27 Sept 12
With a new Chief of Defense Staff coming from the RCAF, who is
committed to the purchase of the F-35, any dreams of the CF operating as a
Joint Force are out the window. For a
generation, at least.
With the examples of blitzkrieg, the AirLand Battle concept,
Maneuver Warfare, and the United States Marine Corps to look at, you would
think that the highest strategic thinkers in NDHQ and in the MND’s office would
gaining an inkling of Air – Land joint operations. That has not happened.
Paul Hellyer’s idea of a single service never extended
beyond the administrative. He sought to
eliminate the silly administrative barriers created by three legally separate
services and inter-service rivalry. Hellyer
never thought about the three services actually working together and in harmony
to defeat the enemy in a battle.
The purchase of the F-35 will eliminate for a generation the
chance for a Canadian AirLand battle concept because nobody is going to use a
stealth fighter to bust tanks, bunkers, or to shoot up enemy ground
forces. And there will be no money left
over to buy something that can, after spending that wad on air superiority
fighters.
So a new question appears: is the CF as currently constituted
best suited to be “strategically relevant and tactically decisive” over the
next thirty years? Instead of a
predominance of Land forces, should the CF be reoriented to favor air and/or
naval power?
Over the past sixty years, Canada’s land contribution to
international efforts has not been “tactically decisive.” In Korea, in peacekeeping, and in
Afghanistan, Canada’s contribution has been “strategically relevant” but can
hardly be said to be “tactically decisive” because the size of the force we
sent was too small. We contributed
troops to a largely U.S. led effort in Korea and Afghanistan. The CF was “tactically decisive” in the small
sphere assigned to it, and the “strategic relevance” of the CF derived from the bragging
rights our government had from having troops in harm’s way.
Tactically, UN peacekeeping has been a failure. So much so that Canada no longer has an
interest in putting a large blue-bereted force in the field. Peacekeeping is no longer of strategic
relevance to the Canadian government.
The bragging rights from having troops in harm’s way is the
strategic relevance the CF will likely have for the Federal government for the
foreseeable future.
But is there not more than bragging rights in the way of
strategic relevance that we can expect of the CF? Does Canada not have interests independent of
the United States, NATO, and the UN?
Many of those of isolationist persuasion (and with the
election of a PQ government in Quebec of Separatist persuasion) would say
no. We live in a fire-proof house far
from the sources of conflagration. But a
stronger air force and navy, and a correspondingly weaker army, has advantages
of their own to those averse to admitting that we might have independent Canadian foreign
interests.
A stronger and more capable air force and navy would enable
a Canadian military contribution to international joint efforts more relevant and
also less hazardous diplomatically than one involving putting large numbers of boots on the ground
to make a recognized effort. They would
also give Canada an independent strategic capability.
The kinds of effort Canada would require from her Armed
Forces in the foreseeable future involve the firing of missiles and the
dropping of bombs from a stand-off distance.
Driving home Canadian diplomacy at the point of a bayonet is unlikely to
be a requirement, and to have to do that involves some pretty serious political
calculations here at home.
It is far easier - tactically, politically, and
diplomatically - to be able to engage an enemy with sophisticated weapons at
long range; and the RCAF and RCN are the services that can provide that kind of
strategic relevance and capability.
The Canada First Defense Strategy is already in tatters
because the government does not have the money it thought it would. The major investments in the CFDS are not in equipment,
but in people and infrastructure.
Perhaps, the CFDS should be reconsidered, with an emphasis on kitting
out the RCAF and RCN at the expense of the Army, which will always be too small
to be “tactically decisive”.
The RCAF and RCN are not arms of tactical decision. But, the strategic relevance of the RCAF and
RCN to the Canadian government domestically and diplomatically in future
conflicts ought to outweigh this factor.
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