Proceedings of the Standing Senate Committee on
National Security and Defence
Issue 22 - Evidence, June 2, 2005
MONTREAL, Thursday, June 2, 2005
The Standing Senate Committee on National Security and Defence met this day at 9:00 a.m. to examine and report on the national security policy for Canada.
Senator Colin Kenny (Chairman) in the chair.
[English]
The Chairman: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. I call to order this meeting of the Standing Senate Committee on National Security and Defence.
My name is Colin Kenny, and I am a senator from Ontario. I chair this committee, which is in the process of conducting a defence review.
Briefly, I will introduce the members of the committee. On my far left is Senator Nolin from Quebec. Beside him is Senator Munson from Ontario. On my right is Senator Meighen from Ontario, and beside him is Senator Atkins, also from Ontario.
Before us today, we have two witnesses: Mr. Paul Taillon, Director, Review and Military Liaison, Office of the Communications Security Establishment Commissioner, formerly with the Canadian Security Intelligence Service. Mr. Taillon has written extensively in the area of terrorism, low-intensity operations and special operations. Mr. Taillon is a Canadian Army Reserve Lieutenant Colonel who has served with the British and American special operations forces. He is a graduate of the United States Marine Corps Amphibious Warfare School and the USMC Command and Staff College. Currently, he is a student at the U.S. Army War College, class of 2006, and directing staff at the Canadian Forces College. Mr. Taillon is an adjunct professor at the Royal Military College of Canada and is an Associate Senior Fellow at the Joint Special Operations University, JSOU, at Hurlburt Field, Florida, USA.
Appearing with him is Mr. Rémi Landry, who is a Research Fellow, International Security Study and Research Group, at the Université du Quebec à Montréal. Mr. Landry retired from the Canadian Forces in November 2002 with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel after 34 years of continuous military service. He began his career with the Royal 22nd Regiment in 1973 and occupied various posts as a junior and then a senior officer with motorized and mechanized infantry battalions and the Canadian Airborne Regiment. In 1993, he was seconded to the European Union as a member of a standing committee on reconciliation, which was part of the EU monitoring mission in the former Yugoslavia. From 1997 to 2000 he worked as Deputy Director, Project on Policy Advocacy and Facilitation in Haiti.
Since retirement, Mr. Landry has been active as a military analyst and research associate with a research group on international security. He is currently writing his doctoral thesis at the Department of Political Science, Université de Montréal.
Welcome, gentlemen. Mr. Taillon, please proceed.
Paul Taillon, Director, Review and Military Liaison, Office of the Communications Security Establishment Commissioner: On April 1, 2005, the Canadian Special Operations Forces, or CANSOF, celebrated its thirteenth year of service in the Canadian Forces. The past years have been ones of great challenge and change, with a developing national and international reputation for professionalism, which was recently proven in joint and coalition SOF operations in Afghanistan. This has also been a period of garnering military and political support. In one decade, CANSOF has gone from an organization that drew heavily from the Canadian Airborne Regiment to one comprising a broad spectrum of service volunteers, including reservists. CANSOF has performed duties in a number of countries, including Bosnia, Rwanda, Afghanistan and Haiti. Moreover, CANSOF operations run the gamut from protective duties for Canadian VIPs, acting as Joint Commission Observers in Bosnia and training Haitian police personnel, to surveillance and direct action operations in Afghanistan.
In the wake of the New York and Washington attacks on September 11, 2001, the Canadian government reportedly increased CANSOF's budget by some $119 million as an integral part of Canada's participation in the global war on terrorism, or GWOT. The government's intent was to double the size of this unit to a reported goal of 600 personnel. This is a most difficult challenge considering not only the size of the regular Canadian Forces but also the demanding selection requirements for those individuals who aspire to become SOF operators.
A Special Forces operator needs very specific attributes. He or she must be highly motivated with a keen intellect, be physically fit and psychologically stable, resourceful and self-reliant. Moreover, an SOF operator must be able to operate alone or in a small team and possess an unflappable personality — a courage that Ernest Hemingway once described as ``grace under pressure.'' In addition, tact and persuasive skills are also critically important for those involved in advising and training foreign militaries. Those not sensitive to the socio-cultural milieu in which they are operating will hold little local influence over foreign officers and their NCOs, many of whom have had more practical experience. As one Special Air Service, or SAS, operator noted: ``You may advise the wily Afghan on how to orchestrate a better ambush, but never say they do not have the experience in conducting ambushes. Any short military history on the Soviet operational experience between 1979 and 1989 will quickly persuade you otherwise.''
SOF operations, by nature, are low-visibility operations, using speed, surprise, audacity and perception to minimize the associated risks and to maximize the results. The employment of these tactics, techniques and procedures, better known as TTPs, enables SOF forces to accomplish missions that n many cases conventional military forces could likely accomplish, albeit with greater difficulty. Hence they are a ``force of choice.'' In some of our allied forces, the United States and Great Britain in particular, many of their SOF operators have been, or are, geographically oriented, and are therefore well attuned to and capable of communicating in the languages of the region. This capability enables our SOFS allies to acclimatize rapidly in exotic locales and undertake their missions from a standing start. Thus, our allied forces can easily employ their personnel to conduct foreign internal defence operations, mobile training teams or act as advisors, not only to assist friends and allies but also to leverage their assistance to further the foreign policy agenda of the respective governments. For the SOF personnel involved in these initiatives, such training programs improve their spectrum of competencies and develop personal contacts that could have importance in the future.
Considering that special forces and intelligence will be at the forefront of the GWOT, CANSOF is one of the two strategic military assets that the Canadian government has available. In this regard, CANSOF has the capability of influencing Canada's international security agenda. The future employment of CANSOF as a training asset to friendly nations could ensure high quality training while extending Canadian foreign policy interests and influence abroad. Canadian participation in foreign internal defence and military assistance programs in conjunction with our allies could enhance our international stature while providing a viable and attractive option for nations that may not seek assistance from our British or American cousins. Such duties, although well in the range of our Canadian light infantry capabilities with appropriate tweaking, could be viewed at the same time as degrading their conventional force capabilities.
In order to address this possible future requirement, CANSOF will have to incorporate language abilities other than the two official languages of Canada into their skill sets: Arabic, Spanish, Chinese and Afghan dialects are some of the languages that will likely remain necessary in the foreseeable future. In addition, French is a great asset in dealing with the African francophone nations and with Haiti, who may solicit military assistance in the future.
One way of resolving the issues of language and cultural sensitivity would be to talent-spot and directly recruit second-generation Canadians of various ethnic groups into the CF with the aim of selecting and assigning them for CANSOF training. The selecting of second-generation foreign-language speakers who are Canadians would be similar to the Swedish model of employing for security reasons only second-generation Swedish translators with their forces abroad. A similar initiative would provide CANSOF selection with candidates who are not only Canadian but also who were born and raised in a multiethnic nation, retaining the vital skillsets of cultural sensitivity and insight, in addition to having a critical language capability. Moreover, in the wake of selection and training, Canadian ethnic operators, or CEOs, could be allowed the opportunity to travel to their family homelands to see, firsthand, their potential area of operation and to evaluate the necessary requirements should they have to undertake overt or covert operations in these areas. Native speakers selected and trained as CANSOF operators would be highly valuable additions to our capability spectrum.
The intent of this CANSOF introduction is to underline one of the many issues that will likely affect the evolution of the Canadian Special Operations Forces. It must be kept in mind that Canada does not have the 60-plus years of our Commonwealth and American allies. Moreover, we are a conventional force steeped in a conventional mind-set. However, it is vital that we learn from our past and the past of others and that we aggressively pursue the skills that our allies have within their respective SOF communities in order to develop and expand our own capabilities for future SOF operations and within coalitions.
The Canadian SOF community should look at doing the following: develop a CANSOF force structure to include specialized tasks, skills and training that could be encompassed for a reserve CANSOF squadron; develop a CANSOF linguistic and cultural skill set; encourage unorthodox approaches and unconventional techniques; develop flexible thinking and innovation in addressing unconventional security threats; invest in academic expertise, science and technology; use academics and technologists as force multipliers; promote a CANSOF capability for rapid deployment and regional adaptability; and develop a regional orientation for CANSOF.
There are four simple yet self-evident truths learned from extensive operational experience that have been coined by our southern cousins. They are the fundamental and underlying aspects of the issues discussed in this paper and apply to all SOF forces. They are: Humans are more important than hardware; quality is more important than quantity; special operations forces cannot be mass-produced; and competent SOF cannot be created quickly after emergencies.
The Chairman: Mr. Landry, please proceed.
[Translation]
Lieutenant-Colonel (retired) Rémi Landry, International Security Study and Research Group, Université de Montréal: Mr. Chairman, thank you for your invitation. I am honored to find myself here among so many illustrious Canadians, who are concerned about the security of our country and more specifically, the health of our armed forces. I have shared that passion for the past 37 years.
I gave you a copy of my presentation, which I consider to be strictly a working document. I will try to cover it as best I can, because I have more than six minutes worth of material. Given that you have already covered my introduction, I will go straight to the heart of the matter.
My presentation is intended as a reflection on several years of community experience. As a researcher, I will bring a much more structural dimension to a point as specific as the one my colleague just presented.
Unlike several of my colleagues and former colleagues, I do not intend to comment on departmental funding, the need for a better defense policy or even Canada's recent international policy statement and the section on defense and how it will be applied. My presentation is quite different. It seeks to put in perspective a structural dimension that is often left to the military and that in my opinion, should undergo a full review if we wish to make the most of the resources provided and moreover guarantee the efficiency of their use.
In that regard, the comments of the chief of staff are reassuring and promising, including what he said about the current structure of the Canadian Forces when he met with members of the Standing Committee of the House of Commons on National Defense and Veterans Affairs on May 19, 2005.
[English]
The second thing that has become a very real focus for us in the transformation of the Canadian Forces is a Canadian Forces focus. As senators are aware, the Canadian Forces went through integration and unification in the late 1960s and early 1970s. However, in my view, we have continued to maintain a Canadian army, navy and air force mentality, attitude and structure and not the Canadian Forces attitude, culture and structure that would allow us to conduct operations and to do what we have to do on behalf of the people of Canada.
[Translation]
Keep in mind that the very structure of NDHQ and its operation are for all practical purposes the same as at reunification in 1968 and what followed in the early 1970s. Cohabitation does not come without costs! Although some effort was made to reduce the size of NDHQ, what about the increasing number of assistant deputy ministers and their assistants. In 1976, we had the equivalent of nine assistance deputy ministers, six of whom were members of the forces. Now, according to the Department of National Defense website, we have 15 of them, six of whom are members of the forces. And what about the growing interference by senior officials in these positions? Although some changes have been made since 1997, the Dimoff Report clearly illustrates the difficulties flowing from the integration of the Department of National Defense and the Canadian Forces Headquarters at the time, which some feel was never completed nor revised since its conception.
I would just like to comment on or mention a situation from the Dimoff Report that provides a very good illustration of my thinking and reflects the current state of the structure within the Canadian Forces.
[English]
The majority agree that many of the problems within DND and the Canadian Forces are interrelated and are the wrong outcomes of two organizational decisions: First, to unify the Canadian Forces in the late 1960s, which amalgamated the three elemental services into one; and second, to amalgamate the military Canadian Forces Headquarters and the Civilian National Defence Headquarters, which was the result of a defence management review in 1972. Civilianization is a consequence of these amalgamations and has affected organization, command and management structures. The present structure and procedures of DND do not provide adequate levels of accountability from either the military or civilian perspectives.
The intent of this present configuration at DND was to provide Canadians with the best of military tasks and public service ethics. It has been concluded that Canadians have received neither, and that both have been damaged. In terms of the command and management of the Canadian Forces, some have suggested that, in the current structure of NDHQ, it is difficult to determine where the jurisdiction of DND ends and where the CF begins. Moreover, it is difficult to articulate the role of the Deputy Minister, the Assistant Deputy Minister and the Chief of Defence Staff with clarity. Some have stated that the military has not been civilianized but that the DM's role has been militarized. It was commanded that DND and the CF should be reorganized so that all aspects of accountability and operational responsibility of the military and civilians are clearly and transparently defined.
Furthermore, there is a consensus that the government should consider the desirability of splitting the issue into a civilian and military department. The civilian department would be responsible for the strategy and policy formulation and function and the DM would be served by a staff sufficient to fulfill his or her responsibility and provide sound, credible policy direction and insight into the Armed Forces. The CDS, as head of the military component, should be able to provide, unfettered by the DM, military advice to the Minister of Defence, cabinet and the Prime Minister. He or she should be responsible only for the implementation of policy, not for its formulation and not for the day-to-day administration of the department. Some suggested that the military adopt the pre-1968 system of CFHQ, with the chair of defence staff and three service chiefs. Many were not sure that the separation of NDHQ and CFHQ was the answer. However, all agreed that structure and organization need to be reviewed.
[Translation]
Unified Canadian Forces? Headquarters may be, but the Canadian Forces are not. It follows that the nature of the various commands, naval, air and land forces, creates an adversarial dynamic where there is competition for resources rather than the pursuit of a policy that seeks to use the available resources in the way that best accomplishes the objectives of the government of Canada. In my opinion, having the Canadian Forces unified under one command would unencumbered the decision making process, despite the shock that this change would create within the current military structure. This unification would facilitate the adoption of a common doctrine that would provide for an integrated equipment and armament systems acquisition process and would lead toward achieving a common vision, thereby avoiding the dynamic of current disputes resulting from the separation of the three branches.
In addition, savings are to be expected in terms of staff and probably infrastructure of the multiple headquarters that would be integrated. And what about the institutional advantages of, among other things, having the three branches of the Canadian Forces operate within the same operational framework toward the fulfillment of common goals.
This unified forces proposal originates in an institutional reality that has already stood the test of time. The U.S. Marines, with about 172,000 men and women, has a unified command structure that could be adapted to Canadian needs. And I do say could be adapted. I do not advocate copying the U.S. Marines' structure, just the concept. It is a unified structure despite the doctrinal specialization. The US Marines are an expeditionary force for air, land and naval operations. It is currently the only division with this capacity in the US Forces. That would in no way hinder the employment of our forces.
We currently have 62,000 men and women, of whom almost 6,000 are in training for all types of conflict in the spectrum of armed conflicts, and if necessary, that could constitute the basis for a return to the three branches should the situation call for that. Among other things, our recent borrowing from the doctrine of the three blocks to describe the environment within which our soldiers have to operate, by our current chief of staff, was borrowed from the Americans. The future of our forces apparently has a lot in common with how the Americans use their Marines.
I would like to conclude my presentation by adding three other factors that support the need for further thought on the need to unify the Canadian Forces in the current domestic and international context. The first factor has to do with the military culture that needs to be revisited. Typically, according to military culture, you must always be prepared for the worst possible scenario — at least, that is what I was taught throughout my career — and that is also the answer people gave me so that I would not be too radical with my proposals for change.
Personally, in a theoretical context, that is certainly the attitude to take, but here, this type of attitude requires such a high level of resources that it becomes completely inappropriate. After all, what is the worst possible scenario in terms of domestic and international security? A terrorist attack with nuclear, biological, or chemical weapons or a global armed conflict? What else? So it quickly becomes irresponsible to prepare for the worst possible situation when you do not have the means and no one agrees on the definition, especially because the risk of that happening under the current circumstances is extremely unlikely. Why would we attempt to maintain, at great cost and inappropriately, a military structure that would only be fully effective in a major conflict or catastrophe, and that would require us to control a staff of several hundreds of thousands of men and women? Imagine such a structure with the approximate staff and resources required to effectively implement it, and it would also have to deal with daily situations requiring a much more simplified decision-making process. Imagine how heavy that system would be, whereas the present climate calls for a much more agile structure and above all requires a higher ratio of operators. That is my argument with respect to the current structure of the Canadian Forces.
I also share the views of a number of military and industrial strategists who maintain that preparing for the most likely scenarios makes the best use of your limited resources, though not without some risk. To minimize the consequences, you must therefore incorporate risk assessment into your structures and equip yourself with the tools you need to guarantee a better assessment of the most significant threat.
In conclusion, on this point, isn't what the government already does when it applies one policy instead of another? In so doing, it responds to the most likely situation with the resources available and regularly reassesses its position. That is what any good general has to do on the battlefield: assess the most likely situation and prepare to deal with it with the resources available and continue assessing the situation so as to be able to make regular adjustments.
Why should the Canadian Forces have a structure enabling them to manage forces of several hundreds of thousands of troops? Is this realistic and, what's more, do we have the means whereby to achieve this? If the last 20 years are any indication of what the next 20 years will be like, and the forces total between 65,000 and 100,000 troops, let us develop a structure enabling us to optimize these resources. I can comment further and provide you with relevant examples on these issues if need be.
The second matter which I would like to briefly raise has already been clearly demonstrated by several scientific studies confirming the need for an appropriate structure in order to adjust to the current Revolution in Military Affairs. There is a lot of talk about Revolutions in Military Affairs, for which the acronym RMA is used. Studies on the RMA have already demonstrated that the structure of the US Marines is such that it possesses the institutional characteristics best suited to integrating the new generation of technologies and that it is the best prepared to maximize the advantages which scientists most readily associate with the information revolution.
I could, if need be, put my finger on several studies which demonstrate that the unique and integrated structure of the US Marines' command is currently the most appropriate, as far as armed forces are concerned, to be able to fully integrate what people call ``the new Revolution in Military Affairs''.
My last example, which backs up the need to reassess the current structure, comes from the Auditor General's last report, which clearly outlines the huge resource coordination needs that the Canadian Forces are unable to meet in order to keep pace with ever-changing technology and interoperability needs. Indeed, we eventually need to guarantee the interoperability of all our command systems — control, communications, computer systems, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance — commonly called, according to the English acronym, C4ISR.
I am going to quote a paragraph from the Auditor General, Ms. Fraser's, report, which states:
Including over 90 projects, the C4ISR initiative implemented by National Defence in support of command and control is complex and costly. According to our audit, the department must ensure better coordination and seek to apply a common approach in developing the required systems. National Defence estimates that by 2015 it will have invested almost $10 billion on projects to improve the way it gathers, processes, and uses military information. This is needed to provide commanders with better information for decision-making in order to exercise faster and more effective command and control in both joint and combined operations.
The design problem comes from the current structure which encourages the various commands — the design problem stems from the need to have so many coordination committees between various sections and groups. This is due to the fact that commands are mandated to continually look for ways of being better prepared in the context of their given environment and in partnership with the other military forces. It is often only after a situation has been recognized as requiring total interoperability that the decision is made to standardize operating protocols and equipment. This is the job that coordination committees carry out between the various stakeholders. The coordination committees then report to senior committees which have decision-making authority. These senior committees must also report to their chain of command before making the appropriate decisions. The chain of command must also assess and adopt proposals before any decisions are made by the armed forces. A unified structure would stop such a reactive process, thereby limiting the number of committees and, notably, speeding up the decision-making process.
I would like to conclude on that matter by reminding you that regardless of what the defence policy may be, regardless of the equipment and platforms we want to give to the Canadian Forces, if the structure is not appropriate, we will not be able to optimize our resources nor will we be able to make sure that the Canadian Forces are using public funds efficiently.
Senator Nolin: Good morning, I would like to thank both of you for having accepted our invitation to appear before the committee. LCol. Landry, I will start with you. I took a quick look at your brief and noted that you have already covered several of the questions that we were going to ask you. So, we will go ahead and ask a few questions that we had not planned to ask.
We visited Norfolk. You know that NATO has changed its Norfolk command and that it is now a strategic command which carries out conversion. Are you familiar with what is done there?
LCol. Landry: Yes, I visited NATO 18 months ago.
Senator Nolin: The Danish asked the Norfolk strategic command to review the conversion plans to see if their conversion or their conversion structure were what the Norfolk strategic command had envisioned. That really interested me. I liked the fact that the Danish were doing this. Do you think that we, as Canadians, should follow suit and submit our conversion plans to a command like Norfolk?
LCol. Landry: The simple answer is yes. But to be able to do so, one already needs to have plans.
Senator Nolin: That was my second question.
LCol. Landry: I have a great deal of respect for the Canadian Armed Forces' structure and I am no way here to criticize it. From 1995 to 1997, I was involved in the conversion you spoke about. I did this for the whole Quebec region. I was what you call in military jargon the G3 redesign. The problem that we encountered is that within various commands, renewal comes from the bottom up. And this renewal, once it reaches the top, creates problems. We realize that as a result, that we should eventually standardize this change. Currently, we have at least three other commands which, given the nature of the beast that they have to command, require conversion. However, this conversion is occurring in stove pipes — that is, each part of it starts in a silo — whereas what I am suggesting or what I want to be capable of measuring, is the change that comes from the top down, so that we have a vision which will standardize these changes and, notably, integrate the three commands. We currently do not have the resources to enable our Navy to train more often with the Americans anymore than it trains with our own Canadian Forces, including land and air commands. The same is true with the Air Force, we should be able to have a structure which unifies us despite our limited resources. If that were done, we would eventually be able to develop a vision and be involved in that sort of thing. We have an army comprising 62,000 people, and a Maritime Command with a three-star commanding barely 9,000 people. Furthermore, given that our commands are troop generators, commanding officers do not command in operation. We generate troops for the DCDS, which is responsible for operations. So, these three sections provide troops which are used by another three star and this other three star has different needs from the three commands.
In the late nineties, the DCDS decided to establish a joint operational headquarters, because it became apparent that there were so many different ways of operating among the various sections that there needed to be an overall harmonization. Over time, needs were generated where there would normally be none had integration already occurred. Have you already asked yourselves, just to give you another example to support what I am saying, what the Quebec sector's operational command needs are? Yesterday, you met General Côté. You have been made aware of the hoops that he has to jump through to keep the Saint-Jean base which, in 90 per cent of cases, answers to the Associate Deputy Minister's orders as far as personnel management is concerned. Our national schools are in Saint-Jean, but they are managed and administered by foundations which are linked first and foremost to the army and thereafter to the Quebec sector. Imagine the amount of resources that have to be allocated to coordinate such needs. The same is true of Longue-Pointe. In Longue-Pointe, there is the Dépôt, which is primarily one of the Associate Deputy Minister's (equipment) resources. So, the Quebec sector has its funds, but they are subject to regular discussions with the command to ensure that there are coordinated and concerted effort. We are spending an inordinate amount of time and using an incredible amount of resources to find out what others do and how they do what they do in order to harmonize our policies. If we had a more unified structure, this would be a whole lot easier. As you know, there is not just one Chief of Defence Staff. There is a Marine Commander who commands the Navy, a Army Commander who commands the Armed Forces, and an Air Commander who commands the Air Force, and also a DCDS who commands both national and international operational troops.
[English]
The Chairman: I am just concerned. It is very interesting testimony.
LCol. Landry: Am I speaking too fast?
The Chairman: A little bit, but also we are getting answers that are a bit too long. We will receive all sorts of documentation afterwards, if you want to give us examples, but we cannot have such a long —
LCol. Landry: I am very sorry. As you can see, I am passionate about this subject still.
[Translation]
Senator Nolin: We have nothing against that, but if you have any further documents which you feel would be useful to our study, please do not hesitate to send them along to us, and the same thing goes for you, Mr. Taillon. Please do not limit us to this conversation, which will unfortunately only last for an hour and a half.
You have read the recently published new policy, which was made public by the Prime Minister, as he wrote the preface; you are obviously not satisfied by the content of the document.
LCol. Landry: Good news for the Forces is always good news.
Senator Nolin: You will take any good news, even if it is extremely rare.
LCol. Landry: The only problem is that I believe the government was not in a position to listen to the recommendations made by this illustrious committee. Amongst other things, it addresses the fact that currently, given our tax system, the Canadian Forces need $1 billion to maintain their current activities. I was expecting the Forces to receive that amount this year, not to do new things with, but simply to be able to meet their needs.
Senator Nolin: I do not want to confuse two different things: funding, the budget took care of. We have major concerns regarding the financing of operations; we have said so, and we will write it down again, but on the issue of long-term policies, on the operational structure of the Canadian Forces, the document we were presented with — and I understand that it cannot cover the scope of all the details we would like to see included in it, and time will tell if the restructuring was adequate — but with the information we have before us, that is the question I am putting to you. It appears to us that there is a better streamlining of Canadian Forces operations. I will have questions for Mr. Taillon concerning special forces operations. But according to your reading of the situation, is this a step in the right direction?
LCol. Landry: Yes, but I continue to believe that what the Chief of Defence Staff wants to do when he refers, amongst other things, to the integration of regional commands — I attended a presentation that he gave the same day, amongst others in Ottawa, where I was sitting with generals like General Belisle and others who received the Chief of Defence Staff's comments favourably, but unofficially said: we are coming full circle, because we have already witnessed what is being proposed, these integrated headquarters and that is not where the problem lies. The problem will continue to require a high level of coordination between the various components. From what I recall of the Chief of Defence Staff's initial comments, I believed we were headed towards a much greater level of integration. And to aim only for the integration of operational headquarters will continue to necessitate enormous resources for the coordination, because the resources still belong to the command; it is as if we are setting up a parallel structure.
Senator Nolin: At the end of the day, what you are asking of the government means, more or less in the long term, the elimination of a series of positions at the top of the pyramid that ultimately are of no use to the effectiveness of the structure. If that is the major problem, you will understand that there are not many politicians, especially in the Ottawa region, who would willingly venture into a policy targeting the streamlining of operations at the top.
LCol. Landry: What I am saying, quite simply, is that we currently have a command structure that, in my opinion, could easily command armed forces of several hundred thousand men.
Senator Nolin: I understood that.
LCol. Landry: The analogy which best represents my way of thinking is if you have a formula 1 maintenance team to service your Volkswagen; something somewhere is not working, and it will cost you so much to maintain your car that you can afford the gas anymore.
Senator Nolin: So, your answer to my question is basically yes.
LCol. Landry: That is what I am saying. However, at it now stands, is not normal that out of a total of 62 000 troops, only about 24 000 can be deployed. We keep on deploying those same 20 000 men.
Senator Nolin: Can you really only deploy 20 000 men?
LCol. Landry: It is the most we can currently deploy.
Senator Nolin: Mr. Chairman, I had the impression that it was less than that.
LCol. Landry: I say 20 000 men, but there is something you have to understand: We do not only send people from operations on mission; many of those come from headquarters as well. So what happens is that to ease the burden at various headquarters, officers are sent out on mission, and often the work they used to do is carried out by someone else. It is as if we did not have the resources to maintain the structure, but the structure is always supposed to work at maximum capacity. Since they do not have all the resources they need, these people therefore spend their time in committee, with the deputy minister where they study and develop projects, and this is what slows down the decision- making process.
Senator Nolin: I only have one question. I will let my colleagues ask questions of Mr. Taillon, but since he is currently working on his doctorate, I cannot put the question to him, because you are in the process of studying issues related to sovereignty and international intervention. We are greatly concerned with this policy, we all have Kosovo in mind and the fact that NATO was in Kosovo without receiving a mandate from the United Nations, and that increasingly our citizens are demanding that we do not get caught up in international technicalities — our new colleague Mr. Dallaire would surely have something to say about that — but rather that we intervene to protect societies which are at the mercy of tyrants, of individuals who do not care for the human rights of their citizens.
But there is always the issue of sovereignty which ultimately becomes an almost insurmountable obstacle. How can we protect civil societies, which is something we want to do, while respecting the concept of sovereignty? That is what you are now working on.
LCol. Landry: Yes. The answer might be very long, so if you wish, I could write it out for you, since I already have a couple of 100 pages on the subject. I carefully read the study the Canadian government produced when it was a member of the Security Council on interventions. The Security Council currently has the mandate to intervene and ignore jurisdiction sovereignty. The mandate of the UN Security Council includes the responsibility — and it is the only one which has this responsibility — to decide that the domestic situation of a country is degenerating or becoming a problem. There are already rules in place concerning situations of genocide. As soon a situation is declared genocide, the Security Council needs no other reason to justify intervention. What I am saying is that we already have a mechanism in place to take action. Take East Timor, for example. It is interesting to know that in the case of East Timor, it was not necessarily the super powers which directly intervened to eventually resolve the situation. Middle powers built a coalition and indirectly forced the Security Council to intervene.
In east Timor, Australia orchestrated this. At present, in Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo DRC, we can see that they are no small powers in the position to intervene. I can say that, if Canada were to assume its leadership role as it should, we have a concept which we adhered to since 1997 — it is known as the Sheer Brigade, you might have heard of it. This is the Special Eye Readiness Brigade, to which Canada contributes. At present, the brigade is led by a Canadian based in Denmark.
The brigade already has rapid intervention capability. Canada does not always have that rapid intervention capability, but with the brigade we have set up a coalition of persons or countries that have the same interest in rapid intervention. The brigade has done its reconnaissance for Sudan, and can intervene very quickly for Canada in these situations. But what we need is leadership, a country that is in a position to push when major powers do not see the action to be in their interest. When I say major powers, I mean the permanent members of the Security Council. It takes a Coalition of the willing to assume responsibility and put pressure on the Security Council and eventually oblige the Council to take action and assume its responsibilities.
Senator Nolin: I would invite you to write to us. I understand that your thesis will not be fully developed, but please write to us. This is an issue that has been raised by many Canadians we have met during our hearings.
LCol. Landry: Some people try to codify the exact moment when one should intervene. In my view, in a real situation, we will never have the critical mass of people who can accept that with the current concept of sovereignty within the United Nations.
Senator Nolin: When the North Atlantic Council decided to intervene in Kosovo, the next day the Security Council agreed with the action taken, as if by coincidence.
[English]
The Chairman: Thank you, Senator Nolin. LCol. Landry, we will have our staff contact you and follow up in that way. I think that is a better format through which to collect the information than here.
Senator Atkins: My question is to Mr. Taillon. What place do you see for the special forces in the new Canadian defence policy?
Mr. Taillon: When you look at the situation from a strategic point of view, Canada has two leverages on the strategic side: One is our submarines and the other is our special forces. From a coalition standpoint, they provide a certain degree of comfort to our allies because they are considered tier one, particularly in Afghanistan, where they conducted themselves with great gallantry and efficiency.
From our point of view, the next evolution — and I think particularly of special operations and expanding tasks that they are receiving in the global war on terrorism — is national security issues relating to our allies in conducting foreign internal defence, or mobile training teams, for example, or possibly in dealing with unconventional warfare threats.
I see also issues relating to foreign internal defence where we can leverage those capabilities along with our allies. Right now, our special operations are in a nascent stage — perhaps I should not say ``nascent'' because it has evolved very rapidly, literally in less than two decades, while our closest allies have had 60 years in dealing with this. Fortunately, we have some extremely fine people and people with vision who provide that capability. I think that cascades not only upwards but also downwards to provide not only the Government of Canada with a number of options — and that is what we all look for strategically — but also to provide some incredible ground troops, as we saw in Bosnia when we deployed our people as JCOs. At a strategic, operational and tactical level, it provides options, which are extremely important, and also provides us our five cents in coalitional special operations.
Senator Atkins: Does it call for an entirely new approach to training and operational concepts?
Mr. Taillon: It may. I would argue that our forces are already evolving toward that state. Recently, General Hillier has said, basically, that we will be selecting a unit of light infantry — I use in my paper a special operations direct support unit, very similar to the American Rangers. Our light infantry, if I may be so bold, is extremely fine. They are well-trained and are already close to what I would consider second tier - in some cases, special operators. If we can only maintain that level, we will be well off in that regard.
Senator Atkins: That leads to this question: Are you optimistic with the new defence policy paper? The second part of that question is what was your reaction to the budget?
Mr. Taillon: I would like to see the money now, sorry.
Senator Nolin: Do not be sorry. We are used to that.
Mr. Taillon: That is critical. The vision is good. I must admit that what General Hillier, as a CDS, is doing is a bold move. He has his supporters and detractors. From a Canadian point of view, that sort of vision may be too provocative for some elements and perhaps not provocative enough for others.
Senator Atkins: In the organization structure, do you think he can achieve his goal?
Mr. Taillon: I would hope so. It is a move that is bold and daring. From my point of view, I think Canada needs some bold and daring moves in this regard.
Senator Munson: Do you think the air force and navy are getting short-changed?
Mr. Taillon: I had an opportunity to give a lecture — actually, I was invited to be a dinner guest at two navy messes, and I gave an army view because I studied naval history at King's from an army point of view. A number of years ago, when I was a student and then as an instructor at the Marine Corp Command and Staff College, I thought, quite frankly, that what we were missing were LPHAs — basically a command ship able to carry VISTOL aircraft like the Harrier — maybe 8 of them, maybe 14 helicopters. We put a light infantry battalion-plus on it. You have a command capability, you have a power projection capability, you have a little bit of air assets to deal with certain issues of a limited area, and it would have jelled rather nicely with the Americans, British and, indeed, the French. We could be used as a second-tier, amphibious operation force.
I would suggest to my navy colleagues that they may have to lose some of their destroyers, which are both command and control platforms, and maybe a couple of frigates, but then we would have two or three of these ships to actually project power and influence and also assist in our coalition activities.
The Chairman: You still do not have a refuelling capability there, though. That is the problem. You have a Swiss army knife if you try and put them all together.
Mr. Taillon: That is true, sir, but we do have refuellers.
The Chairman: Not anymore.
Mr. Taillon: We would have to deal with some of those issues, I agree. That would be one of the options that we should seriously take a look at.
Senator Atkins: When we were in Washington, we were briefed by a marine colonel. It sounds like your concept is coming close to what they are suggesting.
Mr. Taillon: Unlike my colleague here, I am a bit pro-marine on a number of issues. For leveraging Canadian foreign policy at the strategic level, being a power projector for a middle power, that would be one concept we may want to look at seriously.
I may be unpopular with the air force because they may have to lose a few F18s to purchase VISTOL aircraft and train people and put them on board ship for a while. The navy may not like losing their destroyers but they will get a command and control ship. From the army point of view, they may not like going to sea for four months at a time, but those are some of the issues we are facing in the world right now.
I foresee, in the next five or 10 years, Africa being one area in which we may be finding ourselves. We require that line of communication, but to have a capability of self-sustaining a light infantry battalion in a semi-hostile environment with helicopter capability, resupply of some degree, to project our power for peacekeeping or peacemaking operations or coalitional operations, that would be a very valuable asset, sir.
Senator Atkins: The second part of my question is the funding.
Mr. Taillon: Funding.
Senator Nolin: Details.
Senator Atkins: Were you encouraged by the budget?
Mr. Taillon: I was encouraged in part by the budget, sir. The military needs the money now. I think Mr. Landry would agree with me. For years and years, we have been pushing this back —
Senator Atkins: I do not mean to interrupt, but our committee keeps hearing that if they had the money, they would not know how to spend it.
Mr. Taillon: Our purchasing aspect would have to change, but I do think we have the people there who have the vision and would know how to spend it.
LCol. Landry: May I give you an example of the effect that the shortage of money has right now on the land forces? Then I could eventually, given some time, give you some examples on the naval and air force.
Right now, because of shortage of money, the land forces have decided to go on a three-year cycle for training. When I was in the forces, that three-year cycle was an every-year cycle. The impact that this cycle will have on the chain of command is that right now command appointments are two years. Guess what will happen to the guy who is unlucky not to be able to command his troops during an operation or training exercise? To me, if we had this money, that thing could be changed right away. People have to be very careful when the government or the forces say that we will not know what to do with this amount of money, period. There are definitely places where this money is needed now.
Senator Atkins: I am telling you what we hear. I can tell you this committee could spend the money very quickly.
Assuming there is no definition now of worst-case scenario, what do you see as the role or missions that should be assigned to Canadian Forces? Either one of you could answer that question.
LCol. Landry: This business of worse-case scenario is a Utopia. It does not exist. In my view, it is a way to eventually face the reality, and that means taking risks. Operators are trained to take risks. Within the Canadian Forces, there is an element of intelligence with which we make analyses. We can project a few years ahead what the most likely scenarios will be. It is quite obvious why someone who experienced our efforts in the 1990s would say that we could not face a third world war but that we would eventually deal with the kinds of things to which we have the capability of reacting quickly. Yet we have not been able to do anything. Now, General Hillier is deemed to be the one with the vision. Others had that vision in the early 1990s but the structure did not allow us to proceed with it.
Contrary to what the country should be doing, Canadians decided in the late 1940s that our safety would be through an alliance. Since then, that is exactly what we have been doing. We always assume that if we are part of an alliance and do our share, that alliance will protect us. Guess what? The threat is no longer coming from the former Soviet Union but from all over the world. We realize now that we have so much invested in our allies that we no longer have the resources to deal with our problem.
If people had begun in the mid-1990s to ask what Canada needs for security, as the Australians have been doing for Australia, then we could have built this over time. Perhaps today we would now be in the position that they are in currently, whereby they can eventually export their power and eventually lend influence, which Canada cannot do.
Senator Atkins: If the Government of Canada were to ask the CDS what missions it could fulfill if the government were to make a commitment, what would the response be?
Mr. Taillon: I would be too bold to speak on behalf of the CDS. We have had a year of supposed rest. At the height, three years ago, we had about 4,500 people deployed in some pretty interesting areas, such as Bosnia in the early 1990s where there was a shooting war. Someone was overheard saying ``My God, sergeant major, they are using ball ammunition,'' which was a bit of a shock for some people having come from quiet Germany and suddenly finding themselves in the midst of that conflict. It was a shock for many Canadians.
In peacekeeping/peacemaking terms, I do not see peacekeeping as often. Rather, I see more and more peacemaking and, on a number of occasions, I have seen us go in shooting, which can be rather nasty. Coalitional operations will be a big issue for us because we like going in with partners, which is a standard. We will always maintain that aspect, generally speaking, with our closest allies, particularly on NATO and UN operations.
In terms of big operations, my concern would be domestic. There is a threat. I hate to say that a threat from right- wing, left-wing and religious extremists exists. Terrorism attacks occurred in the early 1980s, one being at the Turkish Embassy. That was not pleasant for the RCMP, the security service, or for the government. I see that possibly recurring. Chemical-biological issues exist. The ricin incident occurred recently in the U.K., and there has been potential chemical-biological terrorism in Europe going all the way back to the 1970s, not to mention the subway stations in Japan. It is just a matter of time. As well, we have had links to al Qaeda in Ottawa, with the recent capture last April of a young man named Kawaja. Many issues are percolating. Should terror strike, people will not ask where the first responders are but, rather, where the military is.
Nepean has a population of about 100,000 and Health Canada likes doing studies there. In one disaster mock-up, the projected casualty lists included 32,000 dead from a chem-bio issue, although my numbers may be off. Who would you look to in such a disaster? The local police? No, you would ask DND where the military is. We have to look at this issue seriously. I know the military, Land Force Reserve Infrastructure and PCEPC are looking at such issues, but we need real leadership, which will have to come from government.
Senator Atkins: Both of you have had practical experience and you are both academics. Does the Charter interfere with practical training?
Mr. Taillon: I am not a lawyer so that is a difficult question for me, sir. I would have to take time to read the Charter again. In my past when I was with the British Special Forces, we had to undergo resistance to interrogation, which was highly unpleasant. Sheep entrails being dunked into things, and being brutalized. Such treatment could be considered against the Charter. However, it was for a purpose. Should we have been seized, there would have been issues to deal with.
Senator Atkins: I ask that because it seems to be affecting recruitment, training and operations. Is it becoming a major factor?
Mr. Landry: I will give you a few examples so that you might draw your own conclusion.
The Chairman: We should not have a few examples but, rather, move to other witnesses on this, senator.
LCol. Landry: I will say only that you should visit Saint-Jean and look at the ages of the recruits. What should we do with some recruits who are single mothers and 35 years of age? What kind of career can be expected? What kind of investment are we making in those people? Will they be with us for 20 years or for five years? The Charter says that there is to be no age discrimination. If a recruit can pass the entry test, there is no problem. However, it has an effect on the whole structure and on the training.
Senator Meighen: I am hearing a fair consensus between you both but I am not certain whether it is a ``JTF2- ization'' or a ``marine-ization'' of the Canadian Forces or a combination of the two.
Dr. Taillon, are you calling for an expansion of JTF2 within the force by transforming some infantry units into a force similar to JTF2? Is that what you are looking for?
Mr. Taillon: We may want to look at having our non-SOF forces more SOF-like. For example, JTF2 conducts operations called Close Protection Parties, CPP, which is not a SOF mission. In fact, some of our light infantry — the Van Doos, the RCR and the Princess Patricias — are truly second to none in the world. They are hard-charging, fit, well-adapted and experienced teams of individuals. Instead, take ten people out of the light infantry company and train them for CPP. When the time comes and you ladies and gentlemen arrive in Kabul, those people, having trained for a couple of days prior to your visit, will guard you. CPP is not a duty for SOF but they want SOF to do that. Let us make our forces more SOF-like to deal with that.
Another consideration is political leverage. For example, the Brits are notorious for sending Special Air Service to train bodyguard teams for African and Middle Eastern leaders. They do that quite well and it gives them political leverage in theatre. They also have their eyes wide open and are collecting information overtly in bits and pieces to determine who's who in the zoo, and what they are doing. This kind of overt operation occurs on a daily basis with SOF forces.
That being said, we have an opportunity to leverage our skillsets much more than we have had in the past by expanding those skillsets, not by expanding the special forces, as much as I would love to see that. We have only a small recruiting group but there are ways to deal with that. We can utilize talent-spotting techniques, as the Special Operation Executive, or SOE, did during the Second World War. We have only to look at our history to find numerous examples of this. The Chinese-Canadian community were selected by the British Indian Army to conduct Special Operation Executive operations with Force 136 in Malaya because they spoke Chinese. This occurred when the Malay-Chinese were at war with the Japanese. All of those Chinese-Canadians realized that they risked being captured and dealt with severely. Historians might suggest that they were likely one of the most distinguished military units that came from Canada at any one time.
Senator Meighen: With that memory, why do you think we are having apparent difficulty in increasing the level of recruitment among minorities in this country?
Mr. Taillon: First, minorities do not know the opportunities, which is why I argue for talent-spotting. I will leave a paper with the clerk of the committee for senators to read. In it, you will find a series of options, either through university training or second-generation personnel. When the Swedes are drafted, and they happen to be second- generation Swedes of ethnic groups, they are assigned to either intelligence or translation service. They do quite well.
We have used locals in our deployments, as have the Brits and Americans, and discovered that they are working for the other side as well.
Senator Meighen: It is a communication problem.
Mr. Taillon: Yes, but it is also a security problem. In Croatia, we sent reservists who were Canadian-Croatians to be drivers for COs. They were able to confirm whether the interpreter was interpreting properly. The effort was very useful to us.
The Chairman: Every embassy in Canada has such a problem with the locally engaged.
Senator Meighen: This leads me to a second question before I turn to LCol. Landry. I did not realize there were reservists in JTF2.
Mr. Taillon: We have had reservists go through the selection process and succeed, after which they go on contract. The British SAS has 23 members and 21 of them are reservists. A reservist in such an organization is being deployed. The Americans have two National Guard units that are special forces. My previous reserve unit was a special forces group.
The Chairman: Could we clarify this area, Senator Meighen?
Senator Meighen: Certainly.
The Chairman: You are not talking about a reserve SAS unit that has its own drill hall, et cetera; rather, you are talking about people who have come out of the reserves and are functioning in an SAS unit for an extended contract period of time.
Mr. Taillon: No, sir. The 21 reservists are in London. It is an SAS unit with an SAS headquarters, and the 23 are elsewhere, Scotland and Wales, et cetera. They are separate.
Senator Meighen: When they receive the call to go, can they refuse to go because of a family commitment, for example?
Mr. Taillon: I was with them in November and they go when they receive the call.
Senator Meighen: Is that because they are anxious to go or because the law requires them to go?
Mr. Taillon: There is an obligation to go.
Senator Meighen: Is it a moral obligation?
Mr. Taillon: There is a moral obligation and a legal obligation. The SAS tell reservists when they join that when the call comes, they go.
Senator Meighen: That would be a problem to overcome in Canada when it is up to the individual to decide whether to go.
Mr. Taillon: As a reservist, I have been using my leave for years and years.
Senator Meighen: I know there are overly dedicated reservists, but we have had ample testimony that one of the difficulties is not knowing who will show up when the call goes out.
Mr. Taillon: Absolutely.
[Translation]
Senator Meighen: Many commentators support the concept you described, whereby the Canadian Forces would be brought together within a single command. In theory, this proposal makes excellent sense, but it is not moving forward. Why is that? Is it because there is resistance within the Canadian Forces, or is it because senior officials or politicians do not understand the proposal?
LCol. Landry: It is because of all those things combined. We have to stop asking the Canadian Forces what they can do for the country; we have to tell them what they must do. According to my studies — and I have been working on this for some 20 years now — we do not at present have either the means or resources to maintain the three components. What I tell people is that the focus is increasingly on optimizing existing resources. At that point, why not bring our forces together? This will not mean that some of them would no longer be dressed in blue and some in green. That is not necessarily what I am suggesting. I am talking about unifying the command structure, so that any initiatives put forward can immediately be linked to priorities established by the government.
Not so long ago, according to the bureaucratic approach to managing the procurement programs, for one year we would agree that the Navy would get the money, another year the air force would get it, and the year after that the land forces would get the money. All I am saying is that people are not comfortable with that. In a given year, the Navy decides on the kind of equipment it needs. But from a national perspective, that may not be the top priority. Perhaps the top priority would be equipment for the air force. So from the very start we have a structure that, rather than leading to a harmonized vision, establishes an adversarial relationship within the command structure.
I can tell you that the simple announcement of the Chief of Defense Staff as a future chief has clearly shaking things up, as practice would dictate that it was the Navy's turn to fill this position. Look at the numbers of three stars there were in Ottawa. We were ready to have a sailor. The choice was left up to the government, and there were four vice- admirals that were, I believe, ready to take up the position. So, that is what this leads to. When you have fewer resources, you need to make sure that there is a structure which meets your needs. A good director of a company would not say that a structure which was enough to prevent another war was sufficient. Nor would a good general be satisfied with this. Risks have to be taken.
Senator Meighen: Last question. Within the NDHQ, it would appear firstly that there are far too many people, and secondly, that there is a mixture of military and non-military personnel. Do you think that there is a need for integration or for improved integration of military and non-military personnel?
LCol Landry: I would briefly like to remind you of what the Dimoff report said in 1997. Sometimes it is worth digging up all reports. It was said that there was an attempt to create a new culture by splitting up bureaucratic and military cultures. We realize that that approach did not work very well. I left in 2001, and already you can see a dichotomy between the headquarters' culture and that of the operators. We are not talking about the same culture at all. People look up above and say: I hope that I will never be up there. Things become so highly bureaucratic and politicized that you get the feeling the military is there to serve the government whereas, in fact, it is there to serve its country. The bureaucracy serves the government. I have no problem with that, we should not be trying to turn our bureaucrats into service men and women. When I joined the army, it was to become a service man, and not a politician or a diplomat or bureaucrat.
Senator Meighen: You are describing the problem very well, now, can you describe the solution?
LCol Landry: Before leaving, I met the former Chief of Defense Staff, General Barril. I told him that the Chief of Defense Staff needed to have the power to set up a team composed of service men and women, former service men and women and civilians in order to study this issue. We need to be careful to not, as we say get four quarters in exchange for a loony. We need to ensure that any change made meet our needs. That is why the government needs to know what it wants to do with its Armed Forces. Currently, there is a vacuum. Making a policy statement and simultaneously saying that we are going to buy Strikers, that is transport helicopters, seems to me to be completely illogical. You cannot decide to buy equipment when you still have not established an expenditure policy. What is the deal? We decided that we no longer needed tanks when we had invested $17 million to upgrade them. We have to think, and this reflection needs to be guided. We need to stop writing reports like the Dimoff report simply to satisfy politicians and then put them on a shelf to gather dust.
[English]
Senator Munson: I will be brief. Do we have the right forces in the right places in Canada, given the way bases are spread across the country?
LCol. Landry: I think that we simply do not have sufficient forces. I am fortunate in that my career afforded me the opportunity to serve in all the major areas of this country. However, that is no longer the case. Eventually, we might go back to the system that was in place during the late 1960s, at least on the land side of the forces, when we had army units in the West, in Ontario, in the Maritimes and in Quebec. If I were asked if we have sufficient numbers, I would say that we do not. Do we need to have a more active presence across the country? Yes, definitely. The military, like other organizations, has to promote being Canadian. We need to use it but the government seems to no longer care about the military.
Senator Munson: How do we change that?
LCol. Landry: It takes time to change and we have much homework to do. This government has to re-establish the credibility of the Canadian Forces such that it does not have to renew its credibility with Canadians each year. Government has to build the credibility of the military and be proud of it. We must not use the military to promote economy in various places. We need to make citizens proud of their military.
In Ottawa and Montreal, have you noticed the few members of the military travelling in? That is because they are ashamed. I have worked hard in my career and put my life at risk in Bosnia with the military. I am back in Canada now and afraid to walk on the street in uniform because people point their fingers at me. I ask them whether they were happy that the military has helped in so many crises, such as at Oka. I ask whether they were happy to have the military in Montreal for the Summer Olympic Games. Yet, Canada does not seem to promote this. Being in the military for me has enabled me to be a Canadian who speaks French. That is who I am. We need to be proud of the institution that has been with us for so long and not imagine that all the problems are because of the army, the navy or the air force. Currently, the information officer at NDHQ is not even military but is a civilian. When General Côté wants to respond to an article in the newspaper, he has no authority to do so. He has to prepare his response and send to Ottawa for approval. By the time he receives that approval, it is usually too late to respond to the article.
We need to be more passionate about the military because this country was built by citizens who gave their lives in service to Canada. Today, the work abroad of the military will eventually show that Canadians can make a difference and have made a difference, but to do that, the military needs the support of this country.
Now we are compared with health care. If we give to health care, we will not be able to give to the military. If we give to the military, we will not be able to give to the whatever. What the heck is going on? There is something wrong with this dialogue. The Canadian Forces is something that belongs to the people of this country, not the other way around.
Senator Munson: Do you make that speech in Quebec a lot?
LCol. Landry: Every time.
Senator Munson: It is a shame a reporter is not here to listen to your passion.
LCol. Landry: Last fall I was invited to a primary school, and I gave a speech on the Canadian Forces. Last fall I was invited to a CEGEP in Victoriaville, at the University of Trois Rivières. A group of people had decided they could not find someone to speak for this business of the missile defence system. I was there. You should have seen the people when I introduced myself as Lieutenant Colonel in the Canadian Forces. They almost booed me. At the end, most of them came back and said, ``Well, we were not aware of this. We should have more people like you coming forward.'' But we do not do this. We keep our military on the base. We are so afraid that one of them might say something that eventually will end up in the office of the Chief of Defence Staff that we refuse them.
I will give you another example. I know that Senator Kenny is not very fond of examples.
Senator Meighen: Ignore him.
The Chairman: He will not be recognized again, Senator Meighen.
Mr. Landry: I was the first one, the Deputy Commander Officer of the second battalion when we moved to Oka. I was the first officer to arrive at the village of St. Benoit, and I received a direct order from the commander of FMC not to speak to the media because I could eventually create a trauma. Guess what? When I arrived in St. Benoit, there were about 10 newspaper reporters there, along with the TV people. What do you think I did? I spoke the truth. I told them what I had to say: nothing more, nothing less.
There is this culture that the military is coming from this low-level or average income family and cannot speak up. You would be surprised to find out that most of the young soldiers these days are sometimes more educated than their officers, and they have a passion for their country.
Senator Munson: You are speaking to the converted here.
LCol. Landry: I know that.
Senator Munson: Perhaps what you are saying is that there are too many retired officers who are preaching those things you are talking about, but not enough people working in the military today who are on the streets saying what you are saying. There has to be a cultural change there.
Just one brief thing on the reservists — there is a new and old guard in the reservists in terms of attitude. Should we be able to deploy as a reservist unit in this day and age?
Mr. Taillon: Given all the support and given the direction, you have to give the reserves a tasking, tell them that you will be sending a company. I had one of my former officers bring a composite company to Bosnia and it did very well. It was reported by the commander that his unit was the most unprofessional in the terms that they were reservists, but the most effective unit in the theatre. He would always chide the CO that he had more degrees in his company than the whole brigade. It proves the effectiveness. We have now had reserve commanders in S4 that are reserve full colonels commanding there. We have had reserve commanders in various other UN missions in Africa. They have done well, and they should be commended.
It is time that we could possibly send companies and, depending on the situation and with the appropriate planning, possibly a battalion in the future. It is an evolutionary phase. It is a matter of ponying up the money, some of the direction and the right sort of leadership. I am sure, sir, it would happen.
Senator Munson: I would like to leave it right there, but Mr. Landry is shaking his head.
LCol. Landry: I must say I agree in part with what Mr. Taillon has said. What we have to realize is that we have been reviewing the militia or the reserves for the past 25 years, and we keep reviewing them. Every time, politicians get involved and we start from scratch. As you know, the way the militia is organized, they can pull strings on the political side. All I want to say is that we have been reviewing militia for the past 25 years. Do we need to review them for the next 25 years?
There are tasks that we can give to the militia which they have the capability to perform right now. Those tasks, to me, are here at home. For those individuals who do demonstrate the ability and the availability, yes, we could eventually provide them with command appointments. The fact that we think we can train a battalion right now of militia to go to Afghanistan, it would take so much in resources to do it that we are better to optimize the resources and the availability of the people we already have. That is what we have not been very smart in doing. We have reservists that have specific limitations. We have regulars that have other limitations. Let us optimize and stop trying to make the reservists as good as the regulars, and vice versa. It is this business of apples and oranges.
The good thing about the militia is that they are locally present, and usually when they join, they join for many years. They are part of their locality. They know the authority. Why not, then, try to eventually use them better in this business of a national security program? Why would they not, in case of an emergency, be able to provide the people to go and protect, to provide the infrastructure, to have them in charge of a brigade responsible for a territory as far as national security goes? Those are the things they can do. Let us stop thinking that eventually, with the flick of a finger, they should be deployed in places where — just to give you an example, and I will finish on it. Do you know how much time it takes to train a LAV crew? A LAV is the new armoured vehicle for the infantry. It takes a year to have a crew commander, a gunner and a driver. When we see those vehicles operate in Afghanistan, keep in mind that it has taken us a year to train this team to operate as a team. That is a lot of investment, and the more we want the militia to be ready, the more regular troops we will need to attach to them, to train them and to provide them with the support. If there is a war and if we see something forthcoming, there is always the time to build up and eventually to give them more of a role here in this country.
I keep saying to people, it is not the militia that will go first and eventually go overseas. The militia will eventually have to provide protection here in this country, will have eventually to provide training support for those new recruits who will eventually have to go overseas.
Anyway, I could speak for hours on this.
Senator Munson: Thank you very much.
The Chairman: Thank you. I find myself the victim of the Meighen syndrome — where has he gone? How can I insult him if he is not here?
Senator Meighen: You were talking, chair?
The Chairman: I find myself the victim of the Meighen syndrome, where I am left with bottom-feeding questions.
Senator Meighen: Feed on.
The Chairman: Thank you.
LCol. Landry: But I have good examples, senator.
The Chairman: No examples. I would like just a very short exchange and to make some comments.
My first comment is that both of you have been talking around an issue that this committee has been struggling with now for a number of years, and that is the state of mind of Canadians and why they react or not to the concerns that those who are interested in the military have, and to the threats that they have.
Mr. Taillon, I have to say that all of the examples that you gave may be absolutely true, but they are certainly not front of mind in any Canadian whom we have yet met. We have a country that feels very secure and safe. It is not the U.K., where they have had years and years of terrorism. It is not the United States, where they have continually had wars in which they have been engaged. We have a very different challenge in terms of how we go about dealing with our own situation.
The passion that you have, LCol. Landry, is very real. It is important. You cannot do things without passion. This committee believes that firmly. Having said that, we have had a series of governments that have been providing Canadians with exactly the sort of military that Canadians seem to want. This is an interesting dilemma in a democracy. The dilemma is when you lead and when you follow, and how far you can lead before the followers say, ``No, no, you are going the wrong way and we will have someone else lead us.''
This is the struggle that we are faced with. We have to start with the concerns and interests of individual Canadians and work out from there. A stack of ideas on how to connect Canadians to the threat and then see the military as being part of the response is very important. There has been a lot of mixing of apples and oranges between what civilians should do, and can do, here just during this last hour and a half, and what the military should do. I am not sure that we should not have civilian organizations doing a whole lot of things here that they may be better equipped to do as things are changing. We are seeing a huge change in how first responders are developing in this country compared to just five years ago.
I would be curious to know whether you have any citizen-centric answers to why we do not have a better response. If you accept the fact that the politicians are reading the public correctly, then how should politicians be talking to the public in order to have them consider other issues that relate to the military and better preparedness?
Mr. Taillon: Education is first and foremost. We have to understand that military and foreign policy are hand in glove in many cases, along with CIDA, along with —
The Chairman: With respect, they are not. They are just not. Foreign policy in this country turns on a dime, and military policy takes 15 years for a new platform.
Mr. Taillon: True.
The Chairman: What really drives it is that military drives foreign policy, and nobody wants to admit that, but that is the bottom line. We have the military that we have, and we cannot change it for a long time. The foreign policy changes with a single speech given at a G8 meeting, and God knows where we are off to.
Mr. Taillon: But it also begs the question: What is our national security strategy?
The Chairman: Tell us our threats. The problem is that the guy living in Winnipeg says ``Big ocean to the right, big ocean to the left; snow to the north, friends to the south. Why should I worry?''
Mr. Taillon: That is viable. That is the Canadian way. We have had that for eons. The fact is that we are now living in an environment in which predation by certain individuals and organizations will inevitably come to our shore.
The Chairman: The problem is we cannot persuade Canadians of that, and therefore we have to predicate our preparations on waiting for the next disaster, and have cued up a series of acquisitions and policies that we will probably ram through after the next 9/11. We will wait for the next 9/11 to come, and then we will ram through the changes you want, and then we are fine until —
Mr. Taillon: Absolutely.
The Chairman: If that is the case, that is a hell of a way —
Mr. Taillon: It is a hell of a way to run a government. I find that personally reprehensible. From a personal point of view, it is important when I teach to talk about these issues that we face, not only as a nation but as the western world. It is important that we understand the underpinnings of Canadian democracy, as we have underlined here. Do you want good education, health care, defence? What do you want? Those are the balancing acts that our politicians have had to deal with throughout our history, and it will continue to be those.
Unfortunately, at some point we may find that we will be caught off guard, and the cost will be very high. We are the happy little kingdom, living our own little lifestyle, but unfortunately, on 9/11, there was a bunch of Canadians who got killed, as well as some 80 or so Brits. I have castigated certain Americans who say it was an attack on America. It was an attack on the western world. It just happened in New York City. If you go down through the list of citizens who died that day, you will find that they probably represented 60 nationalities and a cost of $95 billion the second those buildings went down; $7 billion in insurance and a loss of 141,000 jobs, not to mention the cascading costs that we experience on a day-to-day basis every time we walk into an airport. Those are heavy costs.
I applaud this committee for surfacing these issues for Canadians. It is time that we took a look at a hard situation, at a tough situation, and made some serious decisions, which will have a direct impact on our alliances.
The Chairman: Canadians, quite properly, say that there is a far greater chance of me getting killed driving between Toronto and Montreal than being caught in a terrorist attack.
Mr. Taillon: Absolutely.
The Chairman: You are talking about a high-cost, low-probability event.
Mr. Taillon: The low-probability event, yes, but the cost of that low-probability event, should it ever occur, will be exceptionally high.
The Chairman: Is the Swedish example a realistic one for Canada? Not a whole lot of people are emigrating to Sweden, are they? When you talk about having indigenous, second-generation ethnics assisting the military, what sort of numbers are you talking about and what sort of population?
Mr. Taillon: I was in Pristina with the first Mac brigade as a staff officer. I had to deal with the Swedes on a continuing basis. They had numerous second-generation Yugoslavs, so they spoke the language.
The Chairman: How would they make out if they had to produce Chinese —
Senator Nolin: Or Darfur. They need coloured people. That is what they want.
The Chairman: There are not a lot of Swedes who are coloured.
Mr. Taillon: No, but we do have enough Sudanese in Canada to figure that one out.
The Chairman: The issue that comes up right away is that many of the communities, as Senator Meighen raised earlier, for one reason or another are not interested in a career in either the police or the military. They come from countries where the police and the military are not friendly. I wanted to ask you about the Chinese example you gave us earlier, in World War II. Why was the Chinese community more interested then than it is now in participating in the military?
Mr. Taillon: I think it is because the Brits came to Canada, a bunch of talent spotters, and sat down and chatted with people one-on-one. It is part of a mentoring issue. That is one of the things we do not do very well in the military. It is one of the things I always instigated when I was a commanding officer. I made sure I mentored my officers. I dined with them, talked about the military, why we do things and how we do things, and what leadership was about and what courses they were going on and we basically monitored their careers and developed them. Generally speaking, we just leave people on their own. We are dealing with a different generation than we had 40 years ago, 20 years ago and today.
The Chairman: We are also dealing with a totally different threat. We had a very symmetrical situation. It was much easier to say ``Those are the bad guys.'' It is much harder to articulate that now.
Mr. Taillon: The second-generation Canadians who have been growing up in Toronto, they are 20 years old now, and their family has been here for 25 years. They have grown up in a secular environment. They have been educated. They have friends of multicultural backgrounds, that sort of thing. You then say ``We are going to do this for you, get you through university, do whatever —'' and have someone they can work with and bring them through. It is a bit like developing agents, in many cases.
The Chairman: That leads me to my last question, and that is the use of contractors. When we were in Washington, we met with Porter Goss, and he asked us why we were not considering that more as a bridge between special forces and CSIS. Do you have any views on that matter?
Mr. Taillon: I would look at it in a different way, that you never leave the intelligence service or you never leave special forces. I call them special forces for life, intelligence officers for life. It works very well, sir, as you have probably seen. We are everywhere.
The Chairman: That is what Barry keeps telling us. It makes us nervous.
Really, the question is, is this a force multiplier that we should be thinking about as a matter of policy, and what are the downsides in terms of keeping what are essentially mercenaries on the leash?
Mr. Taillon: You raise a very difficult issue. I would suggest that it comes down to professional trust. An individual, for example, leaves our CANSOF organization after 20 years and moves into a government-sanctioned company that does security work for government-sanctioned operations where he or she can make $1,500 a day, which is apparently the going rate in Iraq. You then have to sit back and say, ``We trust you because of your 25 years of good service, your personality profile, your skill sets, et cetera.'' Trust goes a long way in a lot of this. I prefer to have that rather than what we are seeing now with those special operations organizations, such as Blackwater, which are now taking individuals who have never even been special forces. I know of cases in Great Britain where organizations that used to be solely SAS are now taking in Royal Marine commando corporals and calling them special operators. Because of the high demand, you are seeing a watering down of the qualities of the individuals.
The Chairman: I am less worried about the watering down than about them going bad.
Mr. Taillon: That is where you have to be very selective in whom you take, and the trust factor becomes very high.
LCol. Landry: You asked a question about threats. It will take two minutes and I will not be giving any examples.
These days, I am looking at threats in a very different way than you have been portraying. The threat, to my point of view, is for a country like Canada to be able to decide for itself. Right now, with what we have seen over the past 10 years, I can guarantee you that at times we were forced to be involved in things in which we did not want to be involved, because we just have not done our homework properly. Right now, the threat is coming from the fact that we have been earmarked as the most famous free rider of this world. The threat for me is the fact that we Canadians should be able to decide when we get involved and how we will be doing it. When we do not do our homework, then we are being forced to do things we do not really like. For example —
The Chairman: Do not do the example, but let me respond, Mr. Landry —
LCol. Landry: The Iraq war, for example; when Canada said we were not involved with the Iraq war, that was wrong.
The Chairman: We understand that, but you are getting closer to the point that I was trying to get to, which was really when we make the argument on the basis that ``this is good for the military,'' that does not cut any ice anywhere. We have to make the argument on the basis of what works for Canadians. We have not been doing that. That is what we are looking for help with: finding a way to make the case that this will give their government more options to serve them better.
The problem is that, all too often, we are hearing back, ``I am sorry but we do not want that service.'' We are hearing back much too often, ``Threat? Well, I am more concerned about the threat the Americans are posing to us because I do not like the way George Bush talks, or because they are mean to us on BSE, or softwood lumber.'' That is the reality in which we are trying to work. Our task is how to come up with the solutions.
We have run out of time, but we would welcome hearing from you on these sorts of questions. If we cannot solve that problem, it does not matter too much about the organizational problems or the funding problems, or all of the other problems that we have on our list. Problem number one is the connection with the citizen.
LCol. Landry: I could not agree with you more.
The Chairman: We will be coming back to both of you on this.
LCol. Landry: I would suggest strongly that you look at the way the Australians did it in the mid-1990s, with their defence review. They were able to do it, but not in the way that the Canadians did it lately in the NDHQ, behind closed doors. They did it publicly, and they listened to the public.
The Chairman: As we say in the trade, we know where you live. We are coming back to talk to you some more and people from the committee will be in touch with you. On behalf of the committee, I would like to thank you both very much. It has been a fun morning. We have enjoyed the discussion. It has been constructive and helpful.
What you have heard from me, just at the end, is a plea for more assistance in a slightly different direction because that is where we feel we are missing the connections. We think that is the main issue, and is the toughest one to grapple with.
On behalf of the committee, thank you so much for coming. We are grateful.
The committee continued in camera.