs or haybox only)

Just curious.

:cheers:

 

[Rifleman62]

Op tasted 26 Fd Regt had two CP's (one not completely outfitted with radios I think but had the Milpac) an Amb, ammo 2 1/2 with winch, plus another. Can't remember about a kitchen truck. That was was possibly after your tenure there. As G4, did the planning/veh tasking for Prairie Mil Area Arty Conc, and once Prairie/Pacific as Man Mil Dist was tasked to run all the Arty Concs. Always got Wpn Techs from Shilo for the Concs to do safety pre-fire checks after the moves and during the FTX. We eventually low bedded all the guns to save wear and tear, but still did the SPF.

 

[Colin Parkinson]

I believe op tasking started around 1980 and ran for about 3-4 years, then it was dropped. As part of that tasking, they airlifted the entire unit to Shilo to support the German Black Bear exercise, heady times they were, we had kit, pay, bodies, radios, working howitzers and ammunition. We never got our full compliment of small arms though, i think we were supposed to get some .50cals or GPMG's as well. The politics at the end I have no real idea of though.

 

[AlDazz]

I bit of a wandering topic. I don't think any PRes unit is capable of generating a capable sub unit in the form of Sqn, Bty or Coy.  They don't posses the required stores and resources and would need considerable augmentation. The differences in equipment for the Armd Recce and Fd Arty units would present integration challenges as well. The Infantry would be able to generate Platoon Groups into Light Infantry Companies and any training deficit would be eliminated during work up training.  As the PRes is expected to provide individual augmentation to the Regular Army if there is no change to equipment scales of issue then there will be no change in capability.

 

[MilEME09]

"Matt Gurney: Keep Canada safe by building out the Army Reserve"
https://nationalpost.com/opinion/matt-gurney-keep-canada-safe-by-building-out-the-army-reserve?utm_term=Autofeed&utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Facebook&fbclid=IwAR0hIw6nod3_4Gu3fAZH_fHmPZoWiFArG7O9zI9AhnBs6rK936wxsHAbr2w#Echobox=1562604573

Two take aways from this article: One sounds like the Cons may expand the reserves if they gain power in October.

Two: The author makes things way to simple of a money game, which is naive at best. Sure the reserves cost $300 million in 2015, at face value he suggests doubling the Reserves. Great idea if it was only so simple as to cost $300 million more. He fails to account for if you added say 20,000 bodies to the reserves, the cost to equip them, and the cost to expand infrastructure. While he claims many reserve units have lot's of space to grow, that is not the case from what I've seen, at least in major cities. If you told my unit our authorized effective strength was doubling, you would be crazy to say we had the space, or the equipment for 450 - 600 bodies. We would need huge investments in infrastructure, vehicles, weapons and other equipment. Which as pointed out on this thread, without a fundamental restructure of the Reserves is not worth the investment.

 

[FJAG]

"Matt Gurney: Keep Canada safe by building out the Army Reserve"
https://nationalpost.com/opinion/matt-gurney-keep-canada-safe-by-building-out-the-army-reserve?utm_term=Autofeed&utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Facebook&fbclid=IwAR0hIw6nod3_4Gu3fAZH_fHmPZoWiFArG7O9zI9AhnBs6rK936wxsHAbr2w#Echobox=1562604573

Two take aways from this article: One sounds like the Cons may expand the reserves if they gain power in October.

Two: The author makes things way to simple of a money game, which is naive at best. Sure the reserves cost $300 million in 2015, at face value he suggests doubling the Reserves. Great idea if it was only so simple as to cost $300 million more. He fails to account for if you added say 20,000 bodies to the reserves, the cost to equip them, and the cost to expand infrastructure. While he claims many reserve units have lot's of space to grow, that is not the case from what I've seen, at least in major cities. If you told my unit our authorized effective strength was doubling, you would be crazy to say we had the space, or the equipment for 450 - 600 bodies. We would need huge investments in infrastructure, vehicles, weapons and other equipment. Which as pointed out on this thread, without a fundamental restructure of the Reserves is not worth the investment.

I'm not sure where Gurney got the $300 million figure from. Para 5.82 of the Auditor General's Report says this:

National Defence reported to Parliament that it spent $1.2 billion to train and operate the Primary Reserve in the 2013–14 fiscal year. According to the Canadian Armed Forces, $724 million of this amount was to train and operate the Army Reserve. Of that amount, $166 million was attributed to the Army Reserve for the operation of Canadian Army bases. This amount was calculated based on a ratio of the number of Army Reserve soldiers to the number of Regular Army soldiers, not on the use of base facilities. The Canadian Armed Forces does not maintain information on the Army Reserve’s actual use of base facilities. In our opinion, the $166 million estimate is not well supported and may result in providing incorrect information to Parliament by overstating the reported expenses of the Primary Reserve.

I think that there's some creative math there but let's not quibble about numbers.

The problem isn't one of expanding the number of reservists but the need to change the structure, role and overall concept of the reserves within the overall CAF. Our system is broken. Adding more people is just reinforcing failure.

I've been doing some number crunching for an article on reforming the Army's primary reserves that I've written for the Canadian Forces Journal and quite simply, even at some 20,000 trained Army reservists, you can fully man 2 mechanized brigade groups (at 4,500 each), three support brigades (at 3,000 each) and training depot establishments (another 2,000). (Members who are undergoing their DP1 level training should be counted against a BTL rather than the establishments of the Reserve Force's units and formations)

Expanding the number of reservists is not a bad idea, but before one even considers that, one has to completely and utterly change the underlying system so that we have not merely more reservists but rather that we have an effective, equipped and deployable Reserve Force that will multiply rather than augment the combat power of our existing Regular Force. Anything else is a waste of money.

:stirpot: