Justin Trudeau hints at boosting Canada’s military spending

I'll believe it when I see it.

 

[WestIsle]

A minor point of interest, I believe the Army Modernization Team is currently viewing the Army as made up of four armies;

1. Institutional Army - Army HQ, Div HQs, CDSGs, CADTC (to include all the IT and CT elements)
2. Regular Field Army- CMBGs and CCSB
3. Reserve Field Army- CBGs
4. Rangers - CRPGs

Discussions around the Rangers are interesting to follow. Questions abound about the cost and purpose of this line at the L1 and L2 levels.

 

[FJAG]

Your answer as to composition of the field force has been provided above.

Yes. I thought it was very well done by @TangoTwoBravo.

If we are mobilizing, the field force is going to war and not surging into the schools.

Okay. @TangoTwoBravo cleared it up that the CMBGs and CCSB form the bulk of the field force. As to the "not surging" lets elsewhere, note his last paragraph and let's put a pause on that.

The institutional army and the reserve force are also not going to provide giant pools of instructors.

Let's pause that for a moment too.

The institutional demands on the CA institutional structures will substantially increase/accelerate commensurate to the acceleration in the rate of train, equip, deploy, sustain of the Army as a whole.

Absolutely and undeniably.

Meanwhile, the PRes will need to be forging platoons and companies in collective training.

Yes they should be - I'd go further to bns and bdes as well.

Yes, some reservists will reinforce training systems, field force, and institutional army. But this individual augmentation is filling vacancies or growing capacity to long war requirements.

This brings me back to the above pause. If the the bulk of field force is going to war and the ResF is forging units and only providing some augmentation to reinforce the training system then where are the knowledgeable and capable resources to substantially increase/accelerate the institutional structures come from?

Again, I think @TangoTwoBravo hits the nail on the head when he says:

Mobilization of the Canadian Army would take the training system, the field force working and the reserves working together. Some field units would likely have to take on the role of teaching new soldiers with their Cpls (and maybe one-hook Ptes) become MCpls overnight. I think that most see the reserves as having a big role to play in this. The reserves provide a "mobilization base", even if the plan is not fully fleshed-out.

Some members/elements of the "field force" will not be able to go to war. Some of them need to be set aside to form the well trained and knowledgeable augmentees to the training system needed to handle the increased training load. Their place in the field force will be taken by reservists who will also fill in the blank files in the field force. In addition, some of the reserve force will also be allocated to augment the training system with yet more, but less experienced, instructors.

There is another element of the field force (or institutional army) which may need to be set aside (and similarly be backfilled by reservists). These are knowledgeable leaders at the officer and Snr NCO level who may be needed to augment the reserve force in their role to force generate additional sub-units, units and brigades. Our current reserve system, even with its complement of RSS staff, may not have sufficient fully trained leaders to effectively generate the units required.

In many ways, despite what others may think, this is why I am not a fan of reserve force restructuring by itself. I tend to believe that there is a need for an across the board restructuring of the whole army which leads to an total force quite capable of continuing its peace-time missions effectively, but at the same time having a fully formed structure in place to allow a rapid conversion to Stage 3 and 4 mobilization with the least amount of last-minute ad-hocery possible.

 

[Fabius]

The question then is are the units in the field force manned sufficiently to do all that will be expected, concurrently;
1. Deploy in combat operations;
2. Detach personnel to the Trg system; and
3. Detach leadership to the Reserve Field Force units and formations.

The CA has decreased the unit establishments quite a ways from the once existing war strengths.

 

[KevinB]

Yes. I thought it was very well done by @TangoTwoBravo.

Okay. @TangoTwoBravo cleared it up that the CMBGs and CCSB form the bulk of the field force. As to the "not surging" lets elsewhere, note his last paragraph and let's put a pause on that.

Let's pause that for a moment too.

Absolutely and undeniably.

Yes they should be - I'd go further to bns and bdes as well.

This brings me back to the above pause. If the the bulk of field force is going to war and the ResF is forging units and only providing some augmentation to reinforce the training system then where are the knowledgeable and capable resources to substantially increase/accelerate the institutional structures come from?

Again, I think @TangoTwoBravo hits the nail on the head when he says:



Some members/elements of the "field force" will not be able to go to war. Some of them need to be set aside to form the well trained and knowledgeable augmentees to the training system needed to handle the increased training load. Their place in the field force will be taken by reservists who will also fill in the blank files in the field force. In addition, some of the reserve force will also be allocated to augment the training system with yet more, but less experienced, instructors.

There is another element of the field force (or institutional army) which may need to be set aside (and similarly be backfilled by reservists). These are knowledgeable leaders at the officer and Snr NCO level who may be needed to augment the reserve force in their role to force generate additional sub-units, units and brigades. Our current reserve system, even with its complement of RSS staff, may not have sufficient fully trained leaders to effectively generate the units required.

In many ways, despite what others may think, this is why I am not a fan of reserve force restructuring by itself. I tend to believe that there is a need for an across the board restructuring of the whole army which leads to an total force quite capable of continuing its peace-time missions effectively, but at the same time having a fully formed structure in place to allow a rapid conversion to Stage 3 and 4 mobilization with the least amount of last-minute ad-hocery possible.

With no spare equipment that is not a plan, it is a joke.

 

[FJAG]

With no spare equipment that is not a plan, it is a joke.

No. It's one half of the plan.

A joke is what happened in the Senate a few days ago.

 

[daftandbarmy]

A minor point of interest, I believe the Army Modernization Team is currently viewing the Army as made up of four armies;

1. Institutional Army - Army HQ, Div HQs, CDSGs, CADTC (to include all the IT and CT elements)
2. Regular Field Army- CMBGs and CCSB
3. Reserve Field Army- CBGs
4. Rangers - CRPGs

What about the 'Shadow Army', because they cast such large shadows

 

[GK .Dundas]

With no spare equipment that is not a plan, it is a joke.

We all know what is really going to happen when it hits the fan, the politicians, the bureaucracy and the Generals ( All though not as many in the last group as the other two groups. ) will panic.
The reserves will be seen as a quick fix to bring up regular units to full strength and as casualty replacements .
If we're really lucky there will actually be time to train these basically ad-hoc units before they're thrown into the meat grinder.
I've had a couple of pints at my local and alcohol is a depressant so that may account for my pessimism. On the other hand I have also read a bit of military history so either maybe influencing me.

 

[OldSolduer]

We all know what is really going to happen when it hits the fan, the politicians, the bureaucracy and the Generals ( All though not as many in the last group as the other two groups. ) will panic.
The reserves will be seen as a quick fix to bring up regular units to full strength and as casualty replacements .
If we're really lucky there will actually be time to train these basically ad-hoc units before they're thrown into the meat grinder.
I've had a couple of pints at my local and alcohol is a depressant so that may account for my pessimism. On the other hand I have also read a bit of military history so either maybe influencing me.

I don't think you are far wrong. Despite the pints.

A good portion of the population will say "WTF did the GoC give you billions for? and this is what we get?"
Another portion will say "the GoC has under funded the CAF for decades - the chickens are coming home to roost"
And some of us will say "we have warned all of you of this situation for decades and you would rather have a half ass dental plan - until there is a flood/fire/ice storm in your province - then who answers the call?"

 

[Fabius]

I found this quote from the current CDS’s interview with Mercedes Stevenson interesting.
In one aspect it’s realistic and yet it strikes me as lacking vision. I am uncertain whether that’s fair or not.


“I have a tendency to look at things for what they are without wishing what they could be. So there is no point wasting too much time in complaining about what is; we need to deal with what we have to the best to our best possible way of doing it.”

Canada must take ‘responsibility’ for its sovereignty, defence chief says - National | Globalnews.ca

U.S. President Donald Trump's complaints about Canada's military spending and capabilities have underscored the need for Ottawa to prioritize defence, Gen. Jennie Carignan says.

globalnews.ca

 

[McG]

Some members/elements of the "field force" will not be able to go to war. Some of them need to be set aside to form the well trained and knowledgeable augmentees to the training system needed to handle the increased training load. Their place in the field force will be taken by reservists who will also fill in the blank files in the field force. In addition, some of the reserve force will also be allocated to augment the training system with yet more, but less experienced, instructors.

There is another element of the field force (or institutional army) which may need to be set aside (and similarly be backfilled by reservists). These are knowledgeable leaders at the officer and Snr NCO level who may be needed to augment the reserve force in their role to force generate additional sub-units, units and brigades. Our current reserve system, even with its complement of RSS staff, may not have sufficient fully trained leaders to effectively generate the units required.

There is not time to pull and replace great numbers of junior officers and senior NCOs out of the field force and to integrate new PRes into the units to replace them. We agree there will be members of the field force who just cannot go at the moment of mobilization, and those holes will have to be filled.

The rest of the growing the institutional component becomes a whole lot easier when you start with a fully resources individual training system that does not need augmentation to deliver the CAF’s peacetime training needs.

 

[WestIsle]

I found this quote from the current CDS’s interview with Mercedes Stevenson interesting.
In one aspect it’s realistic and yet it strikes me as lacking vision. I am uncertain whether that’s fair or not.


“I have a tendency to look at things for what they are without wishing what they could be. So there is no point wasting too much time in complaining about what is; we need to deal with what we have to the best to our best possible way of doing it.”

Canada must take ‘responsibility’ for its sovereignty, defence chief says - National | Globalnews.ca

U.S. President Donald Trump's complaints about Canada's military spending and capabilities have underscored the need for Ottawa to prioritize defence, Gen. Jennie Carignan says.

globalnews.ca

Is it possible that maybe these kind of statements are why they were selected as CDS?

 

[PrairieFella]

So are the Yanks going to increase their defence budget to 5% of GDP? I’ve heard the demand that other NATO countries should increase to 5%, but not a commitment from our southern neighbours.

5% is completely untenable. The Americans can't afford 3.6% without the money printers, nevermind 5.

 

[quadrapiper]

Is it possible that maybe these kind of statements are why they were selected as CDS?

Diplomacy during parliamentary leadership shuffling: don't want to become an issue.

 

[Halifax Tar]

With no spare equipment that is not a plan, it is a joke.

Remember my statement about delusions of grandeur?

I found this quote from the current CDS’s interview with Mercedes Stevenson interesting.
In one aspect it’s realistic and yet it strikes me as lacking vision. I am uncertain whether that’s fair or not.


“I have a tendency to look at things for what they are without wishing what they could be. So there is no point wasting too much time in complaining about what is; we need to deal with what we have to the best to our best possible way of doing it.”

Canada must take ‘responsibility’ for its sovereignty, defence chief says - National | Globalnews.ca

U.S. President Donald Trump's complaints about Canada's military spending and capabilities have underscored the need for Ottawa to prioritize defence, Gen. Jennie Carignan says.

globalnews.ca

That's a worded up CAF mantra. Do more with less.

 

[KevinB]

5% is completely untenable. The Americans can't afford 3.6% without the money printers, nevermind 5.

We’ve been over this before. It’s been done.
But the 5% would be temporary to solve all your rust out issues that are pretty much endemic in NATO.

No. It's one half of the plan.

I’d say it’s worse than no plan.
Right now the Reserves have no equipment- so they cannot even be mobilized and used effectively in a LSCO, which let’s face it is the main reason you would need to mobilize…

A joke is what happened in the Senate a few days ago.

Embarrassing, but not a joke sadly.

 

[PrairieFella]

We’ve been over this before. It’s been done.
But the 5% would be temporary to solve all your rust out issues that are pretty much endemic in NATO.

It was done in a different place at a different time. The peak of Canadian defence spending from post-war on appears to be around 4.1% in the early sixties, which makes sense as it roughly lines up with the CMC and starts declining from there.

The decline really makes sense if you recall what kicks off in 1966 - The Medical Care Act, which establishes national, standardized Medicare for all in Canada. After the introduction of universal healthcare, the decline really kicks off. In 1965, defence spending was 2.93% of GDP. By 1975, 1.86% of GDP. There is also an uptick in other social programs around the same era, all requiring a hefty budgets.

If we want 5%, we can return to a pre-Medicare Canada, but considering any politician who did so would probably become a lamppost piñata, we ain't getting there anytime soon unless war is imminent or already upon us, nor do we really need to get there. It's completely excessive. Furthermore, we don't have the benefit our mercurial neighbours to the South have by being able to print the world reserve currency. Money printers going brrrrt will just devalue the CAD even more and threaten domestic prosperity further.

2.5% - 2.75% would be plenty if we buy smart off the shelf from allies like Korea, Israel, etc.

 

[Brad Sallows]

Armies and Army systems do not exist for peacetime. A training system that can't train without augmentation can't train sufficient replacements in a war.

Systems to train soldiers aren't a nice to have that an Army can cheap out on. Unless it's an Army you'll never employ.

Who right now has a training system already staffed to provide wartime mobilization and sustainment?

In a general war scenario, pretty much everything has to be expanded. What's critical is not current capacity, but prepared workable plans to increase capacity.

 

[ytz]

We’ve been over this before. It’s been done.
But the 5% would be temporary to solve all your rust out issues that are pretty much endemic in NATO.

We can't even really absorb 2% right now. Solving the rust out most definitely doesn't need 5%. Canadian GDP over US$2.1T. 1% of that is US$21B. This is more than Canada is paying for all its F-35s which even at 88 frames has us on track to be the fourth largest customer for that program. Even if South Korea, Australia, the UK and Israel order more that only drops us to 8th. That's an example of what 1% of GDP in one year can do.

Spend 3% over a decade and Canada could comfortably do everything short of fielding aircraft carriers and nuclear submarines. And depending on the economy we might actually be able to do those as well. To simply recapitalize what we currently have 2% spent continuously actually would do that. Getting closer to 2% would also get us out of the criteria that has put us in the NATO quadrant of shame: 20% of defence spending on R&D and procurement. Simply add 0.5% of GDP (~US$10B) to the defence budget and dedicate it mostly to equipment procurement, infrastructure renewal and training budgets and we'd see a massive increase in both capability and readiness over 5 years. And a complete transformation over a decade.

 

[FJAG]

I found this quote from the current CDS’s interview with Mercedes Stevenson interesting.
In one aspect it’s realistic and yet it strikes me as lacking vision. I am uncertain whether that’s fair or not.


“I have a tendency to look at things for what they are without wishing what they could be. So there is no point wasting too much time in complaining about what is; we need to deal with what we have to the best to our best possible way of doing it.”

Canada must take ‘responsibility’ for its sovereignty, defence chief says - National | Globalnews.ca

U.S. President Donald Trump's complaints about Canada's military spending and capabilities have underscored the need for Ottawa to prioritize defence, Gen. Jennie Carignan says.

globalnews.ca

I'm a believer in Rumsfeld's mantra of "You go to war with the army you have, not the army you might want or wish to have at a later time." That is a statement of fact that you do not have the option to not go to war just because your army isn't at an optimum level. At the same time, it is not a statement that suggests that you shouldn't be striving to continuously improve yourself to reach that optimum level.

Like you, I read her statement as a tacit acknowledgement that Canada's military leadership tend to "go along to get along." The state of the CAF has become one which literally screams for a massive overhaul of its basic foundation to move it from a green, bureaucratic civil service back to the defence force that it needs to be. That's not only a need for an infusion of cash, but an inward look at systemic reform.

It's a little hard to parse the meaning of her last sentence there, because it feels like she restructured it while speaking, but to my mind it wasn't the expression of a vision for internal reform but rather a statement of fine tuning the status quo. The CAF is too far down the road of calcification to be fine tuned into being the best it can be.

I’d say it’s worse than no plan.
Right now the Reserves have no equipment- so they cannot even be mobilized and used effectively in a LSCO, which let’s face it is the main reason you would need to mobilize…

I think that we've seen what marginally trained and organized forces can do in Ukraine with a last second infusion of limited modern weaponry. I'm certainly not advocating that "everything's alright, Jack," but I do think that we have the raw material to be built on. It does need a plan, however, and while the fundamental concepts for mobilization are there, there is much to be done. The augmentation portion of reserves in RegF units was used extensively, in Afghanistan and showed that it could work.

I have less confidence in augmenting the training system - although to a limited extent, the reserve force NRQS and ARTS programs assembled in the summers is akin to that - and in reallocating existing RegF and ResF personnel and equipment to create new units. I'll simply throw in here that it is not that the reserves do not have equipment, because they do, it's just not equivalent to what the RegF has. When I look at a ARNG light infantry battalion, I see very limited equipment - add Javelins and some 120mm mortars to our reserves and you're almost there. What is missing isn't so much the people or even the equipment, but the vision and plan to get them from moderately competent platoons to trained and properly led battalions.

Embarrassing, but not a joke sadly.

. It's a strange thing, but in looking at the surface of several of Trump's recent directives find myself not in disagreement with them. The idea of shaking up and trimming down the bureaucracy and its associated crippling processes and procedures is one, in particular I agree with. The concern that Americans should have id that much of the weeding out that is happening is revenge-based coming from a particularly thin-skinned man who is not above using illegal methods to get his way.

I don't see Hegseth throwing out to many of the military's leadership - after all, they are mostly Republican to start with - except those who have been involved in the DEIing of the military (because that is the great bugaboo in the MAGA crowd's eyes) That's a small fraction. The US military has too great a depth and too engrained a culture to be seriously hurt by a few "night of the long knives'" decapitations. More of a concern is that he may slip in too many leaders who are prepared to go the distance to enshrine MAGA in the military.

Hegseth may be an over imbibing, womanizer, but Canada has had its own share of useless MNDs. But mostly they were ineffective and not destructive. Time will tell who is really in charge at DoD.

 

[KevinB]

I'm a believer in Rumsfeld's mantra of "You go to war with the army you have, not the army you might want or wish to have at a later time." That is a statement of fact that you do not have the option to not go to war just because your army isn't at an optimum level. At the same time, it is not a statement that suggests that you shouldn't be striving to continuously improve yourself to reach that optimum level.

Agreed

I think that we've seen what marginally trained and organized forces can do in Ukraine with a last second infusion of limited modern weaponry. I'm certainly not advocating that "everything's alright, Jack," but I do think that we have the raw material to be built on. It does need a plan, however, and while the fundamental concepts for mobilization are there, there is much to be done. The augmentation portion of reserves in RegF units was used extensively, in Afghanistan and showed that it could work.

The issue is, no one is going to be providing Canada equipment if the shit hits the fan...

I have less confidence in augmenting the training system - although to a limited extent, the reserve force NRQS and ARTS programs assembled in the summers is akin to that - and in reallocating existing RegF and ResF personnel and equipment to create new units. I'll simply throw in here that it is not that the reserves do not have equipment, because they do, it's just not equivalent to what the RegF has. When I look at a ARNG light infantry battalion, I see very limited equipment - add Javelins and some 120mm mortars to our reserves and you're almost there. What is missing isn't so much the people or even the equipment, but the vision and plan to get them from moderately competent platoons to trained and properly led battalions.

I will differ with you there, as ARNG LIB's have Comms, NV, support past the Battalion...
In fact in many ways the ARNG LIB's are much better kitted out than the CA Reg Force LIB's.

. It's a strange thing, but in looking at the surface of several of Trump's recent directives find myself not in disagreement with them. The idea of shaking up and trimming down the bureaucracy and its associated crippling processes and procedures is one, in particular I agree with. The concern that Americans should have id that much of the weeding out that is happening is revenge-based coming from a particularly thin-skinned man who is not above using illegal methods to get his way.

Ack

I don't see Hegseth throwing out to many of the military's leadership - after all, they are mostly Republican to start with - except those who have been involved in the DEIing of the military (because that is the great bugaboo in the MAGA crowd's eyes) That's a small fraction.

I think it depends who is assigning labels, as a lot may be viewed as RINO's through the MAGA lens.

The US military has too great a depth and too engrained a culture to be seriously hurt by a few "night of the long knives'" decapitations. More of a concern is that he may slip in too many leaders who are prepared to go the distance to enshrine MAGA in the military.

Hegseth may be an over imbibing, womanizer, but Canada has had its own share of useless MNDs. But mostly they were ineffective and not destructive. Time will tell who is really in charge at DoD.