FJAG
Army.ca Legend
- Reaction score
- 12,942
- Points
- 1,160
I go back to my 2 RCHA days where F Bty maintained a complete C1 battery in Petawawa which ResF units from all over Ontario came to use. They'd board a bus at their armouries, sign for the kit on the 2HA parade square and do a night deployment with rounds down range at first light.There needs to be a reckoning of "what types of units can be what distances from bases that provide training areas and support". That, in turn, means units in some locations will have to be re-roled. Never assume the current laydown is optimal.
Quebec units are even closer to Valcartier.
M109 Paladin's have a cab training simulator where all the complex tasks can be taught. Driver training can easily be done at smaller training facilities.
ResF units do not live fire that much. Most do two a year and a summer concentration. Most everything else can be done locally. One doesn't need to modify armory doorways. Most don't have a floor stressed to take that much weight easily - but they all have parking lots. More importantly, only a few units need large guns anyway. Half the artillery uses lighter guns like M777s and LG1s and could easily handle STA and and OWUAV systems.
Let me reiterate. Canada's army, as currently authorized with RegF and ResF personnel, could usefully use the support of 9 SP, 3 HIMARS, 9 light, 3 AD, 3 or more OWUAS and 3 STA batteries - 30 in total (excluding the FOO batteries). The RegF currently has 6 gun and 3 STA and 3 GS batteries. There are also 16 ResF regiments and three independent batteries, all of which are hard pressed to generate a battery each - say 17 batteries total. That adds up to 29 batteries in grand total to draw on unless we drastically restructure the artillery manning. If all Canada can generate is some 30 batteries. Based on a three gun/rocket battery structure, that means we only need 10 regiments total - 4 RegF and 6 ResF. Even less if you plug the OWUAS batteries into the DS regiments. My napkin force has eight regiments total supporting the army's two divisions.
Since the CAF hasn't interested itself in growing a "great host" through Stage 4 mobilization we really need to concentrate at building the ResF into a viable structure that a) provides trained reservists as augmentees to all the the specialties that the artillery needs to support the greater army as a whole during peacetime; and b) has the personnel and equipment to expand the army to its full capability during wartime. As a tertiary goal there should be a plan that facilitates expanding the army beyond its current size with new personnel and equipment.
Honestly, distance from training areas and re-roling units to match training areas is the least of the army's problems. First the army needs to figure out what it wants to be (or perhaps what it's capable of becoming) when it grows up.
![Clinking beer mugs :beers: 🍻](https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f37b.png)