Evidence of meeting #3 for National Defence in the 41st Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was afghanistan.
A recording is available from Parliament.
9:10 a.m.
Conservative
Cheryl Gallant Conservative Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, ON
Can you advise if the Canadian Forces members filling the training mission roles are regulars or reservists?
9:10 a.m.
BGen Craig King
It's a combination of both regular and reserve in all locations, as far as I'm aware.
9:10 a.m.
Conservative
Cheryl Gallant Conservative Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, ON
Okay.
Is there a limit to the number of tours our soldiers will be asked to do on this particular mission?
9:10 a.m.
BGen Craig King
We certainly are very conscious of tour numbers and how tours are managed, and that is something that is managed very, very carefully by the chain of command. So we start to hit thresholds. Once a guy has had a couple of tours, or three tours, it's very, very carefully managed. And we always make sure there is a set period of time between deployments that the individual has back in Canada so that his personal operational tempo is not placing him at risk for continual exposure to that environment. But it's something that's very carefully managed.
9:10 a.m.
Conservative
Cheryl Gallant Conservative Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, ON
What are the current numbers of those serving with both the ANA and the ANP?
9:10 a.m.
BGen Craig King
The overall number that we will eventually flow.... As I mentioned, we're sitting right now at just a little over 600 total trainers in theatre. We'll hit our total number, which will be just shy of about 950, by early November. The actual breakdown is heavily weighted right now to the ANA, with what I would say are the largest number of them being in places, as I mentioned, like the Kabul Military Training Centre and the Consolidated Fielding Centre. There is still a presence with the police, but it is dwarfed by that which we're making for the army.
So what we've said in terms of our overall posture and our structure is that we will remain agile, and over time and in concert with our allies and our Afghan partners--which is a very important aspect of this--if we see that the shift needs to be made there, we have the agility to make those kinds of adjustments to our structure and to what we are doing. But currently, as it stands right now, the vast majority of our trainers are allocated to the army.
9:10 a.m.
Conservative
Cheryl Gallant Conservative Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, ON
With respect to the numbers you gave us--the current numbers--have those numbers been an overall increase to what we had before our training mission began?
9:10 a.m.
BGen Craig King
It's a fairly sizeable reduction in terms of our presence in Afghanistan from what we were maintaining before when we were responsible for a battle space in Kandahar Province.
9:10 a.m.
Conservative
Cheryl Gallant Conservative Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, ON
I mean the number of recruits in the ANA and ANP.
9:10 a.m.
BGen Craig King
I want to be clear. You're asking about the number of recruits we're getting in the ANA compared to before?
9:10 a.m.
BGen Craig King
We're seeing an increase. The Afghan National Army recruitment has gone up in accordance with the discussion on numbers that occurred at the Kabul conference last year. In the last year the army has grown substantially towards a target of 171,000 across the country. So yes, there is an increase that's occurred in the last year.
9:10 a.m.
Conservative
Cheryl Gallant Conservative Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, ON
You mentioned that you spent nine months of your life in Afghanistan. Over that time, have you observed a progression in the skill sets of the ANA and the ANP?
9:10 a.m.
BGen Craig King
Absolutely. And I would say this, wouldn't I, because I was personally involved in this. But let me give you a sense of where we were just a couple of years ago and where we are now.
A couple of years ago 86% of the recruits coming in that you've mentioned were illiterate. Right now we've got mandatory literacy training going on in all the institutions they have to pass through.
We were having problems with pay and the quality of life, and that was having a negative impact on the attrition that was occurring. Now we have a living wage and pay incentives for them to operate. And we've taken a lot of measures to address their basic quality of life, in terms of where they're stationed, with infrastructure, access to programs such as leave, so that can be managed and reduce again the numbers of attrition.
We had a significant leader deficit before. By that, I would say that huge numbers of troops were being commanded by one individual, who is likely put in a position not for his professional ability but because of some political influence. So the leadership that was being exerted on the police particularly was extremely poor. Now we have a fivefold increase in the number of leader programs and output for leaders across the security forces.
What I'm telling you is the trend just in the last two years has been significant. We have made some real significant systemic institutional progress to get them to the point where they will be self-sufficient, all the time doing our very best to respect their way of doing business, their culture, and the desires for their leadership and the kinds of Afghan security forces they want to see.
9:15 a.m.
Liberal
John McKay Liberal Scarborough—Guildwood, ON
Thank you, Chair.
Thank you, General King, Ms. Sinclair, and Madam Bernatchez.
You used the phrase that it's like moving a small city halfway around the world. I think I could add to that: “while they're shooting at you”. I appreciate that it's a very difficult environment.
I don't know whether you read The Globe and Mail this morning, particularly the editorial. It's a sentiment expressed in The Globe and Mail with which I largely agree. One of the paragraphs says it was Mr. Karzai who put Mr. Rabbani in harm's way by giving him an extraordinarily dangerous mission. As you know, he's been assassinated. The person who's trying to negotiate the peace with the Taliban has been assassinated.
The president seems to be preparing for the day when NATO and ISAF have left, when the Afghan war will once again be a civil war, rather than a civil war with a huge international component.
You say in your presentation that you can report that you don't perceive any outstanding issues that will affect the mission transition task force's ability to meet the timelines. Isn't the assassination of critical figures in Karzai's government a pretty important aspect to whether in fact your mission succeeds? If in fact the leadership is being systematically destroyed by the Taliban, that seems to be a rather significant component of whether your mission will succeed.
Notwithstanding all of your good efforts to train the police and the military up to some level of capability, if the leadership is not there, if the core elements of the government have been destroyed, isn't that probably the most serious threat to the success of your mission?
9:15 a.m.
BGen Craig King
I think what you've highlighted is an area of great concern. It's all about the leadership is another lesson that I learned in my time there. With strong, effective leadership great things are accomplished, particularly in that environment.
The assassination of former president Rabbani yesterday did a couple of things. First of all, it highlighted just how ruthless the Taliban are and the determined enemy that we continue to face there. And the fact that they targeted, as you say, the minister responsible for reconciliation and building peace and really having a vision for the future of the country that would reconcile very extreme elements speaks to their view of what they think the future of Afghanistan should be. Absolutely.
I was also sorry to hear that Minister Stanekzai was badly injured in the attack as well.
This is without a doubt an impact on the political landscape and the progress of reconciliation for the future. There's no doubt about that. Now, as to what kind of impact that environment has on our activities, specifically with the closeout, I think there will be, in the context of the effectiveness of government, perhaps an indirect impact. But the timelines we're working to right now are very short: we are out of there at the end of December. The impacts of the kind of thing you've referred to usually take some time before the tactical level effect you're drawing reference to can occur.
It's something we continue to monitor, absolutely. At this stage we think, with the timelines we're moving in, we're pretty good. But it's an area of concern, absolutely. We were all saddened when that event occurred earlier this week.
9:15 a.m.
Liberal
John McKay Liberal Scarborough—Guildwood, ON
When the enemy is systematically assassinating critical figures in the government, it effectively destabilizes the government. The bizarre possibility is that we may not be gone by the time this government is completely destabilized and chaos breaks loose.
Within my lifetime--not that of these young members over here--I remember the withdrawal from Vietnam, and it was chaos. So is there a plan B or a plan C to either accelerate the withdrawal or decelerate the withdrawal?
9:20 a.m.
BGen Craig King
In response to that, I would say that I think we have to understand the nature of government in Afghanistan to draw the connections you're making. Certainly the potential is there. The events you've described are at the federal level, and there have been assassinations at local level, but the kind of support we require for the close-out that we're in now would be in a very localized area right now. That sort of effect you're talking about, the scenario you've painted, just is not seen at this time, but as I say, we continue to monitor it.
9:20 a.m.
Liberal
John McKay Liberal Scarborough—Guildwood, ON
Presumably if in fact you've planned the contingencies so that you're still going to maintain your timelines, there are still people left over. There's still some training going on. You're still going to have I think 950 people there--
September 22nd, 2011 / 9:20 a.m.
BGen Craig King
Yes, sure.
9:20 a.m.
Liberal
John McKay Liberal Scarborough—Guildwood, ON
--and arguably this place is just going to degenerate into a well-armed civil war, with the irony in our case of having trained one side very well.
9:20 a.m.
BGen Craig King
Right, absolutely. What I take from what you said is the absolute need for us to be invested fully the way we are. When we talk about Afghan values and ethos, we talk about the fact that we're not creating armed camps like we had in the immediate post-2001 environment. We're talking about an army just as you expect your army to act here: that it is an instrument of government and is not creating opportunities for warlords.
In order to preserve ourselves from exactly the situation or the scenario you've alluded to, it argues all the more why we should be involved where we are with the training of those security forces. Absolutely, the situation on the ground is closely monitored. I have a more optimistic view of the conditions than you do, perhaps, notwithstanding the unfortunate events of this last week. But as they relate to the mission transition task force in Kandahar, I think we're okay there.
In terms of Operation Attention and what we're doing around the various parts of Afghanistan in that mission, absolutely, we are very closely linked in watching the situation there and invested to be able to provide the support to the Government of Afghanistan as I've described.
9:20 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative James Bezan
Your time is up. I'm sorry.
We're going to go to a five-minute round now. Kicking it off is Mr. Norlock.