National Defence Committee on Sept. 27th, 2006

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

I call the meeting to order.

I'd like to welcome our presenter today to continue our discussions and study on the Canadian Forces in Afghanistan. Appearing today is General Michael Jeffery.

I have a very lengthy resumé of your military history, sir. I'll go right to the end, if you don't mind.

He served as Chief of the Land Staff from August 2000 to May 2003 and retired from the Canadian Forces at the rank of lieutenant-general on August 1, 2003, but carries on as the honorary campaign chairman for the Royal Canadian Artillery heritage campaign.

Sir, you obviously have the qualifications to come and talk to us about the issues we're studying. What I'd like to do is give you an opportunity for your comments and then open it up for questions.

We also have some business to deal with on our budget estimates for travel to Petawawa, Edmonton, and Gagetown, so I propose to save some time at the end. If we've exhausted our questions and could plan to wrap this meeting up between 5 o'clock and 5:15, we'll move into committee business.

Sir, the floor is yours. Thank you for being here.

[Lieutenant-General Michael Jeffery, Retired) (former Chief of the Land Staff (2000-2003), As an Individual]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Chairman, ladies and gentlemen, it's a pleasure to be here. The last time I was here I was in uniform. Of course, it's a much different context, although it's much the same sort of feeling being here in the room.

I did serve for three years as the army commander, ending 39 years of military service. During that period of time as army commander, I was involved in the first two deployments in Afghanistan. Given that type of experience, I will try to provide whatever insights I can into the mission. I want to make it clear, however, that I'm not an expert on the region; it's a complex area of the world, and I do not attest to being any sort of expert.

Having been retired now for three years, I am not current with all the details of what's going on in the Canadian Forces. I do maintain connectivity with them, but I wouldn't want to suggest that I am an expert in all those details, although I do have a sense of the challenges they face.

Of all the places the Canadian Forces is required to deploy, I can't imagine a more unlikely place than Afghanistan. It may interest you to know that when I was the army commander in the late 1990s, we were undertaking experimental war games to test new concepts to determine what kind of army Canada needed for the 21st century. It is instructive that for that war game we chose a region of the world that would be the most difficult in virtually every aspect that we, as soldiers, saw as a profession. And the region we chose was in the Caucasus, not very far from Afghanistan. Indeed, it was a coin toss. We could have chosen Afghanistan, never dreaming that this very difficult region would be one that we would deploy into one day.

The full magnitude of that challenge became clear when we were faced with deploying the 3 PPCLI Battle Group into the region in 2002. Given that Afghanistan has virtually no infrastructure, we were faced with long lines of communication and the need to deploy and sustain virtually everything by air. But despite my concerns in that context, the mission was manageable, largely because we deployed as part of a U.S. brigade, with their infrastructure, and also because the political objectives were clear. That early, post-9/11, there was no question that we were fighting terrorism.

Within a year, however, we faced the prospect of deploying into ISAF, in Kabul, and there I had greater concerns. For that mission at the time, I perceived a lack of clear political objectives, an uncertain command and control structure, and limited strategic support for the job, all of which created, in my personal view, high risks. To be blunt, I was not in favour of going. But the decision was made to go.

Since then, however, we have established NATO in the region, and many of the concerns I had earlier have been mitigated. The CF have performed well, and NATO, at least for the moment, seems to be resolute in staying. Indeed, having invested so much in Afghanistan, my view is that we need to stay and get the job done.

My concerns really can be encapsulated, at this stage, in my concern over the lack of resilience that we may have in staying. First is the ability of the Canadian Forces to endure this mission over the long term. Make no mistake, I believe that by any standard, the Canadian Forces have performed superbly in Afghanistan, and the comments of our allies, I think, confirm that. My worry is that they will not be able to sustain this tempo, and I do not yet see the essential increases to CF capacity occurring at the rate required. If this doesn't change, in the long term I believe the CF risks burning out. And of course, it is the army that by far takes the largest load in that mission.

Second, and far more concerning, is that we may lack the national will to stay. This, in my view, will be a long commitment. There are no quick fixes. The ongoing debate on casualties, I believe, misses the point. No one, least of all me, wants to see our young men and women in uniform killed or wounded. But if the lack of casualties were the benchmark for Canadian participation, then we'd never go anywhere. The real issue is what we are trying to accomplish and whether the sacrifice is warranted. Only when we're convinced, as a nation, that the goals in Afghanistan are essential and that we are prepared to pay the real cost for achieving them will we have that national will.

Mr. Chairman, in my view, both these issues--the military capacity and the national will--are the real challenges any government will face as our mission in Afghanistan evolves, and in my personal view, it will be a true test of leadership.

Mr. Chairman, that ends my prepared remarks. I'll attempt to answer any questions the committee may have.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

Thank you very much.

We'll start our first round of questioning with the official opposition for seven minutes.

Mr. Dosanjh.

[Ujjal Dosanjh, Liberal, Vancouver South, BC]

Thank you.

Thank you, General, for coming to talk to us.

You raised the issue of the ability of the CF to sustain the tempo over the long haul, and you believe that to achieve this mission we need to stay there for the long haul. What specifically do you think needs to change so the tempo can be adjusted and we can be successful?

[LGen Michael Jeffery]

If I may put this in some strategic context, until about 1990 the Canadian Forces was deployed principally in Europe, in a footing that really can be best described as just-in-case. We maintained a reasonable size of forces. It varied, but at one stage it was upwards of 90,000. Through a succession of reductions we're now down to 62,000, but even that varies on a day-to-day basis.

In the same timeframe we have seen the tempo of the Canadian Forces, through the nineties into the 21st century, steadily increase. The train lines are going in the wrong direction, and we know that. As I sat here in uniform as a witness, I continued to be concerned. At that stage I said we faced an emerging demographic crisis, because not only did we have that problem, we had the additional problem--which I believe all of the committee members will understand--of the aging of the Canadian population. The pool from which we drew the recruits was getting smaller.

We could have had this discussion ten years ago, and in many respects the problem hasn't improved. That doesn't mean the Canadian Forces has not started to solve its recruiting difficulties, etc. An increasingly larger share of those who are recruited are replacing the ones who are leaving. We have the problem of regeneration of the forces we have today, let alone expansion of the capacity. Unless we can start taking a significant bite out of that expansion piece and make the forces larger, we're going to burn out those we're using, because we're using and reusing them at a high rate.

I think the ideal is to have a six-month tour for a soldier about every three years. When they're in hard combat or hard operations in a place like Afghanistan, even without a lot of combat, that's pretty demanding. We expect our soldiers to go there once every 18 months. They're home for less than a year and they're gone again. It's not sustainable.

[Ujjal Dosanjh, Liberal, Vancouver South, BC]

When you were engaged in exercises after 9/11, you said that in the Caucasus you knew clearly that terrorists were the enemy and you were essentially on anti-terrorism exercises. Was any thought given at any stage to the kind of insurgency one might face in those countries if we did go in, and how we would deal with insurgency?

[LGen Michael Jeffery]

If I may just correct something in terms of specifics, the exercise we did in the nineties was prior to 9/11, obviously, and we were trying to analyze what kind of world we were going into. We already believed that we were going into a much more complex world, and that with the end of the Cold War we were going to see asymmetric warfare emerge: a lot of little guys trying to beat up the big guys, if you want to put it in simple terms. It changes the very nature of conflict. The tactics all change, and you have to adapt the army to that. That drove a lot of our thinking.

In early 2000 we actually developed an army strategy that saw us fundamentally shift the kinds of operations we'd undertake. In many ways General Hillier of CDS has carried those ideas on. So you're seeing that change.

It came home to us in spades early after 9/11 when we started to face that reality. Afghanistan was the first encounter of that. At that stage I would not have termed it counter-insurgency as an operation; it was counterterrorism and search and destroy, to be very blunt. It was that kind of operation. But if you want to put a label on it, what is going on in Afghanistan today is much more classic counter-insurgency operations.

[Ujjal Dosanjh, Liberal, Vancouver South, BC]

This may be an unfair question, and I don't mean to cast any aspersions on any of our forces, but this is a question I'd like to have answered. Do you think the Canadian Forces are well trained and well prepared to deal with the kind of counter-insurgency we're dealing with? I don't know whether tanks are what you need in a counter-insurgency. I don't know whether fighter pilots are what you need. I'm not a military person. I'm simply a layperson who happens to be a parliamentarian, so I'm asking the questions in lay lingo. Are Canadian Forces prepared to deal with the kind of counter-insurgency that we face? Granted, we have brave soldiers doing a great job, but being trained for this kind of counter-insurgency is a different issue.

[LGen Michael Jeffery]

As a statement of personal belief, I believe that the Canadian Forces are among the best trained militaries in the world. I think they're ideally suited for not only counter-insurgency operations but many others. But let me try to put some meat on those bones.

I think it's important that I define, at least from my perspective, what counter-insurgency is. The basic premise of counter-insurgency is where you have either a part of the population or an insurgent organization inside a nation-state or region that is trying to foment unrest and basically disrupt the government and ultimately take over. Straight combat, straight fighting, isn't what you need. What you need to do is to remove that insurgency force, but fundamentally ensure that in so doing you win and maintain, for want of a better term, the hearts and minds of the people of the nation. You have to get the populace on your side. If they're not there to begin with, you have to earn that, and there are a variety of dynamics: political, development, reconstruction, a whole range of issues. The military force may not even be in control. It's a political issue and the military force is in support. That doesn't mean that security is not important. If the insurgent is creating violence, is causing you to fight, then you have to get rid of it. Your challenge is to as quickly as possible get back to that balance of winning the hearts and minds, and if you fail there, no amount of fighting is going to solve the problem.

I don't know if you want me to go further, but you raised the issue of tanks and pilots. I don't know whether that's--

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

The time's up for this, but keep that thought in mind, if you can insert it somewhere else, and we'll go on.

Thank you, Mr. Dosanjh.

Monsieur Bouchard, seven minutes.

[Robert Bouchard, Bloc, Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you as well for your presentation.

You are a lieutenant general with considerable experience. No doubt you have commanded many such operations. To date, the mission to Afghanistan has claimed the lives of a number of our soldiers.

In your opinion, how have these deaths affected the morale of Canadian troops in the field? Is morale affected for only one day, or for longer than that? Are measures in place to counter these losses that can undermine the morale of surviving soldiers?

[LGen Michael Jeffery]

Thank you for the question, Mr. Chairman.

First of all, let me give my apologies; I'm going to do this in English. My French is getting rustier by the day, so I will not impose upon you or the committee.

Yes, we've had casualties in Afghanistan, but casualties are an inevitable part of the conflict and of what we do as soldiers, and in my mind, given the kinds of operations we've been in, the casualties are relatively light. They're hard for a nation that hasn't seen casualties in a long time, but they are relatively light, and the soldiers feel the same thing.

That doesn't mean to say that every casualty is not important. It's important to all of us; it's specifically important to the soldier who loses the buddy next to him. It is a significant issue, but the dynamic that a soldier goes through when that occurs is principally a focus on getting the job done. As much as it may be painful to lose your best friend, the focus is to get the job done. The first problem comes in the break--in the break in the fighting or in the break in the operation--when you have time to sit back and think about it.

A whole range of academic work has studied this, going back over a century, in terms of war and fighting. I would say that today the Canadian Forces are probably as well prepared as any in the world--and better than I can ever have imagined, given our history--to deal with those kinds of issues of counselling soldiers, helping them deal with their grief, and helping them to get back to the job and move on.

Human nature being what it is, most soldiers will very quickly suppress those concerns as long as they're in the theatre of operations. It will jump out at them again when they get back home. When they get back to Canada, back with the family, the pressure is off, and that's when you'll start to have the problem. That's when, in many cases, post-traumatic stress disorder, PTSD, is one of the major issues we have to deal with.

I will go back to my point. It is an understandable side effect, and soldiers' morale will be all right as long as a couple of things occur. One is, most importantly, that when they lose a friend and a buddy they can come back and say that he died for a good cause. If they can't, we all have a problem, and that's the source of much of that lack of morale.

The other is that we as an institution--the Canadian Forces and the Government of Canada--help those soldiers with that problem and the aftermath, whatever that may be. As long as those things occur, I don't think you will have a morale problem. That doesn't mean it's not difficult for every soldier to deal with a death, but it will not be a morale problem.

[Robert Bouchard, Bloc, Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, QC]

General, you stated that Canadian Forces may not be able to sustain the tempo and that at this pace, they risk burning out. I also understood you to say that the Afghanistan mission presented a formidable challenge for Canadian Forces.

Are Canadian troops more heavily engaged in combat operations than the forces of other countries battling the war in Afghanistan? Apart from Canada, which countries are contributing the most to the Afghan mission?

[LGen Michael Jeffery]

If I may, Mr. Chairman, I'll attack this from the perspective of trying to put myself in the position of a commander, like Commander ISAF.

A commander in that situation is dealing with a multinational force, and the first thing he has to look at is the nature of the job, the mission, how big an area he has. It's not uniform. There's great complexity to it. Some areas are peaceful; some are more difficult; some are really terrible and you don't even want to send troops there. It would be ideal if you had all troops at the same level of capability, the same level of professionalism, and indeed the same limitations, if you will, but that's not the case.

The first thing that happens is a commander receives troops on which the respective national governments have put limitations on their employment. You've seen it. Certain of the nations will not be allowed to deploy in certain areas of the country. It's not my place to question that, because Canada has done the same, not necessarily in Afghanistan, although there will be some limitations there. Certainly in other regions of the world, we've often sent troops in with significant political limitations on their employment.

The second is that you have to look at the professionalism and the overall capability of the force. Some are highly professional, well trained, well equipped--all of that; others are at lower orders of capability. The problem a commander has is to mix and match all of those limitations with the tasks that he has. The reality is, certainly in Afghanistan, by my judgment and, I would suggest, the judgment of many other observers, that Canada is in the top three--at the maximum, four--of all the forces in Afghanistan. The British, the Americans, and maybe somebody like the Dutch are up there, but Canada's certainly up in that category and, as the vernacular goes, punching above its weight. In that context, a commander's going to use Canadian troops where he needs them.

So Canada is, in a sense, shouldering a higher percentage of the overall load because it has the troops that can do it, and any commander from any nation would achieve the same thing. The question, perhaps more importantly, is whether it is unreasonable. Is this a disproportionate share? And from what I can see at this juncture, the answer is no. We have far fewer troops in the region, even on any percentage basis, than some of the other nations. We have always had a challenge of matching other nations in terms of their commitment to international operations. This is one of those cases where we stand out as being near the top of the pack, and I think it's high time that be the case. I don't think we're carrying too much of the load. The casualties we have taken are not out of proportion to the numbers we've had or the kind of operations that we have undertaken.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

Thank you, Mr. Bouchard.

We are moving down to Mr. Christopherson.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Thank you very much, Chair.

Thank you, General, for appearing today. I especially want to thank you for your frankness. Without it, the whole system we have here can't work, so it's very much appreciated.

I want to pick up on a couple of things. In part, you said you believed we should stay and “get the job done”, even though you expressed that you had some initial misgivings about going in. Again, I appreciate your frankness on that.

I will be putting a couple more pieces on the table, but I will be asking you how would you define “getting the job done”. In other words, when X is accomplished, how can we say “mission accomplished”, if you will?

I want to come back to quoting some thinking of others who've been involved in this for some time, starting with Leo Docherty, a former aide-de-camp to the British commander who called the mission “a textbook case of how to screw up a counter-insurgency”; our current Minister of National Defence, who said, “There is no military solution there”; and also an Afghan commander, who said publicly, “The foreigners came here and said they would help the poor people and improve the economic situation, and they only spend money on their military operations. The poor people are poorer now than when the Taliban were the government. We don't trust them anymore. We would be fools to continue to believe their lies.” The second last quote is from President Karzai, who of course was here last week. He said, “Bombings in Afghanistan are no solution to the Taliban. You do not destroy terrorism by bombing villages.”

That brings me to quote one of your other points, which is that it's crucial to get the population on your side. I didn't write down what you said, but I think the essence was that you're in big trouble if you don't, that it's key to do it.

We're now sending in more tanks. We're in the process of destroying an awful lot of infrastructure and villages as a result of the force that we've needed to use to counter what we've met, and by its very nature, of course, that is leaving a lot of Afghan people wondering how we are their friends. We want to help, but it's after we've gone in and blown everything up. And now we're sending tanks over there.

So my question is, with all of this in front of you, how do we, one, establish what is a successful mission; and two, how are we going to get the population on our side if the process right now of fighting is destroying everything around them and, for many of them, leaving them worse off than they were before? How do you see Canada's forces squaring that circle?

[LGen Michael Jeffery]

Mr. Chairman, if I may, I'd like to address that in reverse order. I want to talk about the challenge of the population first. I agree with a number of things you said here, and it is an issue of balance.

I'm not a medical man, but let me use a medical analogy, if I may. We're all familiar with streptococcus A infection, this flesh-eating disease that gets hold of the body fairly quickly, such that surgeons have to operate pretty intricately to stop the thing killing the patient. In many respects what we're dealing with in Afghanistan is not dissimilar. You make the point that we can't win hearts and minds by bombing villages, and you're 100% right, but if you don't sometimes do that and get the disease out—which is the terrorist—it's only a matter of time before the body is going to die. That's exactly the situation we're facing here.

It isn't that the military commanders want necessarily to use force; it's trying to find that balance. But when the Taliban and the insurgents are regaining strength or re-establishing in certain areas, and then re-establishing their hold on the local populace, you don't have an environment that allows stability operations to occur—to get reconstruction, to develop, to seek and find political solutions to the problem—because that cancer, if you will, is in the middle of the body. Therein lies the challenge.

You're right; finding that balance is the essence of it. There will be from time to time regions in Afghanistan, as in other insurgency campaigns, where the balance is going to be wrong, because security issues will demand a greater use of force. The challenge is to do it as quickly as possible and get back to a balanced approach and ensure that it doesn't infect the rest of the country.

How do you define success? I don't know how you do that. I certainly couldn't give you in a nice academic, objective manner, a “do this, do this, and once you achieve x, y, and z, this is what you're going to achieve”. But I can give you a sense, I think, of the kind of thing we need to be looking for.

First and foremost, we must have an ongoing commitment from the western world—not rhetoric, but real, displayed commitment—that will provide to the government and the people of Afghanistan a sense that we're not going to leave them high and dry. I think that's a big problem right now; there is all of that constant worry.

As is happening now, the organs of government have to be established: the political, which you ladies and gentlemen know about far better than I, but that's clearly a large part of it; the security organs of the state; the military; the police; the rule of law—those are the kinds of things that need to be in place.

Basically the international support, certainly from the military point of view, needs to transition from being in the front line to supporting, to being available. We're still very much in the front line. A lot of our effort is being put on trying to get the Afghan national army and its police force to a stage where it can be in the front line. Once you get there, that's a measure that we're having success, that we're moving forward. It's a judgment call whether at that stage you reduce the amount of force you have. It's a judgment call to decide when you start to run your forces down. But you need clear progress in those kinds of things in order to say that you're making a success.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

I hear what you're saying. I guess our concern is that the balance is not there, for the most part, in southern Afghanistan. The fact that we're sending over tanks speaks more to the heavy end of the balance that you were looking for. That was our concern.

My other question—and I leave that one with you, if you want to comment on what it may signify, the fact that we are sending those tanks.... That really does tip the balance in terms of heavy artillery, heavy fighting, and more destruction.

I was curious when you mentioned, sir, our troops not being sustainable over 18 months.... What happens to a commander in the field who is told the mission is still continuing but the troops just aren't there, or they aren't able to perform? What happens? Is there then a recommendation from the commander to the minister saying, “I cannot complete the mission you've asked of me because I don't have sufficient forces”, at which time, if there aren't more, that forces us out? What do you do at that stage as a commander, if you don't have those troops who, you say, are already overstressed, in my words?

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

Give a short response, please, if you can.

[LGen Michael Jeffery]

I guess the bottom line here is that the men and women in uniform are duty bound to go and do what it takes. We sent people into Europe in 1939, and they didn't come back until 1945. If you want an extreme scenario, that's what you could do.

We've been shortening that time, loading more and more onto it. So you can do it, and without other direction, that's what a military, by and large, will do.

My hope, my belief, is that we shouldn't need to do that. What we need to do is push that expansion of capability as quickly as possible.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

Good. Thank you.

Mr. Hiebert.

[Russ Hiebert, Conservative, South Surrey—White Rock—Cloverdale, BC]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, General, for being with us today. I really appreciate your presence at the committee.

In recent weeks we have heard all kinds of suggestions from all quarters of the country calling for different action to be taken in Afghanistan. The most interesting comments I've heard have come from the leader of the NDP, suggesting that we remove our troops, that we cut and run, so to speak.

My first question of several would be, what impact would withdrawing our troops from Afghanistan have on, first of all, our troops; second, our international reputation; and third and most importantly, the safety and security of Canadians in Canada and around the world?

[LGen Michael Jeffery]

I don't think we should leave, but I would be irresponsible if I sat here and said there is no choice. There's always a choice. The situation in Afghanistan, as in any region of the world, could actually deteriorate to the point where I'd be sitting here saying we have to get out. What's the old adage, “Better to fight and run away and live to fight another day”? There's an element of that.

With no doubt, I am of the view that if we don't win this battle or win a large part of the war against terrorism here, it will be much tougher when we have to fight it somewhere else. So we should stay. That doesn't mean you couldn't leave if the circumstances warranted it, but if we leave, it's a clear sign to the insurgents, given what I've said about what Canada's contribution is and where it stands in that region, that they're winning. It gives them a big boost and gives the western world, our allies, a real kick in the pants in terms of what it does to the collective commitment. Canada has had a credibility problem in terms of its military commitments for some considerable time. It's earning a lot of that back, but you might see a lot of that lost very quickly.

To be frank, the impact on the morale, the mood of the Canadian Forces, would not be positive. Soldiers don't like going and doing tough jobs just to leave before the job is done. They particularly don't like having their buddies left on the battlefield and not win the day, not complete the mission. It would be hard on them. But all of that could happen if the circumstances warranted it. It's a tough call.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Casson]

One issue was the effect that would have on the safety of Canadians at home and around the world.

[LGen Michael Jeffery]

In the short term, none; in the long term, I think it would be significant. It goes in line with my view that what we're dealing with here is not just trying to look after the burgeoning state of Afghanistan, given their recent or long history. I have a very, very strong view that what we're dealing with here is a long-term campaign for our way of life, for western values and the western way of life. There are large segments of those insurgents who are out there to ensure that our way of life does not continue.

So my view is, in the long term, it does imply a lessening of Canadian security, because we'll fight them somewhere. If it's not in Afghanistan, it's going to be somewhere else, and it will be much more expensive.