National Defence Committee on May 13th, 2014

[LGen Stuart Beare]

Thank you for that question.

I'm very conscious that the American approach to environmental stewardship and safety in their Arctic is incredibly multi-agency. The U.S. Coast Guard, the U.S. military environment, have a very robust and mature multi-agency view on the problem, and capacities to respond to it. Their population density is different than ours, and their distribution clearly is different than ours. We too have a multi-agency view on the nature of the challenge and the potential requirements to respond to environmental disasters in our Arctic.

Again, General Loos spoke to the intent to work with Arctic security partners, to plan for an exercise that would simulate an environmental disaster response in our Arctic in the summer of 2015.

[Jack Harris, NDP, St. John's East, NL]

Do we actually have any oil spill response capabilities currently?

Could you be even more specific in terms of what we do have?

[LGen Stuart Beare]

As it relates to recovering vast amounts of hazardous material, we have a limited capacity for our own use, and that could complement somebody else's capacity.

The capabilities we would have to bring to that kind of complex response are not just limited to the ability to recover the hazardous materials, to help coordinate, provide logistics to—

[Jack Harris, NDP, St. John's East, NL]

I know we have lots of logistics—command and control.

Mr. Stockton told us they actually had assets involved in operating the skimmers and doing that type of work in the Gulf of Mexico. I can't imagine the Canadian Navy doing that sort of work in the Arctic.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems pretty clear to me that we don't have those kinds of assets.

[LGen Stuart Beare]

Well, we certainly have it where we're operating today, with our warships today and the bases we work in today, and whether or not that's transportable and usable, I really can't speak to that point.

Greg.

[BGen G.D. Loos]

I can't go much further.

I'm aware that the navy has capabilities, but primarily for their own purposes. They're not specifically designed or envisioned for that kind of response.

[Jack Harris, NDP, St. John's East, NL]

You mean for their own purposes, in the event of a spill from their own ship.

[BGen G.D. Loos]

Yes, for cleaning up anything small, in ports, wherever they are, but not necessarily envisioning that kind of response.

I believe the lead agency is the coast guard, as it applies to the north. I know they have undertaken some preparations in the north, to and including distribution of community response kits and providing some training at the community level.

I think that what we're looking at going forward is having that broad view of what the demand is, how it is growing, the threats and risks and whether they are rising, and, if so, on what kind of time scale; in which case, how do we collectively have to get better at that game?

It's not because we're specifically looking at military-specific capabilities in that area, but how we might be called into action to support others who have the lead role.

[Jack Harris, NDP, St. John's East, NL]

You're basically looking at what role you might play in assisting someone else, not in terms of taking a military mandate.

[BGen G.D. Loos]

That's correct, sir.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Norlock]

Thank you very much, Mr. Harris. You're 20 seconds over.

The chair is trying to be as generous as he can.

[Jack Harris, NDP, St. John's East, NL]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Norlock]

Mr. Bezan, for five minutes.

[James Bezan, Conservative, Selkirk—Interlake, MB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Since we struck CJOC, in 2012, what are the lessons learned? How has CJOC functioned in bringing together all of the components of the Canadian Armed Forces? How do they work multi-agency, as a whole-of government-approach?

We haven't even talked about how the coast guard ties in with CJOC. Are there lessons learned with our multinational approach, not just within the NORAD context, but beyond that?

[LGen Stuart Beare]

Thank you, sir, for the question.

This may be my swan song, as I'm retiring this year, so thanks for giving me the platform. Mr. Harris more or less asked the question earlier on, what's different?

Number one, the motivation to integrate three commands into one came from five-plus years of experience post deputy chief of defence and the staff approach to operations, four operational commands, and from commanding operations with full-time staff, to now occupying a middle ground.

What the middle ground allowed us to do was achieve an economy in structure. I gave back 140 positions of staff from headquarters to the Canadian Forces for reassignment to higher priorities. Concerning efficiency, when you have to go higher less often, you're more efficient; I think everybody can appreciate that. Finally, on effectiveness and agility, the devolution of the responsibility to coordinate operations one layer down—for Canada, internationally, and support to both—makes us more agile.

That played out in continuing with home operations in the period before Christmas, when we did the DART. We were recovering troops from Afghanistan, and all of a sudden the DART launched. The next thing you know, we were projecting Canadian Forces 13 time zones away at speed and were still recovering forces from Afghanistan without skipping a beat by leveraging other partners, other partnerships, and using other sources of transport, for example.

So that's the result.

Internally, if I were to offer a professional military man's view on what is different now for folks such as General Loos today, as compared with three years ago with the four separate commands, when General Loos and his predecessor were executing Nanook in 2012—when he was planning and then conducting that operational activity—if he looked up, he saw “Canada Command”. Canada Command had to go over to Support Command to go down to get the support requirements. He had to go to another command and strategic level to get airlift. He had to go to a lot of places to get what today he gets by going horizontally, because they're all in the same command today.

What we have now is a structure that isn't a building out on Star Top Road here commanding all operations. You have a structure today that includes a maritime component in Halifax, with a home and away game; an air component in Winnipeg, with a home and away game; and a support component in Kingston delivering support to everybody: deployable command and control, regional joint task forces, global support hubs—the list goes on—all in one command framework.

So the agility and the flexibility is very real, the economy is real, the efficiency is real, and the effectiveness has not gone down. In some cases we're more effective, because we're more recognizable to our partners as a singular versus plural command. Those partners are here in Ottawa, in safety and security; they're in the provinces and territories; they're on the continent, in USNORTHCOM and NORAD; and they're international—U.S., U.K., French, Australian, UN, NATO.

It's a fascinating little construct for what is a relatively small military compared with others, with incredibly huge territories and incredibly distributed actions. It's working for us.

Thanks for giving me the platform to tell that little.... That's my report card, Mr. Harris.

[Jack Harris, NDP, St. John's East, NL]

Thank you.

[LGen Stuart Beare]

Thanks for giving me that platform, because this does work for us. It's still new in the Canadian experience, so it is still being learned and understood. Every time we practice, exercise, or operate is another learning opportunity that allows us to get better.

[James Bezan, Conservative, Selkirk—Interlake, MB]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Norlock]

You have 45 seconds.

[James Bezan, Conservative, Selkirk—Interlake, MB]

Here is a quick question, then, General Loos.

In Joint Task Force North, how important are the Rangers?

[BGen G.D. Loos]

The Rangers, as you know, are a special reserve component, and they're absolutely vital. They were first envisioned back in 1947 to provide the eyes and ears of the north—surveillance and presence. We have more than 1,800 in one Canadian Ranger patrol group, the one that serves my area of responsibility. There are four others further south in other regions.

I have 1,850 rangers spread across 60 patrols across the land. You can imagine little circles across all of the north with about a 300-kilometre radius that they can get out on, whether by ATV and boat in the summer or by snow machine and komatik in winter. So we can get places, we have eyes and ears, we have mentors and guides for when forces come from the south, so that they can not only survive but survive to operate.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rick Norlock]

Thank you very much, General Loos.

We will go to Ms. Murray for five minutes.

[Joyce Murray, Liberal, Vancouver Quadra, BC]

Thank you.

As this is a defence of North America study, we've been very interested in collaboration with the United States.

General Beare, could you tell us what you think are perhaps the top three most effective coordinating mechanisms or projects between the U.S. and Canada in the defence of North America—not including, obviously, NORAD and some of the structured cooperation, but those happening at different levels down the chain of command that are perhaps examples that could be replicated and are scalable into other parts of the military.

What are the three that are working the best, and what might be three areas in which you see opportunities for more cooperation and collaboration in order to manage with constrained resources, of course respecting sovereignty?

[LGen Stuart Beare]

Thank you. We call that in military terms the “after action review”. So “three things to keep” and “three things to change” is our language.

Among the things to keep and reinforce are the coordinating mechanisms that allow domain awareness and the effective exchange of information in all domains—space, cyber, land, maritime, and air.

[Joyce Murray, Liberal, Vancouver Quadra, BC]

What are the mechanisms as opposed to the effects?