Top sailor defends navy's role in Arctic

[bradlupa]

Now I don't know about anybody else but, I think that the Artic should not be divided, and the Harper Government needs to make that clear.

Any thoughts?


MURRAY BREWSTER

OTTAWA — The Canadian Press, Wednesday, Jun. 24, 2009 05:14AM EDT

The Canadian navy is still the best choice to patrol Arctic seas, even though its proposed icebreakers are looking remarkably like coast guard ships, says the new chief of maritime staff.

"It's about sovereignty; it's about jurisdiction," Vice-Admiral Dean McFadden said yesterday.

Vice-Adm. McFadden recently took over the navy's top post from Vice-Adm. Drew Robertson, who retired after a 36-year naval career.

The specifications for the country's six Arctic patrol ships, one of the cornerstones of the Conservative government's northern strategy, have been redrawn to keep the program within its existing $3.1-billion construction budget.

The proposed patrol boats - to be delivered in 2014 - will be slower, have a lighter radar and carry a smaller deck gun than originally conceived - changes that have led critics to suggest Ottawa is not serious about defending the Arctic.

There are some within military circles who question why the navy is getting into the icebreaking business, a mission it ceded to the Canadian Coast Guard decades ago.

But Vice Adm. McFadden said only the military is able to meet emerging threats in waters that will soon be ice-free part of the year.

"Nobody can respond as rapidly to developing situations as we can," said Vice Adm. McFadden, who commanded Canada's task force that responded to Hurricane Katrina.

"The coast guard [employs] superb mariners, but [it's] a civilian work force governed by the Canadian labour codes. It is very difficult to retask the coast guard to missions that arise when [there] are surprises. We respond - [it] doesn't matter what the surprise is."

But to patrol the north, the military will have to get the ships built. Vice-Adm. McFadden is inheriting a mostly middle-aged fleet of warships, the backbone of which is 12 patrol frigates, which have just entered a multibillion-dollar life-extending facelift.

The fleet is struggling to keep its two replenishment ships going, field the remainder of its used British diesel electric submarines and replace its 1970s vintage command-and-control destroyers, which also act as anti-aircraft ships.
Join the Discussion:Sorted by: Oldest first

 

[GAP]

Robert Smol: Sweden's arctic army can beat up our arctic army
Posted: August 27, 2009, 10:00 AM by NP Editor
Article Link

There is much discussion these days about the need for Canada to assert its sovereignty in the Arctic. Our politicians are talking tough, announcing new arctic defence initiatives mainly in the form of capital projects. But just how strong are they from a combat capability standpoint?

By all indications this country’s present and future combat military presence in the Arctic remains largely a dog and pony show of soldiers and sailors flying the Canadian flag atop snowmobiles and submarines with the primary objective of placating the public. What these new government initiatives lack are permanent professional operational formations stationed in the arctic, trained on a full-time basis to fight in the Arctic and able to deploy on a moment’s notice, with their base of operation in the Arctic region. Our neighbours to the south have that capability, as do the Norwegians, Finns, Swedes and Russians.

One indication that our military is not taking arctic defence seriously is the fact that the nominal effort at providing new combat troops for the region is being tasked to our part-time soldiers. Last week, the Harper government announced the formation of a company (approximately 30 personnel) of part-time soldiers to train in the Yellowknife area... to be increased to 120 people by 2019! In addition the government last year announced that army  reserve units here in the south are to earmark certain personnel to attend military exercises in the north. That’s the army’s overall operational contribution to Canadian sovereignty.

In the mean time, no measure of public affairs ink at National Defence seems to be spared in portraying our Canadian Rangers, another component of Canada’s reserve force, as a major symbol of Canada’s determination to assert its dominion in the Arctic. But in their current state of readiness, the Rangers are a minimally trained group of auxiliaries that no military commander would ever employ directly in any conventional military engagement. Outfitted with Lee Enfield rifles used by the Canadian army in World War II, Canadian Rangers receive a mandatory 10 days basic military training and are required to provide their own personal equipment and snowmobiles for military duties. They are useful for search and rescue, reporting unusual activities and providing winter camping and survival skills to members of the Canadian Forces, but not for conflict.

I do not mean here to denigrate either the commitment or the potential of my former colleagues in the reserves. However in my twenty plus years in the Forces I have never seen a task assigned exclusively to reservists — either on an individual or group level — that was considered more important than anything that the regular military might have been doing at the time.

Otherwise, Canada’s permanent military presence in the vast expanse of the arctic consists of a  headquarters staff in Yellowknife, an air transport squadron of 35 personnel flying propeller driven Otter aircraft and approximately 70 communication personnel stationed at  Canadian Forces Station Alert on Ellesmere Island.
To better illustrate how well we actually measure up, let’s refrain from comparing ourselves to military powers such as the United States and Russia. Instead let’s compare our efforts at defending ourselves militarily to smaller Nordic countries like Sweden. 
More on link