Conservative pledges: battalions in Goose Bay, Bagotville, Trenton, Comox

[MarkOttawa]

A story based on a February 21, 2006 briefing note.

B.C. units may be used for overseas deployments (stupid headline)
http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/news/story.html?id=e97b12c6-63be-45de-bacd-decf9b6ab7c7&k=52110

A new 650-person rapid reaction battalion to be located at Canadian Forces Base Comox and a smaller unit to be stationed in Vancouver could be fully operational by 2010, according to newly released internal documents...

Harper announced the new units during a December campaign stop and also promised more navy personnel at CFB Esquimalt, new equipment such as search-and-rescue aircraft, and the creation of a territorial "defence unit" to be based in Vancouver made up of 100 regular and at least 400 reserve troops...

The Tory election plan included the creation of three other rapid reaction battalions across Canada as well as the creation of smaller territorial defence units in Vancouver and other Canadian cities...

The RRBs [rapid reaction battalions], to be based in Comox, Bagotville, Que., Trenton, Ont., and Goose Bay, N.L., will be launched next year. Each unit would include three rifle companies, light patrol vehicles, a small headquarters, and a combat service support company...

Another document obtained through the Access to Information Act says there will be a dozen territorial defence units, with "emergency response capabilities," based in Vancouver, Calgary, Regina, Winnipeg, Ottawa, Toronto, Montreal, Quebec City, Saint John, St. John's, Halifax and the Niagara-Windsor corridor...

Most of the briefing note is whited out under provisions of the Access to Information Act which allows the government to exclude from the public advice to ministers. One of the exempted sections covers the estimated cost of the RRB initiative.

However, one document -- and some accompanying e-mails -- suggest that military officials are questioning the capacity of the government to meet all its military commitments.

"The initiatives outlined above aid in satisfying a few of the many key defence objectives outlined by the government," concludes the Feb. 21 briefing note to Buck [Vice-Admiral Ron Buck, the former vice-chief of defence staff].

However, it continues, the desire to create RRBs must be balanced with various other plans, including the creation of the city-based battalions, the doubling in size of the JTF2 special operations unity, and the creation of a Canadian Special Operations Regiment, a new special forces unit...

Mark
Ottawa

 

[Journeyman]

Obviously a slow, and not time-sensitive, news day at the Vancouver Sun.

Clearly they didn't have any real news.....like the CBC's heart-strings' tugger: "I just can't wait to be a wife again, cooking and picking up after him. I miss that a lot." 
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/edmonton/story/2006/08/07/edm-afghan-homecoming.html

 

[George Wallace]

That old song from the '60's' comes to mind......

High Hopes
(From the album "CAPITOL COLLECTORS SERIES")

Writer(s): Cahn/Van Heusen


Next time your found, with your chin on the ground
There a lot to be learned, so look around

Just what makes that little old ant
Think he'll move that rubber tree plant
Anyone knows an ant, can't
Move a rubber tree plant

But he's got high hopes, he's got high hopes
He's got high apple pie, in the sky hopes

So any time your gettin' low
'stead of lettin' go
Just remember that ant
Oops there goes another rubber tree plant

When troubles call, and your back's to the wall
There a lot to be learned, that wall could fall

Once there was a silly old ram
Thought he'd punch a hole in a dam
No one could make that ram, scram
He kept buttin' that dam

'Cause he had high hopes, he had high hopes
He had high apple pie, in the sky hopes

So any time your feelin' bad
'stead of feelin' sad
Just remember that ram
Oops there goes a billion kilowatt dam

All problems just a toy balloon
They'll be bursted soon
They're just bound to go pop
Oops there goes another problem kerplop

http://www.song-teksten.com/song_lyrics/frank_sinatra/capitol_collectors_series/high_hopes/

 

[paracowboy]

somebody tell MND that the NCO cloning machine is N/S.

 

[couchcommander]

somebody tell MND that the NCO cloning machine is N/S.

I was about to say... aren't you having enough trouble meeting CURRENT staffing requirements??

 

[Echo9]

There's no way that the regional reaction battalions can happen within any short timeframe, unless the government is looking to re-locate 3 VP, 3 RCR (what's left of it after CSOR), and 3 VanDoo to fill out Comox, Trenton and Bagotville respectively.  That would allow the politicians to say that they've delivered, and actually have a force in place that can do something in case the bluff gets called.  At a conceptual level, the existence of these battalions also supports CANCOM and how it would/should operate.

Whether CANCOM will end up working is another matter- it's certainly been having teething pains.

The other problem with this approach, is, of course, that it takes these battalions out of the mix for foreign ops, and this capability needs, if anything, bolstering at the moment.

Ultimately, the army is in a pinch now after the years of the "peace dividend", and it will take years to gain the actual capability behind the added numbers that have been promised- with leadership capability growth being the key missing factor.

 

[xo31@711ret]

Most likely can't be done (antytime soon); but from my previous 24 yrs+ in the military; I like the way this PM thinks  ..

-ger

 

[couchcommander]

Dumb civvy question time...

Why all of these different units with specific taskings? Airborne (rapid response, whatever), "home defence" battalions... etc. etc.

Seems like an awful lot of overhead for some very specific roles. Also seems like there are more pressing, basic meat and potato, things needed RIGHT NOW, and most definitely before any of this (I've heard NVG, thermal equipment, radio's, slow rate production of LAV's and Bison's to account for attrition/losses/increased need, repairing a submarine that happens to sitting in dry dock,armed UAV's for both patrol and fire support...list goes on and on.. we could use a functional air defence system as well, not a present operational need, but one of those important things to have in case stuff goes boom).

Why not just fill out the current brigades and CSOR (I assume it will be both airborne and high readiness) and equip them properly rather than making all of these small units for specific, narrow uses. IMO it's more useful to make full use of what we have before jumping onto other things.

Most importantly to me, I think you guys deserve to have what you need to do the job WE are telling you to do, putting your asses on the line for the country and all.

Further, hypothetically, assuming IF, IF they were to do all of this... would still not make more sense to, oh I don't know, stand up another brigade and develop a divisional HQ? Nothing like actually being able to defend yourself (not to mention it would have greater utility in a wider number of roles)

But yea, dumb civvy question, fire away.

 

[redleafjumper]

And what about all of the promises to increase reserve force strength?  It will be most instructive to see if the trucks actually pull up and anyone gets out.

 

[warpig]

There is an interesting opportunity missed here. The Conservatives had a specific vision of the roll they want the CF to perform. Is it rational or was it just shooting from the lip as one of you is so fond of saying? I mean, this was a serious Conservative plank and you have one guy humming a child’s song, one guy going on about slow news days and generally limited functional debate about exactly how far the Conservatives want to go in moving and changing the CF.

Having received a detailed multitude of first-hand reports of how well the 2 PPCLI move to Shilo didn’t go, I would seriously have to question just how far the military would allow the gutting of the Brigades to man new digs in far-flung and un-supportable areas that would cost a fortune to build to any standard. And where are these units supposed to do training? I was posted to London with 1 RCR and we needed to travel an hour just to zero our rifles. Does anyone actually think guys from Petawawa are gonna afford off-base housing in Vancouver? Do you think most of 3 Van Doo would actually leave Valcartier for Bagotville? I’m sure the divorce rate would skyrocket, followed shortly by the young guys quitting in droves and the old guys doing 20 on the dot see ya. Spare us anyone who would quip that tired old phrase “You go where yer’ told to with your mouth closed…” We owe our troops rational postings and money for equipment, training and missions, not sitting around Comox waiting to fight forest fires.

As for a high Arctic unit, how many of you still serving would volunteer for that? Anybody singing children’s songs now? That guy must be retired.

The Conservatives said a lot of things during the election. How much of it was junk and how much were they dead serious about? Harper was in Alert this week. He’s dead serious about units in the far north. Would a three-year IR posting up north suite most of YOU?

 

[MarkOttawa]

warpig:  At least the government is buying stuff, mainly for the air force, to help the army.  It remains to be seen how far the silly battalion promises will be acted on.  What amazes me is that an army person such as O'Connor could have accepted them in the first place.

Mark
Ottawa

 

[geo]

worked across the NWT and Baffin (whups - Nunavut)off & on for some 8 years.
Was a great experience BUT not for everyone and not for the duration.

 

[geo]

Mr O'Connor also said that we are not using the GWagons outside of KAF....... when we in fact are.............

 

[born newfie]

goose bay rocks i am in the army now and as soon as i here that there is a position open i will jump at the chance

(modified to get rid of the extremely annoying number of smileys, here and quoted. Made the damn thread nearly impossible to read. - pc)

 

[GAP]

goose bay rocks i am in the army now and as soon as i here that there is a position open i will jump at the chance

Take it easy on the emotocons...they wear out easy...there's only so many bullets per gif you know!!

 

[warpig]

goose bay rocks i am in the army now and as soon as i here that there is a position open i will jump at the chance

Good to hear you will go to Bagotville at the drop of a hat! Hope you speak French fluently. We need guys like you because so many others won’t go where their wife takes a $30K wage cut and their kids get sub-standard schools and no hope of post-secondary education. Where single guys get the choice of the fattest left-overs and hottest cheating wives, and the ratio is 5 guys to one left-over.

See my point yet? Where I work the Pats WERE asking about the CSOR in Petawawa until they found out their wives would be waiting in line to do the night shift at Macdonald’s and the is next to nothing for their kids to do except get into trouble. No, there is no health clinic in Pet and the closest hospital emergency room is Deep River, 25 minutes away. Getting my point yet? Bit of a come-down from Edmonton, no?

These units are great ideas in principle, if not in theory. But they are way, WAY too impractical. And that leads me to ask why with so many military people supporting the Conservatives, they got limited feedback before opening their mouth. Perhaps the Conservatives are the same as the Liberals: the military will do as it’s told no matter how impractical and uneducated the politicians are.

 

[PPCLI Guy]

the military will do as it’s told no matter how impractical and uneducated the politicians are.

And that is a good thing.

 

[MarkOttawa]

warpig:

Some of us tried:

"WHO WILL TRAIN THE TROOPS AND HOW LONG WILL IT TAKE?"
http://www.damianpenny.com/archived/005457.html

"HOW MANY BATTALIONS HAS MR HARPER? AND HOW MANY IMMIGRANTS HAS MR MARTIN?"
http://www.damianpenny.com/archived/005467.html

Mark
Ottawa

 

[SupersonicMax]

Good to hear you will go to Bagotville at the drop of a hat! Hope you speak French fluently. We need guys like you because so many others won’t go where their wife takes a $30K wage cut and their kids get sub-standard schools and no hope of post-secondary education. Where single guys get the choice of the fattest left-overs and hottest cheating wives, and the ratio is 5 guys to one left-over.

I'm sorry, I'm from Bagotville and no you don't have to take a 30K$ cut to live there (there are all kinds of industries in the region), schools aren't sub-standard and yes, there is in fact 1 university there and a few colleges (all within 15 minutes from Bagotville)  So please...

Max

 

[SeaKingTacco]

Hey warpig,

Slow down on Petawawa- it is not the backside of the moon. I was there from 91-96 and loved pretty much every minute of it.  Yeah, it is not Edmonton, but the nearest emergency room is not Deep River, it is Pembroke (a city of 15,000)- unless something has drastically changed (15 minutes away, not 25 min).  Ottawa is only 90 mins away.

Sure, you are not going to get lost in the skycrapers of downtown Pembroke, but if you are outdoorsy at all, it is a great place to raise kids.

Nothing in our contract says that we will only get posted to major metropolitan centres.  Sometimes, our spouses will have difficulty getting work. Yet, what I have found is that, whatever the perceived drawbacks of a posting location, there are always silver linings.

That's 21 years of experience, FWIW.