National Defence Committee on March 25th, 2015

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

Is this just speculative or have they actually done that?

[Capt(N) S.A. Virgin]

That's speculative.

[The Chair, Conservative, Peter Kent]

Thank you very much. You're out of time, Mr. Harris.

Mr. Bezan, you have five minutes.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Captain, for coming in.

Does your unit have its own risk assessment process or are you trying to analyze through other segments of CANSOF?

[Capt(N) S.A. Virgin]

Yes, it does. In pretty much everything we do, whether it's the formulation of a fairly benign project or the actual mission to do an operation, we go through a robust risk assessment. It's done at the tactical level, right at the working level, and then through and up to the commander of the command, who does a the risk assessment in looking at all aspects of the spectrum. Then, depending on the level of the risk, say, he would even take it higher to his superiors to discuss the potential risks in anything that we do.

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

So you're looking at both state and non-state actors, the proliferation of dirty bombs, and things like that. Are you always doing the analysis and working with allies to determine where the threat lies?

[Capt(N) S.A. Virgin]

Yes, we are, to a degree. The security and intelligence practitioners within the government are more of a lead on that side, but we are so well-networked.... It goes back a little to the previous question in terms of response and working with others. One of the great attributes of the special forces is that we are thoroughly integrated and networked across all levels of government. We exercise together, work together, and have everybody on one another's speed dial, so to speak. That certainly enables the rapid sharing of information.

In some of those areas in terms of the state and non-state actors, those who would do us harm, we track what they might have, but I would not say that we are the leading edge in terms of the intelligence community. We draw from those authorities, and then we do our analysis for the capabilities that we have, because all of that gets fed right back into our training, for example, and our force development and capability development for the future to respond to whatever threats are out there.

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

Captain, I suspect that you need some very specialized people under your command. How do you go about recruiting? Is it people from within the Canadian Armed Forces or do you recruit from outside as well? Are you taking fresh recruits or are you looking more at seasoned members of the CAF?

[Capt(N) S.A. Virgin]

It depends on where one would work within the organization, but we don't recruit straight from the street. We recruit just from within the Canadian Armed Forces. We are a reflection, so to speak, of the Canadian Armed Forces, because we draw all of our people from the navy, army, or air force. They come into our organization. Part of the fundamental definition of SOF is specially equipped, specially trained, and specially selected individuals.

We recruit across the country and across the Canadian Armed Forces. We look for certain attributes, cognitive as well as physical. We put individuals who volunteer to work in any one of our units through a screening and selection process. If they are successful, they carry on and do some very rigorous and precise training following that.

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

You mentioned in your comments and did just now too that one of the things that is part of the CJIRU is the training component. Where is that actually located and how do you go about training the members you recruit?

[Capt(N) S.A. Virgin]

The CJIRU has some very unique training outside of the normal SOF training, because they are very specialized in chemical, biological, and radiological hazards. For example, we have agreements with colleges and universities, so we actually have a number of junior members in that organization who have post-graduate education qualifications in those respective fields.

We do practical training across Canada. We work with the DRDC organizations. We work right out to Suffield. We work with allies and with other members of the CF. That's what we would call common training or collective training, and then the individual training is very precise skill sets for those operators, be it the shoot-move-communicate skills that they would need, or their more precise tradecraft, which is a thorough scientific background.

[The Chair, Conservative, Peter Kent]

Thank you. The time is up, Mr. Bezan.

Mr. Hsu, we are virtually out of time, but in the interests of fairness and balance on the committee, I will allow you two minutes for perhaps a question or two.

[Ted Hsu, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

I'll ask some questions with—

[An hon. member]

The bells are ringing.

[The Chair, Conservative, Peter Kent]

I'm afraid we have bells. We're being called to the chamber.

Under the standing orders for this committee, Captain, we must adjourn.

Thank you for your time with us today. I'm sorry that we're cutting it short.

We are adjourned.