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

[McG]

Question: Why does LFAA still have two CBG HQs, when they were instructed over a decade ago that they were entitled to one, and to prepare a rationalization plan?

Start obeying a few orders to reduce overhead, then complain.

Maybe because we cover 4 provinces?

How about LFCA they have 3 CBG's.

Yeah.  Right.  Two CBGs plus one Comm Gp turned OSG in LFAA.  For four provinces, and (about) 4K personnel.

Wasteful overhead that isn't needed.


In my world, there would be 2 Reserve formations in LFWA (5 right now), 2 in LFCA (4 right now), two in SQFT (who would inherit the NCR) (3 right now), and one in LFAA (3 right now).

But the LFAA case is simple: orders were given and ignored.  "Plan towards one CBG HQ - two is a temporary measure."  But if you ignore an order long enough someone above might forget it - so you can get away with it.

Sounds reasonable to me.

 

[Rick Goebel]

"In my world, there would be 2 Reserve formations in LFWA (5 right now), 2 in LFCA (4 right now), two in SQFT (who would inherit the NCR) (3 right now), and one in LFAA (3 right now)."

While this is a fine idea, it is necessary to also look at what is in those HQs.  I'm morally certain and willing to bet really good money that HQ costs for the army reserve INCREASED in the process of REDUCING 21 Militia District HQs to 10 CBG HQs and five Militia Area HQs to the army reserve responsibilities of four LFA HQs.  Just as an example, the old MD HQs each had one full-time Major and two full-time Captains while the CBG HQs started off with a full-time Lieutenant-Colonel, three full-time Majors and several (more than four) full-time Captains plus large increases in other full-time and part-time positions.

While eliminating HQs is a good idea in and of itself, it doesn't necessarily go the distance needed.

 

[old fart]

Have fun with this...

I realise the thread has moved on...I started to cobble this together last night....so here is a belated post....

In answer to Dapaterson's post from last evening...not really a side issue...in essence it’s all part of the same sh_t sandwich or getting better bang for the buck. Unfortunately the CF does not get what it should in that regard...Minimal bang for our defence buck remains acceptable....and I for one cannot see things changing....But one can hope...

Our reserves would downsize massively if I was king for a day, but units that remain would be viable entities with a critical mass, and used domestically unless we mobilize, that’s it.  Do I ever see us mobilizing, never say never, but do I see a requirement for a larger Regular Force, of course I do.

Reservists would not be permitted to be employed in a Regular capacity under any circumstances...limited full time reserve service would be possible and similar to how things are now just in a much reduced force.  Reserve HQs would be CHOPPED to the bone. 

Much needed monies would be applied back into the Reg Force pot.  A Reg Force that would sustained and utilized by the Govt commensurate with its capabilities at the time expanding as need be (Govt decision).

An arbitrary reduction in the Reserves would not equate to an easy expansion to the Reg Force, but should make growth easier. The choice would be clear... if you want a full liability career complete with all the trappings join the Regulars.  Reserves service could not be used to circumvent a traditional read full time/normal career progression.

I'm not interested in hearing we could not function overseas without the contribution from our deployed Reservists...and I am certainly not knocking the contribution they have made...but a Reg Force fit for purpose would not need to draw on reserve augmentation.

Bottom line we should contribute to the world stage with what we have.....but at least with a view to getting the MAX BANG FROM THE DEFENCE BUCK.

Of course I am not a fan of the Total Force concept...never have been and never will be.  But should we have a Reserve Force, of course we should and could ex Regs join bringing what ever experience they may have, of course (supplementing a pension if that is the case).

On this happy note...this Old fart..is off to nap...

 

[dapaterson]

Interesting collection of thoughts.

Given the Reg F's penchant for waste and bloat, I'd start looking inside for expansion before attacking Reserve budgets, though.

Example: over ten percent of the Reg F trained strength is in NDHQ.  Hmm.  Sounds to me like a prime target for reductions - even a modest 10% would give each Reg F Inf Bn a mortar pl, with some left over for other purposes.

Or, why are there nine Reg F inf bns?  There's no doctrinal reason, there are a few plans that were drafted to argue the conclusion, vice arrive at an analysis, but the need for an even multiple of three isn't sound at all.

Simple observation: 9 bns x 600 + 3 Armd Regts x 500 + 3 arty regts x 500 + 3 CERs x 500 + 3 Svc Bns x 500 = 11 400 Reg F. Yet the Army is around 21 000.  So, what are those other 10 000 doing?  (Yes, bases, support - all good - but how many HQs do we have?  How many do we need?  Why does Comd LFCA need a manpower expensive duty watch 24/7 so he can be told that a routine airforce training flight from outside his AOR to a destination outside his AOR that would not be transiting his AOR had a mechanical failure, that does not impact him in the least?)

The Reg F bloat need serious evaluation - and it's well past time to review the assumptions underlying pay, and re-allocate it: no more "team" approach, but different positions should get different premiums.  CO 1st Bn RHC (assuming we bring the Black Watch back into the Reg F )?  Extra pay.  LCol staff wanker in NDHQ - no extra.  Posted in the last 3 years?  Extra pay for the disruption.  Settled down somewhere for 10 years?  No disruption pay.

And so on - reward the individuals doing it; don't spread the reward among everyone.  Heresy, I know.

 

[old fart]

Dapterson....totally agree...

In my utopia self licking ice creams would be gone also.

I would also bring back round trip memo's etc...and minimize computers, my list goes on   Leaders out leading and not by virtue of Windows XP.

HQs shook up/NSEs would be thinned massively also....yes I am on a roll.

More teeth where needed commensurate with a well staffed training system...

"Soldiers First"...primarily Reg Force ones... 

 

[dapaterson]

Dapterson....totally agree...

In my utopia self licking ice creams would be gone also.

I would also bring back round trip memo's etc...and minimize computers, my list goes on   Leaders out leading and not by virtue of Windows XP.

HQs shook up/NSEs would be thinned massively also....yes I am on a roll.

More teeth where needed commensurate with a well staffed training system...

"Soldiers First"...primarily Reg Force ones... 

One key disagreement:

Two choices:  Rebuild the echelon properly for units, or expand the NSE.  You can't fire the the unit support, cut the NSE, and then expect any decent support. 

The NCE, on the other hand, is ripe for some delicate adjustments - made with a chainsaw.

 

[dangerboy]

Have fun with this...


Reservists would not be permitted to be employed in a Regular capacity under any circumstances...limited full time reserve service would be possible and similar to how things are now just in a much reduced force.  Reserve HQs would be CHOPPED to the bone. 

One question, could you expand on this point?

Do you mean we should not have Reserves deploying overseas on tours or do you mean things like 3 year class B contracts.

Not knocking your ideas, just would like a clarification.

 

[Mountie]

"In my world, there would be 2 Reserve formations in LFWA (5 right now), 2 in LFCA (4 right now), two in SQFT (who would inherit the NCR) (3 right now), and one in LFAA (3 right now)."

While this is a fine idea, it is necessary to also look at what is in those HQs.  I'm morally certain and willing to bet really good money that HQ costs for the army reserve INCREASED in the process of REDUCING 21 Militia District HQs to 10 CBG HQs and five Militia Area HQs to the army reserve responsibilities of four LFA HQs.  Just as an example, the old MD HQs each had one full-time Major and two full-time Captains while the CBG HQs started off with a full-time Lieutenant-Colonel, three full-time Majors and several (more than four) full-time Captains plus large increases in other full-time and part-time positions.

While eliminating HQs is a good idea in and of itself, it doesn't necessarily go the distance needed.

I've posted this idea before, but can't remember which thread or how long ago.  But this post reminded me of it.  Its based on a staff college paper written by an Australian Army captain, but it fits the Canadian Army very well too.

Re-clasify each Area Headquarters to a Canadian Brigade Group Headquarters and make it a Militia command.  Re-clasify each Canadian Brigade Group to a Canadian Battle Group and create 12 CBGs: 4 in LFWA (one per province), 4 in LFCA and 4 in Land Forces Eastern Area (combining the two CBGs from LFQA and LFAA). This reduces the size of the HQs and the number of officers more in line with the number of troops being supported.
Each regiment would then be organized with a single operational sub-unit maintained at full-strength.  This allows unit history and traditions to continue.  Most have only one operational sub-unit anyway, so why maintain a unit headquarters and a training sub-unit just to support the one operational sub-unit.  The training sub-unit can be a battle group asset holding all the soldiers undergoing training.  This would elminiate several senior officers and allowing those that remain to actually command the elements that they would really command on operations.

For example:
38 Canadian Battle Group (Manitoba/Western Ontario)
Battle Group HQ
Royal Winnipeg Rifles
Queen's Own Cameron Highlanders of Canada
Lake Superior Scottish
Fort Garry Horse
26th Field Battery (with each numbered battery becoming a troop to preserve unit history)
31 Field Engineer Squadron
17 Service Battalion
 

 

[daftandbarmy]

I've posted this idea before, but can't remember which thread or how long ago.  But this post reminded me of it.  Its based on a staff college paper written by an Australian Army captain, but it fits the Canadian Army very well too.

Re-clasify each Area Headquarters to a Canadian Brigade Group Headquarters and make it a Militia command.  Re-clasify each Canadian Brigade Group to a Canadian Battle Group and create 12 CBGs: 4 in LFWA (one per province), 4 in LFCA and 4 in Land Forces Eastern Area (combining the two CBGs from LFQA and LFAA). This reduces the size of the HQs and the number of officers more in line with the number of troops being supported.
Each regiment would then be organized with a single operational sub-unit maintained at full-strength.  This allows unit history and traditions to continue.  Most have only one operational sub-unit anyway, so why maintain a unit headquarters and a training sub-unit just to support the one operational sub-unit.  The training sub-unit can be a battle group asset holding all the soldiers undergoing training.  This would elminiate several senior officers and allowing those that remain to actually command the elements that they would really command on operations.

For example:
38 Canadian Battle Group (Manitoba/Western Ontario)
Battle Group HQ
Royal Winnipeg Rifles
Queen's Own Cameron Highlanders of Canada
Lake Superior Scottish
Fort Garry Horse
26th Field Battery (with each numbered battery becoming a troop to preserve unit history)
31 Field Engineer Squadron
17 Service Battalion

Nice idea, but the demographics suggest that you could probably have Bde in BC alone, and a BG spread across the Prairie provinces. It doesn't make sense to try to be 'fair' the the Prairies, in the reserve world, by making sure that they get the same deal as the West Coast.

Oh, and make sure that they move LFWA HQ and WATC to BC as well, reflecting these demographic realities.

 

[Mountie]

Yah, I agree the demographics of the Prairies don't really work.  The rest of the counry is better though.  Perhaps BC could have two CBGs.  Maybe ON and QC/Maritimes could each have 5.  Just trying to keep it even, but that might not really be possible. 

 

[dapaterson]

Please, no.  Given an Army Reserve that parades about 15000 (trained strength) there's no way to form that number of Bdes.  BC would be hard pressed to put together a decent sized BG, let alone a Bde (more musicians than gunners in at least one unit).

We need to break the paradigm that a Reserve LCol commands 120 people.  That paradigm in turn breaks units, forcing folks into positions without sufficient experience.

There's no need for one Bde or more per province; put command where the troops are,not where there are pipe dreams.  With 20K Reg / 15K trained Reserves, and a Bde of 5K, that's a maximum of 7 Bdes nationally - and likely less.

 

[Michael OLeary]

Re-clasify each Area Headquarters to a Canadian Brigade Group Headquarters and make it a Militia command.  Re-clasify each Canadian Brigade Group to a Canadian Battle Group and create 12 CBGs: 4 in LFWA (one per province), 4 in LFCA and 4 in Land Forces Eastern Area (combining the two CBGs from LFQA and LFAA). This reduces the size of the HQs and the number of officers more in line with the number of troops being supported.
Each regiment would then be organized with a single operational sub-unit maintained at full-strength.  This allows unit history and traditions to continue.  Most have only one operational sub-unit anyway, so why maintain a unit headquarters and a training sub-unit just to support the one operational sub-unit.  The training sub-unit can be a battle group asset holding all the soldiers undergoing training.  This would elminiate several senior officers and allowing those that remain to actually command the elements that they would really command on operations.

A simplistic plan that conveniently skips a few other functions of the Area HQs, like domestic response responsibilities.  These existed before the Area HQs did, and used to be embedded in the various  command HQs (MARCOM, LFCHQ, etc.).  Any new plan has to address all the required functions.

While many will also agree that economies should be made on unit structures, just deceasing each unit to an authorized sub-unit level ignores the demands of administration.  While a Reserve unit may have "only" 100+ soldiers, they take an incredible amount of administration compared to a Reg F soldier for which a decrease from a BOR to Coy Clerk(s) would be a disastrous "solution".  (For example, when a Reg F soldier (I.e., Cpl/Pte) goes on a course while serving in a battalion, it is usually a locally run course and doesn't require travel claims, changes to pay accounts, etc - While a Reserve unit BOR may process all of that admin for 100+ people launching out of the local area on training and tasks every summer.)  Any new plan has to address all the things those units do now - though few would argue against a seriously reconfigured admin system for repetitive tasks (that would have to be in place first).

 

[Mountie]

True enough.  But wouldn't the Battle Group Orderly Room be able to handle this for the whole battle group, along with the sub-unit clerks?  With todays technology surely someone going on course from 26th Field Regiment in Brandon, MB  could process his admin work through 38 BGOR 200km away in Winnipeg.  Its being done in the RCMP.  From rural MB all admin/financial claims are processed through either Division HQ in Winnipeg or Regional HQ in Edmonton.  Email is wonderful thing. 

 

[McG]

It is being done the in the reserves already too.  The Engineer squadrons in Vancouver, Chilliwack and Trail are all part of the same unit.  Several other examples exist of units spread across multiple cities.

In the current structure, sub-sub-unit sized organizations are deemed "battalions" with all the "key positions" established at full rank while at the same time many of the lower ranking manpower within the HQ does not exist.  Through combining several regiments into a single battalion, we could reinvest the freed-up manpower to have full BORs (including all the Pte through MCpl positions) ... imagine this would also improve supervision and development of personnel as compared to the current system with one-ofs scattered about.  This more robust BOR would also have better flexibility to handle things such as leave, surges in work flow, and other unusualness.

... now repeat this improvement in the RQ and Ops shops for the amalgamated battalion.

 

[dapaterson]

There is the challenge of geogrpahy.  The bigger the AOR, the greater the demand on the CO and RSM (and ancillary other members of the command team).  How big is too big for a part-time CO and RSM?  Important question to consider in drawing up plans for the future.

 

[daftandbarmy]

True enough.  But wouldn't the Battle Group Orderly Room be able to handle this for the whole battle group, along with the sub-unit clerks?  With todays technology surely someone going on course from 26th Field Regiment in Brandon, MB  could process his admin work through 38 BGOR 200km away in Winnipeg.  Its being done in the RCMP.  From rural MB all admin/financial claims are processed through either Division HQ in Winnipeg or Regional HQ in Edmonton.  Email is wonderful thing.

This would be the ideal solution, I agree. If we had great information systems, a stable command structure and a high % of reliability from the membership we could likely do the same thing. However, the reality is that the BOR staff are constantly overwhelmed with issues that can't be managed at a distance and still require alot of paper and F2F contact to handle. That is, of course, if we shiftless Class A vagabonds are available when required!

I'm constantly amazed at the effort our administrators have to put in to help troops in our system, while equivalent issues in civvy organizations are dealt with by simple emails and phone calls. Radar O'Reilly would probably quit from stress...

 

[Michael OLeary]

This more robust BOR would also have better flexibility to handle things such as leave, surges in work flow, and other unusualness.

Therein lies the key to any restructure plan, the admin support has to have the strength to match the surge requirements.  A simple model copying Reg F strength ratios between teeth and tail is not always the answer.

 

[McG]

There is the challenge of geogrpahy. 

Yep.  And, also the challenge of supporting:

shiftless Class A vagabonds

Because of these challenges, the HQ structure may have to be individually tailored to each battalion in order to accommodate unit size and dispersion. Even for units that are relatively concentrated geographically, the differences for administering primarily Class A reservists means that the training, competencies and structure of the BOR may have to be different. 

A simple model copying Reg F strength ratios between teeth and tail is not always the answer.

+1

 

[Mountie]

I'll have to take your word for it since I'm an outsider. But I work for the same federal gov't and experience the same problems with administration and technology.  I just find it hard to believe that we can have over 30 isolated detachments spread across the province, many of which are accessible only by plane, which are administered by computer and mail through Winnipeg & Edmonton, but yet the Militia can't administer a unit in Brandon from 200 km down the Trans-Canada Highway in Winnipeg???  What businesses/organizations these days doesn't administer elements of their organization from other cities.  Perhaps an investment in communications would save in manpower.  We experience the same issues (general administration, course coordinating, compensation claims, relocation claims, pay claims, overtime claims, leave requests, medical administration, etc) and its all done effectively and quickly from a distance by a very small staff.

 

[Edward Campbell]

I'll have to take your word for it since I'm an outsider. But I work for the same federal gov't and experience the same problems with administration and technology.  I just find it hard to believe that we can have over 30 isolated detachments spread across the province, many of which are accessible only by plane, which are administered by computer and mail through Winnipeg & Edmonton, but yet the Militia can't administer a unit in Brandon from 200 km down the Trans-Canada Highway in Winnipeg???  What businesses/organizations these days doesn't administer elements of their organization from other cities.  Perhaps an investment in communications would save in manpower.  We experience the same issues (general administration, course coordinating, compensation claims, relocation claims, pay claims, overtime claims, leave requests, medical administration, etc) and its all done effectively and quickly from a distance by a very small staff.

I used to ask similar questions, albeit not about our reserve forces.

daftandbarmy provides most of the answer: "If we had great information systems, a stable command structure and a high % of reliability from the membership we could likely do the same thing. However, the reality is that the BOR staff are constantly overwhelmed with issues that can't be managed at a distance and still require alot of paper and F2F contact to handle. That is, of course, if we shiftless Class A vagabonds are available when required!"

I'm not sure why DND's IT appears to always be a major problem, but it does.

I'm prepared to agree that the CF reserve's "command structure" and the "reliability of the membership" are real problems.

I'm with you, Mountie, on one point: why do the CF reserves have "issues that can't be managed at a distance and still require alot [sic] of paper and F2F contact to handle" while e.g. the RCMP in isolated detachments do not or, at least, learn to manage at a distance, without face-to-face contact?