Informing the Army’s Future Structure

[Brad Sallows]

Maintaining the capability difference is the essence of the "strategy of technology". Conveniently, the side with the most individual liberty has advantages.

 

[suffolkowner]

Maintaining the capability difference is the essence of the "strategy of technology". Conveniently, the side with the most individual liberty has advantages.

I tend to agree but sometimes worry that this isn't more of a hope in this grand democratic experience that we are undertaking. The recent Russian adventure in Ukraine does tend to support this and again I hope it is not put to the test again on a larger scale against China

 

[Kirkhill]

Is that true? More complex and advanced equipment is relatively more expensive, but economies have grown.

All figures approximate and nominal.
Upper bound cost of Sherman tank in 1945: $65000
US GDP in 1945: $228B
US GDP in 2021: $22996B

GDP has increased by roughly 100 times.
If the cost of a MBT increased 100 times, it would be $6.5M. That doesn't sound too far off. I'd guess if similar comparisons were made with respect to aircraft, ships, etc, we'd find that most things are, in fact, more expensive. But capability must also be compared, and if we could somehow reduce that to a quantity, I suspect we'd find several orders of magnitude of difference.

Capability differences can be hugely influential. (Just ask anyone who is lagging in the race to climb a tech tree...)



I suppose we'd find that it is vital to have the most capable equipment, otherwise we're just wasting money on targets.

Here’s how much housing prices have skyrocketed over the last 50 years

In 1940, the median home price in the U.S. was less than $3,000.

www.cnbc.com

If you want to buy a house this year, you may well be paying around $199,200, the median price for a home in the U.S., according to Zillow.

Houses weren’t always this expensive. In 1940, the median home value in the U.S. was just $2,938. In 1980, it was $47,200, and by 2000, it had risen to $119,600. Even adjusted for inflation, the median home price in 1940 would only have been $30,600 in 2000 dollars, according to data from the U.S. Census.

So a Sherman in 1945 cost $65,000
A house in the US in 1940 cost $3,000
So in 1940-45 a single tank would house 21 families

In 2022 a Merkava with Trophy costs $5,000,000
A house in the US costs $200,000
So in 2022 a single tank would house 25 families

So, is it that things cost more or more things cost? There are more things to spend money on?

It would be interesting to see how much of the budget now gets spent on "flying machines" - to include planes but also helicopters, ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, guided missiles of all sorts, glide bombs, UAS's and smart artillery rounds.

Versus 1940-45 and the only "aircraft" in the sky were piloted and dumb bombs and shells.

And

Prices over the decades

www150.statcan.gc.ca

 

[Infanteer]

Versus 1940-45 and the only "aircraft" in the sky were piloted and dumb bombs and shells.

Werner Von Braun, the V1, and the V2 say "Pardon?"

 

[Brad Sallows]

I'll stipulate that everything is more expensive now.

I'll contend that an expensive peacetime force is cheaper than war, and that an expensive peacetime force is most effective if it demonstrates clear technological superiority.

A subsidiary contention is that an expensive peacetime force that fits well with allies and can operate abroad produces international security and trade benefits that are hard to measure, but exceed the cost of the force.

 

[suffolkowner]

Here’s how much housing prices have skyrocketed over the last 50 years

In 1940, the median home price in the U.S. was less than $3,000.

www.cnbc.com

So a Sherman in 1945 cost $65,000
A house in the US in 1940 cost $3,000
So in 1940-45 a single tank would house 21 families

In 2022 a Merkava with Trophy costs $5,000,000
A house in the US costs $200,000
So in 2022 a single tank would house 25 families

So, is it that things cost more or more things cost? There are more things to spend money on?

It would be interesting to see how much of the budget now gets spent on "flying machines" - to include planes but also helicopters, ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, guided missiles of all sorts, glide bombs, UAS's and smart artillery rounds.

Versus 1940-45 and the only "aircraft" in the sky were piloted and dumb bombs and shells.

And

Prices over the decades

www150.statcan.gc.ca

In Canada is not the average house something like $850,000? If the US is under $250,000 still that tells you how much trouble we are exposed to

 

[Blackadder1916]

In Canada is not the average house something like $850,000? If the US is under $250,000 still that tells you how much trouble we are exposed to

Keep in mind that Kirkhill quoted a nearly five year old article (23 Jun 2017).

 

[Kirkhill]

Werner Von Braun, the V1, and the V2 say "Pardon?"

V1 June 13, 1944 - 8,025 missiles launched
V2 September 7, 1944 - 3,172 missiles launched
And the first military helicopter flew in 1941 - also German
The first military jet also flew in 1941 - also German
And guidance systems came into vogue.

However as revolutionary as all those technologies were, in my opinion, they had minimal impact on a war that was primarily fought with the technologies of 1900-1940.

 

[GR66]

That is untrue. The Ukrainian President and other government officials have repeatedly and publically chided NATO and the West for just leaving weapons at the door, and not taking more direct forms of participation such as aerial intervention.

https://www.cbc.ca/radio/asithappens/as-it-happens-the-tuesday-edition-1.6385827/why-zelensky-won-t-stop-pushing-for-a-no-fly-zone-according-to-his-former-adviser-1.6385830

This is true, but they were specifically requesting enforcement of a No-Fly Zone which is (primarily) an Air Force intervention, not a ground force intervention. That lies outside our discussion of Army force structure under Force 2025 and beyond.

I've expressed my opinion on the balance of Air/Sea/Land forces for Canada previously and definitely belong to the camp that would prioritize Air/Sea over Land.

 

[GR66]

Another thing to keep in mind is that not only has the cost of equipping the military gone up, but the cost of manning that equipment has gone up greatly as well.

 

[Kirkhill]

Another thing to keep in mind is that not only has the cost of equipping the military gone up, but the cost of manning that equipment has gone up greatly as well.

In 1944, privates serving in World War II made $50 a month, or $676.51 in 2016 dollars.

Here's how much US troops have been paid in every American war

The troops who have fought America's wars did so for relatively low pay — when they got paid at all.

www.businessinsider.com

So a $65,000 Sherman would buy you 1300 privates for a month or roughly a company of infantry (118) from D-Day to VE-Day.

A Canadian Private PI3 now costs $4650 a month. Or, again, about 100 times what a 1944 US private cost. +or-.

 

[FJAG]

I look at these various ORBATS (and have posted several of my own) and more and more I'm beginning to wonder if we're missing what our politicians, public (and to some extent the war in Ukraine) are trying to tell us.

The real reason Canadian's (and by extension our politician's) support for the military is "a mile wide and an inch deep" is because realistically we face no (non-nuclear) military threat to our existence. Yes there are security threats, threats to elements of our sovereignty and threats to our national interests (both economic and political), but there are no "barbarians at our gates".

For that reason our involvement in military actions are by our choice as opposed to by need. So it's really not shocking that the appetite of Canadians for a large, expensive military in peacetime or for significant casualties in deployments is low. Canadians view the participation of the military as "providing assistance". Assisting those affected by a natural disaster/pandemic. Assisting the police with security. Assisting other countries develop their own capabilities. Assisting in securing/maintaining peace between warring parties. Assisting other countries to defend themselves against invasion. Assisting our allies to defeat an evil dictator/terrorist organization. That's not the kind of mindset the screams support for things like Armoured Brigades, Tanks, Attack Helicopters, Aircraft Carriers, Assault Ships, etc.

All of the above are very valid and accurate reasons for where we are but I do think that at the heart of our problem is the Canadian military itself.

I've whinged about this many times before, but Canada is already contributing well towards the military. True it's not the NATO 2% standard Canada has agreed to, but $26 some odd billion isn't chickenfeed.

To be useful, a military needs both people and modern equipment. We spend roughly half of our budget on people and the lion's share of that goes to full-time people, both military and reserve.

It's dead simple math to conclude that if you cannot afford the level of equipment needed then the people, or many of them, become mostly useless on both a day-to-day basis and in an emergency when you really need them and their gear.

The mathematical answer is also dead simple; reduce your people costs and invest in equipment that you foresee might be necessary in a worst case scenario.

Since the late Fifties and Sixties the CAF has been enamoured with the "Forces in Being" concept which lead to the rapid expansion of the RegF and its resultant people costs. Ever since then we have not changed that paradigm. We basically keep a full-time force equipped with the money allocated. That might make sense to an extent for the RCAF and the RCN but it makes zero sense for the Army.

On a day to day basis the bulk of the Army, and to extent the RCN, spends its time in training and continuously regenerating itself through turnover and, most of all, administrating itself. There are some deployments but they generally involve only a small fraction of the force.

It's blindingly obvious that much of the Army and, to an extent, some of the Navy could put much of its manpower into a "reserve" status for much of the time. The key is finding the right balance in the RegF to ResF ratio and, absolutely critical, building a reserve force structure that turns out a credible and reliable product.

Whenever I'm at my tinfoil hat worst, I conclude that the very reason that the Army has not reformed its reserve component over the last seven decades is precisely for the reason that it would cause the government to conclude that it could do with a lot fewer of the expensive full-time PYs ... and they'd be right.

The model I built above uses existing numbers to create five deployable manoeuvre and three support brigades using existing manpower levels. It only has the equipment for three brigades though. One could as easily use the same 30/70 model to cut ten thousand full-time Army positions while retaining the reserve numbers as is and retain the three manoeuvre brigades we have equipment for. That would save in excess of $1 billion each year that could go to buying the anti armour and air defence systems we need to actually be able to fight the first year, tanks the second, artillery the third and IFVs the fourth.

The primary requirement for all of that though is to have a ResF structure that works and to have a tad less risk aversion. We can see what badly trained and badly equipped Russian full-timers are accomplishing against motivated hybrid force of Ukrainian part and full-timers given the right modern weapon systems. I'm spitballing here but my guess is that a Canadian brigade with the equipment it has and facing the Ukrainians would be blown out of the water as well because of its lack a artillery, ATGMs, air support, and air defence notwithstanding their superior training.

I'll repeat it again. Canada's problem isn't so much the lack of funding provided by the government but the lack of defence outputs that the combined military and civilian bureaucracy outputs with that funding. A solid hybrid 30/70 RegF/ResF structure in the Army (and a lesser extent in the RCN) would be much more suitable agency to meet the governments actual defence needs.

 

[KevinB]

I wonder what the production line time of a Sherman is vs an Abrams?

Or more accurately what could the production of Abrams be?

We aren’t in a wartime economy, and only recently did we seek to expand production of ‘consumables’.

No direct effort has been made to speed/streamline the production of significant military items.

 

[Brad Sallows]

In Canada is not the average house something like $850,000? If the US is under $250,000 still that tells you how much trouble we are exposed to

Median and average are not the same thing.

 

[GAP]

In 1944, privates serving in World War II made $50 a month, or $676.51 in 2016 dollars.

Here's how much US troops have been paid in every American war

The troops who have fought America's wars did so for relatively low pay — when they got paid at all.

www.businessinsider.com

So a $65,000 Sherman would buy you 1300 privates for a month or roughly a company of infantry (118) from D-Day to VE-Day.

A Canadian Private PI3 now costs $4650 a month. Or, again, about 100 times what a 1944 US private cost. +or-.

In 1967-68 & 69 as a Sargent I received 200.00/month plus $65.00 Danger pay

 

[Kirkhill]

To be useful, a military needs both people and modern equipment. We spend roughly half of our budget on people and the lion's share of that goes to full-time people, both military and reserve.

Regulars - 68,000
Reserves - 27,000
Rangers - 5,000

Civilians - 27,000

DND/CAF Footprint - Canada.ca

March 2020 - Essential information to familiarize the Minister with the Department.

www.canada.ca

It is not just the Regs that eat up the cash. It is also the government mandated civilians.

And we can't forget about the 17,000 civilians at Public Services and Procurement, and whatever other there are in Innovation, Industry etc.

There are an awful lot of civilians feeding at the trough as well.

 

[McG]

Does everyone collecting a government pay check need to be presented as an extraneous pig at the trough? We can’t spend our budget on major equipment & war essential consumables for lack of people, but we should manage the budget by cutting the too few who we have?

 

[Kirkhill]

Does everyone collecting a government pay check need to be presented as an extraneous pig at the trough? We can’t spend our budget on major equipment & war essential consumables for lack of people, but we should manage the budget by cutting the too few who we have?

Fair comment.

If I could edit my remark I would.

Having said that there are a lot of people drawing salaries that are related to National Defence and that don't show up directly in the National Defence budget while a lot of those civilians employed by DND are not seen to be directly contributing to the frontline effort.

FJAG wants to supply more Reserve Troops at the expense of the Regular Troops. I'm wondering if there is opportunity for savings in the civilian sector of DND.

 

[GR66]

All of the above are very valid and accurate reasons for where we are but I do think that at the heart of our problem is the Canadian military itself.

I've whinged about this many times before, but Canada is already contributing well towards the military. True it's not the NATO 2% standard Canada has agreed to, but $26 some odd billion isn't chickenfeed.

To be useful, a military needs both people and modern equipment. We spend roughly half of our budget on people and the lion's share of that goes to full-time people, both military and reserve.

It's dead simple math to conclude that if you cannot afford the level of equipment needed then the people, or many of them, become mostly useless on both a day-to-day basis and in an emergency when you really need them and their gear.

The mathematical answer is also dead simple; reduce your people costs and invest in equipment that you foresee might be necessary in a worst case scenario.

Since the late Fifties and Sixties the CAF has been enamoured with the "Forces in Being" concept which lead to the rapid expansion of the RegF and its resultant people costs. Ever since then we have not changed that paradigm. We basically keep a full-time force equipped with the money allocated. That might make sense to an extent for the RCAF and the RCN but it makes zero sense for the Army.

On a day to day basis the bulk of the Army, and to extent the RCN, spends its time in training and continuously regenerating itself through turnover and, most of all, administrating itself. There are some deployments but they generally involve only a small fraction of the force.

It's blindingly obvious that much of the Army and, to an extent, some of the Navy could put much of its manpower into a "reserve" status for much of the time. The key is finding the right balance in the RegF to ResF ratio and, absolutely critical, building a reserve force structure that turns out a credible and reliable product.

Whenever I'm at my tinfoil hat worst, I conclude that the very reason that the Army has not reformed its reserve component over the last seven decades is precisely for the reason that it would cause the government to conclude that it could do with a lot fewer of the expensive full-time PYs ... and they'd be right.

The model I built above uses existing numbers to create five deployable manoeuvre and three support brigades using existing manpower levels. It only has the equipment for three brigades though. One could as easily use the same 30/70 model to cut ten thousand full-time Army positions while retaining the reserve numbers as is and retain the three manoeuvre brigades we have equipment for. That would save in excess of $1 billion each year that could go to buying the anti armour and air defence systems we need to actually be able to fight the first year, tanks the second, artillery the third and IFVs the fourth.

The primary requirement for all of that though is to have a ResF structure that works and to have a tad less risk aversion. We can see what badly trained and badly equipped Russian full-timers are accomplishing against motivated hybrid force of Ukrainian part and full-timers given the right modern weapon systems. I'm spitballing here but my guess is that a Canadian brigade with the equipment it has and facing the Ukrainians would be blown out of the water as well because of its lack a artillery, ATGMs, air support, and air defence notwithstanding their superior training.

I'll repeat it again. Canada's problem isn't so much the lack of funding provided by the government but the lack of defence outputs that the combined military and civilian bureaucracy outputs with that funding. A solid hybrid 30/70 RegF/ResF structure in the Army (and a lesser extent in the RCN) would be much more suitable agency to meet the governments actual defence needs.

I'm not going to disagree with your argument that the Army has its Reg/Reserve balance wrong. I do however question the fact that you're really just changing the manning of the same basic force structures from full-time to part-time...using the Reg Force PY savings to create Res Force Brigades (admittedly with the key enablers that we're currently missing put back).

We're currently seeing Russia in a full-scale shooting war with a NATO partner nation. A nation that until just before the initiation of hostilities was hosting our military trainers. Even this extreme situation hasn't led the Canadian government to deploy any significant new troops and equipment to Europe. Hasn't led to some dramatic increase in Reserve activity. No scramble to urgently acquire vital military equipment. No serious talk about re-activating a Canadian Brigade Group in Europe. No loading of LAVs and tanks onto Ro-Ro's so they're ready to deploy if needed.

You might write this off as just another example of the talk-much, do-nothing leadership of an anti-military government. However, do you see any of those actions taking place in the UK? In France? Germany? Sure, the Germans are increasing their defence spending, but are they pushing Brigades forward? That's what's making me wonder if your model of using the savings to just create more of the same old Brigade Groups is the right path?

 

[daftandbarmy]

Or more accurately what could the production of Abrams be?

We aren’t in a wartime economy, and only recently did we seek to expand production of ‘consumables’.

No direct effort has been made to speed/streamline the production of significant military items.

IIRC the Lima plant can produce 120/month.

I assume that, should the demand increase, they could double that if required.... at least.


In February 1980, the first M1 Abrams rolled out of LATP. After a contract the plant began producing the Abrams at a rate of 30 a month.

Chrysler subsequently sold the Defense subsidiary to General Dynamics in 1982.[3] In January 1985, the last M1 rolled off the assembly line, and in October, production began on the improved M1 (IPM1). The plant later manufactured the M1A1, with the first pilot vehicle built in August 1985. The M1A1 was produced at a rate of 120 a month.[4]

Lima Army Tank Plant - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org