Canada opens new residency paths for military recruits, other workers

[brihard]

You mean like this?

Not a concern to the present government until one of our new pilots lands a CAF F-35 on a waiting PRC aircraft carrier off the west coast.

I would not be surprised of POTUS47 put a halt to all foreign military sales to Canada in anticipation of such an event and to dissuade us from this path.

Kinda like that in concept but way more absurd and stupid. Filling the ranks with Chinese troops to prevent Alberta separation, that kind of thing. But subtract grammar and spelling.

 

[Colin Parkinson]

As I have said before, if you need a couple of companies of infantry, just piggyback on the UK selection process for Gurkhas. They take some 200 recruits out of 15,000 applications yearly. After the UK selects their 200, we get the next 100 or so. There is no reinventing the wheel. Copy of much of what the Brits do as possible.

 

[daftandbarmy]

As I have said before, if you need a couple of companies of infantry, just piggyback on the UK selection process for Gurkhas. They take some 200 recruits out of 15,000 applications yearly. After the UK selects their 200, we get the next 100 or so. There is no reinventing the wheel. Copy of much of what the Brits do as possible.

The supply chain for the Gurkha regiments is infamously expensive and tenuous, far more than for domestically raised troops. And it's not like they're raised from a first world country's population where kids go to school and are medically well managed - educational and health issues are massive. Think about how difficult it is to keep a 'normal' unit staffed up and then add a multi-time zone gap to a small, poor, third world country to that mix.

The key reasons they were retained following WW2 (managing the retreat from Empire in the Far East, and Hong Kong) have largely disappeared, and it's difficult to deploy Gurkhas in many typical Western military scenarios, which means they can't be slotted in to the usual round of taskings easily. You'll never see them deployed to the Arctic or on domestic COIN Ops, for example.

Thanks to recent changes in their citizenship status, hordes of Nepali extended family members are also being imported into the UK. Having a son the the regiments is increasingly seen as a huge back door into the UK social safety net for the third world.

For these and other reasons they've been trying to get rid of them for years, but public sentiment keeps dragging them back into the spotlight. I'm sure there's a 'wanted' poster with Joanna Lumley on it posted at MoD HQ

So no, don't do what the British have done in this regard.

 

[Eaglelord17]

The supply chain for the Gurkha regiments is infamously expensive and tenuous, far more than for domestically raised troops. And it's not like they're raised from a first world country's population where kids go to school and are medically well managed - educational and health issues are massive. Think about how difficult it is to keep a 'normal' unit staffed up and then add a multi-time zone gap to a small, poor, third world country to that mix.

The key reasons they were retained following WW2 (managing the retreat from Empire in the Far East, and Hong Kong) have largely disappeared, and it's difficult to deploy Gurkhas in many typical Western military scenarios, which means they can't be slotted in to the usual round of taskings easily. You'll never see them deployed to the Arctic or on domestic COIN Ops, for example.

Thanks to recent changes in their citizenship status, hordes of Nepali extended family members are also being imported into the UK. Having a son the the regiments is increasingly seen as a huge back door into the UK social safety net for the third world.

For these and other reasons they've been trying to get rid of them for years, but public sentiment keeps dragging them back into the spotlight. I'm sure there's a 'wanted' poster with Joanna Lumley on it posted at MoD HQ

So no, don't do what the British have done in this regard.

Alternatively they are just practicing effective logistics and that is the true reason they are kept around, remind the higher ups regularly the importance of them.

 

[foresterab]

The supply chain for the Gurkha regiments is infamously expensive and tenuous, far more than for domestically raised troops. And it's not like they're raised from a first world country's population where kids go to school and are medically well managed - educational and health issues are massive. Think about how difficult it is to keep a 'normal' unit staffed up and then add a multi-time zone gap to a small, poor, third world country to that mix.

The key reasons they were retained following WW2 (managing the retreat from Empire in the Far East, and Hong Kong) have largely disappeared, and it's difficult to deploy Gurkhas in many typical Western military scenarios, which means they can't be slotted in to the usual round of taskings easily. You'll never see them deployed to the Arctic or on domestic COIN Ops, for example.

Thanks to recent changes in their citizenship status, hordes of Nepali extended family members are also being imported into the UK. Having a son the the regiments is increasingly seen as a huge back door into the UK social safety net for the third world.

For these and other reasons they've been trying to get rid of them for years, but public sentiment keeps dragging them back into the spotlight. I'm sure there's a 'wanted' poster with Joanna Lumley on it posted at MoD HQ

So no, don't do what the British have done in this regard.

As someone who has worked over there though I would say there is a pool of English speaking recruits that would be a possible hiring pool but only if distributed amongst existing Canadian formations. Canada thankfully could pull upon the WW1 CEF example where some First Nations offered to raise local battalions but the offer was declined due to concerns over recruitment pool size and replacement (amongst other issues) and instead First Nation soldiers served as part of integrated CEF battalions.

Some folks I have worked with both overseas and here in Canada definitely meet or exceed Canadian education standards but this unfortunately the 1% of the population...not the norm. But the British Army is already trying to get the top 1% of candidates so joint offers? Canada offers those who wash out or age out from British process?

However if we're going to allow direct entry for certain ethnic and/or national groups in order to increase recruitment (and accept the associated family immigration/cultural pressures that creates) then such a program should also be considered for more than just the 6 Nepalese tribal groups who tend to make up the Gurkha regiment (Gurung, Magar, Rai, Limbu, Tamang, and Sunwar). Are there Latin sources? African? European? that would also be eligible to the same amount? And is there a long term value in the diversification of backgrounds in recruits/benefit to Canada to offer such programs.

What I don't want to see is the CAF full of raw recruits from around the world enlisting for the purpose of gaining citizenship - and the existing Canadian population doesn't serve or connect with the CAF. We just saw/see something similar regarding Temporary Foreign Workers undercutting Canadians job prospects which is harming things long term.

 

[brihard]

What I don't want to see is the CAF full of raw recruits from around the world enlisting for the purpose of gaining citizenship - and the existing Canadian population doesn't serve or connect with the CAF. We just saw/see something similar regarding Temporary Foreign Workers undercutting Canadians job prospects which is harming things long term.

No fear of that. Nobody is having that discussion at the grown-ups table. Idiot conspiracy theorists and disinformation peddlers on Twitter are spouting off about it, but they tend not to have a grasp of anything remotely resembling the facts.

This is a path to attract a small pool of “need right now” trained medical experts and pilots, not filling the ranks of rifle companies.

 

[daftandbarmy]

No fear of that. Nobody is having that discussion at the grown-ups table. Idiot conspiracy theorists and disinformation peddlers on Twitter are spouting off about it, but they tend not to have a grasp of anything remotely resembling the facts.

This is a path to attract a small pool of “need right now” trained medical experts and pilots, not filling the ranks of rifle companies.

Coincidentally, if you have a look at some Reserve units, you can have both doctors and riflemen

 

[OldSolduer]

Coincidentally, if you have a look at some Reserve units, you can have both doctors and riflemen

I met a doctor who went through basic with Mike. He is a corporal despite him being a urologist. One of my former Rfn is a doctor as is my daughter’s boyfriend who started off as a medic in the Reserves

 

[daftandbarmy]

I met a doctor who went through basic with Mike. He is a corporal despite him being a urologist. One of my former Rfn is a doctor as is my daughter’s boyfriend who started off as a medic in the Reserves

It was fun to compare the Officer's Mess with the others and note that the % of successful business owners in the latter greatly exceeded the former.

So much for yet another 'Militia Myth'

 

[Colin Parkinson]

No fear of that. Nobody is having that discussion at the grown-ups table. Idiot conspiracy theorists and disinformation peddlers on Twitter are spouting off about it, but they tend not to have a grasp of anything remotely resembling the facts.

This is a path to attract a small pool of “need right now” trained medical experts and pilots, not filling the ranks of rifle companies.

I point out to the conspiracy types that a Canadian RCN Officer was commanding Australia's largest warship, so does that mean we plan on taking over Aussieland?

 

[The Bread Guy]

Oh man the disinformation train started fast on this one, critics immediately saying Carney is letting the Chinese communist party to take over the CAF

Sometimes coming from some who, not tooooo long in the past, seemed quite keen on the idea of a Canadian Foreign Legion.

Immigrants who have passable english are going to love learning french as well!

If the French Foreign Legion can do it, it can be done here too. Now, how much time do you want to spend on “this is called a fork,” is another matter.

 

[The Bread Guy]

The supply chain for the Gurkha regiments is infamously expensive and tenuous, far more than for domestically raised troops. And it's not like they're raised from a first world country's population where kids go to school and are medically well managed - educational and health issues are massive. Think about how difficult it is to keep a 'normal' unit staffed up and then add a multi-time zone gap to a small, poor, third world country to that mix.

The key reasons they were retained following WW2 (managing the retreat from Empire in the Far East, and Hong Kong) have largely disappeared, and it's difficult to deploy Gurkhas in many typical Western military scenarios, which means they can't be slotted in to the usual round of taskings easily. You'll never see them deployed to the Arctic or on domestic COIN Ops, for example.

Thanks to recent changes in their citizenship status, hordes of Nepali extended family members are also being imported into the UK. Having a son the the regiments is increasingly seen as a huge back door into the UK social safety net for the third world.

For these and other reasons they've been trying to get rid of them for years, but public sentiment keeps dragging them back into the spotlight. I'm sure there's a 'wanted' poster with Joanna Lumley on it posted at MoD HQ

So no, don't do what the British have done in this regard.

And don’t get us started on the two-tier pension thing, right?

 

[OldSolduer]

To add I knew of sit least three WOs who were German - and one Hungarian. This was in the 70s. 1VP I liked to call the Canadian version of a foreign legion.
Acceptance of foreign nationals in the CAF is a real thing.

 

[Fishbone Jones]

Have they discussed what criteria and terms are being offered?

I'm uncomfortable with the government saying, "We'll swap you our citizenship for your service." and providing no other discussion on the subject.

There has to be favoured nation status. There also needs to be hard exclusions to volunteers. No Chinese, N. Korean, Cuban, etc, as well as certain Islamic states. I'd also like to see a fairly high length of service to qualify. 10-15 years. No initial engagement crap.

I also have to wonder what kind of security clearance they'll get, given our penchant for taking years to check on our own clearances.

The whole thing stinks of good idea fairy farts.

 

[Fishbone Jones]

If the French Foreign Legion can do it, it can be done here too. Now, how much time do you want to spend on “this is called a fork,” is another matter.

You don't get that in the FFL either. Almost from Day 1 you'll hear nothing but French. It's up to you to learn the lingo by assimilation. And you don't get cut any slack.

 

[The Bread Guy]

... I also have to wonder what kind of security clearance they'll get, given our penchant for taking years to check on our own clearances ...

That alone makes me wonder, for sure.