Evidence of meeting #108 for National Defence in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was training.

A recording is available from Parliament.

On the agenda

MPs speaking

Also speaking

Roméo Dallaire  Founder, Roméo Dallaire Child Soldiers Initiative, As an Individual
Shelly Whitman  Executive Director, Roméo Dallaire Child Soldiers Initiative, As an Individual
Julie Dzerowicz  Davenport, Lib.
Richard Martel  Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, CPC

11:40 a.m.

Founder, Roméo Dallaire Child Soldiers Initiative, As an Individual

Roméo Dallaire

Part of the reforms that Kofi Annan tried to bring in, which Ambassador Bolton—who's now at NSA in the United States—crashed in 2005, was to build command and control capability and contingency planning and implementation for the Security Council, because DPKO is really a force generator. It puts forces together and puts them out in the field and tries to manage that capability. It is not an operational headquarters, and although it has built capacity to try to fill that gap, it is not at a core level. It has 110,000 troops around the world. You need a significant capability to actually influence the battle. The Security Council doesn't have that. The secretariat has something.

Until the Security Council can command, control and influence its missions and its mandates, we will always be caught up in wondering what it really wants us to do and how far we can actually push it.

11:40 a.m.

Conservative

James Bezan Conservative Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman, MB

It was reported in 2016 in the National Post that you said you “wouldn't touch Mali with a 10-foot pole”.

11:40 a.m.

Founder, Roméo Dallaire Child Soldiers Initiative, As an Individual

Roméo Dallaire

Yes. At the time, I said I would not send field troops—ground troops—into peacekeeping operations in Mali. You're quite correct. In fact, I was concentrating far more on the avoidance of a genocide going on in Central African Republic, where we could build from scratch a capability with that nation.

However, shifting gears and giving a force multiplier to a mission with one of the most critical assets that every mission needs—which is the helicopter capability, the troop lift, the casevac and so on—is, in my opinion, a very reasonable commitment, but there are going to be some interesting lessons learned. There are people who are going to go sniff it out, and we hope to be involved in the validation of the procedures that are being used in order to gain more experience in that type of operation.

11:40 a.m.

Conservative

James Bezan Conservative Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman, MB

Major-General Lewis MacKenzie was before committee on this study back in the spring, and when he was talking about Mali he said:

Just check the fatality rate in Mali, for example. Over 50% have been killed in their bases by indirect fire. Even the Germans, bless them, have counter bombardment mortars, a mortar radar. I don't know what good it's going to do them, because they don't have any ability to respond to the mortar fire coming from outside the base.

Do you agree with his assessment? He's talking about Gao.

11:40 a.m.

Founder, Roméo Dallaire Child Soldiers Initiative, As an Individual

Roméo Dallaire

I don't see a role for Canadian battalions to go fight in Mali. I do not see the Canadian battalions doing peacekeeping. What I do see is Canadian instructors preparing African Union forces to enable them to take on that capability.

We were in Nigeria, which had Boko Haram, and we could see that they needed capacity to handle that type of threat.

I would strongly advise on what we should do, and interestingly enough, it's in the defence policy paper. Rwandans, as an example, have 6,000 troops deployed in peacekeeping. We are training battalions of Rwandans to go into those mission areas in South Sudan and the like. They want to do it. They want to be professional, and they will bring their assets and tools, but there are certain technologies they can't bring, such as helicopters.

11:45 a.m.

Conservative

James Bezan Conservative Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman, MB

Those other partners are going to be doing the protection and security for our air task force that's in Gao. Can we trust them to provide—

11:45 a.m.

Liberal

The Chair Liberal Stephen Fuhr

I'm going to have to hold it there and yield the floor to....

11:45 a.m.

Conservative

James Bezan Conservative Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman, MB

—close combat protection?

11:45 a.m.

Founder, Roméo Dallaire Child Soldiers Initiative, As an Individual

11:45 a.m.

Liberal

The Chair Liberal Stephen Fuhr

MP Garrison.

11:45 a.m.

NDP

Randall Garrison NDP Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC

Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Thanks to our witnesses for being here today.

I want to focus on the child soldier aspect we're talking about. Maybe since we've been talking about Mali, I could ask what the situation is with child soldiers in the conflict in Mali.

11:45 a.m.

Executive Director, Roméo Dallaire Child Soldiers Initiative, As an Individual

Dr. Shelly Whitman

There are significant numbers of child soldiers who are estimated to be used in Mali. It is also one of the countries that is listed by the UN Secretary-General's report that comes out every year on the state of children in armed conflict. We know for sure there are at least four armed groups that are using and recruiting child soldiers in Mali for a variety of purposes.

I want to also make it clear to those who may not understand this issue clearly. When we talk about child soldiers, we're not just referring to the children who are on the battlefield with an AK-47s. We are talking about a whole range of issues. The children can be the porters, the messengers, the spies, doing support functions. What's important for you to recognize and understand is that this is also the most incredibly important time, because that is when you can prevent them from being indoctrinated further, or from entering onto the battlefield.

This is a point we should be clear on. It's not just about our being afraid of facing children on the front line, but it's also about what we can proactively do to prevent that from occurring further.

11:45 a.m.

NDP

Randall Garrison NDP Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC

That's where I guess I was going to go next.

In the work you're doing on child soldiers, what are the most effective things that prevent the recruitment and use of child soldiers in conflicts?

11:45 a.m.

Executive Director, Roméo Dallaire Child Soldiers Initiative, As an Individual

Dr. Shelly Whitman

One critical thing is that we have to be able to recognize those areas and moments when we could do more effective prevention techniques, because we don't do that enough.

General Dallaire made the example of Boko Haram and the Nigerian Armed Forces. All of you will have known about the Chibok girls who were taken a few years ago from that school. That is a perfect example. If priority and training had been given, that school could have been protected because they had some forewarning that they were going to be attacked. Waiting until after the fact to try to counter that has proven to be ineffective for a number of reasons.

From our perspective, it's making sure there is adequate training that is practical in its approach, meaning scenario-based. It isn't just a legal lecture that is given, or a set of PowerPoints, as we often see. It's really working through a set of scenarios with real-life examples. It's understanding that it's not prescriptive, that it will change. What we want is for soldiers to be able to think through these dynamics before they face them. Not walking through those issues before you face them will result in a reaction from the portion of your brain that just deals with emotion, versus the rational portion of your brain. We want rational approaches. We are also told you have to practise something at least seven times before you face it in the field.

Currently, some of the approaches that have been taking place in terms of preparation for this issue have been far from adequate in terms of the standard. That was certainly our desire with the Vancouver principles, to increase that standard to make it a priority and not just another issue to be aware of in terms of the realm of human rights.

The last point I would make here is that it's also incredibly important that the training you conduct on this matter has an impact not just in the brain but also in terms of the way people think, which genuinely changes the way they perceive the conflict, the way they see children, and that they recognize some of those intelligence dynamics that otherwise they would not pay attention to.

11:50 a.m.

Founder, Roméo Dallaire Child Soldiers Initiative, As an Individual

Roméo Dallaire

All this leads to prevention, which then reduces the conflict and reduces the ability to sustain, and also makes the mobilization base of the belligerents much smaller. If they can't use children because they are rendered ineffective, then they will have to look at another option if they want to continue the fight.

Putting soldiers asleep with three hours of international law may have helped their morale, but has done nothing to move the yardsticks in preventing the use of child soldiers and being effective against that threat. I would contend that the doctrine we helped the Canadian Forces write, the training directive they have, which we helped them put together, the Dallaire initiative, are still steps towards the Canadians Forces being effective in facing child soldiers.

11:50 a.m.

NDP

Randall Garrison NDP Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC

Can you comment on the balance between what I guess I'd call “push and pull” with child soldiers? A lot of people have in mind that these children are always forced into the conflict. We've heard, certainly, testimony at this committee that for adults there's often a lack of alternatives and, therefore, they're attracted into the conflict.

11:50 a.m.

Executive Director, Roméo Dallaire Child Soldiers Initiative, As an Individual

Dr. Shelly Whitman

It's certainly the case that you have to understand that not all children are forcibly taken, but we also want everyone to understand that the lack of choices exists, whether it's because there isn't an opportunity to go to school, the economic situation, loss of parents, etc. There are many of those factors that exist and certainly should be understood. However, in all of these instances, the adults who use and recruit them are responsible for their being employed.

Just because a child makes a difficult "voluntary" decision—and we say “voluntary” in quotation marks because it's based on a very limited set of options that they may have—it should be understood, and it's incredibly important, that these children often don't know what they are choosing. Many will talk about the fact that once they are in the armed group it's like they've lost all sense of why they originally were there, because it doesn't make sense anymore and they had no idea of the long-term situation they were going to be in, etc., and the consequences of that, which we, as parents here in this country, can understand.

11:50 a.m.

NDP

Randall Garrison NDP Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC

Right.

11:50 a.m.

Liberal

The Chair Liberal Stephen Fuhr

That was perfect timing.

MP Dzerowicz.

September 27th, 2018 / 11:50 a.m.

Julie Dzerowicz Davenport, Lib.

Thank you so much, Mr. Chair.

I want to say what an honour it is to have both of you here today. You have given a colossal amount of information and a lot of recommendations, and not all of them are going to be implemented overnight.

I'd love to, as I'm asking questions, focus a little on what next level of changes we can push, both domestically and also within the UN.

I respectfully disagree with my colleague across the way. I think that most Canadians now actually believe we've moved past the peacekeeping of the past, and that Canada is actually part of a collective. We've moved into chapter VII. No one will say chapter VII, but I think we know there is more danger to our missions right now. No one believes that Canada's going to run into a country and then create stable peace overnight, but we're part of a collective of countries, under the direction of the UN, trying to create the conditions for peace.

My first question is to you, Mr. Dallaire. I'm assuming you were part of the group that recommended Mali to Canada. How is it that this mission meets the new conceptual framework of peacekeeping that you talked about?

11:50 a.m.

Founder, Roméo Dallaire Child Soldiers Initiative, As an Individual

Roméo Dallaire

It's set within the context of a multi-faceted, multidisciplinary solution to a state that is nearly stateless. How do you establish a reasonable framework, from a peace agreement that is flawed, in order to protect the civilians and bring in capacity to build that nation's ability to take on its own future?

We're just part of a long-term exercise. Going into these countries where so much has been destroyed and so on, you're into that for years and years, if not decades, so you can't assess the effectiveness of a peacekeeping mission or a mission from the UN from a short-term four-year span of your being in power, or months. It has to be looked at as a long-term investment in how we engage in that endeavour.

Mali is a good training ground. It seems we're going to disagree because I would say that 50% of the Canadian population still doesn't think that Mali is a worthwhile exercise. There are two reasons for that, I believe. One is that people don't think it's in our self-interest. There isn't a conflict in the world that's not going to affect us. With large-scale refugee campaigns and internally displaced camps, they're going to have pandemics. The rage and the extremism, and ultimately, terrorism that come out of those camps is going to spread. The diasporas are going to be affected in our country. Remember the Tamil in Toronto when they didn't like what we did? They got caught up in the maelstrom of that. Every conflict has an impact on our self-interests, strategically. That's the first thing.

The second thing is that people still fear casualties. Even though we were magnificent in handling the casualties of Afghanistan in that overt exercise, peacekeeping is still thought of as something from which we'll all come back safely, and it's because people want us there. It's not necessarily so, depending on the mandate. Yes, there are risks, but that is our era. That's why I argue that I think the people are still thinking of another era, when in fact ultimately the belligerents really had resolutions, while we now see belligerents still trying to figure out what the resolution might be.

11:55 a.m.

Davenport, Lib.

Julie Dzerowicz

What I'm hearing from you sounds like the UN has started shifting into this new conceptual framework that you were talking about, which I think sounds great.

The next area I want to talk about is what's stopping more women from joining these missions and the army. What we heard from a previous academic is that you almost have to build a certain number of women to be able to help create some change within the army and within these missions. Also, once even women come in, you have to help them build capacity, so it's not just getting more women. We've heard from the people who run the training centre that they do everything they can to try to outreach to women, but they're still not getting what needs to be done. I would love some recommendations.

You see how serious we are about it. We've put money into it. We've said that this is a priority, and we've given as much leadership as we can, but what more can we do?

11:55 a.m.

Founder, Roméo Dallaire Child Soldiers Initiative, As an Individual

Roméo Dallaire

I'll say one word and then give it to Dr. Whitman. It is about the underestimation of the force multiplier that women provide in peace support and conflict resolution. It is an underestimated capability, and their presence in the field is critical, because they're bringing a whole new set of capabilities that the men don't even recognize when we ask them.

11:55 a.m.

Executive Director, Roméo Dallaire Child Soldiers Initiative, As an Individual

Dr. Shelly Whitman

Just to reiterate a point you're making, if you're going to move towards a role that is not commonly undertaken by someone who doesn't look like you, you need to see those people out there, so we need to find ways to put women out there so that other young women can see that as an option, number one.

Number two, you're right, we have to build the capacity. In Africa we've been working with Sierra Leone's armed forces, the Rwandans, Ugandans and even Somalis, and I can tell you that there are a lot of amazing women out there who desire to be a part of peacekeeping missions, but they also have unique abilities that we should look to hone.

The nature of the training and the way that we're addressing this should be addressed. There are women-only units that are out there from Jordan to Rwanda, as examples. I've had women who we've trained on child soldier prevention say to me, “If you create a network of us to come together, you wait and see what we can do.”

What Canada should be doing is finding ways to create these networks of women and supports to be able to move forward and give them specific areas of operations that they want to partake in, not just be placed there.

11:55 a.m.

Davenport, Lib.