CIGI Canadian Armed Forces Lecture

[Goose15]

I recently attended a lecture being held at CIGI featuring: CDS General Tom Lawson:
The State of the Canadian Armed Forces and Its Priorities

I am posting the video as I would love to hear everyone's thoughts on the lecture, as well as promote some discussion about it. Especially some of the answers he gave during the question period, which begins around the 32-minute mark.

:cheers:

 

[Goose15]

One question I was surprised with the answer was this:

Q: With the large use and depletion of resources (both physical and monetary) in Afghanistan and the concurrent operations; is there a particular timeline on when Canada will again be in a position to be 100% operational and/or deployable?

A: Lawson acknowledged the fact the everything was pretty beat up from Afghanistan then Libya. Lawson said though that since bringing the equipment back and going through repairs we are at that point now where we are once again 100% deployable and ready for a mission of the same magnitude as Afghanistan.

I found this to be surprising. I have several friends who are veterans who still have close ties with currently serving CAF members that I have spoken with, as well as a 36-year veteran (who retired last year) that was sitting behind me; everyone said that this was untrue and that most of the repair bays are still swamped. Our men and women are ready but the equipment they need is not.

Thoughts?

 

[s2184]

Part of his response to a question about PTSD:

Our suicide rates are lower than the same age groups and genders in Canadian Society.

+++

But, can you actually compare the medical standards of the military to the civilians'? Don't you always expect higher medical standards for military?

 

[MilEME09]

Part of his response to a question about PTSD:

+++

But, can you actually compare the medical standards of the military to the civilians'? Don't you always expect higher medical standards for military?

Not to mention the military is much high at risk for mental illness like PTSD then the average civilian populous

 

[s2184]

But, known risks, precautions & all other safeguards + military protocols should put military personnel in better shape than civilian population?