daftandbarmy
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It already is, about 80% of the time.
The ability to advance beyond 'the basics' is - or was - pretty limited depending on your leadership and the available resources.
Army Reserve Restructuring
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It already is, about 80% of the time.
The ability to advance beyond 'the basics' is - or was - pretty limited depending on your leadership and the available resources.
Halifax Tar
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I think the basics is all we should expect from part timers. And anything more than that can be accomplished during WUP trg.
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Is it time to go zen on the system and just accept the 80% solution and optimize for that?
Once the basic skills, whatever those are defined to be, skills that can be taught locally cost effectively, then those "graduates" become eligible for advanced courses and employment commensurate with their skills.
IE, hand the armouries over to CADTC. Make the regiments lodgers and employers of the graduates.
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A good read
https://www.militarystrategymagazine.com/exclusives/reserves-without-purpose-the-hidden-weakness-in-modern-militaries/
Reserves Without Purpose: The Hidden Weakness in Modern Militaries - 18 Nov 25
Alex Gerald is a former regular officer who served in British artillery and armoured regiments and continues to serve as a reserve officer. He is currently at King’s College London, where his research focuses on mobilisation, deterrence and military strategy
Extract:One of the key lessons from the Russian invasion of Ukraine is that military mass has an inherent property that cannot be replaced with other capabilities.[1] The obvious problem is that mass is expensive to maintain. In war, military mass has great utility; in peacetime that same mass has limited utility at best yet must be maintained in case of, or to deter, war. This gets to the heart of the idea of strategy as ‘the use of military force to achieve political outcomes at tolerable cost’.[2] How can military force be maximised, while minimising the costs in peace as well as war? At its simplest, the answer is reserve forces.
Reserve forces trade time for mass. A professional army is deployable in a relatively short timeframe, but the cost of maintaining a commensurate standard of training and readiness is high. A reserve army, comprised of part-time volunteers, maintains a lesser standard of training and readiness at greatly reduced cost, but in return can only be deployed within a moderate timeframe. Building any reserve force requires a series of decisions from policymakers and military planners. What ratio of reserves to regulars should comprise the whole force? What level of training should reserve forces maintain? How can you recruit and motivate them? However, all decisions are subordinate to one key decision: what function should that reserve force fulfil in your national security strategy?
daftandbarmy
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FWIW, despite the challenges, I think Canada has shown the rest of the world how to do a good job with respect to integrating Reservists into the RegF on operations.
FRY deployments were a rocky start, but it improved through the AFG period.
Could it be better? Hell yeah, but we've got alot of good stuff to build on IMHO.
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So we can take a bunch of keen youngsters, with basic skills, and with 4 to 6 months intensive training turn out a battle ready product?
That is inded a good thing.
Next question, how many of those people that served in Yugoslavia, Somalia, Eritrea, Rwanda and Afghanistan did we manage to hold on to?
Reg force retention is an issue but I think reserve force retention might be a greater issue. It is fashionable to deride the social aspects of the reserves but at the same time one of the issues arising among returning vets, both regs and reserves, is the feeling of loss of family and isolation. Keeping those folks engaged and giving them a purpose couldn't be bad.
daftandbarmy
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You mean the ones who were treated like shit, not by the Reg F but by the Reservists who remained at home, after they returned from battle?
Not many...
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F*ckery all round then?
daftandbarmy
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YMMV, but I saw some really bad examples of various leaders engaging with these young veterans, and corrected that when I could.
Although I detected no sense of general entitlement, the overall feeling seemed to be "Oh, so you think you're so special?".
Their experiences with the RCLegion seemed to be the same, based on a few chats I had with some. This might have had something to do with the fact that there was so much positive national coverage for the CAF's troops during the AFG period, unlike other eras, which sparked some jealousy.
I preferred to mine them for the latest good practises for us to adopt and rehearse e.g.,'9 liners' anyone?
Regardless, we lost alot of good people who only signed up for abuse from the enemy. Many CT'd I believe, several went on to SOF roles, so their experience wasn't lost to the CAF as a whole.
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I believe the WW2 tribe had the same reaction to the "Koreans".
It’s a real shame when you don’t retain and want to learn from those whom have real experience.
Brad Sallows
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Define basics. Should what the US has demonstrated it can teach/maintain in the NG be the baseline?
Brad Sallows
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Shouldn't take anywhere near that long.
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Every Roto is Roto Zero.
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Excellent quotes - I know exactly where they fit into my redraft of "Unsustainable"
I agree. Every one I interviewed had nothing but good things to say about the reservists that went over. We do need to cut down the time involved. A four to six month predeployment period is too long in general but worked well for fitting reservists in. We need to figure out how to create shorter cycles and that means having reservists who can fit in quicker. Not an easy task.
If I understand correctly, RegF and ResF retention rates are about the same with a roughly 8 to 10% annual turnover. @dapaterson would know better.
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Excellent quotes - I know exactly where they fit into my redraft of "Unsustainable"
I agree. Every one I interviewed had nothing but good things to say about the reservists that went over. We do need to cut down the time involved. A four to six month predeployment period is too long in general but worked well for fitting reservists in. We need to figure out how to create shorter cycles and that means having reservists who can fit in quicker. Not an easy task.
If I understand correctly, RegF and ResF retention rates are about the same with a roughly 8 to 10% annual turnover. @dapaterson would know better.
I would like to see both those 10%s being released to the Supp List as a matter of course.
6000 Regs a year
3000 Reserves a year (and that ratio is all wrong in any event)
9000 Releases to Supp List a year
90,000 on the Supp List after 10 years
270,000 after 30 years.
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I just remember that few of the Yugo vets stayed long at our unit after they returned. I don’t know if it was maltreatment by unit leadership (they were revered in the JR’s) or being unsatisfied with Reserve life after returning from tour or what. Many decamped for the Regs. Others went civie. But I’d say most didn’t stay in the ARes.
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