Despicable

Some people just make one retch (see final paragraph):

Garth Turner accuses Canadian military of pursuing the destruction of Afghan villages

Thank you, Steve Janke.

Sketched on the back of a cocktail napkin

A telling exchange from Milnet.ca:

E.R. Campbell - « Reply #16 on: Yesterday at 14:54:25 »

Sorry to rain on the parade but, I’m with Old Sweat:

• According to Statistics Canada our GDP at end 2007 was $1.558 Trillion and our defence budget for 2007/08 is $16.881 Billion which equals 1.08% of GDP;


• If the defence budget is $30 Billion by 2027 then that will equal only 1.32% of GDP, IF GDP rises much more slowly than most economist predict;


• As The Ruxted Group has pointed out, a more reasonable level of expenditure on national defence for a would-be Leading Middle Power is 2%+ of GDP; and


• 2.2% (Ruxted’s number) of a very conservatively projected GDP in 2027 of $2.271 Trillion would be $49.965 Billion- nearly $20 Billion more than Prime Minister Harper promises.

But, getting the defence budget to 2% of GDP may be more than the political system can manage. If we grew the budget by stages starting at 2% real growth in 2008/09 and getting to 5% real growth by 2017 – a not unreasonable number when one considers that the inflation rate for things like fuel, ammunition and MILSPEC equipment is waaaaay higher than the general inflation rate of 2%± - we would have a budget of just about $40 Billion by 2027. That's not the $50 Billion we need but better than the $30 Billion Harper is promising.

On the bright side growing the budget from 1.08% to 1.3%of GDP is, at least, not disarmament by stealth.

***

Lone Wolf Quagmire - « Reply #17 on: Yesterday at 15:01:13 »

Well you know what we Cpl's say. "Its better then a kick in the junk!"

David Pugliese writes an article that backs up our impressions here at The Torch:

Canada's defence strategy for the next 20 years will be based on speeches by Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Defence Minister Peter MacKay given yesterday in Halifax.

In a highly unusual move, the Conservative government will base its entire future rebuilding of the Canadian military on Mr. Harper's 10-minute speech and Mr. MacKay's 700-word address. No actual strategy document has been produced, or will be produced, according to government and defence officials. Neither speech went into any specific details about equipment purchases, costs or timelines or how the future strategy will unfold. Both speeches presented more broad-brush approaches to defence.

Asked about when the actual Canada First Defence Strategy was going to be released, Jay Paxton, Mr. MacKay's press secretary, replied: "It is a strategy that you heard enunciated by the prime minister and Minister MacKay."

"It is not a 'document' like a white paper -- it is the vision delivered today for long-term planning for the CF," he added. "As such, the speeches are the strategy."

I'm speculating, but what this tells me is that the Conservatives - for reasons that quite frankly baffle me - are hoping the average Canadian and defence watcher sides more with the Corporals quoted above: "Its better then a kick in the junk!"

But as far as I'm concerned, the NDP's Dawn Black hit the nail on the head, here:

NDP defence critic Dawn Black said even the previous Liberal government produced a strategy document when it last announced its defence policy for the future. "It's appalling that defence is the biggest expenditure of government and yet there's no strategic documents to go with this supposed plan," Ms. Black said. "We waited two years for this, if you can believe it."

Hear, hear, Ms. Black.

Update: From something I wrote more than two years ago:

Interestingly, my concerns with the Conservative platform (page 23 of the pdf, but 45 of the policy book) are exactly the opposite to those I harbour about the Liberal plan. While the Liberals have communicated a vision with mediocre details and follow-through, the Conservatives have laid out significant detail without an overarching policy. Perhaps the Tories assume the policy status quo holds unless contradicted, but I would have liked to have seen that affirmed in their platform. Because, as I've said before, without a cohesive policy thread to hold it all together, their platform is just a series of spending announcements. Welcome and needed spending announcements, mind you, but hardly a defence policy.

I'd like some policy, please. Spending can be turned on and off at a whim. With policy behind it, governments need to at least make a half-hearted show of an argument to justify budgetary changing course. So I want some policy to back up the Conservative spending promises.

We're talking about a budget in the tens of billions of dollars. I don't think a written policy statement is too much to ask.

Updatest: Don Martin hits the nail on the head.

As commenter Zip said over at this thread: "...it's not worth the paper it's not written on."

Up-the-flagpole-date: Here's some informed speculation I just heard:

• There was significant conflict between Hillier and O’Connor over this policy statement which prevented its release except in snippets over the past few years and usually made by the MND on his own.


• There are supporting documents, but they are for the most part still under negotiation or being developed and face the challenge of competing visions.


• The government is trying to shift the focus of the debate back to their election platform which is about protecting Canada’s north and building increased capability in various parts of the country (i.e. maritime commando unit in Comox, northern trg centre in Goose Bay, ice hardened frigates and an arctic port, heavy lift helos and Bagotville, territorial battalion for major population centres, etc.) and not about progressing the war in Afghanistan. They think it is an election winner and would rather fight an election on this than over the war.


• They are doing it at this time because the CDS, who had been the key roadblock on much of this is on the way out, and before a new CDS is brought on board who may oppose it, especially if it’s Natynczyk.

I'm afraid this sounds more than plausible to me, it sounds downright likely.

"Canada First Defence Policy": Drowned squib

Prime Minister Harper gave a speech in Halifax today unveiling the Conservative government's long-promised ( it's well over two years since the Conservatives took power) "Canada First Defence Strategy" (news release here, video here).

Rather a complete disappointment. After all that work we get this--all of five pages if you care to read them. There's nothing new of any substance in the "Strategy". Except maybe these items: the Regular Force will eventually be expanded from the current 65,000 to 70,000 (less than a year ago then-MND O'Connor was promising a future strength of 75,000; DND's 2008-09 Report on Plans and Priorities pledged 68,000 by FY 2011-12. So now 2,000 more in never-never time. Wow.

The reserves, now 24,000 will increase to 30,000. That is 4,000 more than the 26,000 envisaged in the Report--but 5,000 less than the 35,000 Mr O'Connor promised.

The "Strategy" is just a repackaging of what has been in budgets, the Plans and Priorities documents, announced procurement actions, and well-known future equipment replacement projects (update: but only 65 new fighters, very likely F-35s). Future spending pledges are of no substance given the realities of politics. In any event even the promised increases will get us nowhere near spending the 2% of GDP on defence that we probably should be.

Especially disappointing from my point of view is that there is no rethinking of the services' roles and required equipments: e.g. (my examples) Air Force aerial combat/ground attack fighters, Air Force doing search and rescue; a blue water Navy with submarines. I just don't think Canadians are willing to pay for the effective and efficient "combat-capable, flexible, multi-role" Canadian Forces that the "Strategy" maintains will continue to be an achievable goal. I wonder if this essentially empty--from a "strategic" standpoint--two year exercise had anything to do with General Hillier's decision to step down as CDS (he has had his differences with this government).

And of course the prime minister is trying to sell the economic goodies that will flow from current and new procurements. As he put it in answer to a question, getting the "greatest economic bang for the buck". He had no solid answer when asked about speeding up procurement--which is almost always slowed by the time taken to define the attached, highly politicized, industrial benefits--which is why, I'm sure the contract for the C-130Js took so long to negotiate (more here--note the "astounding coincidence" near the end).

A few specific comments. There is nothing about UAVs for northern and maritime surveillance and nothing about satellite surveillance capabilities, especially a follow-on to RADARSAT-2 (see Uppestdate here). There is no mention of a replacement for the Twin Otter as our northern utility aircraft and nothing on attack/escort helicopters (the Buffalo fixed-wing SAR aircraft will be replaced at some point, as will be the Army's LAV IIIs). And there is nothing about big honking ships (more here).

On the bright side General Hillier seems to have been able finally to kill the Conservatives' silly campaign promises about new rapid reaction battalions at various ill-suited bases (update: e.g. Goose Bay) across the country, and for troops in our cities.

Update: Babbling lets fly.

Upperdate: Here's an official list of various procurement initiatives with related backgrounders and news releases. Apparently the prime minister's speech, and that of MND MacKay which followed (not even a news release on that available yet online), are themselves to constitute the "Strategy". Good grief. Moreover the full text of neither speech is online yet.

Predate: There were full defence white papers in 1987 and 1994.

Much ado about...? *flipping pages madly, looking for the "strategy"*

So, the Prime Minister has announced the long-awaited "Canada First Defence Strategy." The news organizations covered what there was to cover (here, here, here, here, and here), but to be honest, I'm not sure what exactly was worth announcing.

This line from the G&M actually made me laugh:

“The newest thing about this announcement is that it is a long-term plan,” Mr. Harper said, suggesting that previous announcements of this type took a piecemeal approach.

Previous announcements were piecemeal? Are you kidding me? The first reader who can point me to the "Canada First Defence Strategy" itself gets a gold star. Because all I can find are announcements and backgrounders.

Even the skeptical Toronto Star got it wrong:

Prime Minister Stephen Harper unveiled his government's $30-billion Canada First Defence Strategy today, a long-term vision statement for the military that was scant on details but vast in scope.

Harper acknowledged there was little new in the announcement, delivered to about 100 military personnel at a drill hall inside the Halifax Armoury, but said it heralded a new way of doing things for Canada's military.

"Vast in scope..." - really? This isn't a defence strategy so much as a budgetary promise, one that can get undone by the next government, or pulled apart by a determined opposition in a minority parliament.

Look, my enthusiasms and loyalties are pretty unambiguous here: I'm in favour of a stronger, better-equipped, bigger, more capable military in Canada. So promising more money and more troops so the CF will be able to do more things to promote Canada's national interests gets my support.

So, as far as that goes: yay for the Conservative government.

But that's not what this "strategy" was originally supposed to be about, was it? It was supposed to be a defence capabilities statement. But then it got its feet stuck in a bureaucratic tar pit, and when it got dragged out for Budget 2008, it looked like this. To this observer, they're trying to stuff a bunch of welcome but piecemeal funding announcements into a pretty new dress and pass it off as some sort of overarching strategy.

It's not. You want strategy? Much as it pains me to say it, and as much as I pointed out the weaknesses in the plan at the time, the Martin Liberals were miles ahead of the Conservatives in terms of an actual policy statement.

Like I said, the first person who can tell me what the Canada First Defence Strategy actually strategizes gets a big red lollipop. I don't expect many takers.

Update: Mark delivers a much more substantive critique here.

Upperdate: Speculation as to what the Harper government might be trying to do with this announcement, at the end of this post. If he's trying to preemptively limit the next CDS, I won't be impressed. But how else to explain this announcement, in this way, at this time?

The CDS

Mark already brought your attention to it in this post, with great excerpts, but I really want to encourage you to read the Legion Magazine piece by Adam Day on Rick Hillier. Day does a wonderful job letting the general's words stand on their own, including this handwritten diagram (click to view a larger version)...

I was particularly happy to hear General Hillier mention the training block that is currently the CF's biggest barrier to growth:

Meanwhile, back in Canada, the CF is in a different struggle. After being repeatedly reduced in size and restricted in equipment purchases in the period following the end of the Cold War, it is now in the position of growing slightly faster than it can manage. “We went down so low in numbers; I actually think we went below critical mass,” explains Hillier. “In a country this big, with this number of bases and stations, with this number of tasks in Canada, this number of tasks in North America with Norad and this number of missions outside…we were below critical mass.”

And while the forces are growing rapidly, the main problem Hillier faces is training the recruits fast enough. In addition, he says there are so many procurement programs going on that they too are moving a little too fast to handle. “We’ve got more equipment programs ongoing right now than we can actually manage at one time,” he explains, “and as a result we are prioritizing and sliding some to the right. For example, we would have liked to have been at fixed wing Search and Rescue two years ago, but it just wasn’t possible with all that we’re doing, but now in the not distant future we’ll get back to that one and get that one moving….”

I've spoken with two senior officers in the past few weeks, both of whom have some experience putting people through the recruitment-training-employment-retention pipeline, and both mentioned the training bottleneck as a significant problem. When we can recruit motivated and talented people into the CF, but then lose them to voluntary withdrawal after they spend a year in a PAT (Personnel Awaiting Training) platoon painting rocks white in Borden, or picking up garbage in St. Jean, or making coffee in Halifax, we're doing something wrong. Not just because we lost those recruits, mind you, but because each of those recruits has friends and family whose opinion of the CF as a profession will be tainted by their one recruit's poor experience.

Anyhow, the article touches upon a whole host of issues, including Hillier's "Four Lessons of Counter-Insurgency Warfare," and other gems. Like I said, do yourself a favour and read the whole thing.

Update: Oh, and for those who need a laugh on this overcast Monday, remember: Rick Hillier makes Chuck Norris look like a baby when it comes to fighting. No, really - Rick came over to Chuck's place last week and made him dress up in a diaper and bonnet with a soother in his mouth. And Chuck thanked him for it, right before paying Rick 105% of the earnings Chuck had made from movies based loosely on 1/10th of what Rick Hillier could do.

Totally true story.

"15 Wing under attack (sort of)"

Interesting Air Force training (via Spotlight on Military News and International Affairs):

15 Wing Moose Jaw was attacked by a squadron of CF-18s on Thursday.

The CF-18 squadron — on transit from Bagotville, Que., to Cold Lake, Alta. — was participating in an airfield mock attack, which was planned as a motivational exercise for the student pilots presently going through the NATO Flying Training in Canada program (NFTC).

The CF-18s simulated disabling the wing’s fuel supply, the runways and the control tower in four circuits around the 15 Wing airfield. Many of the students and personnel from the wing watched as the aircraft flew attack patterns around the airfield.

“In the air everything is serious, even during training missions,” said Maj. Paul Doyle who flew with the squadron.

After the mock attack, the squadron, which included Doyle, Capt. Corey Mask, Capt. Larry Gojla and Capt. Dave McCloud, held a debriefing for the students of the NFTC.

Those attending the debriefing, which was like a recruitment seminar, were told the capabilities of the CF-18, two-engine, single seat fighter and the multiple roles the aircraft is capable of handling during times of war, acting as a fighter jet, a bomber or both.

“Even with a damaged wing or tail these planes are capable of flying as the computers inside compensate for any distress placed on the plane,” said Gojla.

The students were told about the roles of a fighter pilot, whose No. 1 job is the defence of North America through NORAD operations, any NATO commitments and general purpose combat capabilities.

The squadron was en route to Cold Lake to participate in an advanced [international] aerial combat training exercise [MAPLE FLAG--lots here] which simulates war time conditions and puts the fighter pilots through training that gives them valuable combat experience.

The exercise itself occurs annually over a six-week period.

“This is where we are evaluated, we test weapons, our pilots and our crews to make sure everyone is ready when we need them to be,” said Doyle.

Here's a flight simulator for Cold Lake Hornets.

Update: MAPLE FLAG news here; six CF-18s recently in Exercise Red Flag-Alaska.

Now if the Taliban can only be hit for six...

Who says there's little progress? I'll be they weren't playing cricket at the time of the three Anglo-Afghan wars:

Afghan cricket team aims for world cup glory

Taj Malik has more to worry about than rain stopping play or the wicket his team will have to bat on.

The charismatic coach of the Afghan cricket team has been threatened by a suicide bomber for not picking a particular player, while his brother and one of his star bowlers bear the scars of bullet wounds from years of war.

But Mr Malik, 32, and his players say that nothing will stop them achieving their dream of getting to the Cricket World Cup in 2011...

Afghanistan has had an international team only since the Taleban were ousted in 2001 but the potential is amazing. In 2006 the Afghans beat the MCC by 202 runs, getting the former England captain Mike Gatting out for a duck. Hamed Hassan, their fastest bowler, and team-mate Mohammed Nabi, 24, were recruited later by the MCC for several matches.

Talk about "Out of the Ashes". More, from the Asian Cricket Council:

Afghanistan are the rising stars of Asian cricket. Already with a global following, they play with dash and panache, care only for winning and consider every match played to be a matter of national honour. Since becoming ACC members their progress has been rapid and had it not been for tactical naïveté and an ability to countenance anything else but big hits against spinners, it would be they and not Hong Kong who would be in the next Asia Cup...

More on hitting for six (second para). And don't forget the Kabul Golf Club--nor the Afghan Sports Federation.

CDS General Hillier in the Legion Magazine

Much to think about--more allied support (read American) seems crucial (via Spotlight on Military News and International Affairs):

...
While he believes there is slow and steady progress in Afghanistan, he says there is “not enough development visible” and that while the Taliban have been diminished, they are still a lethal fighting force.

Despite this, he is confident that the bulk of the fighting is over, and that in the near future, after February 2009, Canada will be able to devote a larger proportion of its forces to training Afghan soldiers and police, mainly using the Operational Mentor Liaison Teams (OMLTs) which are Canadian soldiers embedded inside Afghan army and police units.

Meanwhile, Hillier acknowledges that the task of stabilizing Kandahar province and routing the Taliban has been a difficult mission, particularly in what he calls the “iron triangle,” the area west-southwest of Kandahar city roughly centred on Zhari, Panjwai and Pashmul, birthplace of the Taliban, where the majority of fighting has occurred.

While for the past two years the CF had tried to tackle this ground largely alone—and consequently was engaged in a futile game of battling to drive insurgents off a piece of land only to have to withdraw and cede it back to them—in the next few months, according to Hillier, there will be a whole new reality on the ground. “The fact is we didn’t have the troops to be in places all the time. So we could surge in, but then we had to go elsewhere to conduct an operation and the Taliban therefore could come back in and felt free to do so, and in fact still do…right now it’s a whack-a-mole game as they say.”

But heading into this spring, a number of things have changed in favour of the NATO mission. The first and most obvious are the approximately 3,000 United States Marines streaming into Kandahar province to work alongside the CF, in “synchronized operations,” as Hillier calls it.

But beyond that, as Hillier points out, are a few more subtle but possibly equally decisive developments. Not only are the famed Nepalese Gurkhas now operating alongside the Canadian battalion in the south as a regional reserve battalion, there is an American theatre reserve battalion also slated for operations in the south. “The potential of four battalions or more working together in Kandahar for good parts of this next campaign season from March to November changes the dynamic completely,” says Hillier. “Because the Taliban can’t just withdraw to Maywand district or to Spin Boldak or to the northern Arghandab because there’s going to be a battalion there also. So all of a sudden they’re left without a place to go and we have a more sustainable presence over the next six to eight months in a huge way and that allows the police to get in and do something and it allows their confidence to grow and it allows us to make more progress with the Afghan army because we’ve got more training teams there.”..

Meanwhile, back in Canada, the CF is in a different struggle. After being repeatedly reduced in size and restricted in equipment purchases in the period following the end of the Cold War, it is now in the position of growing slightly faster than it can manage [more here]. “We went down so low in numbers; I actually think we went below critical mass,” explains Hillier. “In a country this big, with this number of bases and stations, with this number of tasks in Canada, this number of tasks in North America with Norad and this number of missions outside…we were below critical mass.”

And while the forces are growing rapidly, the main problem Hillier faces is training the recruits fast enough. In addition, he says there are so many procurement programs going on that they too are moving a little too fast to handle. “We’ve got more equipment programs ongoing right now than we can actually manage at one time,” he explains, “and as a result we are prioritizing and sliding some to the right. For example, we would have liked to have been at fixed wing Search and Rescue two years ago, but it just wasn’t possible with all that we’re doing, but now in the not distant future we’ll get back to that one and get that one moving….”..

“The part that’s negative is when you get the phone call in the middle of the morning, middle of the night—and I used to joke to my guys, but it wasn’t much of a joke, that nobody phones me at three in the morning to tell me I’ve won the lottery—when that phone rings at three in the morning I’m now to the point where I sit up, take my time, get ready, because I know what’s on the other end. That’s the only reason people are calling, because we’ve lost somebody. And that part is the part of it that I don’t wish on any chief of defence staff...

As the battle for Kandahar province moves away from conventional force-on-force confrontation, the fight is increasingly becoming the kind of thing special operations forces were designed to do. While Joint Task Force 2—Canada’s top-end counter-terrorist force—has been in Afghanistan since 2002, Hillier confirmed that the Canadian Special Operations Regiment (CSOR) is now conducting operations in Afghanistan as well. While details of the operations are secret, Hillier makes it clear that Canada’s special operations forces are actively hunting Taliban leadership across Kandahar province...

“What we want to do is take out the commanders who are engaged in orchestrating, facilitating, paying, leading, planning and driving folks to attack us or attack the Afghans or attack the innocent. And our special forces are focused very much on that. And that sets conditions for success in Kandahar but equally important from our perspective it helps reduce hugely the threat to our men and women.

“I said (during a recent speech) that we had removed from the battlefield six commanders who were responsible for the deaths of 21 Canadian soldiers, well that’s changed. We’ve removed seven commanders who have been responsible for the deaths of 27 soldiers and that in itself means those commanders—who are capable people—are not out there planning and setting up and enabling attacks against us, let alone attacks against Afghans or aid agencies.”..

...“You don’t win a counter-insurgency campaign with the military operation. What you do is keep the insurgents, in this case the Taliban, you keep them from stopping the progress or slowing the progress, although sometimes they will slow it but you keep them from stopping it, until you can actually build that country around them. And the cross-over point is hard to see, but in my view it’s subjective. So, right now, if a big explosion occurs in Kabul, people still look around to see if the Afghan government is still standing, still there. Because, you know, the confidence is still fragile. At some point in time, Afghanistan will become like many other countries, it will still have violent problems, but when they occur, nobody will be concerned that this is going to cause a series of events and lead to the fall of the government, because they will have confidence that the government is going to be able to handle this. And that’s the part you’ve got to cross over...

...“From our perspective a counter-insurgency requires professional soldiers and sailors and airmen and airwomen of a degree that I don’t think history has ever demanded. It requires leadership at the very lowest level. Young men and women we rely upon to do things that are quite phenomenal, out on a dirty, dusty dangerous trail, way beyond any of the other units, with local Afghans…. The professional serviceman or servicewoman that’s required for that is absolutely incredible, and I think one of the things (Afghanistan) has re-validated for us, is that we’ve got… professionals in uniform.”

"Afghanistan: policy, conflict, context"

Media round-up from the Conference of Defence Associations.

"Petraeus, Afghanistan and the Lessons of Iraq"

A lengthy piece, well worth reading, at the Conference of Defence Associations web forum. Here's an earlier post on General Petraeus' taking over Central Command.

Update: Intelligent intervention, with a sad result.

ISAF: US getting really serious about stronger command role in south

American generals are now taking action; that slightly disingenuous "one country" surely is meant to be the US (unless the Americans would settle for the UK and the UK accepted):

NATO could change its rotating command of southern Afghanistan [see end of link, more here] and give the role to a single country, amid concern that the current system is boosting the Taliban insurgency, NATO's top US general [SACEUR] said Thursday.

"Everything is open," General Bantz Craddock told AFP when asked how command of the Taliban hotbed area, which currently alternates between Canada, Britain and the Netherlands, was likely to change.

Craddock said he received a letter from the commander [US General Dan K McNeill] of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force, saying "it would be better if we had one country take lead as opposed to rotate."

ISAF includes 47,000 soldiers from 40 countries who work alongside a separate US-led coalition numbering about 20,000 and the Afghan security forces to defeat extremist violence.

Regional governors from Afghanistan warned earlier this week that failure by Western powers to coordinate their military deployment could ultimately play into the hands of the Taliban, because some countries had gained a reputation as softer targets while others were more aggressive.

Craddock said he would make a recommendation but the decision would be made in the political arena.

He added that "from a military perspective, unity of command does make a lot of sense ... on the other hand you want a full participation."

US Defense Secretary Robert Gates said last month that he expects a significant addition of US forces in Afghanistan next year, though the Pentagon has stressed that such a move would depend on deep troop cuts in Iraq...

The US generals would not be taking these actions without political support in Washington--I hope the US has conducted some serious diplomacy trying to ensure that we, the Brits and the Dutch may be amenable. I also wonder how much real consultation there has been by General McNeill with senior officers in Afstan of other ISAF contributors.

The command of ISAF itself seems to have stopped rotating for the time being.

Update: More Marines would certainly lend weight to the US case. From horses' mouths:

The Marine Corps may begin shifting its major combat forces out of Iraq to focus on Afghanistan in 2009 if greater security in Iraq allows a reduction of Marines there, top Pentagon officials said yesterday.

Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates and Adm. Michael G. Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said that the proposal by the Marine Corps commandant, Gen. James Conway, to focus his force on Afghanistan -- which they rejected late last year -- could be reconsidered.

"Should we be in a position to move forces into Afghanistan, I think that certainly would come back into consideration," Mullen said at a Pentagon briefing. He said that he understands it is challenging for the Marines to have "a foot in both countries" and that Conway seeks to "optimize the forces that he has," but stressed that any shift is likely to occur "down the road."

Gates said he agrees that the Marine Corps shift is "a possibility" for next year. He explained that when he earlier said the change "wouldn't happen on my watch," that was not an unchangeable policy decision -- he meant it would not unfold until 2009, when he plans to step down.

Gates said that the Pentagon is still looking at options to increase U.S. troop levels in Afghanistan in 2009, but that there is no plan to extend the seven-month deployment of about 3,200 Marines dispatched there this spring. "I'd be loath to" extend the Marines beyond November, when they are scheduled to leave Afghanistan, he said.

A senior military official said this week that after a "vigorous debate," Mullen, Conway and other members of the Joint Chiefs recently hammered out their priorities for employing stretched U.S. ground forces: first, Iraq; next, Afghanistan; and finally, bringing troops home to increase the amount of time they have in the United States to train and recuperate...

"The People We Believe In"

A picture...and a future?

New fighters: Denmark vs. Canada

What the Danes are doing (AW&ST, April 28, p. 20, text subscriber only):

Denmark plans to fly air force pilots in the Boeing F/A-18E/F Super Hornet as part of its fighter evaluation process. The Danish Defense Ministry has asked the U.S. Defense Dept. to release additional information on the aircraft. The Saab Gripen and Lockheed Martin F-35 are also contenders. A selection is expected by mid-2009 [emphasis added, these things often slip].

What Canada is doing (from December 2006):

...
Canadian defense officials are eying the 2012 time frame for a final decision on what platform, or mix of platforms, will replace the F/A -18E/F Super Hornets [well no, they're just Hornets, not "Super" (warning: Boeing site)] that make up the majority [all] of Canada’s fighter fleet...

That eventual fighter force structure is expected to be transitioned into the Canadian air force between 2017 and 2020...

These would be very useful...

...in addition to RADARSAT-2. Northrop Grumman wins the US Navy's Broad Area Maritime Surveillance (BAMS) competition (AW&ST, April 28, p. 27, text subscriber only):

The U.S. Navy’s decision to select a Northrop Grumman design for its new surveillance unmanned aerial vehicles appears to secure the company’s foothold as that service’s preferred UAV provider.

The Apr. 22 announcement also stamped out Lockheed Martin’s attempt, as a prime contractor for a General Atomics Aeronautical Systems’ Predator-derived design, to break into the burgeoning Navy Broad Area Maritime Surveillance (BAMS) UAV market.

The decision stemmed a push by General Atomics, a mainstay in the U.S. tactical UAV account, into the strategic market carved out by Northrop Grumman’s Global Hawk...

One of the reasons for delays earlier in the BAMS program was to allow time to work cooperatively to craft requirements for the U.S. system that would also satisfy Australia’s needs. Canberra put $15 million into the program prior to development and is expected to add another $100 million for this phase. A formal decision is expected by year’s end.

Dishman [BAMS program manager at NAS Patuxent River, Md.] says there is interest from the U.K., Canada [emphasis added--see end at this post], Singapore and Japan in buying the system down the road.

Update: Industry minister Jim Prentice has confirmed the decision not to allow the sale of MacDonald Dettwiler and Associates' space division (maker of RADARSAT-2) to an American firm. Bad decision.

On bullets and beans

I'm not a logistician. I don't even play one on TV. But I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night, so here goes...

With thanks to my Chief Ottawa Correspondent for pointing me in the right direction, I had a chance to read Chapter 2 of the Auditor General's report to the House of Commons, which deals specifically with "Support for Overseas Deployments - National Defence (pdf)." As usual with these reports, I found it insightful, plainspoken, and to the point.

In most organizations - especially big ones with very specialized sub-units like, say, an Auditor General - if you're a hammer, every problem coincidentally turns out to be a nail. So it was refreshing to see a watchdog organization say, in essence, that while there are issues with operational support to the Afghan mission, overall it seems to be working: for the most part, the pointy end is getting the in-theatre support it needs.

National Defence has been able to deliver to troops its equipment and supplies that they need to do the job in Afghanistan. While we did note that commanders have expressed concerns over some supply chain shortcomings, we found no reports of supply chain problems that had significantly affected operations. This is largely because the high level of dedication and hard work of Canadian Forces personnel enabled them to deliver the needed support.

For those who don't speak governmental bureaucratese, that's pretty high praise for the men and women on the ground doing the grunt work of getting people and materiel into the hands of the troops at the tip of the spear. In fact, the report gets even more blunt later:

While there is little information available to quantifiably assess the supply chain’s performance, our observation is that results are often achieved more by military personnel’s concerted efforts than by the system’s design.

In other words, the supply folks are doing whatever it takes to make things happen. Good on them for that.

Of course, that doesn't mean there aren't problems. And of course, the AG lays out just what those problems are. I won't go into each in detail, as you might as well read the whole document at that point. In fact, if you're interested in this sort of stuff, I'd recommend you do just that.

But for the rest of you, I'll just touch on some highlights. First, the design of our supply system isn't the best at supporting deployed operations. The realities on the ground don't match the theoretical model.

I'll give you an example. The base at Kandahar runs on the same stocking system as bases back in Canada: hold 30 days of stock on everything you need at your own warehouses. The system is set to automatically reorder certain stock when levels dip below a trigger point. For some stock, however, the reordering is a manual affair, with priority codes inputted by the folks in theatre.

The first problem is that it often takes more than 30 days to deliver stock to KAF.

That's partly because of transport shortages: during the audit period, which as far as I can gather was roughly 2006-2007, we chartered two to three commercial aircraft per week to move materiel, while we used our own aircraft only once per week. It's partly because we haven't always got the right equipment to properly load the cargo for transport:

The proportion of some types of materiel-handling equipment that is in working order has been unacceptably low. It was reported that some materiel-handling equipment deteriorated so badly that it needed immediate replacement. Logistic reports from Kandahar showed that the shortage and lack of working equipment was affecting the ability to support day-to-day operations. Logistic reports also stated that the unavailability of working materiel-handling equipment at CFB Trenton, used to load and unload supply planes, delayed the return of various types of equipment shipped by these planes for repair.

It's partly because of lack of availability of some supplies from the supplier, like spare parts for the Nyalas. Interesting passage:

...shortages of spare parts from the manufacturer contributed to the armoured wheeled vehicle known as the Nyala being sent back to Canada. The three Nyala in Kandahar were out of service for months and subsequently returned to Canada as the parts could no longer be acquired, due in part to obsolescence.

That's like getting a much needed role player at the trade deadline, and then having him go down with a career-ending injury two games into the schedule with his new team. Ugh.

It's partly because our purchasing models aren't always spot on with their projections, like how the CF underestimated the need for spare parts for our heavy logistics trucks, which were going through parts far quicker than expected because of the rough operating conditions and the tempo of operations. And it's partly because ordering more supplies isn't always easy, as the example cited below illustrates:

Soldiers in Afghanistan are protected by body armour, helmets, and goggles, which has saved lives by protecting vital areas. Consequently, the hospital treats a large number of serious injuries to arms and legs. Between February and July 2007, 281 orthopaedic surgeries were performed, representing half of all the surgeries during that time. Surgeons needed large numbers of orthopaedic surgical pins to fix and correct the bone fractures on wounded soldiers and civilians.

Orthopaedic pins are expensive and since orders for pins cost more than the $5,000 procurement approval limit, any purchases of more pins had to go through the government contracting process. In April 2006, National Defence recognized the high demand for these items and initiated negotiations for a standing offer of agreement to ensure a quick supply. By October 2006, an agreement was signed with a vendor, with a purchase limit of $40,000. However, by this time the Canadian Forces medical system needed over $400,000 in surgical items from the vendor and it was not until November 2006, seven months after the need was identified, that stocks were shipped to Kandahar.

In other words, there are a whole pile of reasons why the base at KAF should be stocking more than 30 days worth of supplies.

The second problem is that we can't always keep track of the supplies once they arrive:

2.29 We found that in many cases when supplies seemed to be arriving late, the goods had already been received but the mission in Afghanistan was unaware. The mission has a database that lets users know if items are in transit. It cannot, however, provide information on when supplies are likely to arrive. The Department is shipping 85 tonnes of goods weekly by contracted airlift to the mission, and we found that it is able to track goods while in transit, but can lose sight of supplies once they arrive at their destination. In Kandahar, it can be difficult for supply technicians who run the supply warehouses that receive shipments to know what has arrived or where to find it.

2.30 National Defence has an established system of stock numbers, package tracking numbers, and waybills to know what the requested items are and where they are in the supply chain, but technicians receiving the planeloads of supplies are required to deal with shipments manually. Supply technicians must physically find the goods, check their condition and quantity, and write down that they have been received. Therefore, supply technicians in Kandahar may not actually know that some supplies have arrived until they find the boxes and put them on the shelves. As a result, some items may be reordered or even forgotten, which can result in surplus stocks, unnecessary delays, or wasted shipments. National Defence regularly reviews its holdings in Afghanistan to maintain control and sends in rotation support assistance teams to conduct inventory counts. During the last review of its inventory holdings, the team found that the Department had lost track of a significant amount of inventory — over $7 million of items could not be located — but it found another $6.6 million of items that were not listed as part of the mission’s holdings. The mission may have been unaware that it had the items, which included spare parts to repair equipment. [my emphasis]

That's almost $14M of lost stuff. Now, I suspect that those numbers, while sounding huge, represent a very small percentage of the overall materiel shipped to KAF. But it's still astounding, especially for an organization that is a stickler for accountability (Pretty much everyone I know in uniform has said some variation of this: "Hey, be careful with that - I signed for it!").

We lose stuff partly because we're understaffed, partly because we're way behind on the technology we're using, and partly because we're not even using the technology we have to our best advantage:

2.32 The Department has recognized that it has a shortage of supply personnel to deal with the volume of goods arriving in Kandahar and, from time to time, it sends in technical assistance teams to help clear backlogs. It also increased the number of contract personnel it uses to perform supply functions. However, the technicians are using a bar coding system in a manual way, not in the electronic way they are trained to do in Canada. This slows down the receipt of goods in Afghanistan. [again, my emphasis]

How badly was the support end of the mission understaffed at the beginning? Check out this graphic:


From May 2006 to July 2007, the support staff were tripled. And we're still a bit short, as I understand it (It would be interesting to know the number of TAV's required on the support side in the last twelve months. But I'm not going to eat up somebody's time at CEFCOM asking for a compilation of that data. Of course, if anyone reading has the info at their fingertips...).

So, given the realities of the supply system leading into KAF, how do the soldiers, sailors, and airmen respond? They do whatever it takes, of course. They pull out the gun tape and baling wire, and get 'er done. Just look at this fleet reliability graphic:


That's just plain impressive, especially once you know about the supply chain difficulties. How do they do it?

Well, for one thing, they cannibalize equipment when necessary:

2.44 Although undesirable, maintenance personnel are permitted, when necessary, to borrow parts from one piece of equipment in order to make timely repairs to another. Our audit found that borrowing was necessary on some critical fleets in order to keep enough equipment available to meet mission needs.

...

2.52 In 2003, before beginning operations in Kandahar, the Department introduced tactical uninhabited aerial vehicles into operations at Kabul. About 85 flights were flown until June 2004 when the vehicles were no longer sustainable due to crashes and failures. In February 2006, the vehicles were reintroduced into operations at Kandahar, resulting in a number of challenges, including crashes, frequent flight cancellations due to equipment problems, and shortages of spare parts, with long lead times to reorder. By September 2006, the Department recognized that the vehicles’ sustainability was again at risk. A number of actions have been taken, including extensive borrowing of parts from other aircraft to keep the aircraft operating. Our review of flight data from February to August 2007 shows that Canadian Forces operators, maintenance personnel, and supply personnel managed to keep the fleet operational but serviceability and parts availability issues persisted. [Babbler's note: I suspect that if you included the cost of crashes, the Sperwers would be among the most expensive aircraft the CF owns, based on cost per hour of flight time]

...

2.54 The Canadian Forces in Kandahar keeps a reserve fleet of equipment, known as operational stock, to be used when the number of available vehicles declines. For example, a LAV III light armoured vehicle damaged beyond local repair could be replaced by a vehicle from the reserve if one is available. This reserve stock has also been used in Kandahar as a pool through which equipment is rotated in order to undergo upgrades, such as the installation of additional armour and protection, without affecting the number of pieces of equipment available for operations.[my emphasis]

For another, they game the system to some degree. That is to say, they figured out how to manipulate the system so that the really important stuff got where it needed to be. Here's what the AG saw:

2.25 We observed that requests are identified in the system with both required delivery date and priority. Some 47 percent of requests for items from the main depot in Canada are coded as either operationally critical or essential. As well, 81 percent of these orders ask for delivery within 10 days—a cycle that has been very difficult to achieve. The supply chain is expected to use the priority code in conjunction with the required delivery date to determine the most appropriate and economic mode of transportation to meet the required delivery date. For example, less urgent items can be shipped by sea and road, which is less costly than by air. However, most items were needed within a time frame that only shipment by air could accommodate.

2.26 We observed that while some supplies needed on a priority basis arrived quickly, often supplies listed as operationally critical or essential did not. We wanted to know if there was an impact on operations if supplies that were described as operationally critical or essential arrived late. We could find no reports of late supplies seriously affecting operations. However, we did review reports where delays in receiving parts reduced the number of military vehicles and equipment ready to be put into service.

2.27 We also found that the system sometimes recorded required delivery dates that were the same as the date the request was made, thus making timely delivery impossible. We found that these unrealistic required delivery dates, combined with high priority coding, resulted in special handling and increased transportation costs. The Department is currently redrafting its instructions to provide better guidance on requesting and shipping supplies and to try to minimize high priority demands.

2.28 We found that higher priority items were generally transported faster than those of lower priority. Nevertheless, we noted that when items were identified as particularly high priority by the user in-theatre, those responsible for getting them to Kandahar did not rely on the supply chain, but instead made phone calls back to Canada to ensure that items were flagged and shipped right away. [my emphasis, yet again]

If you can decode the bureaucratese, what that means is that people order everything "high-priority," knowing full well it won't arrive in the time frame they're asking for, but also knowing that if they don't, their item will get bumped for someone else's "high-priority" item. When it's really, REALLY mission-critical, phone calls get made to flag stuff informally outside the system. There's nothing like the supply-chain mafia - mostly sergeants and higher - to get what you need when you need it. Scroungers are doing what scroungers have always done. There's a reason why it's such a valued unofficial skill in the military.

And this manipulation is serious enough that the department is redrafting its guidance on what constitutes "high-priority." Which means a bunch of supply officers are going to be leaning on a bunch of senior NCO's, who will then squeeze a bunch of junior ranks to not game the system. Which will work for awhile, until a crisis hits, and they need to start gaming the system to get what they need.

Which is how it should be. That tension between following the system, and going outside it to accomplish the mission has always been with us, and will always be with us. Leaders know how to balance the demands of each. And our military is chock-full of leaders from private to general.

So, what is DND doing to address these concerns, you ask?

2.33 National Defence should review its practices for tracking materiel once the materiel has arrived to ensure the arrival and storage is accurately recorded in a timely manner. (2.29–2.32)

Agreed. The Department has initiated a project that should address this issue. The first phase of the Asset Visibility Project is to put in place a Canadian radio frequency identification capability to track consignments moving to and from Afghanistan. This capability will remove our current dependency on U.S. support and is expected to be in place by December 2008.

The second phase of the project is to develop an interim capability that will provide visibility of items in transit both within Canada and abroad. This interim capability is expected to be in place by 2009.

The third phase is to develop a comprehensive capability that will provide real time, or near-real time, visibility of assets throughout their life cycle. In other words, a system that provides visibility from the time the Department takes custody of an asset until the time we dispose of that asset.

2.36 National Defence should continue its efforts to develop the performance measurement of its supply system, including assessing whether supplies are received in a timely manner appropriate to priority and need.(2.34–2.35)

Agreed. The Department has initiated a performance measurement system for the supply chain. To date, 15 key performance indicators have been developed to monitor system performance using data from the Canadian Forces Supply System. At the conclusion of a user trial, this initiative is set to roll out to a number of supply management organizations in the fall of 2008.

The 15 key performance indicators developed so far focus on a variety of key measures within the Department’s Supply System, such as average cycle times, depot stock reactivation rates, requisition volumes, and requisition satisfaction.

Work is continuing to prioritize and further develop performance indicators based on the Department’s strategic direction and the perceived needs of the supply chain community.

2.53 National Defence should review how it establishes stock levels for the parts it needs to keep existing and new equipment operating at expected serviceability targets, with a view to obtaining and delivering parts to users in a timely way. It should take into account changes as wear and tear to equipment increases on deployments, as better information becomes available on the performance of new equipment, or as the level of support from the manufacturers changes. (2.50–2.52)

Agreed. The Department is now implementing a Distribution Resource Planning tool, complete with a modelling capability that is expected to significantly improve the ongoing identification of inventory requirements. This electronic tool will improve the Canadian Forces Supply System by addressing a significant weakness in inventory rationalization and optimization. It will also provide the necessary information to make complex decisions regarding what to repair, and what to buy, in what quantities, and where to position it. Rollout is expected to begin in the spring of 2008.

The rapid introduction of new equipment to a theatre can be mitigated by the early identification of an initial provisioning plan for spare parts. The initial provisioning plan will be entered into the electronic Distribution Resource Planning tool and will be monitored by comparing actual usage to the estimated requirements identified in the plan. Within a few months, the Distribution Resource Planning tool will identify the optimal forecast methodologies and algorithms to use for the equipment in question. At that point, the initial provisioning plan can be subsumed into the normal day-to-day inventory management of the Distribution Resource Planning tool.

Which goes to show that DND can say all the right things when required. Whether it actually does them...we'll see. I'm especially interested in finding out how the Asset Visibility Project and the Distribution Resource Planning tool work out. I hope the department is drawing on expertise from both within and outside the military community for this, since private firms like FedEx, WalMart, etc have a pretty good grip on ordering, stocking, moving, and tracking stuff. And since every efficiency they achieve makes them money, they're pretty motivated as well. Can't hurt asking.

I asked a fellow I know what he thought of the problems, the recommendations, and the proposed solutions. He has pretty extensive supply-chain experience both in uniform and on civvie-street. He was less than impressed:

...What is shocking is that they are still struggling with these issues in 2008. Read up on the CFSSU (took 15 years to produce 1970's functionality and last I heard was trying to roll out bar codes... I wonder how long it will take them to get to RFID), MASIS ($165M DRP system and still going... I think the navy might, might be using this - incredibly its an ERP that doesn't integrate with other ERP systems i.e. FMAS), or MASOP (what about performance measures?) initiatives if you are interested in more background on this. Fuck. Btw, the US learned about asset visibility in a war zone during the 80's with the invasion of Grenada. They couldn't find anything in the mountain of sea containers so just reordered everything from the US again. They went to smart bar codes first and then RFID years ago.

I can understand the frustration, especially since this is an area of expertise and he can see the potential gains the CF system is missing out on.

But here's the thing: what they're doing is working. Oh, it's not working as well as it could, and it's likely not working as cheaply as it could, but it's working. To their credit, the auditors recognized this:

We have reviewed the audit reports for the supply operations of the United States and British forces and they show problems similar to those experienced by the Canadian Forces. This suggests, given the long experience of both those countries in overseas combat missions, that some of the issues may be inevitable for military operations with long supply chains.

So the CF supply system will keep plugging along, gaining efficiencies where it can, taking two steps forward for every one step back, and in the end, getting the job done so that the operators can get on with the mission at hand.

Update: Un-freakin'-believable. A CP story at the CTV News site covers many of the same positives and negatives from the AG report that I do, but comes up with this headline:

Supply lines to Afghanistan rife with problems: AG

You know what's "rife with problems"? The state of journalism in this country, when the nation's top watchdog gives a pat on the back to DND support staff, yet the news organizations come up with a spintastic headline like that.

Boo. Hiss.

Just about everything you need to know about the CH-47F

Further to this post, here's an April 21 article from Defence Technology International--second part is on Chinooks.

VE Day

The Governor General and Commander-in-Chief at Bény-Reviers. And good on the President of the French Republic:

President Nicolas Sarkozy, noting the lack of language squabbles in the heroic and bloody 1944 battle here against Nazi Germany's entrenched defence lines, said France doesn't take sides in Canada's unity debates.

"We like Quebec. We like Canada. We like them both," he said in an emotional speech at a Canadian war cemetery near Juno Beach, where more than 2,000 Canadians are buried.

Nodding toward the tombstones around him, he noted that no one asked those soldiers what language they spoke when they were fighting and dying to free Europe from Nazi tyranny.

Earlier today, flanked by Canada's Gov. Gen. Michaelle Jean, Sarkozy thanked Canada's "young heroes" who took party in the decisive 1944 D-Day battle on these Normandy shores.

With French soldiers and the English Channel as a backdrop, Sarkozy's speech marks the first time a French president has gone outside Paris to hold the annual May 8 celebrations commemorating the 1945 end of the Second World War [emphasis added].

After first recognizing British and American troops for leading the charge that day, Sarkozy cited Canada's huge role in the battle.

"We will never forget these young heroes," he said in the first of two events today with Jean...

Earlier in the day, France's state-owned radio station aired comments by Jean, who drew parallels between Afghanistan and the Second World War, saying France's decision to send 700 more troops to Afghanistan was greeted with a "sigh of relief" in Canada.

"You know, it was welcomed in Canada with an immense sigh of relief, this news, France's decision to participate in the reinforcement of the Canadian presence," said Jean. "What we hope is that we arrive together to reestablish stability in Afghanistan. No development is possible without security."..

Lest we forget.

Not GTA IV but...

Simulation sure seems to work for working on aircraft:

You couldn't blame Master Corporal Jason Houle for feeling skeptical about his mission.

As part of a test run for new simulation software, the aviation technician at Canadian Forces Base Borden had just one day to teach nine recruits about the propeller system on the C-130 Hercules transportation aircraft.

Most of his students ranged in age from 19 to 25 and knew nothing about aviation technology. It was their first day of a 16-month course and students usually waded through weeks of theory before tackling the complex propeller system.

“But you know what? It turned out really, really well,” MCpl. Houle said. So well, in fact, that in one afternoon the students were working at a skill level they would not normally reach until 12 weeks into the course.

It seems the Canadian Forces may have something to teach the business world when it comes to using technology to bridge generational gaps.

For the last four years, the air force has been evaluating how its technicians respond to training that incorporates three-dimensional simulations of some of its equipment...

The air force found that software designed by Vancouver-based NGRAIN Corp. drastically reduced the amount of time and money spent on training and knowledge retention. Instead of studying theory, watching an instructor disassemble an engine and then having one or two chances to apply the knowledge on costly machinery, students could do it all themselves with an instructor facilitating...

With the click of a mouse, the technology allows technicians to, say, disassemble and reassemble the Hercules propeller system, see how each part relates to the others and learn about snags that may arise.

“We just don't want a prettier PowerPoint presentation,” said Lt.-Col. Gord Danylchuk, a staff officer for technician training systems based at 1 Canadian Air Division in Winnipeg. “You want it to have a wow factor, but you want your solution to burn less resources, or … allow a person to acquire knowledge quicker.”

Over the last four years, NGRAIN designed several proofs of concept for the air force, which included a model of the Bell CH-146 Griffon helicopter's flight control systems, fuselage and rotors; an anti-submarine warfare torpedo; the Hercules propeller and engine systems – even a hangar to see how many airplanes they could fit inside.

Starting this fiscal year, major technical training schools like the Canadian Forces bases at Borden, Greenwood and Trenton will begin to use NGRAIN's technology – after that, the technology and other enriched media will roll out across the air force...

No Canadian predation in Afstan

Looks like we'll end up with an Israeli UAV (political fun there):

The world's top manufacturer of aerial drones is pulling out of a $93-million competition to supply surveillance equipment that Canada must acquire by next February as a condition of keeping soldiers in Afghanistan.

The move by U.S.-based General Atomics, which makes the well-known Predator drones, reduces the competition for the contract and could leave Ottawa hostage to only one possible supplier: Elbit Systems of Israel and its Hermes pilotless aircraft.

It will also make it more difficult for the Canadian Forces when it comes to interoperability with their U.S. partners in Afghanistan, because the Americans use General Atomics Predator drones for the same mid-level surveillance.

Under a Canadian Forces program called Project Noctua - Latin for owl - the military is in a hurry to lease pilotless surveillance aircraft for at least two years to help soldiers battle the Taliban in Afghanistan...

Sources say the deal breaker for General Atomics is that Ottawa wants the drones by January, 2009 - just six months after the contract is signed, which it contends is not possible.

General Atomics also warned Ottawa that the stipulations it has placed on the tender would expose a contractor to an unacceptable level of risk, adding that it's hard to believe any company that accepted its terms could provide the professional support needed for the program, sources say.

In combination with a hurried timeline, the contract includes big penalties worth hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars for missed deadlines.

Although Elbit and its partners plan to bid for the contract, it's not yet known whether a third company, Israel Aerospace Industries, might step forward...

More in an April 21 post by David Pugliese at his blog.

French air force supports Canadians in Afstan

Not reported in our media, nor by our government (we're very squeamish about some things--AW&ST, May 5, p. 17, text subscriber only):

The French air force has for the first time dropped AASM GPS-guided bombs [see end of third para at link] in combat. A Rafale fighter delivered two of the bombs on Apr. 20 during a mission in Afghanistan. The aircraft was patrolling with a Mirage 2000D when a Canadian ground controller called in an air strike to suppress adversary fire. Cloud cover obstructed the fighters from delivering the laser-guided bombs usually called for, so the Rafale dropped the first AASM, developed by Sagem. Another call for fire 30 min. later caused the same pilot to drop the second weapon, although weather had cleared sufficiently for the Mirage 2000D to deliver a GBU-12 laser-guided bomb as well.

Afghanistan and intelligent, moral minds

Terry Glavin, in collusion with Stan Persky, makes the case for the Canadian mission much better than our Conservative government has. Please read the whole piece:

Why Are We In Afghanistan?

Or, what are two nice lefty writers like you doing in a war like this?

...we thought we should engage in a bit of dialogue as part of our obligation to provide an answer to the question, “Why is Canada in Afghanistan?” And then, we’ll go on to murkier political matters such as, “Why should the left support the Canadian mission?”..

Terry Glavin...on their own, the "anti-war" complaints rarely withstand any serious scrutiny at all. Secondly, just for argument's sake, if we were to go so far as to grant all but the most lunatic "anti-war" arguments—and there is no dearth of those—they still don't add up to a case for withdrawal. They don't come close to justifying an abdication of our basic obligations of solidarity and citizenship as a member of the UN, as a member of NATO, as a member of ISAF, or as a signatory to the Afghanistan Compact...

Our soldiers are helping to hold a critical front in the global struggle against tyranny, slavery, mysogyny, illiteracy, and obscurantism. No self-respecting and well-informed person of the left can refuse to take sides in this kind of a struggle. And it should be expected that there will be armed elements of reaction, arrayed against the people in times like these—and in this case there are such armed reactionary groups, such as the Taliban, Al Qaeda, and Hezb-e Islami. One has to be prepared to take up arms against such elements—that's what soldiers are for. We must stay and fight on.

Beyond that, things do get murky, and so I turn for guidance to our Afghan-Canadian comrades, and to our friends who have worked in Afghanistan. But none of these people ever says we should leave. The subject never even comes up...

Aye. This brings us to the central dysfunction at the very core of the entire "anti-war" discourse. It unfolds within a kind of alternative reality, with its own rigid hierarchies of virtue, its own pass codes, its own self-referential, self-confirming feedback loops, and its very own vocabulary. You can make almost anything appear completely rational in this way, so long as you don't let anything in from the outside world. It involves inverting the meanings of words, such that just talking about it requires frequent use of parentheses and the repetition of such qualifiers as "so-called", merely to avoid becoming complicit in its fictions...

...Negotiations actually could produce something we could call "peace," if we weren't too fussy about finding the proper word for it. All the soldiers could go home. And Afghan girls would be sent home from school. There would be millions of refugees wandering the world again. With the armies of nearly 40 countries in full retreat, and Afghanistan reverting to the "host for terrorist and extremist groups" that the United Nations has warned would result, we could expect new and bloody vistas opening up to emboldened Islamist reactionaries, from the Pillars of Hercules all the way to the Banda Sea.

What sort of "progressive" vision is this?..

I'd go farther, and say identity politics has supplanted the politics of solidarity, and the national self-loathing associated with "cultural relativism" has wholly undermined progressive internationalism. Along the way, the counterculture left also jettisoned the old, bedrock progressive conception of human rights as universal rights. And a crude and irrational anti-Americanism—which, paradoxically, owes far more to American counterculture politics than to Canadian progressive-nationalist politics—is a big part of it, too...

HMCS Charlottetown returns to Halifax

Back home, after an eventful mission:

Clutching a small bouquet of red roses and grinning from ear to ear, Leading Seaman Alex Moore raced down the gangway of HMCS Charlottetown to get his first glimpse of his newborn son.

The crewman was the first off the Canadian frigate Wednesday, moments after it sailed into its home port following a six-month counter-terrorism mission in the Persian Gulf...

The Halifax-class patrol frigate, with a Sea King helicopter aboard, participated in Operation Altair, part of Canada's contribution to Operation Enduring Freedom, the code-name for the American-led war on terror.

The Charlottetown's mission involved surveillance, boarding suspicious vessels and trying to gain intelligence on potential terrorist activity in a body of water that is key to the international trade of oil.

"It's been a very successful trip," said Cmdr. Patrick St-Denis, the frigate's captain.

"We were able to conduct over 103 approaches (and) nine operational boardings, leading to a discovery of over six tonnes of illegal cargo with links to terrorism."

St-Denis wouldn't reveal how the military knows the contraband is tied to terrorism, saying only that intelligence indicated links to the groups.

The vessel engaged in several high-profile operations, including using its Sea King to track a French cruise ship hijacked by pirates off Somalia last month.

It also seized almost four tonnes of hashish from a Pakistani vessel in mid-February after receiving intelligence that the small fishing boat was linked to terrorist activities.

About 20 crew members boarded the Al Moula Madad following a tip that the traditional sailing vessel was tied to unnamed terrorist groups and discovered a massive cache of the potent-smelling drug after peeling back decking.

Charlottetown was commanding eight coalition vessels and five aircraft off the coast of Pakistan, seizing a total of 16 tonnes of illegal cargo with its allies during 133 days in theatre.

The drug seizure was the largest for the coalition forces to date and the first one since a smaller operation in 2005.

The crew boarded another vessel in January, seizing a boatload of booze (see Update here) from smugglers and handing it over to Pakistani authorities.

Charlottetown deployed to the Arabian Sea last November to join the continuing U.S.-led campaign against terrorism, Operation Enduring Freedom.

"It shows the commitment of the coalition partners for the importance of the region - to protect the merchant traffic so (it is) not affected by illegal activities," St-Denis said.

Since the first Gulf War in 1991, the navy has sent ships to the region more than 30 times.

Last month, the 300 sailors aboard the Tribal-class destroyer HMCS Iroquois were dispatched for a six-month tour of the Gulf.

The destroyer joins the frigate HMCS Calgary and the supply vessel HMCS Protecteur as part of its mission.