Breathless speculation...

Lesson for the CF? Don't do important staff work, since it will be reported under a headline of "The Sky May Be Falling!"

Murray, if you or anyone else at CP is reading this, I'm guessing you've just been used to set up the CAS's opening position on the next round of budget negotiations. Each of the element commanders learned how to do that from Hillier himself, when he was CLS:

Jane's Defence Weekly understands that the new Chief of the Land Staff (CLS), Lt Gen Rick Hillier, tried to persuade the senior decision-makers that the capital programme should focus on the army, and that Canada would have little need in the future for a 'blue water' navy or 'blue skies' air force. His angry colleagues rebutted his arguments.

That's how the knife-fight over money at DND works these days.

The Air Force may well take a cut in its operating budget - I have no insight on the internal allocation of scarce resources within DND at this point. But this staffing exercise doesn't prove that, or even indicate it. It's contingency planning, and it's one of the umpteen things military professionals absolutely must be able to do.