- Reaction score
- 0
- Points
- 160
E.R. Campbell said:
So why does tradition always seem to be discussed together with underfunding when they have no relationship? Whether it's crowns and pips on khaki or pink jumpsuits the budget is the same.
Unification is a child of the 1960s, so who is looking backward?
- Thread starter old medic
- Start date
So why does tradition always seem to be discussed together with underfunding when they have no relationship? Whether it's crowns and pips on khaki or pink jumpsuits the budget is the same.
Colin Parkinson
Army.ca Myth
- Reaction score
- 11,906
- Points
- 1,160
Ask any civilian what the Maritime command is and I bet you get lot's of interesting but wrong answers. Ask what the navy is, they will respond correctly. using names like maritime command, etc is like pisssing up hill, it requires more work and does not have the desired effect.
- Reaction score
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- 410
jollyjacktar said:
If there is one thing we have learned as Canadian soldiers it is that politicians, in the end are just politicians. Doesn't matter what stripe: we can be done in as quickly as expediency requires. Our aim has to be what it has always been: try to keep the flame alive for "next time".
Which, if history tells us anything, will definitely come.....
Cheers
- Reaction score
- 3
- Points
- 210
pbi said:
Hear Hear
- Reaction score
- 27,459
- Points
- 1,090
- Reaction score
- 10,346
- Points
- 1,260
Okay, so I've read 4 pages about how unification is a disaster and that we all seem to agree on. All we've seen for fixes is some cosmetic changes to the uniform (which E.R.C. has stated is simply that - cosmetic).
Does anyone have a solution to the disaster?
How about everyone posts their top 3 ideas on "deunification" that would make the forces more effective and operationally relevant.
Does anyone have a solution to the disaster?
How about everyone posts their top 3 ideas on "deunification" that would make the forces more effective and operationally relevant.
quadrapiper
Sr. Member
- Reaction score
- 473
- Points
- 810
Top three, in no particular order.
[list type=decimal]
[*]De-civilianize everything between the CDS and the blank-sleeved Basic candidate, and employ whatever civilians arerequired (cleaners, high-powered engineering types, whatever) as Canadian Forces employees, vice Department or Ministry of National Defence. Whatever staff the Minister might want are all good - but get them out of the chain of command.
[*]Scrap every command that doesn't currently have manned "home" units under it: so MARPAC and LANT, , the LF areas, and whatever the AF force-generation/home command(s) are. Rebuild as required. Fold reserve activities back into their respective elemental chains - is there a need for a separate NAVRESHQ, for example, or could the staff functions be accomplished by pers working within the appropriate bits of MARCOM? Come up with a simple overseas structure of operational/planning commands (Canada, which might be the place to stash "common" training functions, Combat, and "DART missions/peacekeeping/UN non-combat missions/relief/whatever," maybe?).
[*]Give, with encouragement to use it, the respective elemental heads the authority to erase/replace/fix all visual and verbal indicators of unification, including rank titles, CF-anything, uniforms, insignia, etc, and stand up a one-month working group on a stationery-and-gate-signs re-adoption of the Service names.
[/list]
[list type=decimal]
[*]De-civilianize everything between the CDS and the blank-sleeved Basic candidate, and employ whatever civilians arerequired (cleaners, high-powered engineering types, whatever) as Canadian Forces employees, vice Department or Ministry of National Defence. Whatever staff the Minister might want are all good - but get them out of the chain of command.
[*]Scrap every command that doesn't currently have manned "home" units under it: so MARPAC and LANT, , the LF areas, and whatever the AF force-generation/home command(s) are. Rebuild as required. Fold reserve activities back into their respective elemental chains - is there a need for a separate NAVRESHQ, for example, or could the staff functions be accomplished by pers working within the appropriate bits of MARCOM? Come up with a simple overseas structure of operational/planning commands (Canada, which might be the place to stash "common" training functions, Combat, and "DART missions/peacekeeping/UN non-combat missions/relief/whatever," maybe?).
[*]Give, with encouragement to use it, the respective elemental heads the authority to erase/replace/fix all visual and verbal indicators of unification, including rank titles, CF-anything, uniforms, insignia, etc, and stand up a one-month working group on a stationery-and-gate-signs re-adoption of the Service names.
[/list]
- Reaction score
- 0
- Points
- 160
Infanteer said:
I really don't want to tick everyone off BUT. And I have only one BUT. While the nature of the air force demands the specialization of many to support the few at the sharp end, the army is largely the opposite. A little more cross-training in the army providing for many troops to have a field trade and a garrison trade might more efficiently employ soldiers and cut down on some make-work. And yes I mean peeling spuds and mopping floors.
- Reaction score
- 3
- Points
- 210
Dennis Ruhl said:
Ummmm We all ready mop flours (on Course) and peel potatoes in the field. Do you mean in Garrison??? If I do that who fixes my vehicles? How do I do continuation training. How Do I retain my soldiers? Sorry Sir My troop isn't available to do anything this week because some jack ass has them cleaning the shacks this week and then they will be washing dishes next week. Oh yeah on an unrelated note half them quit and the other half have OT's in.
Really? I don't know what your back ground is but that won't work. Contrary to popular belief we don't just sit around in Garrison and make up shit to do because we are bored.
- Reaction score
- 0
- Points
- 160
You are obviously well employed in garrison.
The decline in strength of the army has almost been matched by the increase in civilian employees and contractors. I think the system would be better served were these bodies part of the system. We could also take 850 clerks and odds and sods at NDHQ be handed rifles and spend a month or two playing infantry every year. Reservists do it with full time jobs.
In the days prior to unification, regiments were pretty much self-sufficient doing their own recruiting, training, cleaning, whatever. As far as make-work goes it's all the stuff that comes down the chain that you have to read, respond and send back up the chain. It's all the stuff you did when not fixing your tank or operating it.
The decline in strength of the army has almost been matched by the increase in civilian employees and contractors. I think the system would be better served were these bodies part of the system. We could also take 850 clerks and odds and sods at NDHQ be handed rifles and spend a month or two playing infantry every year. Reservists do it with full time jobs.
In the days prior to unification, regiments were pretty much self-sufficient doing their own recruiting, training, cleaning, whatever. As far as make-work goes it's all the stuff that comes down the chain that you have to read, respond and send back up the chain. It's all the stuff you did when not fixing your tank or operating it.
- Reaction score
- 27,459
- Points
- 1,090
Dennis Ruhl said:
Self sufficient? Wow. So there were no REME officers and NCMs to do maintenance? No Pay Corps personnel to pay soldiers? No RCASC providing support?
Wow.
- Reaction score
- 35
- Points
- 560
1. Agressively de-layer HQ's. So much money and manpower is being sucked up into the various vortex's it isn't funny (and as an aside, it's odd how when the Reserve and especially Class"B" positions were cut earlier this year, the HQ's lost their clerks and other OR positions, but very few officer positions.) We already have 20th century HR tools like Peoplesoft, lets use them properly (you can pay your pers using Peoplesoft, no need for RPSR and the various teams supporting that as an example).
2. Look carefully at how we are employing civilians and ensure their employment isn't detrimental to military "culture". There are other purposes besides hygene for having the course or troops clean the shacks (teaching and enforcing attention to detail and prioritizing work comes to mind).
3. Get away from the bureaucratic mentality that drives spending decisions today. I have been asked in the past if I could spend $50,000 in a month to expend year end funds (on IT equipment). I'd much rather have taken the money and gone to the range, and early in my career the fiscal year end was celebrated with a "firefest" of ranges rather than a purchasfest of Corcan desks and chairs (most of which seem to replace perfectly serviceable Corcan bought within the last five or so years...). Working on point one will probably have this as a follow on effect.
2. Look carefully at how we are employing civilians and ensure their employment isn't detrimental to military "culture". There are other purposes besides hygene for having the course or troops clean the shacks (teaching and enforcing attention to detail and prioritizing work comes to mind).
3. Get away from the bureaucratic mentality that drives spending decisions today. I have been asked in the past if I could spend $50,000 in a month to expend year end funds (on IT equipment). I'd much rather have taken the money and gone to the range, and early in my career the fiscal year end was celebrated with a "firefest" of ranges rather than a purchasfest of Corcan desks and chairs (most of which seem to replace perfectly serviceable Corcan bought within the last five or so years...). Working on point one will probably have this as a follow on effect.
Oldgateboatdriver
Army.ca Veteran
- Reaction score
- 2,254
- Points
- 1,010
My top three would be:
1) Scrap the "Defence Team" thingy: I am sorry, but I have never, ever felt that the civil servants from the Department were on my team. On top of that, its not their job to defend Canada: its the people in uniform's job. So get all the people in uniform in Ottawa, and get them to work at a Headquarter under titles and job descriptions that are military (such as S.O. or S.S.O. strategy, plans, policy, intelligence, etc.) - and put all the civil servants in another building with the Deputy Minister and let them do civilian things (such as audits, contract management, historical records, statistics, etc.). When we had the Somalia Inquiry Show, It amazed me that not a single journalist wondered why people in uniform that appeared before the Commission were in Assistant-deputy Ministers' position. This point here also means that we have to scrap the ridiculous idea of always having to establish a correspondence in "rank", pay, benefits, etc. between the uniformed personnel and the civilians - which led to a huge bloating and inflation of higher ranking officers (particularly generals) not needed from a military point of view.
2) Scrap unified Basic: Give everyone a common set of minimal general military knowledge required of all in uniform and then let each element provide its own appropriate supplement to it and freedom to administer such basic training as they see fit. The requirements of the various elements are too diverse for a single basic as we have now: The army, where every officer is as much a soldier as the soldiers he leads, needs more stringent leadership, self-discipline and physical training which is easier to incorporate from the start at the regiment level (plus you can indoctrinate into regimental aspects right away, which makes you deployable to places like the sandbox much faster); The Air force, where officers do not lead others into combat except other pilots and the crewman are usually techs that work for the warrant officers, would probably be satisfied with the minimal requirements so that the techs get to the shop soonest with the minimal baggage needed to avoid military "faux pas" and insist more, in the officers, on training that instil probity and moral courage; Finally, the Navy, where the officers need to lead within the confinement of a ship people that have better and more thorough knowledge of their trade than the officer ever will , needs a basic course that introduces its people to the harsh environment of the sea and the personal skills relating to the close quarter living on ships from the beginning.
3) Institute a military wide "General Staff" corpus of officers, European continental style. This would be composed of officers identified early on for their strong intellectual capacities, processed through leadership positions a little faster early in their careers so they could then attend advanced military studies before reporting to headquarters where they would be the ones working on plans, strategy, long term planning and doctrine, before returning to senior field commanders headquarters to serve as their chiefs of staffs or similarly senior positions - providing these field commanders, strong in tactics and logistics, with the strategic thinking and detailed knowledge of national plans. Such a corps would provide the CDS with a corporate memory he currently lacks, which would make him much more capable, regardless of personal career history, of providing properly thought through military advice to the civil leadership (the PM).
Just my thoughts.
1) Scrap the "Defence Team" thingy: I am sorry, but I have never, ever felt that the civil servants from the Department were on my team. On top of that, its not their job to defend Canada: its the people in uniform's job. So get all the people in uniform in Ottawa, and get them to work at a Headquarter under titles and job descriptions that are military (such as S.O. or S.S.O. strategy, plans, policy, intelligence, etc.) - and put all the civil servants in another building with the Deputy Minister and let them do civilian things (such as audits, contract management, historical records, statistics, etc.). When we had the Somalia Inquiry Show, It amazed me that not a single journalist wondered why people in uniform that appeared before the Commission were in Assistant-deputy Ministers' position. This point here also means that we have to scrap the ridiculous idea of always having to establish a correspondence in "rank", pay, benefits, etc. between the uniformed personnel and the civilians - which led to a huge bloating and inflation of higher ranking officers (particularly generals) not needed from a military point of view.
2) Scrap unified Basic: Give everyone a common set of minimal general military knowledge required of all in uniform and then let each element provide its own appropriate supplement to it and freedom to administer such basic training as they see fit. The requirements of the various elements are too diverse for a single basic as we have now: The army, where every officer is as much a soldier as the soldiers he leads, needs more stringent leadership, self-discipline and physical training which is easier to incorporate from the start at the regiment level (plus you can indoctrinate into regimental aspects right away, which makes you deployable to places like the sandbox much faster); The Air force, where officers do not lead others into combat except other pilots and the crewman are usually techs that work for the warrant officers, would probably be satisfied with the minimal requirements so that the techs get to the shop soonest with the minimal baggage needed to avoid military "faux pas" and insist more, in the officers, on training that instil probity and moral courage; Finally, the Navy, where the officers need to lead within the confinement of a ship people that have better and more thorough knowledge of their trade than the officer ever will , needs a basic course that introduces its people to the harsh environment of the sea and the personal skills relating to the close quarter living on ships from the beginning.
3) Institute a military wide "General Staff" corpus of officers, European continental style. This would be composed of officers identified early on for their strong intellectual capacities, processed through leadership positions a little faster early in their careers so they could then attend advanced military studies before reporting to headquarters where they would be the ones working on plans, strategy, long term planning and doctrine, before returning to senior field commanders headquarters to serve as their chiefs of staffs or similarly senior positions - providing these field commanders, strong in tactics and logistics, with the strategic thinking and detailed knowledge of national plans. Such a corps would provide the CDS with a corporate memory he currently lacks, which would make him much more capable, regardless of personal career history, of providing properly thought through military advice to the civil leadership (the PM).
Just my thoughts.
- Reaction score
- 5,970
- Points
- 1,260
Dennis Ruhl said:
I was there in "the days prior to unification," as a soldier and as an officer. The 'self sufficiency' was pretty much confined to unit level administration - we had regimental clerks and storemen and that sort of thing but they existed at the end of professional A&Q 'tails' that extended all the way up to AHQ.
As to 'busywork,' there was a fairly substantial crew of cleaners, who worked in soldiers' barracks and offices and kitchen helpers. We did, now and again, do some 'extra' waxing and polishing in barracks - including on the brass in the urinals, but that was not a daily or, as I recall, even a weekly task. But yes, in preparation for a major event of one sort or another, I remember paining the curbs in three colours but, mainly, my days and those of my mates, were filled with training and sports and the occasional parade.
- Reaction score
- 3
- Points
- 210
Save Money in these ways
1) Buy off the shelf if it exist some where else buy don't try and build it here or "Canadianize it" by getting it to do more things than it did before.
2) If it is broken, blown up, or BLR, buy a new one IE; don't spend 10 million to rebuild a tank or plane when a new one only Cost 2 million (this happens a lot)
3) Make all personal fly in coach/cattle class if you want to up grade go ahead but it comes out of your pocket. (this should apply to all MPs as well)
:2c:
1) Buy off the shelf if it exist some where else buy don't try and build it here or "Canadianize it" by getting it to do more things than it did before.
2) If it is broken, blown up, or BLR, buy a new one IE; don't spend 10 million to rebuild a tank or plane when a new one only Cost 2 million (this happens a lot)
3) Make all personal fly in coach/cattle class if you want to up grade go ahead but it comes out of your pocket. (this should apply to all MPs as well)
:2c:
- Reaction score
- 27,459
- Points
- 1,090
(1) Move to PLQ(L) as the CF standard, and have all trades and environments mixed on the course. Institutional leaders need exposure to the rest of the institution; even when looking at Cpls we need to give them a better understanding of the big, multi-coloured machine so as they progress they have better knowledge and understandingof their peers.
(2) Remove NDHQ from the appointment to MS/MCpl. Unit COs be given the sole authority to appoint / strip Cpls/LS of their leaf.
(3) Restore Lt as a working, vice a training, rank. No promotions from 2Lt or A/SLt until an individual is occupationally qualified. And, related, erturn Capt to being a competitive rank - no more "Three years as a Lt, bottom third all along, promoted with your peers".
(2) Remove NDHQ from the appointment to MS/MCpl. Unit COs be given the sole authority to appoint / strip Cpls/LS of their leaf.
(3) Restore Lt as a working, vice a training, rank. No promotions from 2Lt or A/SLt until an individual is occupationally qualified. And, related, erturn Capt to being a competitive rank - no more "Three years as a Lt, bottom third all along, promoted with your peers".
- Reaction score
- 1,720
- Points
- 1,090
dapaterson said:
I don't disagree in principle with a "single source" PLQ, however I think that it should be a CFPLQ. Having everyone do the PLQ(L) does little to level the playing field, and only serves to give members an understanding of the big, green machine. There is little long term value in teaching sailors and air personnel infantry battle procedure they'll discard almost immediately after they graduate.
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