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

[MilEME09]

The Role of the Permanent Active Militia should be to support the Non-Permanent Active Militia. That includes planning and organizing, but also mentoring and training.

Artificial divides are harmful and detrimental to both.

I find we get three Types of RSS, A) the ones looking for their retirement posting, B) burnt out people who need a break from a field unit, or C) The problem bring cast off to someone else. Majority are the first two, but every once and awhile you get a C

 

[daftandbarmy]

I find we get three Types of RSS, A) the ones looking for their retirement posting, B) burnt out people who need a break from a field unit, or C) The problem bring cast off to someone else. Majority are the first two, but every once and awhile you get a C

We had a stalker too, once. No idea what happened to him

 

[dapaterson]

I have seen some magnificent people posted to units as RSS. I have seen bad units break great people. I have seen problems ignored by units because they were too lazy to do the admin to correct it.

 

[markppcli]

The Role of the Permanent Active Militia should be to support the Non-Permanent Active Militia. That includes planning and organizing, but also mentoring and training.

The Canadian Forces​

Constitution​

Marginal note:Canadian Forces

14 The Canadian Forces are the armed forces of Her Majesty raised by Canada and consist of one Service called the Canadian Armed Forces.

• R.S., c. N-4, s. 14

Marginal note:Regular force

• 15 (1) There shall be a component of the Canadian Forces, called the regular force, that consists of officers and non-commissioned members who are enrolled for continuing, full-time military service.
• Marginal note:Composition of regular force
  (2) The maximum numbers of officers and non-commissioned members in the regular force shall be as authorized by the Governor in Council, and the regular force shall include such units and other elements as are embodied therein.
• Marginal note:Reserve force
  (3) There shall be a component of the Canadian Forces, called the reserve force, that consists of officers and non-commissioned members who are enrolled for other than continuing, full-time military service when not on active service.
• Marginal note:Composition of reserve force
  (4) The maximum numbers of officers and non-commissioned members in the reserve force shall be as authorized by the Governor in Council, and the reserve force shall include such units and other elements as are embodied therein.

Just so we’re clear you must have meant the 1800s when the RCR were raised to teach drill right?

Artificial divides are harmful and detrimental to both.

Couldn’t agree more; which is why those jobs need to be filled and performed so they’re not a reliance on one or the other.

 

[dapaterson]

Look, you dissed Melmac, so we old codgers have to use terminology we're more comfortable with

 

[daftandbarmy]

Look, you dissed Melmac, so we old codgers have to use terminology we're more comfortable with

 

[FJAG]

I had a great conversation with one of our former JTACs who’s now RSS. The subject of what he does came up and he gave some good perspective. He’s there to be the Ops WO, that’s his job. Yes he can do a lot of the BSMs work, he can run a Tp as it’s TSM, he could even be a QM if required. So let’s say he does that stuff and “get out of the office” and “leads,” well now what? Who’s learning, who’s developing ? The previous guys did it all and as a result no one in that unit was used to doing those jobs, no one was learning to be a SNCO.

The goal of all RSS staff should be to become redundant.

This takes me back to when I was an RSSO and got my terms of reference from my boss:

"If there's a reservist there who can do the job and is willing to do it, let him do it; if there's no one there who knows how to do the job but there is someone willing to learn, then teach him how and let him do it; if there's no one there who can do the job or is willing to do it, then you do it."

I could always find someone to teach.

As an aside, I was just looking for a copy of the Suttie Commission on the web but couldn't find it. I did come across the RCAA's annual meeting report for 1965/6, my first year in, and looked at the regimental reports. That year 7 Tor Regt RCA (my unit) celebrated the 100th birthday of 9 Bty and held a parade that I was on at Old Fort York where 200 all ranks paraded. More importantly that year all the Southern Ontario regiments were flown to Shilo by the RCAF (it was a bloody cold flight) to do the annual RCAA competition. Each regiment reported sending roughly 100 gunners to field an 8-gun battery (my first November on the Prairies. It sucked but I was still a new recruit but had been taught how to be the number 3 on the gun the weekend before that - it's intricate but it ain't rocket science). Most reported doing 3-4 live shoots each year. Attendance at "summer camps" were also good with each regiment fielding a battery of roughly 60-100 people for a week of training. The daily rate of pay was roughly enough for two-four of beer - $4.00 - All the incentive a 16 year old needed.

 

[Eye In The Sky]

Certainly not in any way meant to disrespect the efforts being put in by any of the members of the CAF that are giving their all to fulfil their duties, but I simply believe that the GOC and CAF aren't providing the resources required to properly so their jobs.

Respectfully SAR is not a primary defence roll for the RCAF and things like the CC-295 debacle put into question the tools being provided for the task.

Transport? Do we have the capability to rapidly deploy a Brigade to a conflict zone if required?

Tac Hel? What is our lift capability? What about AH? Ground attack assets?

LRP and MH? Based on the size of our maritime domain both fleets are far too small for our requirements.

Again, we have great people doing great things with the tools they are given, but lets not pretend that there are enough of any of them to make a serious military contribution in a major conflict.

But your original question was:

“Name one element of the CAF that is successfully performing its primary role of effectively defending Canada and its interests?”

Transport is transporting. SAR is SARing. Etc

From my view as guy who lives life on an operational Wing, the Air Force is successfully performing its primary role and effective at it daily.

Could it be better equipped? Hell ya. That rests at the feet of the voting population to improve in the future. I won’t hold me breath because they care more about free wifi on public transport etc.

 

[Eaglelord17]

But would that actually work? Something like half of Canada’s population lives in our 10 largest cities. If we can’t attract urban Canadians, then we can’t attract Canadians.

Not that I’m saying that Thunder Bay and Windsor shouldn’t have recruiting centres — it’s just that it shouldn’t be seen as a panacea.

Realistically rural recruits are ideal for the CAF. Already used to being rural where most our bases are, generally have more outdoors skills, are used to more hardships/lower standard of living, and are usually more patriotic than the urban population. They also have less well paying job opportunities so are more likely to stay in the CAF longer. There is 6.6 million people in rural areas with a average age of 39 years. The CAF only has to maintain a force of what 80k? Thats 1.2% of that population, and that is excluding the urban population signing up as well. Considering that is basically the size of the Canadian population in WWI and we managed to get about 650k people in uniform, is it really unreasonable to focus on the population which wants to serve?

I couldn’t disagree more. I got back in the army in 2016, so I got to experience the recruiting system in a fairly recent sense (especially in comparison to some of our esteemed members here). I’ve also been a part of the civilian work force. Job applications are all online now, this is the new normal. Coming in to sign forms? Not really a thing, I had to do an interview and forms were signed once, everything else was online. That’s not the problem, the problem is the bottle necking of applicants at the medical stage. For what’s it’s worth I have a friend who’s son was going to join the army, the recruiting centre did the polar opposite of attracting him to the military, at the risk of being harsh perhaps we should present our best appearance at our public interface.
I think the current 25 percent works, and makes it a bit easier when there’s shortfalls. Which will happen with a play as you’d like system.
The problem is that the top heavy reserve structure is a factor of frankly aimless recruiting and then gets justified with this absurd mobilization myth.
Have you heard of operational reserves ?

It is hard to recruit for units when you have to send potential recruits over 3 hours away unpaid to get stupid things like medicals done. Especially when the job is in the city you live in. Its one thing for the Regs, it is another all together for the Reserves. That online paperwork is also a lot more messy with the Reserves. They still get to choose any trade for the Reserves but the reality is that areas units is only looking for 'x' trades. Now the file is all messed up and needs to get sorted which involves a lot more effort on the recruiters part to sort it out. VS just filling out the paperwork in front of the recruiter and submitting it. Maybe changing how it is set up online might be a solution, I don't know. But the current online system has a strong hand towards the Regs with the Reserves being a after thought.

Maybe set it up so when you go to apply for the Reserves it brings up a list of units in your vicinity which has what job openings are there. Then click each specific trade that is open and apply for each trade specifically (like how most employers do it, they list the jobs they are looking for, then you apply for each one you want individually).

I know when I joined the Reserves over a decade ago it turned into a disaster. Took over a year to join. It has gotten much better than that. That being said it is still a long way away from when my father joined (mid 80s) when it was two weeks from starting the paperwork to being in coveralls on the parade floor.

We have had some extremely capable Reserve units in the past, the CAF has purposely killed them though to try and push social agendas. For example the 49th Field Regiment in the 90s and early 2000s would have 240 troops parading a night with over 280 on paper. They had 7-8 guns and manned every position in the regiment. That regiment basically got destroyed because the CAF decided they wanted to recruit a more ethnically diverse population and took all their recruiting positions for a few years and sent them to Toronto area. It only takes a couple years of no recruiting to kill a Reserve unit, and now they are a fraction of that size.

Look at most units now from Covid where they basically couldn't recruit for two years. It's not looking good. It is going to take a couple years at the minimum to restore them to the size they were before Covid, and that is assuming the individual units are able to figure out recruiting enough to make it happen.

 

[markppcli]

Realistically rural recruits are ideal for the CAF. Already used to being rural where most our bases are, generally have more outdoors skills, are used to more hardships/lower standard of living, and are usually more patriotic than the urban population. They also have less well paying job opportunities so are more likely to stay in the CAF longer. There is 6.6 million people in rural areas with a average age of 39 years. The CAF only has to maintain a force of what 80k? Thats 1.2% of that population, and that is excluding the urban population signing up as well. Considering that is basically the size of the Canadian population in WWI and we managed to get about 650k people in uniform, is it really unreasonable to focus on the population which wants to serve?


It is hard to recruit for units when you have to send potential recruits over 3 hours away unpaid to get stupid things like medicals done. Especially when the job is in the city you live in. Its one thing for the Regs, it is another all together for the Reserves. That online paperwork is also a lot more messy with the Reserves. They still get to choose any trade for the Reserves but the reality is that areas units is only looking for 'x' trades. Now the file is all messed up and needs to get sorted which involves a lot more effort on the recruiters part to sort it out. VS just filling out the paperwork in front of the recruiter and submitting it. Maybe changing how it is set up online might be a solution, I don't know. But the current online system has a strong hand towards the Regs with the Reserves being a after thought.

Maybe set it up so when you go to apply for the Reserves it brings up a list of units in your vicinity which has what job openings are there. Then click each specific trade that is open and apply for each trade specifically (like how most employers do it, they list the jobs they are looking for, then you apply for each one you want individually).

I know when I joined the Reserves over a decade ago it turned into a disaster. Took over a year to join. It has gotten much better than that. That being said it is still a long way away from when my father joined (mid 80s) when it was two weeks from starting the paperwork to being in coveralls on the parade floor.

We have had some extremely capable Reserve units in the past, the CAF has purposely killed them though to try and push social agendas. For example the 49th Field Regiment in the 90s and early 2000s would have 240 troops parading a night with over 280 on paper. They had 7-8 guns and manned every position in the regiment. That regiment basically got destroyed because the CAF decided they wanted to recruit a more ethnically diverse population and took all their recruiting positions for a few years and sent them to Toronto area. It only takes a couple years of no recruiting to kill a Reserve unit, and now they are a fraction of that size.

Look at most units now from Covid where they basically couldn't recruit for two years. It's not looking good. It is going to take a couple years at the minimum to restore them to the size they were before Covid, and that is assuming the individual units are able to figure out recruiting enough to make it happen.

So we no longer pay per diem and mileage for travel in the recruiting phase ? Maybe we never did and that’s a figment of my imagination.

I’m going to express some doubt about a regiment parading 200 in the Sue in the early 2000s, I was a reservist in the 2000s and I can’t even fathom that. Is there a number to back it up or is it just passed on knowledge ?

Focusing on recruiting in the largest city in Canada, despite the weird need to bring up “ethnic diversity,” to me would only make sense ? Like if I’m trying to sell a product, or Terri it people surely I want to be in the highest density of people ?

Rural vs Urban - get off the militia myth there Mr Hughes. The average rural Canada may occasionally go hunting but that’s a quick thing to catch up. The Canadian population is urbanizing; if we can’t recruit them we are failing and need to address that. Refocusing on dying regions is going to net increasingly poor returns. My only “rural” regiment was far an away the smallest in the province; those left wing, “diverse,” soft urban Vancouverites dwarfed us for numbers, despite having more choices.

 

[markppcli]

Look, you dissed Melmac, so we old codgers have to use terminology we're more comfortable with

Yet you can used “diss,” I assume to prove you are hip and with it.

To be fair I. Never insulted Melmac… I’d have to know what that is to do so.

 

[RangerRay]

I’ll diss the Melmac plate, only in as much it took up valuable real estate in my FFO that could have been used for snivel kit, and it turned my plate into a biohazard.

Sounds like the dinosaur thinking from the thermos thread where buddy was issued a furry thermos and CQ told him to rinse it out with hot water…

 

[Eaglelord17]

So we no longer pay per diem and mileage for travel in the recruiting phase ? Maybe we never did and that’s a figment of my imagination.

I’m going to express some doubt about a regiment parading 200 in the Sue in the early 2000s, I was a reservist in the 2000s and I can’t even fathom that. Is there a number to back it up or is it just passed on knowledge ?

Focusing on recruiting in the largest city in Canada, despite the weird need to bring up “ethnic diversity,” to me would only make sense ? Like if I’m trying to sell a product, or Terri it people surely I want to be in the highest density of people ?

Rural vs Urban - get off the militia myth there Mr Hughes. The average rural Canada may occasionally go hunting but that’s a quick thing to catch up. The Canadian population is urbanizing; if we can’t recruit them we are failing and need to address that. Refocusing on dying regions is going to net increasingly poor returns. My only “rural” regiment was far an away the smallest in the province; those left wing, “diverse,” soft urban Vancouverites dwarfed us for numbers, despite having more choices.

With the Reserves your primarily recruiting highschool, college, and university students. How many of them can take a day off during the week to travel to a recruiting center 3+ hours away to maybe have to do it again another time or two? Only the most dedicated will make that trip/can afford to make that trip. Even for Regs recruiting that is still a lot to ask from someone. Maybe if the organization is struggling for members at all fronts we should open up more recruiting centers (be it using existing armouries, etc.) to aid in recruiting as what we are currently doing clearly isn't working.

Passed on knowledge by those that were there directly at that time (in my case family knowledge as well as other members I have met who were there at that time). If you ever somehow end up in the gunshed of that armories the amount of trophies on the wall for what used to be the annual arty competitions speaks to how capable they were for a while. They also did lots of initiatives which worked quite well to get people trained up fast. Their main strategy being having students doing BMQ/BMQ-L as co-op then having them do their trades course in the summer. Then the next fall they would do driver wheel/gun tow and follow it up by having some of the 1 hooks go on PLQ. By time they would be promoted to Bdr they would get their leaf. They were pumping out MBdrs in 2 years due to putting 1 hooks on PLQ. Obviously not the best thing for experience but they did train them quite fast which if you want to keep relevant/growing is a requirement. At the time they were also allowed to run many in house courses which keep troops engaged, employed, and trained.

I say focus on ethnic diversity because when you cut recruiting positions from one area which is successfully recruiting and maintaining numbers but is basically all white and native, and give them to units that are failing to recruit but have more of the demographic the CAF was/is trying to recruit maybe it isn't about maintaining a effective force and more meeting a quota. If your successfully selling a product why would you completely change your model if it is already working unless you have some other ulterior motive? They don't hide that they are seeking to recruit 'diverse recruits', and it isn't a bad thing, simply calling a spade a spade. It has been going on for a couple decades now, it shouldn't be a surprise.

Evaluation of Diversity and Inclusion - Canada.ca

www.canada.ca

'State of diversity and inclusion within DND and the CAF: Through a review of available research on diversity and inclusion, the evaluation explored EE statistics and representation goals, and the attitudes and perceptions of the Defence Team on diversity and inclusion. In general, the evaluation found that, despite some progress in terms of representation of EE groups, this progress has been slow and not all goals have been met.'

You say the rural regions are dying, when in reality they simply aren't growing at the rate the rest of Canada is. Last year they went up .4% in population. My point being is we should be able to sustain the CAF on just the rural areas, adding in the urban areas it really shouldn't be that hard. It doesn't have to be a urban vs rural thing. Just you shouldn't cut off resources towards rural recruits when they consistently are able to provide well above their weight percentage wise for the military.

 

[GR66]

But your original question was:

“Name one element of the CAF that is successfully performing its primary role of effectively defending Canada and its interests?”

Transport is transporting. SAR is SARing. Etc

From my view as guy who lives life on an operational Wing, the Air Force is successfully performing its primary role and effective at it daily.

Could it be better equipped? Hell ya. That rests at the feet of the voting population to improve in the future. I won’t hold me breath because they care more about free wifi on public transport etc.

You're kind of proving my point. Yes we're transporting, but we only have the transport capability to support the existing peacetime organization. Do we have the surge capability to support a deployed Brigade Group in extended high-intensity conflict and accounting for potential combat losses and the need to use more distant airfields for our larger aircraft due to enemy AA threats?

If a war over Taiwan were to kick off and Canada sent a TF in support along with some MPAs to help protect US carriers from PLAN subs and at the same time Russia surged assets into the North Atlantic in threatened support of China would we have enough MPAs and MH to both support our deployed TF and adequately patrol both our coasts for an extended period of high intensity operations?

It's like having a Tank Regiment. It checks the box for us during peacetime. See? We're a serious army...we have a Regiment of Leopard 2's! Are they fit to deploy quickly if we need to? Do we have the capability to quickly deploy them if we need to? Do we have all the assets, spares, parts, ammo, crews, replacement crews, replacement vehicles, recovery assets, fuelling assets, bridging and engineering gear, etc. to sustain them in a conflict?

That's the difference between a military that is a peacetime bureaucracy and a military that is prepared to fight a war.

 

[markppcli]

You're kind of proving my point. Yes we're transporting, but we only have the transport capability to support the existing peacetime organization. Do we have the surge capability to support a deployed Brigade Group in extended high-intensity conflict and accounting for potential combat losses and the need to use more distant airfields for our larger aircraft due to enemy AA threats?

If a war over Taiwan were to kick off and Canada sent a TF in support along with some MPAs to help protect US carriers from PLAN subs and at the same time Russia surged assets into the North Atlantic in threatened support of China would we have enough MPAs and MH to both support our deployed TF and adequately patrol both our coasts for an extended period of high intensity operations?

It's like having a Tank Regiment. It checks the box for us during peacetime. See? We're a serious army...we have a Regiment of Leopard 2's! Are they fit to deploy quickly if we need to? Do we have the capability to quickly deploy them if we need to? Do we have all the assets, spares, parts, ammo, crews, replacement crews, replacement vehicles, recovery assets, fuelling assets, bridging and engineering gear, etc. to sustain them in a conflict?

That's the difference between a military that is a peacetime bureaucracy and a military that is prepared to fight a war.

I think no matter what anyone said, or examples were provided to you, your standards would mean the answer is no regardless.

 

[dapaterson]

From 2003-08 I tracked Army Reserve attendance. No unit was at or about 200 people parading regularly, and the only three with a company (150) or more regularly parading were 51 and 55 Svc Bns, and Les Voltigeurs de Quebec.

Lots of units made significantly greater claims that were unsupported facts. And many had dozens of soldiers they claimed to be "effective" who had not paraded in over a year.

Reserve units are notorious for bullshitting themselves about their current strength, and about their pasts.

 

[markppcli]

With the Reserves your primarily recruiting highschool, college, and university students. How many of them can take a day off during the week to travel to a recruiting center 3+ hours away to maybe have to do it again another time or two? Only the most dedicated will make that trip/can afford to make that trip. Even for Regs recruiting that is still a lot to ask from someone. Maybe if the organization is struggling for members at all fronts we should open up more recruiting centers (be it using existing armouries, etc.) to aid in recruiting as what we are currently doing clearly isn't working.

Do they no longer run recruiting events out of local armouries ? That was the norm when I was in, we’d do a couple weekend recruiting events and have people come in and hang out some testing / interviews all at once.

Passed on knowledge by those that were there directly at that time (in my case family knowledge as well as other members I have met who were there at that time). If you ever somehow end up in the gunshed of that armories the amount of trophies on the wall for what used to be the annual arty competitions speaks to how capable they were for a while. They also did lots of initiatives which worked quite well to get people trained up fast. Their main strategy being having students doing BMQ/BMQ-L as co-op then having them do their trades course in the summer. Then the next fall they would do driver wheel/gun tow and follow it up by having some of the 1 hooks go on PLQ. By time they would be promoted to Bdr they would get their leaf. They were pumping out MBdrs in 2 years due to putting 1 hooks on PLQ. Obviously not the best thing for experience but they did train them quite fast which if you want to keep relevant/growing is a requirement. At the time they were also allowed to run many in house courses which keep troops engaged, employed, and trained.

So there’s three points in this block, I’ll address them in turn:

Neither of us have firm numbers, if 240 is real, they would be the largest reserve unit in the country, likely since WW 2 and I have some serious doubts on that one. Given that it’s really double their establishment.

Co-op BMQ was an imitative nation wide, I know we had some success with it in BC, the problem as always is getting enough instructors and critical mass to make it viable. The training plan you described was the norm for any reserve unit in the 2000s, I assume it hasn’t changed a whole lot: weekend BMQ followed by summer DP1, ending with PLQ the following year where they aren’t remotely prepared and end up with a sour taste in their mouth (but I digress).

Have we stopped letting units run courses ? Weekend BMQs and courses seem to still be a thing? I assume you mean the DP1s, but obviously it makes sense to have those as concentrations. Problems will always be getting enough instructors and students to give up their weekends.

I say focus on ethnic diversity because when you cut recruiting positions from one area which is successfully recruiting and maintaining numbers but is basically all white and native, and give them to units that are failing to recruit but have more of the demographic the CAF was/is trying to recruit maybe it isn't about maintaining a effective force and more meeting a quota. If your successfully selling a product why would you completely change your model if it is already working unless you have some other ulterior motive? They don't hide that they are seeking to recruit 'diverse recruits', and it isn't a bad thing, simply calling a spade a spade. It has been going on for a couple decades now, it shouldn't be a surprise.

It’s because they weren’t successful in recruiting, according to you that is neither of us has the numbers or any actuall information on these decisions. If you’re failing to recruit in a city doesn’t it make sense to divert resources to correct that?

Evaluation of Diversity and Inclusion - Canada.ca

www.canada.ca

'State of diversity and inclusion within DND and the CAF: Through a review of available research on diversity and inclusion, the evaluation explored EE statistics and representation goals, and the attitudes and perceptions of the Defence Team on diversity and inclusion. In general, the evaluation found that, despite some progress in terms of representation of EE groups, this progress has been slow and not all goals have been met.'

You say the rural regions are dying, when in reality they simply aren't growing at the rate the rest of Canada is. Last year they went up .4% in population. My point being is we should be able to sustain the CAF on just the rural areas, adding in the urban areas it really shouldn't be that hard. It doesn't have to be a urban vs rural thing. Just you shouldn't cut off resources towards rural recruits when they consistently are able to provide well above their weight percentage wise for the military.

You brought up the urban rural thing. It’s been a trend for decades that the nation is urbanizing.

Sorry this text wall is a bit to decipher.

 

[daftandbarmy]

From 2003-08 I tracked Army Reserve attendance. No unit was at or about 200 people parading regularly, and the only three with a company (150) or more regularly parading were 51 and 55 Svc Bns, and Les Voltigeurs de Quebec.

Lots of units made significantly greater claims that were unsupported facts. And many had dozens of soldiers they claimed to be "effective" who had not paraded in over a year.

Reserve units are notorious for bullshitting themselves about their current strength, and about their pasts.

A few years ago I went tinkering around in the processes we used to manage HR (troops) in my Reserve unit & Bde because: consultant.

I was genuinely curious.

Suffice it to say that if any other public sector, or private sector, organization used similar processes and tools they'd qualify for dissolution out of a desire to protect the organizations, and human beings in general, from huge risk. More importantly, no one realy cared, or had the skills and knowledge (not that I'm and HR expert) to know that there was risk, or what to do about it.

No one really knows who is where, and why, and how many we have today, or where they'll be next week, or how many will be arriving from somewhere else next month. There were brief moments of clarity, usually around sending people off for deployments or courses, but even then it was an act of wizardry, usually executed by a diligent Class B Cpl in the BOR or someone similar, to make it all work at all.

The only reliable method of managing HR was having section commanders phone/text around to find out where people were and would they be coming in next week etc.

Until the troops got tired of being 'pinged' and stopped replying, of course

 

[GR66]

I think no matter what anyone said, or examples were provided to you, your standards would mean the answer is no regardless.

You're probably correct because I believe that the CAF is not adequately prepared to fight a major war if required to do so.

That doesn't mean that I expect any country that isn't actually facing a looming threat of invasion to be going "all in" on defence preparation. Especially a country in a peaceful neighbourhood like Canada. But there are certainly things that should be expected of a military...even a peacetime military...in terms of basic preparedness.

An Army that has no Air Defence and minimal Anti-tank capabilities is not properly prepared. A Navy that's ships are held together with duct tape is not properly prepared. To be fair to the RCAF they are probably the best prepared of the three, but as essentially an island nation they have to be the best prepared and without the US in NORAD to back them up I don't think they'd have the resources required.

Canada's not alone in this. From all reports Germany is also a military on paper only. The Nordic countries however seem to have their act together. Poland is taking serious strides. Both Australia and Britain - with many similar issues to Canada - are at least recognizing the problems and trying to come up with viable solutions.

My problem is that I don't even see the GOC or the military leadership recognizing the situation and seriously trying to fix it. Reconstitution in word only isn't Reconstitution.

 

[dapaterson]

LFCA's coop program should have seen large number of senior officers spend a few months in Edmonton followed by their dismissal from the CAF.

The amoral imbeciles refused to pay soldiers for training "because they are coop students".