Abstract
Since 1945 Canadian defense policy has continuously been shaped by a set of interrelated deterministic variables: geography, alliances, the public favoring of social programs, and budgets.1 The country’s political, bureaucratic, and even military leadership, have long since sought ways to get more “bang for the defense buck” through the adoption of measures that ostensibly would generate greater efficiencies and efficacy in the Canadian Forces (CF) without undermining the military’s ability to fulfill North American and European alliance obligations. One such approach was the 1968 unification of the three armed services — navy, army, and air force — into one CF. Another effort, and the one being analyzed in this chapter, was the adoption of the concepts and platforms affiliated with the Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA) and its close cousin, Transformation, particularly during the period of 200511, at the height of Canada’s combat operations in Afghanistan. But, as this chapter will emphasize, the CF’s approach to both the RMA and Transformation produced mixed results as plans were undermined by the deterministic constraints typical of defense policy-making in Canada, inter-service tensions found at the executive level within the CF, and, of course, the challenges and costs of combatting an insurgency in Afghanistan.
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Notes
Dan Middlemiss & Joel Sokolsky, “Canadian defence: decisions and determinants”, (Toronto: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich Canada, 1989) pp.121–22 &195.
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William L. Dowdy, “The Canadian navy: torpedoed again”, Armed Forces & Society, 16.1 (1989) p.111. The author makes a poignant remark on Canadian defense, Canadians “… prefer daycare over destroyers, and socialized medicine over submarines. But they can afford both, and maybe they cannot afford not to provide both.”
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The abandonment of a Canadian indigenous jet fighter capability following the cancellation of the CF-105 “Arrow” in 1959 is a fascinating tale of Canada’s integration within the North American defense framework. Unfortunately it is outside the scope of this chapter. For more information see Donald C. Story and Russell Isinger, “The origins of the cancellation of Canada’s Avro CF-105 Arrow fighter program: a failure of strategy”, Journal of Strategic Studies, 30.6 (2007) pp.1025–50
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Robert M. Farley, “Grounded: the case for abolishing the United States Air Force”, (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2014) pp.174–77; Sloan, The Revolution in Military Affairs: implications for Canada and NATO”, p.129.
Daniel Gosselin, “Hellyer’s ghosts: unification of the Canadian forces is 40 years old — part one”, Canadian Military Journal, 9.2 (2008) pp.6–15. A 1962 Royal Commission on Government Organization found that the military and the Department of National Defence were inefficient in their personnel and acquisition policies. This report became the driver for Defence Minister Hellyer’s unification reforms. Over the succeeding decades the three services eventually reasserted their identities by obtaining separate uniforms, environmental command structures (e.g. Mobile Command became Land Force), and their original names: RCN, the Canadian Army, and RCAF.
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A token force of pilots and technicians were rotated through Europe as part of Canada’s contribution to NATO’s Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) and Alliance Ground Surveillance (AGS) programs. These personnel were withdrawn in 2014, again, for cost saving reasons. See Murray Brewster, “NATO surveillance programs withdrawal will cost Canada contracts”, The Canadian Press (5 August 2013), http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/nato-surveillance-programs-withdrawal-will-cost-canada-contracts/article13598502/
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For more information on the decision-making behind the Afghanistan deployments please see Janice Stein & Eugene Lang, “The unexpected war: Canada in Kandahar”, (Toronto: Penguin Canada, 2007).
Kimberley Marten, “From Kabul to Kandahar: the Canadian forces and change”, American Review of Canadian Studies, 40:2 (2010) pp.214–36.
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Department of National Defence, Canada First Defence Strategy, (Ottawa: Department of National Defence, 2008)
David Pugliese, “The return of the Leopard”, The Ottawa Citizen (8 July 2006)
David Perry, “Canada’s seven billion dollar war”, International Journal, 63:3 (2008) pp.716–22
Parliamentary Budget Officer, “Fiscal impact of the Canadian mission in Afghanistan”, (Ottawa: PBO, 2008) p.8
Department of National Defence, “Canadian Forces Transformation: New Operational Command and Control Structure”, Backgrounder (11 May 2012), http://www.forces.gc.ca/en/news/article.page?doc=canadian-forces-transformation-new-operational-command-and-control-structure/hgq87xte
Ibid.; Andrew Leslie, “The Report on Transformation 2011” (Ottawa: Department of National Defence, 2011) pp. vii–ix
David Perry, “Leading from behind is still leading: Canada and the international intervention in Libya”, (Ottawa: CDAI, 2012) p.13.
Rachel Bryson, Katie Domansky, and Rebecca Jensen, “Canada in Libya: strategic lessons learned”, (Ottawa: Defence R&D Canada, 2012) p.21
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Collins, J. (2015). The Perpetual Search for Efficiency: The Canadian Approach to the RMA and Military Transformation. In: Collins, J., Futter, A. (eds) Reassessing the Revolution in Military Affairs. Initiatives in Strategic Studies: Issues and Policies. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137513762_4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137513762_4
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