More Commands, More Commanders

[The Bread Guy]

I notice the CF has two more Commanders:

http://www.forces.gc.ca/site/newsroom/view_news_e.asp?id=1750

"Major-General Michel Gauthier is appointed the first Commander Designate of the Canadian Expeditionary Forces Command (CEFCOM) â “ the unified command responsible for all Canadian Forces (CF) international operations with the exception of operations conducted solely by Special Operations Forces."

Background on CEFCOM
http://www.forces.gc.ca/site/newsroom/view_news_e.asp?id=1751

Highlights:

The deployable organizations under command of CEFCOM will include:

- a Standing Contingency Task Force (SCTF) that will be established to respond rapidly to emerging crises. This high-readiness task force will be made up of existing, designated maritime, land, air and special operations elements organized under a single integrated combat command structure. It will be ready to deploy within 10 days' notice and will provide an initial CF presence to work with security partners to stabilize the situation or facilitate the deployment of larger, follow-on forces should circumstances warrant. (...)

- other Mission-Specific Task Forces (MSTFs) will be deployed as required. These task forces, which will be drawn from forces maintained at different states of readiness and structured for longer deployments, will carry out combat and peace support operations. (...)

- the Disaster Assistance Response Team (DART). An enhanced DART, or its component parts, will continue to provide humanitarian support and disaster relief to overseas missions, as directed.


"Colonel David Barr is appointed the first Commander Designate of the Special Operations Group (SOG) â “ the CF organization responsible for responding to terrorism and threats to Canadians and Canadian interests in Canada and around the world."

Background on CF SOG
http://www.forces.gc.ca/site/newsroom/view_news_e.asp?id=1752

Highlight:

"The SOG will be composed of Joint Task Force 2 (JTF2), the Canadian Forces' special operations and counterterrorism unit; a special operations aviation capability centred on helicopters; a Joint Nuclear, Biological and Chemical Defence Company ; and supporting land and maritime forces. The SOG will be capable of operating as an independent formation but its primary focus will be to generate Special Operations Forces (SOF) elements to support Canada Command (Canada COM) and the Canadian Expeditionary Forces Command (CEFCOM)."

So, better co-ordination, or just more bureaucracy?

 

[pbi]

Right now there are a lot of dust and feathers flying, but when it is all said and done we should have a CF that is run by a clear command structure (above formation, which is what these changes adress-at formation and below there won't be much change). The Army Area HQs will merge into the regional joint commands, probably as a sort of joint Land Component Command, so a level of command will actually be reduced.

The important thing is (or should be...) that instead of having the CF run by a welter of confusing and conflicting staff branches, operations will be run by command structures. If you know Gen Hillier, then you will know that he is about action and operations, not bureaucracy. Quiite a few noses are out of joint in Ottawa right now as people adapt to whirlwind change, but I believe that we will be better off.

We are not creating more senior people: we can't. The whole thing is being worked with who we have. The impact is being felt all across the CF at the senior level, especially at Col/Capt(N). Here at CFC, our Advanced Military Studies Course, usually populated by Cdn and International Cols/Capt(N), has exactly one Cdn Col on it: the other Cdns are all LCols/Cdrs because that is all that is available.

The churning and burning will go on for a while yet, but I for one think it is long past due (although in some ways a return to structures we have seen in the past under the old CF regions, although those were not truly effective joint operations structures, just as the unified CF never really was)

Cheers

 

[Edward Campbell]

Flash back time: one of the major reasons we did away with the old National Defence College (Kingston) in the late '80s was because the allies (Australia, New Zealand, UK, US, always â “ others often), who always sent commodore/brigadier general level officers and the Canadian civilian agencies who always sent real, honest-to-gawd senior executives told DND that they were dropping out because Canada would not, because it could not, send the required level of candidate.  NDC was reborn as the AMSC; the 'need' is the same but Canada continues to eat its general staff seed grain.

We could not 'spare' captains/colonels, much less commodores/brigadier generals, for a year because our command and control system kept growing and our 'reserve' of flag and general officers (established explicitly to accommodate professional development/education) disappeared in cut after cut after cut.  The cuts to senior officers were, essentially, politically driven â “ in response to media hoo-haws about more generals than privates.  No one was willing to stand up and explain the 'pool' because the media were not then â “ and are not now â “ interested in reporting news; reporters want to create controversy so that they get their name in a by-line â “ they are economical (at best) with the facts â “ those (the minority) who are even smart enough to recognize facts.

That being said, I rather like the idea of Canada Command and an Expeditionary Command; that is not my, personal preference - I would have preferred four full blown regional JHQs each able to deploy a major JTF HQ for domestic or foreign service but C2 system design was not my specialty.

 

[ArmyRick]

I am kind of curious where all the generals in the army went years ago when they did away with BGEN as brigade commanders? If I am not mistaken (although I don't know for sure) we did not actually reduce the number of generals in the CF at that time (around late 90s). Anybody got the answer.

I say yet again Bravo to my boss at the top end of the chain of command (Gen Hillier). The expiditionary command is another bold and needed step in transformation.

To the noses in Ottawa who get bent out of joint, please do put in your releases. Lead, Follow or get the h*ll out of the way...

 

[Marauder]

Just to clarify for me, will units and subunits or JTFs now fall under *command* of this Expeditionary Command while overseas, or will they be opcon from say thier home brigade? Or will the Operation/Mission HQ be owned by Expeditionary, and the sub-units in the JTFs opconned to the Op HQ?

To be honest, all this perpetual reorg for the sake of reorg is getting continually more confusing.

Do Brigades serve any purpose but housing admin functions for units anymore?

 

[Infanteer]

Just to clarify for me, will units and subunits or JTFs now fall under *command* of this Expeditionary Command while overseas, or will they be opcon from say thier home brigade?  Or will the Operation/Mission HQ be owned by Expeditionary, and the sub-units in the JTFs opconned to the Op HQ?

My understanding is that units/brigades will generate a Task Force that is required for a specific mission.  This task force will be given a NCE and a NSE and report to Expeditionary Command.  It seems the chain-of-command will be Coalface---Task Force---NCE---CEFCOM---CDS.

Sound about right?

To be honest, all this perpetual reorg for the sake of reorg is getting continually more confusing.

I think this really simplifies things.  As pbi stated, you get rid of multiple hands in the pie (Land Forces Command, DCDS Group, Area and Brigade, etc, etc).  These reforms are remarkably similar (and I don't doubt they are in part derived from) Douglas Bland's Chiefs of Defence - the crux of the matter is that we are replacing inefficent service based structures with more unified ones based upon funtional/territorial outlook.  This is in essence what Hellyer tried and failed to achieve in the 1960s.

It looks like General Hillier has written the Afterforward to Bland's book - now all we have to do is sort out NDHQ (another issue altogether).

Do Brigades serve any purpose but housing admin functions for units anymore?

I think Brigades are generally seen as Force Generators these days.  The realities of readiness/rotation make it hard to use them for anything else, although the CMTC should allow for Brigade-level capabilities to be preserved (we seen it with 2CMBG going there a few years ago).  It would take alot of poop to see a Brigade deployed and used as a force employer - if this did happen, I assume you would see the Regional Command (remember, there is six regional commands) send X CMBG to CEFCOM, just like the Task Force/Battlegroups we deploy today.