Army Guy Posted July 25, 2024 Report Posted July 25, 2024 9 hours ago, BeaverFever said: I HAVE been wondering what exactly their role would be if the security situation deteriorated and they had to surge into the theatre. Urban warfare? Trench warfare? Does Latvia have some complex terrain that only dismounted troops can defend? Apparently they have a specific mission set that they are/will be continuously training for but I haven’t seen anything that would suggest what it might be. They awarded the contract earlier this year, I mentioned it on the thread. The Mercedes Zetros family of vehicles to replace LSVW and HLVW Their mission would be the same as the mechanized troops, using the spare LAV's in storage for transport into battle ....being light in fantry in the canadian military only means you don't have LAV's because they did not purchase enough...and this was the solution....only one company out of the BN of light infantry is airborne, the rest ride around in trucks of BV206's...or like us in school busses....Note being Mechanized does not always mean you ride in a LAV....each Bn has 3 companies of infantry, most mechanized BN's only have 2 companies of LAV's .....ya i know more red flags, but this is where getting to dismount from a bright yellow school bus comes from.....don't worry we try and look professional.... As for tough terrain they have g wagons as well, at least they have a hard top and a good heater....and can go anywhere these trucks can... Don't get me wrong, Zetros are good machines, just not the best MAN now Rheinmetall makes the best trucks as most of the European armies are equipped with...back in the day they use to race tanks with mann rucks x cross country, including tank ditches...and the trucks would win, most of the time... The main mission is to stop Russians, the whole country is complex terrain of some sort, but the Brigade we are a part of is a Mechanized one...as for the high readiness factor every brigade and certain units are tasked with high readiness some at the national level (latvia) or rescue citizens for say Lebanon or some other country....some at the bridge level...like fire fighting or plane crash etc... Have you seen the small Zetro....i think they are around 5 ton capacity....thats a huge small truck...but bigger is better, when hauling all the stuff you need for the battlefield...lets not forget we still have G Wagons...or when the road stops get off the truck and use those boots you were issued....I wonder how long is it going to take to get into service...one of the reasons is lack of LSVW, almost 1/2 or more of the fleet is gone, sitting in a field since 2012...I mean good news if they are coming soon...but i mean come on 12 or more years to buy simple trucks....it is just another red flag thats all. Quote We, the willing, led by the unknowing, are doing the impossible for the ungrateful. We have now done so much for so long with so little, we are now capable of doing anything with nothing.
Army Guy Posted July 25, 2024 Report Posted July 25, 2024 7 hours ago, Dougie93 said: it's basically just a replacement for the old CUCV likely to spend most of its time driving around on exercise in Canada but you do have to drive something around on exercise in Canada and it sure beats the Iltis, CUCV or G-Wagon in that role Unless it is 40 below...then having a CUCV, G wagon even an iltis would be much better...and if the terrain is that complex then skidoos or BV206 would be much better... Quote We, the willing, led by the unknowing, are doing the impossible for the ungrateful. We have now done so much for so long with so little, we are now capable of doing anything with nothing.
BeaverFever Posted July 25, 2024 Author Report Posted July 25, 2024 8 hours ago, Army Guy said: Their mission would be the same as the mechanized troops, using the spare LAV's in storage for transport into battle Interesting, I haven’t heard that they’re storing additional LAVs in Latvia or will be employing the Light Bn as mech upon arrival. If so, that would make the purchase of these light vehicles and the ongoing Light Forces vehicle project a curious decison. 8 hours ago, Army Guy said: As for tough terrain they have g wagons as well, at least they have a hard top and a good heater....and can go anywhere these trucks can... Yeah exposure to the elements and winter weather is an obvious limiting factor. The reason the US developed this Infantry Squad vehicle instead of continuing to use their Humvees (which would apply to our G-wagons) is that: 1) Using a Humvee/G-wagon takes more vehicles to move the same number of troops, increasing the logistical burden 2) infantry sections (“squads” in US language) have to be broken up into smaller groups during the movement which results in excessive clusterf*cking when embarking and disembarking . What the US wanted was an off-road vehicle that could fit an entire infantry section and would allow them to mount and dismount quickly. Quote
Dougie93 Posted July 25, 2024 Report Posted July 25, 2024 15 hours ago, BeaverFever said: On paper it looks that way, given that the 3 Baltic states collectively have a population the approximate size of the Greater Toronto Area and narrow territory. I will point out however the following factors: 1) Russian Navy doesn’t have free run of the Baltic Sea, which is increasingly referred to now as being practically a “NATO lake” given Sweden and Finland joining the alliance 2)The build up and mobilization Russian forces and logistics will tale weeks and months and will not go unnoticed by allies 3), NATO is not Ukraine, which Russia still can’t conquer 2.5 years and more than a half million casualties later despite the fact Ukraine is fighting with a hodge-podge of hand-me-down equipment from a dozen different countries and several different deadens. 4) A Russian invasion and attack on NATO would not be contained to just the Baltics. Russia would have to reserve most of its combat power to defend its entire territory on all fronts from a NATO counterattack and air/missile strikes that could come from Eastern Europe, Scandinavia, Alaska or over the North Pole 5) Realistically, enough people believe that any direct action between Russia and NATO could quickly escalate to Nuclear War so to make an actual war very unlikely. The name of the game is simply credible deterrence with the tripwire force is effectively a tripwire for nuclear war The tripwire force has to be big enough that its loss would be considered a direct attack on the alliance nations, and also large enough that it wouldn’t simply surrender or be captured without a fight (and therefore fail to ‘trip). The Russians probably calculate that a battalion-sized tripwire force that could be captured without a shot by a Russian division and chained to flagpoles as human shields a-la Former Yugoslavia wouldn’t trigger the tripwire and neither would a very small number of NATO casualties if a decisive Russian victory came quickly enough Therefore the tripwire need only be sufficient to ensure Russians understand that the defended territory has enough troops in enough places such that substantial casualties and major escalation will ensue if invaded, there will be no quick victories that can be diplomatically smoothed over afterwards those are all valid points however I would suggest that a Russian incursion into the Baltic's would come about as part of a larger war wherein the Chinese were also making their move in the Pacific in that, the Russians are not going to attack NATO alone without the green light from Beijing and they would only do so if American forces were otherwise occupied in other theatres in terms of nuclear war, even in the event of all out war, an interpolar exchange of strategic weapons is unlikely rather there could be theatre thermonuclear war, wherein the nuclear powers decline to attack each other directly, instead only targeting each others proxies which is a nuclear war that I would surmise the Russians would be willing to fight particularly in terms of NATO forces attempting to invade Russian territory that being the threshold wherein the Russians would resort to Nuclear Deescalation in theatre Quote
Dougie93 Posted July 25, 2024 Report Posted July 25, 2024 14 hours ago, Army Guy said: Unless it is 40 below...then having a CUCV, G wagon even an iltis would be much better...and if the terrain is that complex then skidoos or BV206 would be much better... point taken although it should be noted that the US Army does not intend to employ the ISV for winter/arctic operations for winter/arctic operations the US Army is acquiring the BAE Systems Beowulf which opens the door for Canada to piggyback on some orders for those as well 1 Quote
Dougie93 Posted July 25, 2024 Report Posted July 25, 2024 (edited) 9 hours ago, BeaverFever said: infantry sections (“squads” in US language) have to be broken up into smaller groups during the movement which results in excessive clusterf*cking when embarking and disembarking . in fairness, it's always a clusterfck with the LAVIII/6 because it 's 3 crew + 7 dismounts and they don't use Zulu Harbours anymore, the LAV goes forward with the MBTs so it's never a full Section dismounting. it's always a Section Minus and sometimes the Section Commander wants to dismount, other times they want to stay in the turret exactly how many troops dismount with either the Section Commander or the 2IC is not clear certainly as a Section Commander, it's good to have the thermal sight in the turret on the other hand, lead from the front demands that the Section Commander dismount and in this day & age you might want a Team Leader to stay mounted to operate drones this is why I like unmanned turrets it's not so much about gaining a better turret it's just easier, if there is no turret basket, to pick & choose who dismounts where & when ultimately, you'd like to be able to dismount a full Section with just one Corporal being able to operate the mounted heavy weapon on call the LAV-25 turret is obsolete that should be replaced by an automated remote weapon station with counter drone capability one crew member should be able to direct the fire of an RWS, no Crew Commander required ideally, once you reach the objective, you want both the Section Commander & 2IC dismounted keeping one of them in the turret just to shoot the chain gun, is a waste of talent Edited July 25, 2024 by Dougie93 Quote
Army Guy Posted July 25, 2024 Report Posted July 25, 2024 9 hours ago, BeaverFever said: Interesting, I haven’t heard that they’re storing additional LAVs in Latvia or will be employing the Light Bn as mech upon arrival. If so, that would make the purchase of these light vehicles and the ongoing Light Forces vehicle project a curious decison. Yeah exposure to the elements and winter weather is an obvious limiting factor. The reason the US developed this Infantry Squad vehicle instead of continuing to use their Humvees (which would apply to our G-wagons) is that: 1) Using a Humvee/G-wagon takes more vehicles to move the same number of troops, increasing the logistical burden 2) infantry sections (“squads” in US language) have to be broken up into smaller groups during the movement which results in excessive clusterf*cking when embarking and disembarking . What the US wanted was an off-road vehicle that could fit an entire infantry section and would allow them to mount and dismount quickly. They reported it a few months ago about extra LAVs arriving in theater, my son tells me they were put in storage...atleast 2 companies worth... They could be used as garrison vehicles, I think it underlines the need for a LSVW type of vehicle, it also begs the question why has it taken so long, if the issue is so blaring obvious enough to spend a few million on as an interim measure...and i'm sure these vehicles could be used with the light infantry forces back in Canada, i mean they are already driving side by sides in a limited capacity... but in a high intensity warfare in a mechanized force, your just looking for trouble... Our light infantry gets moved by airplane/ helo, BV-206, or truck or foot.......all carry much more than this new vehicle... it also use the side by sides to move heavy weapons such as 50 cal, tow, even Javelin... mounting or dismounting is always a cluster fuc* as Dougie mentions, even more so under fire...try it from a school bus... I think the proper solution here would be to update the BV-206, with the BV10 as dougie clearly showed...they carry 12 troops and equipment, can also be mounted with heavier weapons such as 120mm mortar, Tow, even a turret with 30 to 40 mm cannon...and can go even were boots can not...they are fully amphibious, they are the whole package...and they come with a hard top roof, have excellent heaters, and can be mounted with additional armour and protection systems. UK Royal marines used them in Afghanistan to good effect... open air vehicles are great for specialized light forces, like CSOR, or JTF...that shot, move and communicate at high speeds.... Quote We, the willing, led by the unknowing, are doing the impossible for the ungrateful. We have now done so much for so long with so little, we are now capable of doing anything with nothing.
Dougie93 Posted July 25, 2024 Report Posted July 25, 2024 18 minutes ago, Army Guy said: I think the proper solution here would be to update the BV-206, with the BV10 as dougie clearly showed...they carry 12 troops and equipment, can also be mounted with heavier weapons such as 120mm mortar, Tow, even a turret with 30 to 40 mm cannon...and can go even were boots can not...they are fully amphibious, they are the whole package...and they come with a hard top roof, have excellent heaters, and can be mounted with additional armour and protection systems. UK Royal marines used them in Afghanistan to good effect... open air vehicles are great for specialized light forces, like CSOR, or JTF...that shot, move and communicate at high speeds.... thing is, the war in Ukraine is showing that armoured vehicles are mostly death traps you're actually better off dismounting into the trenches furthermore, in this age of robotics, you don't actually need the heavy weapon mounted on the APC you could switch to Manned Unmanned Teaming ( MUM-T ) wherein you go back to Battle Taxis, with a drone carrying the firepower forward alongside Quote
Army Guy Posted July 25, 2024 Report Posted July 25, 2024 10 minutes ago, Dougie93 said: thing is, the war in Ukraine is showing that armoured vehicles are mostly death traps you're actually better off dismounting into the trenches furthermore, in this age of robotics, you don't actually need the heavy weapon mounted on the APC you could switch to Manned Unmanned Teaming ( MUM-T ) wherein you go back to Battle Taxis, with a drone carrying the firepower forward alongside One must admit the way Ukraine or even Russia is using them is not even close to combined arms tactics that NATO uses...Yes the use of drones is having an effect on the battlefield, but one must adapt or die on the battlefield, more Air defense is required..neutralize the UAV threat, and use combined ops at battle group or brigade level...or higher...I think from the new tanks and IFV designs coming out now, the UAV threat is not going to play a large role... Quote We, the willing, led by the unknowing, are doing the impossible for the ungrateful. We have now done so much for so long with so little, we are now capable of doing anything with nothing.
Dougie93 Posted July 25, 2024 Report Posted July 25, 2024 1 minute ago, Army Guy said: One must admit the way Ukraine or even Russia is using them is not even close to combined arms tactics that NATO uses...Yes the use of drones is having an effect on the battlefield, but one must adapt or die on the battlefield, more Air defense is required..neutralize the UAV threat, and use combined ops at battle group or brigade level...or higher...I think from the new tanks and IFV designs coming out now, the UAV threat is not going to play a large role... everything is in flux right now robotics is already dominating the battlefield at the expense of being buttoned up in an armoured vehicle it's actually back to the 1970's wherein you wouldn't take the M113 forward with the Leopard 1 rather you leave the Battle Taxi in a Zulu Harbour and advance on foot in terms of a robot which carries a heavy weapon alongside you that's just a crew served weapon wherein the crew is a robot Quote
Dougie93 Posted July 25, 2024 Report Posted July 25, 2024 20 minutes ago, Army Guy said: One must admit the way Ukraine or even Russia is using them is not even close to combined arms tactics that NATO uses... another aspect which is under reported is the use of mines Ukraine has already surpassed every previous war in history to be largest minefield of all time both sides are having serious problems even getting their armoured vehicles to the dismount in the first place just trying to pick their way through the deep and massive mixed density minefields again, it's quite obvious that the robot is supplanting the armoured vehicle as the principle mechanized platform frankly, why would you even send troops forward instead of robots, unless & until the enemy defensive is collapsing ? Quote
Dougie93 Posted July 29, 2024 Report Posted July 29, 2024 SUPPORT US What Spending Two Per Cent of GDP on National Defence Means for Canada Table of Contents Executive Summary Introduction The Math The Annual Two-Per-Cent-of-GDP Defence Spending Pledge and its Management Avoiding the Boom-Bust Cycle Envisioning a Canadian Military Funded at Two Per Cent of GDP Multiple Missions Capability Reserve Force Reform Defending the Arctic A Three-Ocean Navy Emerging Technology and the Unforeseen Large Conflict is Back Positive Impact on Industry and Academia Conclusion: A Better Canadian Armed Forces and a More Secure Canada About the Authors Canadian Global Affairs Institute Executive Summary : The latest NATO defence spending data (2023 estimates) show Canada standing alone as the only country in the then-31-member Alliance not meeting both NATO investment pledges: spending at least two per cent of gross domestic product (GDP) on defence and spending at least 20 per cent of the defence budget on equipment and research and development. Still, by spending 1.33 per cent of its GDP on defence, Canada ranks as the seventh largest spender (in actual dollars) on defence in NATO and the 14th largest in the world. Since 2006, though, successive Canadian governments have agreed to the NATO metric of spending two per cent of GDP on defence and since 2023, the Alliance considers this financial obligation to be a minimum level of investment. Canada has not honoured this commitment and has no plan to do so. This situation will feature prominently in military-related public discussion in Canada around the upcoming budget, the “expected soon” defence policy update, and at the 75th NATO anniversary summit this July and beyond. This paper’s purpose is to describe the difference that a minimum two-per-cent-of-GDP annual allocation would make to defence capability, capacity and preparedness aggregated over time for the Department of National Defence (DND) and the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF), and to Canada’s broader national interests and security. Meeting our NATO agreed-upon commitment would force multiple government departments to do more to obtain much better outcomes for the money spent. This will require a change in culture and thinking by our political leaders and within government to meet the range of threats and potential dangers at our doorstep. This certainty in defence budgeting would set conditions for improved partnerships with Canadian industry, help secure Canada’s borders including the Arctic, strengthen our military alliances, and improve our credibility with the U.S. and other NATO members and partners. It would also allow for an armed forces rebuild, including recruiting at least 25,000 Regular Force personnel besides the 71,000 called for under the current (2017) defence policy. Such funding would make the CAF more consistently dependable, relevant, modern and capable. It would set conditions for Canada to once again credibly meet its Alliance obligations and contribute directly to Canadian security and prosperity, as well as to a safer and more prosperous global commons. Such a policy would also have a positive cascading effect on Global Affairs and all other departments and agencies in the Canadian intelligence, policing and national security space. https://www.cgai.ca/what_spending_two_per_cent_of_gdp_on_national_defence_means_for_canada#Envisioning 1 Quote
BeaverFever Posted July 30, 2024 Author Report Posted July 30, 2024 (edited) Bloomberg Canadian soldiers during a combat exercise near Resolute Bay, Nunavut, in March 2024. Photographer: Louie Palu/Agence VU Opinion Liam Denning, Columnist How Canada Is Defending the Place With No Dawn Liam Denning spent 10 days in the Arctic, where the Canadian military is preparing to safeguard its vast, unpopulated mineral-rich territory from emerging threats. July 29, 2024 at 5:00 AM EDT By Liam Denning Liam Denning is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering energy. A former banker, he edited the Wall Street Journal’s Heard on the Street column and wrote the Financial Times’s Lex column. This is the fifth in a series of articles looking at how climate change and geopolitics are reshaping the High North’s strategic landscape, from the military balance of power to the quest for oil and gas and mineral resources. Photography by Louie Palu. You can watch the video feature here. Standing on a thick layer of sea ice, with vague misgivings about the numbness spreading through my feet, I venture a churlish question to the Canadian infantry officer on whose snowmobile I hitched a ride to this remote spot in the High Arctic: “Why are you wearing green?” We’re waiting for the rest of his patrol in the middle of something like a frosted crater; the windchill is around negative 50F. It is a bright morning in early March in Resolute Bay, Nunavut, barely a thousand miles from the North Pole. Chief Warrant Officer Pierre Ouellet’s camouflage looks more suited to the tree line, the Arctic boundary several hundred miles south. White would be more discreet, surely? He answers: “We want to be seen.” That could be Canada’s unofficial Arctic motto. A year before, I was up a mountainside in Alaska with US Army troops training hurriedly for winter warfare. But the US is a continental superpower with an Arctic fringe. Canada, in contrast, is a middling power fringing an Arctic continent: an expanse of mainland and archipelago that makes up 40% of the country’s territory and 75% of its coastline but hosts less than 1% of the population. Ottawa has long fretted about foreign powers stealing in like squatters to some cavernous, virtually empty penthouse. That penthouse includes most of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s Arctic territory and acts as the de facto northern frontier of the US. Long a potential pathway for bombers and missiles in the skies, it also offers a potentially game-changing shipping route between the Pacific and Atlantic oceans — the fabled Northwest Passage. Beneath the permafrost and ever-less-icy waters lies a potential trove of mineral resources, including the building blocks of the energy transition. As climate change and a fracturing international order draw the world’s attention northward, I’ve come to Resolute Bay to watch the Canadian military grapple with the seemingly banal, but hugely complex and expensive, challenge of occupying its own territory and preparing for an emerging great game at the top of the world. Canadian soldiers with snowmobiles and sleds preparing to load into a CC-130 aircraft in blowing snow at Resolute Bay Airport, in March 2024.Photographer: Louie Palu/Agence VU Remote and isolated as it is, Resolute sits in the heart of Canada’s Arctic, making it a key logistical hub: the site of the Canadian Armed Forces Arctic Training Center, which includes the only runway this far north long enough to accommodate giant CC-177 cargo planes. It’s also home to the Polar Continental Shelf Program, supporting scientists in the field, including those involved with mapping out Canada’s entitlements on the Arctic seabed — a latter-day extension of the exploratory mission that gave the bay its name, derived from a British Royal Navy vessel sent in vain to find the doomed Franklin expedition to the Northwest Passage two centuries ago.1 Yet there is another reason Resolute Bay figures prominently in Canada’s effort to assert its sovereignty over its Arctic territory. The isolated hamlet on the bay, Resolute, dates from the 1950s and a dark chapter in the history of Canada’s treatment of the Arctic’s original masters, its Indigenous people. In that feverish early Cold War period, Ottawa coerced, or lured under false pretenses, more than 90 Inuit men, women and children to relocate from elsewhere to Resolute, on Cornwallis Island, and Grise Fiord, a settlement on nearby Ellesmere Island. This was done in part to — you guessed it — reinforce Canadian sovereignty in the Arctic. Ottawa issued a formal apology for the High Arctic relocation in 2010. A little way out of town near Resolute, a stone monument depicts a man looking toward Grise Fiord, where, about 240 miles northeast, stand a stone woman and child with a husky looking back, mute testament to the separation of families that took place. In that context, Resolute’s name in the Indigenous tongue of Inuktitut feels even more apt: Qausuittuq, the place with no dawn. Master Corporal Steve Aulaqiaq, a Canadian Ranger from the Inuit community of Qikiqtarjuaq, teaching igloo construction to non-Indigenous Canadian soldiers at Crystal City, near Resolute Bay, March 2024.Photographer: Louie Palu/Agence VU Yet embedded in that sad beginning also lies a prospective answer to the conundrum of how Canada can exert sovereignty over this harsh and seemingly limitless vista. In Resolute, I saw how Ottawa relies on a largely Indigenous contingent of Canadian Rangers to bolster its Arctic capabilities. Likewise, Ottawa’s commitment to the northern communities from which the Rangers hail, enhancing their resiliency in the face of climate change and other novel challenges, is critical to preserving their presence and the generational knowledge that it underpins. In that respect, Canada’s defense of its sovereignty in the Arctic ultimately rests as much on building a robust and inclusive national identity as it does on fielding a military fit for purpose. Its success in doing so can provide a model from which other Arctic countries, the US included, can learn. Canada’s Arctic Crossroads Resolute Bay sits at the center of Canada’s Arctic territory and sea lanes, about 1,000 miles from the North Pole Sources: Arctic Portal (Northwest Passage); Natural Earth A Desert Made of Water Resolute Bay lies in a polar desert. Stepping off the plane near the training center, a collection of low buildings resembling a moon base, I’m surprised to find myself coughing; the air catches in the throat like an icy dust. I flew in with members of the Royal 22e Régiment, the Canadian Army’s storied Francophone infantry regiment known as the Vandoos (vingt-deux, see?). Some recognize photojournalist Louie Palu, traveling with me, from when he was embedded with them in Afghanistan. For many, this is their first time so far north. A boat on the frozen shoreline of Resolute Bay, in March 2024.Photographer: Louie Palu/Agence VU There are a few short roads around Resolute Bay. Lined with poles and wires covered in a rime of frost like old sailing masts, one runs a mile or so north to a huddle of huts and tents named, with real estate mojo, Crystal City. Three miles south, the road heads into tiny Resolute itself, which has fewer than 200 residents. And that’s it. Cornwallis Island is a small patch of wilderness in Nunavut, the Canadian territory that stretches from Manitoba to the waters off northern Greenland. Averaging 0.05 people per square mile, it is a demographic near-vacuum. In my initial briefing, an officer warns: “If you’re lost in Nunavut and you yell, no one will hear you.” The grim echo of Ridley Scott’s Alien evokes a sense of having landed on a different planet altogether. Canada’s Giant, Lonely Arctic Arctic regions’ share of population and land area [graphic at link] Source: Econor Note: “Nordic countries” includes Greenland, an autonomous territory of Denmark. Greenland’s area excludes its ice cap. Click here to watch the video feature. Maybe that’s why the changing rooms, where you suit up for the outside, feel like an airlock. Besides the cold — the wind chill dips below negative 80F at one point during my visit — dehydration creeps up on you. As Captain Phil Simon, a surgeon and medical officer, tells me, “With every breath, you’re losing water.” Along with biology, medics stationed in Resolute Bay need a doctorate in flight schedules: Even a perfect medevac from here takes about 12 hours. A senior officer in the regional command says it was easier moving casualties from Afghanistan to Germany and then on to Canada than it is getting them out of here. Not to forget: Nanook. No short walk around the complex is complete without doing the occasional 360 to spy any polar bears. Nine are being tracked in the area when I arrive, and the safety tips on posters around the base tend to stoke, rather than allay, anxiety. A homemade effort I found pinned up in a broom closet resonated more: “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger … except for bears…bears will kill you.” VIDEO: Learning to Fight in Canada's Arctic Territory General Wayne Eyre, who has just retired after serving as Canada’s Chief of the Defense Staff, fully acknowledges that no foreign army is coming over the ice today; if they did, he tells me, “the first capability we would send up is search and rescue.” He is instead looking a decade or two ahead, when more ice has melted and the postwar certainties of sacrosanct borders and free trade, coming apart already, potentially break down completely. In the face of such scenarios, Canada’s military suffers from what one might call diseconomies of scale. The army’s roughly 44,000 regular soldiers, spread across a country a little bigger than the US, would fit inside just one major US Army base, Fort Liberty in North Carolina. Joint Task Force North, responsible for Arctic operations, has around 1,600 personnel today. There is a lot of ground to cover, much of it extraordinarily rugged and lacking basic infrastructure. Corporal Nicolas Villemaire refueling a snowmobile at the Canadian Armed Forces Arctic Training Center in Resolute Bay, March 2024.Photographer: Louie Palu/Agence VU All-out war on the ice may be hard to imagine. But as Omond Solandt, the former head of the Canadian Defense Research Board, observed in 1948, not long before Resolute’s founding, “Everybody knows it’s impossible to fight a war in the Arctic, but we have to prepare for the man who doesn’t know it’s impossible.” So armies must imagine stuff anyway. Incursions by small, specialized forces, or drones — or “weather” balloons — are all too easy to imagine in such open space. As sea ice melts, shipping activity picks up. More than 140 vessels are expected to traverse the Northwest Passage this year. Besides offering another avenue for intrusion, each ship represents a potential search and rescue mission. The seemingly obvious draw is what lies beneath. Gold has been mined in Canada’s Arctic since the Yukon rush of the late 19th century. World-class deposits of uranium, diamonds, iron ore and copper have also been mined, and there are hopes to develop lithium and rare earth metals, too. Meanwhile, the US Geological Survey estimates that perhaps 20 billion barrels-equivalent or more of oil and gas lie beneath the Canadian Arctic. Beyond all this, in several senses, is the tantalizing prospect of one day sucking up rare earths and other minerals from the Arctic seabed. At a military conference in London recently, I heard a senior UK Royal Air Force officer almost casually refer to the seabeds and the poles as “the Klondikes of the 21st century.” Exploiting them is another matter. Besides extreme conditions, sheer remoteness and short working seasons make Arctic mining and drilling time-consuming and expensive. The giant Mary River iron ore mine on Baffin Island, for example, took roughly half a century from initial discovery to first production. For all their potential, Canada’s three Arctic territories lag significantly when it comes to investment in new projects. Canada’s Untapped Arctic Resource projects planned or under construction in Canada’s Arctic and other regions, split by type [graphic at link] Source: Natural Resources Canada 2023 inventory Note: Canadian Arctic comprises the Northwest Territories, Nunavut and Yukon. C$10 billion is about $7.22 billion. Climate change is touted as a catalyst for more. But sinking permafrost, less predictable sea ice and erratic weather patterns are less like the neat click of a long-sealed vault unlocking and more like the wayward swing of a wrecking ball. And yet, even if one knows all this, what if the other side thinks it knows otherwise? Most Klondike gold prospectors found nothing and nonetheless joined the rush. When it comes to imagined futures, the Arctic is not just a blank canvas but a shared one, too. In stretching to protect this region, Canada’s military is hampered not merely by the vast distances but also by its less-than-vast budget. An updated defense strategy — “Our North, Strong and Free” — promises more money, including funds for new Arctic installations and equipment. Announcing Eyre’s replacement General Jennie Carignan as the new Chief of the Defense Staff — the first woman to hold that position — Prime Minister Justin Trudeau noted that her appointment came amid “complicated geopolitics and increased threats, particularly to our Arctic.” Canadian soldiers on snowmobiles pass Crystal City, near Resolute Bay, March 2024.Photographer: Louie Palu/Agence VU Even the new budget remains below NATO’s current target of 2% of gross domestic product, however. Meanwhile, Defense Minister Bill Blair has spoken of the difficulty of convincing Canadians to raise spending further. As P. Whitney Lackenbauer, a professor at Trent University in Peterborough, Ontario, and a leading military historian, puts it: “Many Canadians still see the Arctic as a ‘there’ rather than a ‘here.’” One morning, somewhere in among the low hills near Resolute Bay, I watch reservists — wearing white this time — stage a mock attack on an encampment. They are, for all intents and purposes, capturing a patch of nothingness, blank white ground indistinguishable from the wider horizon. Tactical exercises here, as opposed to survival training, are relatively new for this regiment, reflecting the shifting geopolitical winds. For all the spent casings in the snow, and tactical camouflage, a strong element of psyops is at play. These soldiers are demonstrating to anyone watching, foreign or Canadian, that they can fulfill basic roles in a place that, given half a chance, will kill you without any human intervention. Yet they couldn’t do that were it not for a unique part of the Canadian military, one that ties it in a more profound way to this unforgiving land. Canadian soldiers preparing targets for a firing range near Resolute Bay, March 2024.Photographer: Louie Palu/Agence VU Ranger Time The secret to building an igloo is a spiral. You lay down blocks of hard-packed snow — “like sawing Styrofoam,” a sweating soldier tells me — in a ring and then cut a deep, slanted notch in one of them. That is the sloping start of the wall building up, round and round, higher and higher, to the apex. I am watching Master Corporal Steve Aulaqiaq, clad in a red parka, frost clinging to his mustache, as he slowly disappears, walling himself up inside a white dome. He is a Canadian Ranger. The Rangers, founded in 1947, are a part-time force numbering around 5,000, with about 1,500 of those in the Arctic, most of them Indigenous. They’re not combatants; they are the military’s eyes and ears in the emptier spaces of northern Canada, tasked with seeing something and saying something rather than shooting someone. Yet they are far more than that. They’re teachers, pathfinders, weather experts and, in this setting, even protection from bears. Corporal Anuga Michael from the Inuit community of Pangnirtung, in Crystal City, near Resolute Bay, March 2024.Photographer: Louie Palu/Agence VU That morning when I discussed camo with Ouellet, several Rangers were teaching a squad of Vandoos how to hunt seal and fish through the ice. Most of the Rangers hail from Arctic or sub-Arctic communities to the south. They aren’t superhuman; I see signs of frostnip, especially around the eyes, evidence of wind cutting against exposed skin on long snowmobile patrols. But the Rangers’ acclimatization sets them apart. While I fret about my feet getting frostbite despite triple-layered boots, one Ranger kneels on the ice, pulls off his gloves and reties a sled with bare hands. That sled, called a komatik, is itself a form of Indigenous technology. Wooden runners and cross-pieces are lashed together rather than nailed — an elegantly simple design that makes them sturdy yet with enough give to handle rough Arctic terrain. As a metaphor of the pragmatism and adaptability this place demands, they are hard to beat. The Rangers have a quiet presence. For all the incongruity of the Vandoos’ green camo, it’s the Rangers’ outfits that I’ll remember: seal-fur gloves, a bristling coat fashioned from nearly 10 beaver pelts, a striking green cap made from the skin of a harp seal. All stuff that is suited to, and of, this place. It is a tangible facet of the Rangers’ role as living links to the land, waters, animals and people of Canada’s Arctic. They carry generational knowledge of how to survive and thrive here. Master Corporal Kadin Cockney from Inuvik in the Northwest Territories, whose mother is a Ranger, describes a life that’s been defined by seasons of migratory hunting and fishing. Sergeant Noah Mosesee, who has been a Ranger on and off for 21 years, hails from Pangnirtung, or Pang, on Baffin Island and tells me proudly about teaching his youngest son to hunt caribou when he was just 3. Master Corporal Kadin Cockney (l) and Sergeant Noah Mosesee (r)Photographer: Louie Palu/Agence VU Highly trained as they are, the regular military would be lost out in this wilderness without the Rangers’ guidance. “Our Rangers are teaching the army experts. So who’s really the expert: the person who lives here or the person who came up for a visit?” says Sergeant Shawn Spencer, one of the Ranger Instructors who act as a critical link between the Rangers and the regular army. Ranger Instructor Warrant Officer Benjamin Marier (l) and Master Corporal Steve Aulaqiaq (r)Photographer: Louie Palu/Agence VU He characterizes the Rangers as “more organic” than the conventional military — a difference in culture but also a reflection of komatik-like adaptability. Like plans colliding with first contact, rigid army schedules don’t fare well where sudden blizzards chew up days and methodically preparing for the field, with its myriad challenges, takes precedence over a 9 a.m. deadline. “We call it ‘Ranger time,’” says Spencer. Canadian soldiers salvaging snow blocks to build walls around their tents in Crystal City, near Resolute Bay, March 2024.Photographer: Louie Palu/Agence VU To be sure, no meaningful military presence would be possible up here without aircraft, snowmobiles and other modern intrusions. But technology invites hubris. Night-vision goggles fail as batteries succumb to the cold. Condensation hampers automatic weapons (the Rangers use bolt-action rifles). Crashed aircraft are sprinkled across the Canadian Arctic like whale carcasses, melancholic monuments to nature’s final word. Canadian soldiers boarding a CC-130 aircraft at Resolute Bay Airport, March 2024.Photographer: Louie Palu/Agence VU Canadian and US military personnel survey the wreckage of a Royal Canadian Air Force CC-130 aircraft that crashed in 1991 near Alert, Nunavut, June 2016.Photographer: Louie Palu/ Agence VU The skills embodied and taught by the Rangers are vital adjuncts, and backup, to all that. Given that regular soldiers only rotate through the High North periodically (a challenge for the US Arctic effort, too), the Rangers also provide a thread of continuity. Lackenbauer, the historian, calls them a “unique Canadian solution to how to have a meaningful military presence in such a vast area with such a minimal conventional military.” In other words, non-combatants though they are, they punch well above their weight. There is an elegiac moment as Aulaqiaq, who joined the Rangers 50 years ago, begins igloo instruction. Blade in hand, he stands facing a semicircle of Vandoos. Beyond him is an Ozymandian snowscape dotted with the sunken shapes of collapsed old igloos that soldiers scavenge for ice blocks like stones from classical ruins. “This is how we used to live,” Aulaqiaq tells them. “But not anymore. It’s just a story.” As he works, he explains that, when he was a young man, if you couldn’t build an igloo, then you couldn’t get married. You had to be a literal homemaker. When he finally cuts his way out of the completed igloo and pulls himself up from the snow, he thrusts his arms up and shouts “Now I get married!” Everybody laughs. But as he said, the story has moved on. A raw, frozen Arctic char chopped into pieces by a Canadian Ranger for eating on the sea ice near Resolute Bay, March 2024.Photographer: Louie Palu/Agence VU The Hut at the End of the Earth One reason climate change can seem abstract is that it is often portrayed in numbers: temperature variances, ice thicknesses and so forth. When I speak with David Burgess, a research scientist with the Geographic Survey of Canada, he begins by talking instead about a hut. When scientists first began visiting uninhabited Meighen Island in the 1960s to measure its ice cap, flying in by ski-plane from Resolute Bay, they built a hut for shelter and storage. By 1975, the hut was covered by accumulated snow. So they built another one on top. By 2004, that one was covered, and a third was needed. It was the last. By 2008, the year oil prices hit their all-time peak, heavy thawing had begun. “The whole thing just melted right out and blew over in 2013,” Burgess says. We’ve entered the era of falling huts. Melting ice in the Arctic stokes adventurism and an oft-touted “scramble” for position. The verb is wrong — try scrambling when you have to get on five layers just to walk outside for five minutes — but the impulse is real enough. As the sea ice has thinned and retreated, the decades-long legal, scientific and, ultimately, diplomatic process whereby Arctic nations divide up economic rights on swaths of the polar seabed has heated up. A Canadian soldier crawls out of an igloo in Crystal City, near Resolute Bay, March 2024.Photographer: Louie Palu/Agence VU Canada has proposed its own boundaries, under United Nations auspices, which overlap with Russia’s and Denmark’s (via Greenland), as well as a little with those of the US. The scale can be hard to grasp. Canada’s offshore exclusive economic zone and proposed extended continental shelf add up to about 3.4 million square miles, almost as big as the country’s land area. Add renewing Canada’s aging navy to its list of priorities competing for dollars. Canada’s Arctic Rivals Proposed extended continental shelf boundaries of Arctic countries Canada US Russia Denmark Norway Sources: Natural Earth; Oceans and Law of the Sea; United Nations; US Department of State Besides hard choices on spending, addressing Canada’s Arctic conundrum requires more lateral thinking about its objectives and strengths. “We often associate sovereignty with lines on a map, but it’s best understood as everything that goes on within those lines,” says Lackenbauer. In the Canadian context, much of that internal dynamic revolves around the Indigenous peoples who live there and their relationship with Ottawa. This, too, is threatened by climate change. Glaciers are sources of water here, oases in the polar desert; their disappearance risks drought for those relying on them. Thinner, less predictable ice presents a hazard for snowmobiles. Burgess mentions a program called SmartICE, whereby sensors pulled by hunting parties track conditions and find the safest paths, like Waze for ice — ingenious if unfortunate in its necessity. Retreating sea ice also leaves coastlines more prone to erosion and violent storms. With the relationship to the land and sea so central to Indigenous ways of life, the changes now being wrought on the environment undermine the very foundations of these Arctic communities. Survival techniques based on centuries of hunting seasons and weather patterns face possible obsolescence. They are also at risk from sheer neglect. Elon Musk’s Starlink network has transformed internet access around Resolute Bay. I even see a telltale oblong antenna tucked behind a hut at Crystal City. While I am old enough to remember life long before instant messaging and streaming, the youngest recruits to the Canadian Army in 2024 will have been born in 2007, the year the iPhone debuted. They are wired differently. Several Rangers speak in subdued tones of the increasing difficulty in passing on traditional knowledge to younger generations distracted by devices or the lure of lives elsewhere brought to life on handheld screens. I heard similar concerns expressed last year by elders in the remote fishing villages of western Alaska. When I spoke with General Eyre just before his retirement, he envisaged the Rangers’ role in Arctic operations expanding but nonetheless also raised the need to “reevaluate our training model.” Whereas Ranger recruits are expected to arrive downloaded with the skills necessary to survive and thrive, that assumption may also be a casualty of change. Snowmobiles, komatiks and jerry cans with fuel are lined up by Canadian soldiers next to shipping containers at the Canadian Armed Forces Arctic Training Center in Resolute Bay, which is also hosting US soldiers for training, March 2024.Photographer: Louie Palu/Agence VU A phrase I hear several times around Resolute Bay is that “we are guests here,” referring to the non-Indigenous personnel. It seems an odd thing to say when the whole point of this exercise is to demonstrate that Cornwallis is as Canadian as Toronto or Vancouver. It also reflects an essential truth: Canada’s Arctic sovereignty is best understood not as a flag planted in the ice but as a more nuanced construct of overlapping circles or layers. Resolute bridges a history of blunt-force, colonial sovereignty and a more useful, modern relationship between Ottawa and the hinterland. The Rangers personify this on a military level. Meanwhile, the government of Nunavut, carved out as a separate territory 25 years ago, just gained authority over resource development there from the federal government. Even the North American Aerospace Defense Command, or Norad, which guards the skies and waters around Canada, Alaska and the Lower 48 states, is an exercise in pooled sovereignty, and a remarkable one at that. In terms of new military spending, an obvious priority is bolstering and replicating logistical and training centers like the one at Resolute Bay. Sovereignty demands, at a minimum, presence, or at least the capability to manifest it when needed. And up here, that in turn demands the refuge and connectivity such hubs provide. Beyond the military budget, however, spending on public services and civilian infrastructure is what makes sovereignty — in the sense of people actually living in a place — possible at all. Federal transfers to Nunavut of C$50,000 or so per person are higher than the per capita GDP of most countries. Even so, the region scores poorly relative to other Arctic regions in terms of life expectancy and, shockingly so, infant mortality. This represents more of a gap in defenses than a paucity of icebreakers. Canada’s Arctic Demographic Deficiency Demographic and economic indicators for Arctic regions, grouped by area [graphic at link] Source: Econor 2018 data Note: “Nordic countries” includes Greenland, an autonomous territory of Denmark. As much as today’s Arctic narratives revolve around climate change opening things up, it is best understood more tangibly as a force bearing down. The cost of maintaining communities on the polar edge will keep rising. Canada’s balancing act of shared sovereignty here is vital and must enlist a unified cast: military personnel like the Vandoos and Rangers, but also climate scientists, health-care providers, engineers and, wherever possible, industries to provide employment and revenue. The concept of total war is a familiar one, but preserving the Arctic requires something like total defense. For the place with no dawn to be defendable, it must first remain viable. A Canadian soldier walks through a valley near Resolute Bay, in February 2018.Photographer: Louie Palu/Agence VU More From This Series June 4, 2023 Read: Hiding an Army at the Top of the World June 4, 2023 Watch: A Look Inside the US Army Training Camp in Alaska July 10, 2023 Read: Drilling for Oil on the Moon July 10, 2023 Watch: Alaska’s Energy-shipping Advantage July 10, 2023 Watch: Mission to Deadhorse, Alaska July 14, 2023 Watch: What Native Alaskans Say About Drilling Oct. 22, 2023 Read: Red Alert for America’s Wild Arctic Fishery — With assistance from Elaine He This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners. Liam Denning is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering energy. A former banker, he edited the Wall Street Journal’s Heard on the Street column and wrote the Financial Times’s Lex column. 1.Sir John Franklin’s expedition to explore sections of the Northwest Passage in two Royal Navy ships in 1845 met with disaster. Another ship sent to find Franklin and his crew, HMS Resolute, also became trapped in ice and was abandoned in 1854. Eventually recovered, some of its timbers were used to construct the Resolute desk that sits in the Oval Office to this day. View in article https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/features/2024-07-29/as-arctic-race-heats-up-canada-struggles-to-defend-its-land-with-no-dawn Edited July 30, 2024 by BeaverFever 1 Quote
BeaverFever Posted August 1, 2024 Author Report Posted August 1, 2024 (edited) Canadian warship shadowed ‘dual-purpose’ Chinese vessel in Bering Strait A Canadian warship travelled to the Bering Strait in July to shadow China’s most advanced polar icebreaker as the Xue Long 2 transited the passageway between Russia and Alaska as part of Beijing’s effort to reinforce its Arctic ambitions. The Canadian government did not make public this part of HMCS Regina’s trip to the Arctic Ocean until it faced media requests about the frigate’s itinerary this week. The Department of National Defence did not explain why it omitted this monitoring of the Chinese ship from its news release accounts of the trip, which it had described as an “Arctic awareness and sovereignty mission.” HMCS Regina’s tracking of China’s Xue Long 2 (Snow Dragon 2) research vessel came at a potentially fragile moment in Canada-China relations. Open-source vessel tracking websites suggest this took place July 13 to 17. The same ship-tracking websites show HMCS Regina turned off its transponder July 13 in the Bering Sea. Four days later the Canadian vessel reappeared in Arctic waters. …Department of National Defence spokesperson Frédérica Dupuis said in a statement that as climate change warms the Arctic, Canada is seeing more foreign actors with regional military ambitions in the area who seek natural resources, energy and transportation routes. China does not possess territory in the Arctic but has taken to calling itself a “near-Arctic state” with hopes of legitimizing its presence in the region. Ms. Dupuis said China’s Snow Dragon 2 vessel has dual purposes when it enters Arctic waters. Competitor nations “are exploring Arctic waters and the sea floor, probing our infrastructure and collecting intelligence,” she said. On July 24, North American Aerospace Defense Command said it monitored two Chinese H-6 bombers and two Russian TU-95 strategic bombers flying in Alaska’s Air Defense Identification Zone, a defined band of international airspace that requires the ready identification of all aircraft in the interest of national security. “We are seeing more Russian activity in our air approaches, and a growing number of Chinese dual-purpose research vessels and surveillance platforms collecting data about the Canadian North that is, by Chinese law, made available to China’s military,” Ms. Dupuis said. … The Canadian frigate’s trip also coincided with a visit to the Bering Sea by four Chinese military ships including a destroyer, two guided-missile destroyers and a replenishment ship. The government of Japan identified these vessels through postings on X and the U.S Coast Guard reported encountering the Chinese warships. Ms. Dupuis said HMCS Regina did not interact with the Chinese naval flotilla. … Steffan Watkins, an Ottawa-based consultant who tracks aircraft and ships, said he’s still confused why the Canadian military took steps to reduce its visibility during the Bering Strait passage. “Why did they turn off their transponder, specifically hiding their location, for the transit of the strait and until they had broken off from monitoring the research vessel?” he said. “If this is just an innocent friendly passage, why turn off the transponder?” Vice-Admiral Angus Topshee, commander of the Royal Canadian Navy, said he’s proud of how far north HMCS Regina ventured. “It’s extremely rare for a frigate to operate at such high latitudes and it is definitely the record for a Halifax-class north of the Bering Strait.” … https://www.theglobeandmail.com/politics/article-canadian-warship-shadowed-dual-purpose-chinese-vessel-in-bering-strait/#:~:text=A Canadian warship travelled to,to reinforce its Arctic ambitions. Edited August 1, 2024 by BeaverFever Quote
Dougie93 Posted August 2, 2024 Report Posted August 2, 2024 Dr. Jordan Bernt Peterson interviews ; Leftenant General (ret.) Michel Maisonneuve CMM, MSC, CD & Vice Admiral (ret.) Mark Norman CMM, CD 1 Quote
BeaverFever Posted August 13, 2024 Author Report Posted August 13, 2024 (edited) Canadian military drones will face challenges operating in Arctic, RCAF report warns Potential problems include icy, remote runways, -35 C temperatures and limits on satellite coverage for the region. Get the latest from David Pugliese, Ottawa Citizen straight to your inbox Published Aug 13, 2024 • Last updated 10 hours ago • 3 minute read The Liberal government announced on Dec. 19 that Canada would buy 11 remotely piloted aircraft MQ-9B Reaper Drones from Aeronautical Systems, Inc. PHOTO BY GENERAL ATOMICS AERONAUTICAL SYSTEMS INC. /HANDOUT Canada plans to build a facility for its new drones in the Arctic, but will face more than its share of challenges in operating the aircraft in the far north, air force documents show. The Liberal government announced on Dec. 19 that Canada would buy 11 of the remotely piloted aircraft from a U.S. company for $2.5 billion. The new drones will be stationed at 14 Wing Greenwood, N.S., and 19 Wing Comox, B.C. Original plans called for the drones to have their own forward operating location in the Arctic for two of the aircraft as well as maintenance personnel, Royal Canadian Air Force officers told defence analysts in a September 2022 briefing. But that has since been changed and the robotic aircraft will now be located as needed at a forward operating base in the Arctic with other Royal Canadian Air Force planes. Those bases will receive new or upgraded hangars as part of efforts to modernize NORAD capabilities. What hasn’t changed are some of the challenges the drones will face in operating in the far north. Potential problems include icy, remote runways, -35 C temperatures and limits on satellite coverage for the region. The satellites are critical in transmitting flight instructions to the drones as well as for sending surveillance and other data from the aircraft. “Canada’s environment provides unique challenges,” the briefing pointed out. Additional challenges centre on the lack of experience among Canadian military personnel in operating larger drones, the documents noted. The drones will be able to carry different weapons, including 250- and 500-pound bombs as well as “low collateral damage” bombs, according to the briefing on the Remotely Piloted Aircraft System (RPAS) program. Canada is purchasing the General Atomics MQ-9B Reaper for operations both overseas and domestically. The drones could be used on international missions to conduct surveillance and attack targets, while at home they would have a role on sovereignty patrols, surveillance of large events and gathering information in support of responses to natural disasters, according to the briefing. The drones were originally expected to be delivered in 2025, but that will be delayed until 2028 as modifications are made to the aircraft to deal with Arctic conditions. “The need to operate at high northern latitudes, including in the Arctic, requires the use of satellites and aircraft antennas and communication components not previously integrated on the MQ-9,” National Defence spokeswoman Andrée-Anne Poulin explained in a previous email. “Similarly, additional testing and qualification work will be required to ensure the RPAS can be operated and maintained in Canadian climatic conditions.” Poulin said extra time was also needed so Canadian-made systems could be integrated into the drones. Uplands will also be the site for a new $65-million military facility to control the drone fleet. The Ottawa installation, to be ready by 2028, will be around 6,000 square metres in size. It will be home to almost 200 military personnel whose job will be to operate and control the drones flying from the bases in British Columbia and Nova Scotia as well as Arctic locations. The Canadian Forces and National Defence originally claimed to the Ottawa Citizen that the location in Ottawa for the new building was secret for security reasons. But that information was false. National Defence outlined details about the Uplands location in publicly available documents that are online. The department also held public consultations on the Uplands location as part of its environmental assessment for the site, government documents show. The publicly available records outline the construction of the building as well as a parking lot for employees who will work at the Uplands site. The documents indicate that the proposed size of the facility has increased. It was originally envisioned as a 4,000-square-metre building, according to the records, but will now be around 6,000 square metres. The new building will house six stations to control the drones and two simulators to support operations. It will accommodate 198 personnel. It is not clear why the RCAF and National Defence tried to mislead the Ottawa Citizen with false information. Edited August 13, 2024 by BeaverFever Quote
BeaverFever Posted August 14, 2024 Author Report Posted August 14, 2024 Government cost-cutting blows $150M hole in army's equipment maintenance budget While the defence budget is increasing, almost half of the army's equipment is now unserviceable Murray Brewster · CBC News · Posted: Aug 14, 2024 4:00 AM EDT | Last Updated: 3 hours ago A Canadian soldier carries spent light anti-tank weapons following the conclusion of Exercise Steele Crescendo outside of Riga, Latvia in 2020. (NATO) The Liberal government's recent internal budget cutting exercise at the Department of National Defence (DND) has deprived the army's system for maintaining equipment and vehicles of up to $150 million, CBC News has learned. And when the preservation of older systems — the kind that might have to be pressed into service during an emergency — is factored in, the funding gap grows to $260 million, the army acknowledged in a written statement. The shortage of what DND calls national procurement funding is having an impact on the army's ability to respond to a crisis call from NATO or to domestic emergencies, such as the recent wildfires in Western Canada. The "overall serviceability of operational [army] fleets is, as of 10 June 2024, 52 per cent," Lt-Col. Sandra Lévesque said in a statement released to CBC News. CBC asked the department a series of questions about maintenance funding, equipment and training systems. That statement means 48 per cent of the army's equipment is unserviceable — a slight deterioration since last year. CBC News published a leaked document last spring that outlined the state of readiness across the entire military. At the time, the military's figures indicated that 46 per cent of the army's gear was considered "unserviceable." DND said the army's overall maintenance and upkeep budget amounts to $586 million this year. "This covers contracts and the overhead costs associated with industrial support as well as repairs; however, the fund allocation is approximately $150 million short of maintaining the current force's serviceability and roughly an additional $260 million short if considering obsolescence and long-term fleet management obligations," the statement said. "This shortfall will result in a lower serviceability of many Canadian Army fleets." Military told to cut $810M this year The latest federal budget, tabled last spring in the House of Commons, tasked DND with cutting internal spending by $810 million in the current fiscal year, and by $908 million per year in 2026–27 and beyond. In an internal department message, posted the day after the budget was tabled, now-former deputy minister of defence Bill Matthews and now-retired chief of the defence staff Gen. Wayne Eyre told staff that the cuts would target "activities that have a history of underspending their approved funding, and ... initiatives to be delivered in future years." Defence Minister Bill Blair has insisted that any internal military budget cuts would target the bureaucracy, not military capabilities. Defence Minister Bill Blair has said that cuts to military spending will not affect operational capabilities. (Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press) Retired lieutenant-general Andrew Leslie, a former army commander who served one term as a Liberal MP, said there's a clear disconnect between what the minister promised and what's happening to the army. "The Armed Forces don't have the resources they need to do their jobs right now, let alone tomorrow," he said. "If the minister is under the assumption that they do have enough money to do everything they're supposed to do, he's either misinformed or he's not telling the truth." Defence analyst Richard Shimooka agreed and said he believes the budget shortfall is likely to have a disproportionate effect on the army's ability to respond to domestic emergencies. "They have focused all their energies in order to sustain the two thousand or so troops and the ancillary capabilities in Latvia," Shimooka said, referring to Canada's role in NATO's deterrence mission in eastern Europe. The budget woes, he said, are "going to have serious consequences" for the army if it's called on to respond to domestic crises like floods or fires, because those missions are considered lower-priority than overseas deployments. Members from the 41 Canadian Brigade Group (CBG), alongside Alberta Wildfire and local firefighters, participate in fire prevention operations in Drayton Valley, Alta. on May 14, 2023. (Master Cpl. Genevieve Lapointe, Canadian Forces Combat Camera, Canadian Armed Forces) "They're going to have to find savings somewhere," he added. Skimping on maintenance and upkeep, he said, could have "serious consequences" for the army's operational readiness. The military is getting more money from the federal government overall — a cash bump that's largely being swallowed by the purchase of new equipment. But the department has struggled to reconcile the additional cash with the need to cut elsewhere in its budget. At the end of June, Eyre told CBC News that the military did not have answers to crucial questions about how or where the cuts would shake out. All of this is taking place as Canada faces increasing pressure from allies to spend even more on defence than already planned. The country is also being asked to maintain more units at high readiness in case the situation in Europe deteriorates further and Russia's war with Ukraine spills over into neighbouring nations. The army is leading an effort to bulk up NATO forces in Latvia to a full brigade (roughly 4,300 troops or more) and has faced a number of challenges beyond the maintenance budget. It has reorganized its training for soldiers heading to Europe by eliminating a decades-long annual exercise where infantry, tanks, artillery and aircraft trained together. The training for deployed units will now be done in Latvia. The army has insisted the change is not a consequence of budget reductions. Canadian soldiers take part in NATO military exercises at a training ground in Kadaga, Latvia, on Sept. 13, 2021. (Roman Koksarov/The Associated Press) But Leslie said moving the training to Europe means the military no longer has to pay for contracts associated with the now-defunct training regime, including contracts for simulators and travel expenses for soldiers and equipment. "There is no doubt that the Armed Forces right now are in a state of crisis," he said. "And what is not helping the morale of the troops, air, land or sea or Special Forces, is people trying to insist that reductions in funding is not a budget cut. "If you reduce national procurement, if you reduce essential travel for the troops to get to training facilities, if you reduce the capacity of Canadian industry to build ammo, then by definition, you reduce the ability to train." The army has confirmed, meanwhile, that the renewal of an important simulator contract, under the Weapon Effects Simulation Modernization (WESM) project, is in limbo. The government had asked industry for information and had been expected to ask for proposals last fall, but nothing has happened so far. https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canadian-army-equipment-maintenance-1.7293634 Quote
Dougie93 Posted August 15, 2024 Report Posted August 15, 2024 On 8/14/2024 at 7:31 AM, BeaverFever said: Government cost-cutting blows $150M hole in army's equipment maintenance budget While the defence budget is increasing, almost half of the army's equipment is now unserviceable Murray Brewster · CBC News · Posted: Aug 14, 2024 4:00 AM EDT | Last Updated: 3 hours ago A Canadian soldier carries spent light anti-tank weapons following the conclusion of Exercise Steele Crescendo outside of Riga, Latvia in 2020. (NATO) The Liberal government's recent internal budget cutting exercise at the Department of National Defence (DND) has deprived the army's system for maintaining equipment and vehicles of up to $150 million, CBC News has learned. And when the preservation of older systems — the kind that might have to be pressed into service during an emergency — is factored in, the funding gap grows to $260 million, the army acknowledged in a written statement. The shortage of what DND calls national procurement funding is having an impact on the army's ability to respond to a crisis call from NATO or to domestic emergencies, such as the recent wildfires in Western Canada. The "overall serviceability of operational [army] fleets is, as of 10 June 2024, 52 per cent," Lt-Col. Sandra Lévesque said in a statement released to CBC News. CBC asked the department a series of questions about maintenance funding, equipment and training systems. That statement means 48 per cent of the army's equipment is unserviceable — a slight deterioration since last year. CBC News published a leaked document last spring that outlined the state of readiness across the entire military. At the time, the military's figures indicated that 46 per cent of the army's gear was considered "unserviceable." DND said the army's overall maintenance and upkeep budget amounts to $586 million this year. "This covers contracts and the overhead costs associated with industrial support as well as repairs; however, the fund allocation is approximately $150 million short of maintaining the current force's serviceability and roughly an additional $260 million short if considering obsolescence and long-term fleet management obligations," the statement said. "This shortfall will result in a lower serviceability of many Canadian Army fleets." Military told to cut $810M this year The latest federal budget, tabled last spring in the House of Commons, tasked DND with cutting internal spending by $810 million in the current fiscal year, and by $908 million per year in 2026–27 and beyond. In an internal department message, posted the day after the budget was tabled, now-former deputy minister of defence Bill Matthews and now-retired chief of the defence staff Gen. Wayne Eyre told staff that the cuts would target "activities that have a history of underspending their approved funding, and ... initiatives to be delivered in future years." Defence Minister Bill Blair has insisted that any internal military budget cuts would target the bureaucracy, not military capabilities. Defence Minister Bill Blair has said that cuts to military spending will not affect operational capabilities. (Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press) Retired lieutenant-general Andrew Leslie, a former army commander who served one term as a Liberal MP, said there's a clear disconnect between what the minister promised and what's happening to the army. "The Armed Forces don't have the resources they need to do their jobs right now, let alone tomorrow," he said. "If the minister is under the assumption that they do have enough money to do everything they're supposed to do, he's either misinformed or he's not telling the truth." Defence analyst Richard Shimooka agreed and said he believes the budget shortfall is likely to have a disproportionate effect on the army's ability to respond to domestic emergencies. "They have focused all their energies in order to sustain the two thousand or so troops and the ancillary capabilities in Latvia," Shimooka said, referring to Canada's role in NATO's deterrence mission in eastern Europe. The budget woes, he said, are "going to have serious consequences" for the army if it's called on to respond to domestic crises like floods or fires, because those missions are considered lower-priority than overseas deployments. Members from the 41 Canadian Brigade Group (CBG), alongside Alberta Wildfire and local firefighters, participate in fire prevention operations in Drayton Valley, Alta. on May 14, 2023. (Master Cpl. Genevieve Lapointe, Canadian Forces Combat Camera, Canadian Armed Forces) "They're going to have to find savings somewhere," he added. Skimping on maintenance and upkeep, he said, could have "serious consequences" for the army's operational readiness. The military is getting more money from the federal government overall — a cash bump that's largely being swallowed by the purchase of new equipment. But the department has struggled to reconcile the additional cash with the need to cut elsewhere in its budget. At the end of June, Eyre told CBC News that the military did not have answers to crucial questions about how or where the cuts would shake out. All of this is taking place as Canada faces increasing pressure from allies to spend even more on defence than already planned. The country is also being asked to maintain more units at high readiness in case the situation in Europe deteriorates further and Russia's war with Ukraine spills over into neighbouring nations. The army is leading an effort to bulk up NATO forces in Latvia to a full brigade (roughly 4,300 troops or more) and has faced a number of challenges beyond the maintenance budget. It has reorganized its training for soldiers heading to Europe by eliminating a decades-long annual exercise where infantry, tanks, artillery and aircraft trained together. The training for deployed units will now be done in Latvia. The army has insisted the change is not a consequence of budget reductions. Canadian soldiers take part in NATO military exercises at a training ground in Kadaga, Latvia, on Sept. 13, 2021. (Roman Koksarov/The Associated Press) But Leslie said moving the training to Europe means the military no longer has to pay for contracts associated with the now-defunct training regime, including contracts for simulators and travel expenses for soldiers and equipment. "There is no doubt that the Armed Forces right now are in a state of crisis," he said. "And what is not helping the morale of the troops, air, land or sea or Special Forces, is people trying to insist that reductions in funding is not a budget cut. "If you reduce national procurement, if you reduce essential travel for the troops to get to training facilities, if you reduce the capacity of Canadian industry to build ammo, then by definition, you reduce the ability to train." The army has confirmed, meanwhile, that the renewal of an important simulator contract, under the Weapon Effects Simulation Modernization (WESM) project, is in limbo. The government had asked industry for information and had been expected to ask for proposals last fall, but nothing has happened so far. https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canadian-army-equipment-maintenance-1.7293634 the most tragicomic aspect is that the "cost savings" is only $150 million while the federal government is running a $40 billion deficit the city of Toronto is going to spend $150 million on 2 kms of bike lanes, and the Feds are funding 25% of that boondoggle that's Canada in a nutshell, mind you, it's been like this since 1968, it's not going to change other than the government will at some point spiral into an unprecedented financial crisis at which point the military budget will be fully hollowed out in a panic Quote
Dougie93 Posted August 15, 2024 Report Posted August 15, 2024 (edited) On 8/13/2024 at 2:22 PM, BeaverFever said: Canadian military drones will face challenges operating in Arctic, RCAF report warns Potential problems include icy, remote runways, -35 C temperatures and limits on satellite coverage for the region. Get the latest from David Pugliese, Ottawa Citizen straight to your inbox Published Aug 13, 2024 • Last updated 10 hours ago • 3 minute read The Liberal government announced on Dec. 19 that Canada would buy 11 remotely piloted aircraft MQ-9B Reaper Drones from Aeronautical Systems, Inc. PHOTO BY GENERAL ATOMICS AERONAUTICAL SYSTEMS INC. /HANDOUT Canada plans to build a facility for its new drones in the Arctic, but will face more than its share of challenges in operating the aircraft in the far north, air force documents show. The Liberal government announced on Dec. 19 that Canada would buy 11 of the remotely piloted aircraft from a U.S. company for $2.5 billion. The new drones will be stationed at 14 Wing Greenwood, N.S., and 19 Wing Comox, B.C. Original plans called for the drones to have their own forward operating location in the Arctic for two of the aircraft as well as maintenance personnel, Royal Canadian Air Force officers told defence analysts in a September 2022 briefing. But that has since been changed and the robotic aircraft will now be located as needed at a forward operating base in the Arctic with other Royal Canadian Air Force planes. Those bases will receive new or upgraded hangars as part of efforts to modernize NORAD capabilities. What hasn’t changed are some of the challenges the drones will face in operating in the far north. Potential problems include icy, remote runways, -35 C temperatures and limits on satellite coverage for the region. The satellites are critical in transmitting flight instructions to the drones as well as for sending surveillance and other data from the aircraft. “Canada’s environment provides unique challenges,” the briefing pointed out. Additional challenges centre on the lack of experience among Canadian military personnel in operating larger drones, the documents noted. The drones will be able to carry different weapons, including 250- and 500-pound bombs as well as “low collateral damage” bombs, according to the briefing on the Remotely Piloted Aircraft System (RPAS) program. Canada is purchasing the General Atomics MQ-9B Reaper for operations both overseas and domestically. The drones could be used on international missions to conduct surveillance and attack targets, while at home they would have a role on sovereignty patrols, surveillance of large events and gathering information in support of responses to natural disasters, according to the briefing. The drones were originally expected to be delivered in 2025, but that will be delayed until 2028 as modifications are made to the aircraft to deal with Arctic conditions. “The need to operate at high northern latitudes, including in the Arctic, requires the use of satellites and aircraft antennas and communication components not previously integrated on the MQ-9,” National Defence spokeswoman Andrée-Anne Poulin explained in a previous email. “Similarly, additional testing and qualification work will be required to ensure the RPAS can be operated and maintained in Canadian climatic conditions.” Poulin said extra time was also needed so Canadian-made systems could be integrated into the drones. Uplands will also be the site for a new $65-million military facility to control the drone fleet. The Ottawa installation, to be ready by 2028, will be around 6,000 square metres in size. It will be home to almost 200 military personnel whose job will be to operate and control the drones flying from the bases in British Columbia and Nova Scotia as well as Arctic locations. The Canadian Forces and National Defence originally claimed to the Ottawa Citizen that the location in Ottawa for the new building was secret for security reasons. But that information was false. National Defence outlined details about the Uplands location in publicly available documents that are online. The department also held public consultations on the Uplands location as part of its environmental assessment for the site, government documents show. The publicly available records outline the construction of the building as well as a parking lot for employees who will work at the Uplands site. The documents indicate that the proposed size of the facility has increased. It was originally envisioned as a 4,000-square-metre building, according to the records, but will now be around 6,000 square metres. The new building will house six stations to control the drones and two simulators to support operations. It will accommodate 198 personnel. It is not clear why the RCAF and National Defence tried to mislead the Ottawa Citizen with false information. Meh "Defending the Arctic !" is in reality a fake tasking boondoggle other than nuclear submarines under the polar ice, there is no realistic military threat to the Arctic and in terms of "Canadian Sovereignty in the Arctic !" the primary threat to that is America which denies Canada's claims to the Northwest Passage, claiming it to be International Waters beyond the 12 mile limit subject to Freedom of Navigation I would suggest that the real reason the GoC wants the MQ-9 is to use it to spy on the Canadian population to wit, in the event of another Trucker Freedom Convoy, the Reapers would be orbiting overhead bearing in mind that the MQ-9 is not like a patrol plane to cover vast tracks of territory that's not how the MQ-9 works it doesn't have any wide area surveillance capability even if you mount a Gorgon Eye on an MQ-9 that's not designed to watch vast tracks of wasteland like the Arctic Gorgon Eye is designed to watch urban environments, like Ottawa or Toronto the MQ-9 is designed to fly out and orbit over a very specific target running those orbits round the clock in flights of four MQ-9s that's the only thing the MQ-9 would be useful for, it is a COIN platform by design the lunatic leftist Canadian government does not fear the Chinese in the Arctic the Chinese Communists are already their Asiatic Overlords as such, the threat the Canadian Government fears most ; is "far right protesters" otherwise known as the working classes Edited August 15, 2024 by Dougie93 Quote
BeaverFever Posted August 15, 2024 Author Report Posted August 15, 2024 1 hour ago, Dougie93 said: Meh "Defending the Arctic !" is in reality a fake tasking boondoggle other than nuclear submarines under the polar ice, there is no realistic military threat to the Arctic and in terms of "Canadian Sovereignty in the Arctic !" the primary threat to that is America which denies Canada's claims to the Northwest Passage, claiming it to be International Waters beyond the 12 mile limit subject to Freedom of Navigation I would suggest that the real reason the GoC wants the MQ-9 is to use it to spy on the Canadian population to wit, in the event of another Trucker Freedom Convoy, the Reapers would be orbiting overhead bearing in mind that the MQ-9 is not like a patrol plane to cover vast tracks of territory that's not how the MQ-9 works it doesn't have any wide area surveillance capability even if you mount a Gorgon Eye on an MQ-9 that's not designed to watch vast tracks of wasteland like the Arctic Gorgon Eye is designed to watch urban environments, like Ottawa or Toronto the MQ-9 is designed to fly out and orbit over a very specific target running those orbits round the clock in flights of four MQ-9s that's the only thing the MQ-9 would be useful for, it is a COIN platform by design the lunatic leftist Canadian government does not fear the Chinese in the Arctic the Chinese Communists are already their Asiatic Overlords as such, the threat the Canadian Government fears most ; is "far right protesters" otherwise known as the working classes Well at least I can agree that far right protesters are a threat to Canada. But MQ-9 is not the platform to surveil them and certainly we wouldn’t need so many of them. The CE-145C Vigilance is the aircraft we recently acquired for that job. As far as arctic goes I assume MQ-9 is for point surface surveillance and reconnaissance for specific targets of interest whereas P-8 along with satellites, ground-based radar and sonar nets would be for routine wide area surveillance. Quote
Dougie93 Posted August 15, 2024 Report Posted August 15, 2024 28 minutes ago, BeaverFever said: Well at least I can agree that far right protesters are a threat to Canada. in that the Laurentian Elite ruling class has abandoned Noblesse Oblige in favour of far left lunacy putting us on a trajectory towards a massive revolt beyond their control as being the primary threat to civil order hence why I favour the Militia as the arm of decision in Aid to the Civil Power as opposed to buying a lot of American military hardware just for the sake of appeasing Washington Quote
Dougie93 Posted August 15, 2024 Report Posted August 15, 2024 42 minutes ago, BeaverFever said: As far as arctic goes I assume MQ-9 is for point surface surveillance and reconnaissance for specific targets of interest whereas P-8 along with satellites, ground-based radar and sonar nets would be for routine wide area surveillance. again tho, it's a fake tasking boondoggle neither the Russians nor Chinese nor anybody else is going to launch a land invasion in the arctic that's frankly absurd to the threshold of silly if you want to confront the Russians & Chinese, you will need SSNs under the polar ice if you're not doing that then never mind because again, on the surface, it is the Americans who are confronting you in the arctic and obviously you are not really game for picking a fight with them Quote
BeaverFever Posted August 15, 2024 Author Report Posted August 15, 2024 (edited) 40 minutes ago, Dougie93 said: again tho, it's a fake tasking boondoggle neither the Russians nor Chinese nor anybody else is going to launch a land invasion in the arctic that's frankly absurd to the threshold of silly if you want to confront the Russians & Chinese, you will need SSNs under the polar ice if you're not doing that then never mind because again, on the surface, it is the Americans who are confronting you in the arctic and obviously you are not really game for picking a fight with them NOBODY has ever said there was any threat of land invasion and nobody has ever said the purpose of the 11 MQ-9s is to attack land invaders In fact in an article I recently posted in here Eyre joked that if any army ever attempted a land invasion of the Arctic, the only capability anyone would need to launch at them would be search and rescue Edited August 15, 2024 by BeaverFever Quote
Dougie93 Posted August 15, 2024 Report Posted August 15, 2024 2 minutes ago, BeaverFever said: NOBODY has ever said there was any threat of land invasion and nobody has ever said the purpose of the 11 MQ-9s is to attack land invaders fair enough but since the MQ-9 is in fact an already obsolete COIN platform from the GWOT I don't see any particular use for them, other than, again, Ottawa's lunatic war against the "far right" working class bearing in mind, that the Ukrainians are already testing AI controlled drone swarms on the battlefield which make the MQ-9 look like the World War One biplane of drones ; to wit, preparing to fight the last drone war Quote
Dougie93 Posted August 15, 2024 Report Posted August 15, 2024 (edited) On 7/24/2024 at 10:59 PM, Army Guy said: Their mission would be the same as the mechanized troops, using the spare LAV's in storage for transport into battle ....being light in fantry in the canadian military only means you don't have LAV's because they did not purchase enough...oming soon...but i mean come on 12 or more years to buy simple trucks....it is just another red flag thats all. but who says you are actually safer in a LAV6 these days ? the Russians are blowing M1A1 Abrams and Leopard 2's away like it ain't no thang to wit, when they are hovering over you with drones an armoured vehicle is basically a death trap you would honestly be safer dismounting, dispersing, and hunkering down in the trenches World War One 2.0 for example, when you observe the Ukrainian conops now much of the time they are driving around in civilian pickup trucks, with a drone sensor when the drone sensor sounds the alarm, they immediately park the truck to dismount and hide in the treeline armour has become irrelevant being trapped in a vehicle of any kind, in the face of drones, is actually suicidal this is a military epoch in progress like the Maxim machine gun being unleashed upon the Western Front, against Napoleonic tactics to wit, the Ypres Salient, has come full circle; stand to, stand to, prepare grenades, fix bayonets there is no armoured escape from the infantry once again and the air support can't even get through in the face of contemporary SAMs over the top when the whistle blows, into the forlorn hope Slava Ukraini Edited August 15, 2024 by Dougie93 Quote
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