FEBRUARY/MARCH 2012
THE FORUM FOR CANADA’S SECURITY AND DEFENCE COMMUNITY
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NORTHERN STRATEGY
THE FORUM FOR CANADA’S SECURITY AND DEFENCE COMMUNITY
LEADING THROUGH TRANSITION
General Walt Natynczyk Chief of the Defence Staff
HOT TOPICS 2012 Publication Mail Registration Number: 40052410
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FeatureS 10 in transition
Leading new mission requirements An interview with General Walt Natynczyk
13 defence intelligence
Embracing technology to share information by MGen Chris Rousseau
14 Smooth sailing
nSpS steers new procurement model by Tom Ring
16 horizon 2012
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What issues are in play this year? We invited defence executives to share their thoughts
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19 Quantum leap
The F-35 and fifth generation capability by Chris Thatcher
20 arctic security
What’s next for Canada’s northern strategy? by Lee Carson
23 arctic security
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A space-based surveillance constellation by James Fergusson
26 high-tech peacekeeping
The need for intel and early warning by Walter Dorn and Ryan Cross
28 exercise Winged Warrior
Simulated training paves the road to high readiness by Noelani Shore and Yvette Grygoryev
26 WWW.vaNGuardcaNada.coM it’S iN the archiveS Missed an issue? Misplaced an article? You’ll find them all online: interviews with government, military and industry leaders, and articles on the programs and policies of Canada’s security and defence community.
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LetterS We welcome feedback on articles and story ideas. Email editorvanguard@netgov.ca. THE FORUM FOR CANADA’S SECURITY AND DEFENCE COMMUNITY
Building agility into Canadian security
www.vanguardcanada.com
NORTHERN STRATEGY
THE FORUM FOR CANADA’S SECURITY AND DEFENCE COMMUNITY
LEADING THROUGH TRANSITION
Shaping Rockwell Collins’ Canadian strategy
29 iNteLLiGeNce
FEBRUARY/MARCH 2012
THE FORUM FOR CANADA’S SECURITY AND DEFENCE COMMUNITY
Libya mission is not a blueprint
cover StorY Canadian Forces soldiers endure blowing Arctic winds while firing from an improvised defensive position as part of winter warfare training. photo: Master Corporal Kevin paul
30 the LaSt Word
navy ships: Made or assembled in Canada?
General Walt Natynczyk Chief of the Defence Staff
HOT TOPICS 2012 Publication Mail Registration Number: 40052410
www.vanguardcanada.com
FEBRUARY/MARCH 2012 3
e editor’S nOTE EDITOR Chris Thatcher editorvanguard@netgov.ca coNtriButorS Chris Rousseau Tom Ring Lee Carson James Fergusson Walter Dorn Ryan Cross noelani Shore Yvette Grygoryev Bonnie Butlin peter Stoffer editoriaL adviSorY Board LGen (Ret’d) Bill Leach LGen (Ret’d) George Macdonald vAdm (Ret’d) Greg Maddison LGen (Ret’d) Michel Maisonneuve SaLeS vICE pRESIDEnT pUBLIC SECTOR SALES Terri pavelic (905) 727-4091 ext. 225 terrip@netgov.ca nATIOnAL ACCOUnT MAnAGER Marcello Sukhdeo (905) 727-4091 ext. 224 marcellos@netgov.ca MARKETInG DIRECTOR Mary Malofy art & productioN ART DIRECTOR Elena pankova SuBScriptioNS aNd addreSS chaNGeS CIRCULATIOn DIRECTOR James Watson circulation@promotive.net (705) 812-0611 corporate pUBLISHER John R. Jones publisher@netgov.ca
publisher’s Mail Agreement: 40052410 Return undeliverable Canadian addresses to circulation dept. 24-4 vata Court, Aurora, On L4G 4B6 vanguard magazine is published 6 times per year by promotive Communications Inc. All opinions expressed herein are those of the contributors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher or any person or organization associated with the magazine. Letters, submissions, comments and suggested topics are welcome, and should be sent to assoceditor@netgov.ca REpRInT InFORMATIOn: Reproduction or photocopying is prohibited without the publisher’s prior written consent. High quality reprints of articles and additional copies of the magazine are available through circulation@netgov.ca pRIvACY pOLICY: We do not sell our mailing list or share any confidential information on our subscribers. vAnGUARD OFFICE 24-4 vata Court, Aurora, On L4G 4B6 phone: (905) 727-4091 Fax: (905) 727-4428 4 FEBRUARY/MARCH 2012
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northern presence the MeSSaGe FroM the cocKpit oF the cc-177 Globemaster took a few seconds to register: plane crash, no duff. Since many of those seated around me were travelling to the High Arctic to participate in a major air disaster (MAJAID) response exercise, the announcement seemed perfectly scripted. It was only as an investigator with the Transportation Safety Board began furiously writing in a note pad, with the words no Duff – code for this is no longer an exercise – underlined several times at the top of the page, that reality sank in. The crash of a chartered First Air Boeing 737 in mid-August on the ridgeline above the runway at Resolute Bay ignited once again the debate about search and rescue resources across the north, and more generally the presence of the Canadian Forces. The accident occurred quite literally in front of the eyes of hundreds of military personnel, all gathered in Resolute for the annual exercise, Operation Nanook. The response was remarkable: within minutes CF firefighters went into action and a SAR tech preparing for the MAJAID came on scene and took control; two Griffon helicopters, a Sea King, and a Coast Guard helicopter began providing critical lift; the camp’s unit medical station expanded its space and prepared to receive casualties; both officers from the Resolute Bay RCMp detachment came onto the scene as did volunteer firefighters from the hamlet while two community nurses began to prepare their clinic; a representative from Environment Canada arriving on the CC-177 helped coordinate the containment of spilled jet fuel as did the Coast Guard and military engineers; and TSB began their investigation. All this was visible. Behind the scenes, headquarters from Ottawa to Trenton to Yellowknife went into high gear. On a normal day in Resolute Bay, however, the two nurses, RCMp officers and volunteer fire department would have been on their own in the first hours after an accident. And that raises questions, about both SAR and military presence in the north. The northwest passage may never become the transit route some have predicted, and increased air traffic over the region may not result in more frequent accidents, but the Arctic archipelago will increasingly become a point of destination, by air and by sea, for good and for bad. The commanders of Canada’s navy, air force and army have all acknowledged that the Arctic is their toughest assignment, more challenging than the skies over Libya or the waters of the persian Gulf or the sands of Afghanistan or Somalia. In 2011, Canada signed an agreement with the seven other members of the Arctic Council to collaborate on SAR and conducted a tabletop exercise in Whitehorse last fall to better understand each member’s approaches and capabilities. The CF has also taken to winter training in a way not seen in decades: just recently 3,000 soldiers from 5 Canadian Mechanized Brigade Group took part in Exercise Rafale Blanche to learn to survive while conducting winter combat operations while in the northwest Territories almost 1,500 CF members, led by 1 Canadian Mechanized Brigade Group, conducted Exercise Arctic Ram. All are positive signs. But more is clearly needed, perhaps by expanding Ranger capacity or through the acquisition and placement of more resources, to ensure capability and presence.
chris thatcher, Editor
S Sit REp
libya mission is not a blueprint Much has been made of the success of Operation Mobile, including its application in future combat missions. But for those advocating the reuse of the Libyan script in Syria or elsewhere, its commander has a few words of caution. “NATO’s success in Libya is not a blueprint, nor should it be one, for the conduct of future missions,” LGen Charles Bouchard told the Standing Senate Committee on National Security and Defence in February. “We adapted to the environment and conditions on the ground. Future commanders will have similar challenges in future conflicts. It would be unwise to believe that the strategy used in Libya will work equally well in other parts of the world.” Given that the NATO mission achieved two primary objectives – protecting civilians without the loss of life to coalition partners – he was asked why it could not be repeated. “In this case, we were able to do what we did with the projection of power from air and sea. To turn this into the way of the future would be dangerous because each commander, when assigned a mission . . . will go through [his] own estimate process,” he said. “I will admit to you that we tried to adapt Libya to the Afghanistan model in the early days and it did not work. We quickly learned that you should not take the last conflict and try to fit it to the current one. At the end of the day, the lesson learned is what can be applied to the future.” Bouchard downplayed his accomplishment, saying “there is not a three star or two star general in the Canadian Forces today who could not have handled the mission with the same level of success.” But he did have some words of advice for the Canadian Forces as he prepares for retirement.
CF-18 Hornets on Operation Mobile. Photo: DND
“We must develop stronger capabilities in intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, including the need to link all systems together at the national and international levels. We need lower yield weapons with smaller collateral effects. We must be able to operate in built up areas where the difference between rivals, combatants and non combatants is becoming more and more difficult to ascertain. [O]perated on land, at sea or in the air, the assets should have the capability to gather information, pass it on in a real-time manner and engage valid and bona fide targets when needed.”
a proposal to partner on subs The Royal Canadian Navy’s much-maligned submarines have taken a media beating in recent months. But don’t look to John Blaxland for any sympathy. “Cry me a river,” the former Australian military attaché and army intelligence officer said, somewhat tongue-in-cheek, in a presentation to the Conference of Defence Associations. The more than one billion dollars Canada has spent repairing its four Victoria-class submarines pales next to the $6 billion Australia has doled out on its fleet of six Collins-class subs. And while Canada’s subs may appear to be in a permanent state of repair, in fact three will be available for operations by 2013. Of Australia’s six, just one is on operations; one is being cannibalized for spares and one has been mothballed. Dr. Blaxland, a senior fellow at the Strategic and Defence Studies Centre at Australian National University, suggested now might be a good time for both countries to consider collaborating on the next generation of subs. Australia has said it will need to replace its fleet by 2026 while Vice-Admiral Paul Maddison, commander of the RCN, told a Senate committee that the Victoria-class will suffice until 2030. He added, though, that plans for their replacement would be on the agenda within the next four to five years. The suggestion to collaborate on subs is not new. Both Canada and 6 FEBRUARY/MARCH 2012
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HMCS Victoria near Esquimalt during sea training trials and exercises. Photo: DND
Australia entertained the idea 20 years ago when Australia was planning construction of its Collins-class. Maddison recently joined the General Walt Natynczyk, chief of the defence staff, on HMCS Victoria as it conducted diving operations as part of equipment trials. It will be fully operational later this year.
sit rep
Seeking Pacific nation status The Prime Minister may be making inroads with China, but is Canada a player in the Asia Pacific? Speaking to the Conference of Defence Associations in February, Dr. Jim Boutilier, the special policy advisor for Maritime Forces Pacific, suggested Stephen Harper’s recent trip might be 20 years too late. The centre of gravity, he argued, has been steadily shifting from the Atlantic to the Pacific and the waters of the South China Seas and Indian Ocean, where countries have been heavily investing in naval assets, most notably submarines. From energy to trade to disagreements over ownership of islands and waterways, the region will be a focal point for international engagement. Boutilier noted, however, that as he travels throughout the region, he’s often asked: where’s Canada? That absence, he argued, has been due to a lack of interest in Ottawa. But that might be shifting. Dr. John Blaxland, of Australian National University, and Capt (Ret’d) Raul Pedrozo, of the U.S. Naval War College, both argued there is plenty of “scope” for Canada to play in a major way that would be more than welcome. “The U.S. does not have the ship numbers to do it all,” Pedrozo said. “We rely on partnerships . . . they are very important to our strategy.”
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On The Move
John Forster was appointed chief of the Communications Security Establishment, replacing John Adams, a former commissioner of the Canadian Coast Guard and Canadian Forces member, who held the post since 2005. Foster has held a number of senior government positions, primarily with Infrastructure Canada and Transport Canada. Greta Bossenmaier, a former deputy minister of the Afghanistan Task Force, is now the senior executive vice-president of the Canadian International Development Agency. Dave Spagnolo, who led the growth of Thales Defence & Security over the past decade, is now vice president of operations for Thales Canada, based in Toronto. Mark Halinaty, formerly the vice president of operations, is now VP and general manager of Thales Canada Defence & Security, based in Ottawa. Brigadier-General John James Grant was appointed Lieutenant Governor of Nova Scotia. During a lengthy career in the CF, Grant served in a variety of leadership roles, including as Deputy Commander and Area Commander of the Atlantic Militia Area.
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i iNSide InDUSTRY Obst to shape rockwell Collins’ Canadian stratgey
Rockwell Collins cut the ribbon on an expanded facility in Ottawa in February, signalling an increased commitment to Canadian aerospace and defence. The company is probably best known for its avionics systems – if it flies, it likley has a Rockwell Collins system on it – but an increased presence in the land and maritime domains is clearly part of its long-term plans. The company unveiled the newly renovated office space at a ceremony attended by military customers and industry partners, and provided a rare look at some of its leading innovations. The Ottawa facility specializes in the design and development of wireless, ad-hoc networking technologies. In particular, the company demonstrated its Sub-Net Relay (SNR) technologies currently being used by the Royal Canadian Navy to establish Internet-Protocol networks over wideband HF and UHF frequencies for simultaneous tactical data exchanges, chat and enhanced situational awareness, and its work with General Dynamics Canada to embed SNR technologies in the Army’s combat net radio. It also highlighted its satellite-in-a-suitcase systems. It has also made inroads with the RCMP through a product known as iForce, which integrates radio, electronics and computer functions into a single system for law enforcement vehicles. Key to future Canadian business is the appointment of a new managing director. Johnathon (Lee) Obst, a former F-18 pilot with 21 years of service in the RCAF, returns to Ottawa after over a decade in business development roles within Rockwell Collin’s U.S. operations. Thierry Tosi, the company’s vice president and managing director for the Americas, said the company’s research showed growth potential for the Canadian market, but they needed a “Canadian with a military background . . . who knows the industry” to shape its strategy. Obst said business has already doubled since Rockwell Collins established an Ottawa presence in 2006 after acquiring IP Unwired. “We hope this expansion is the first of many across the region to better serve our growing Canadian customer base.”
FWSar: To buy american or italian Alenia Aermacchi may have poured cold water on a possible solution to Canada’s fixed wing search and rescue aircraft conundrum. In a recent statement, Giuseppi Giordo, CEO of the Italian maker of the C-27J, warned the U.S. government the company would not support any aircraft it had previously sold to the U.S. if the Americans decide to resell them to other nations. The planes in question were originally sold to the U.S. Army as part of a $6 billion program for light transport aircraft. L-3 Communications served as the prime contractor. The Air Force took over the program in 2009 and the 145 C-27Js were reduced to 38. In its 2013 budget request, the Air Force opted to end the program at 21 aircraft and retire the fleet next year. So far 12 have been delivered, four are in final assembly and testing, and five are in production. The USAF has not said yet what it will do with the 21 planes – selling, parking or transferring to other serves are all possibilities – but according to reports, DND has been window shopping. The C-27J was thought to be the preferred choice of the Royal Canadian Air Force for the FWSAR program, which is once again moving to the front burner. When the Canadian program was first announced in 2004, it called for 15 aircraft. Alenia, which in addition to its U.S. order has already sold small quantities of C-27Js to seven countries, has identified almost a dozen more nations, including Canada, as potential buyers and does not want the U.S. to undercut its market. The C-27J is one of several options likely to be on the table when the Canadian government announces a competition, possibly later this spring. Lockheed Martin, EADS, Viking Air and Bombardier will all be in the running, as might the Boeing V-22 Osprey.
Canada signs up for satellite system
Thierry Tosi and Lee Obst of Rockwell Collins and MPP Jack MacLaren cut a ceremonial ribbon.
8 FEBRUARY/MARCH 2012
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Secure communication systems are the backbone of today’s networked operations. At present, the Canadian Forces purchases communications bandwidth as required from commercial satellites for about $25 million per year. But with cyber security and the movement of ever-greater data a growing concern, and costs expected to climb significantly over the next two decades, a dedicated government network is required. In January, Canada signed onto the Wideband Global SATCOM (WGS) System, an international partnership developing a global satellite com-
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INBrieF Kelowna-based arMOrWOrKS received a $9.5 million contract from General DYnaMiCS lanD SYSTeMS-CanaDa for the production of seating and add-on armour for Canada’s LAV IIIs. GDLS-C received a $1.064 billion contract in October to upgrade the army’s Afghanistan-weary LAVs. PraTT & WhiTneY CanaDa recently delivered its 75,000th engine, a PT6C-67C that was delivered to aGUSTaWeSTlanD for installation on the AW139, a helicopter AW believes may be a good fit for the Canadian Coast Guard medium twin program.
Montreal-based eSTerline CMC eleCTrOniCS will supply its TacView Portable Mission Display to l-3 COMMUniCaTiOnS as the Situational Awareness Data Link (SADL) solution for U.S. Coast Guard MH-65 Dolphin helicopters. The Canadian Coast Guard awarded ThaleS CanaDa a contract for a Flight Following System to provide improved helicopter
munications system of up to 10 satellites that includes Australia, Denmark, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, New Zealand, and the United States. The buy-in will cost Canada $337.3 million, but the memorandum of understanding assures the CF 20 years of access in both the X and Ka-band frequencies for military communications systems across the globe. Four satellites have already been launched and are in operation, and a fifth is scheduled for launch later this year. Canada’s participation will provide Boeing, the satellite builder, with funding for construction of a ninth satellite. In January, Boeing received authorization from the U.S. Air Force to produce and launch the eighth and ninth satellites, 13-kilowatt spacecraft based on Boeing’s model 702 commercial satellite. Boeing will also be subject to an IRB obligation valued at $240 million or 100 percent of Boeing’s share of Canada’s contribution to the WGS system, known in the CF as the Mercury Global project.
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tracking. The project includes installing flight following equipment in 22 helicopters. Three Canadian firms will receive the first group of work packages for in-service support of 15 Boeing CH-47F Chinook helicopters. BOeinG said that l-3 COMMUniCaTiOnS MaS will provide technical publications; raYTheOn CanaDa will oversee supply chain support; and l-3 eleCTrOniC SYSTeMS will deliver logistics support analysis. lOCKheeD MarTin completed painting on the final CC-130J for the RCAF. The aircraft, the last of 17, will be delivered in May following acceptance flights. ThYSSenKrUPP Marine SYSTeMS and Public Works have inked a deal for a multiphase design study for the Navy’s Joint Support Ship. In a release, the company said one possible design for the JSS “is a version of the German navy’s latest Berlin Class Task Group Supply Vessel.” The modified design, being developed by TKMS Canada in cooperation with Blohm + Voss Naval, will be considered together with an in-house design by DND, the Navy, and BMT Fleet Technology.
Montreal-based Cae has been awarded contracts to upgrade the CC-130H aircraft and CH-146 helicopter simulators to accommodate a crew station position for the air combat systems operator to support search-and-rescue and air-to-air mission training.
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L Leadership
Leading through
transition For General Walt Natynczyk, Chief of the Defence Staff, 2012 will be a year of transitions: adapting to changing mission requirements, the reality of new fiscal pressures as outlined by Strategic Review, the Deficit Reduction Action Plan and a pending federal budget, the review and possible adoption of Transformation recommendations, and a refresh of the Canada First Defence Strategy. He spoke with Vanguard about the impact of recent initiatives and some of the challenges currently facing the Canadian Forces. Q Without unpacking the recommendations of each of these reports, this seems a lot to take an organization through. The focus for the Canadian Forces and National Defence is on operational excellence. We have about 13,000 men and women deployed on operations, and we move forward with all of these transformational agendas cognizant of the fact that we have people in harm’s way. As we go through the various exercises we have to ensure that we enable their success. And that provides us a focus unlike any other organization, be it government or civilian. In each exercise – Transformation, Strategic Review or the DRAP – we have to find the efficiencies but at the same time we have to maintain that effectiveness.
Q You served as Chief of Transformation and had a role shaping the current command structure. Has it work as intended or have recent operations pinpointed areas that need to be improved? The structure was set up so that we could handle concurrent operations in Afghanistan and the Olympics. To have the additional activities of Haiti and Libya be handled by the same structure, I think, is a 10 FEBRUARY/MARCH 2012
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credit to the structure. We set it up knowing what was going to come down the pipe. Now we are into a different situation post the combat mission in Afghanistan. And we’re cognizant of what we cannot predict. So we still need a robust command and control structure, but it must balance effectiveness with efficiency. That is why we are working through transformation on this again. We have created this very large and capable headquarters but we’re entering a period where we anticipate a lower operational tempo.
Q Is there a requirement for a cyber and/ or space command within that structure? This past year we established two positions: Director General, Space and Director General, Cyber and the mission of both is to determine what should be the right approach for us as an institution in dealing with those two evolving areas of operations. Once we have that, then I’ll go to government with some thoughts about it.
Q How does the recently adopted CF global engagement strategy help set your priorities? The global engagement strategy was developed by our policy folks and Foreign Af-
Leadership L fairs and allows the minister, deputy minister and leaders of the CF to build upon our relationships with our international partners. Part of it comes from our operational success over the last while: our partners want more of Canada. Given that we have the Americas strategy, traditional relationships with NATO allies, a focus on the Arctic, and given that Canada is a major Pacific nation, we need to engage with all of our partners. The global engagement strategy has been very effective in focusing us with regard to those countries that wish to have a stronger relationship with Canada.
army, navy to navy, air force to air force – but with some of the smaller countries where they may not have a navy or an air force, Canada Command has the opportunity to fill that void and build the relationship. Also, in the western hemisphere so many security issues are linked from those countries back to Canada, and that is where Canada Command is the key conduit from my perspective, working with Public Safety or other departments. Canada Command has been that key element maintaining links across the whole of government, and now across the western hemisphere.
Q Related to that, you’ve shifted Canada
Q The western hemisphere strategy sug-
Command’s responsibility to the broader western hemisphere. What kind of options does that now give you?
gests a larger training role. Are you going to have a people problem? Are there a finite number of those quality trainers?
The probability of an expeditionary operation in the western hemisphere other than a humanitarian situation is quite low. It takes a lot of time to build relationships in the western hemisphere. Some of our relationships are really service to service – army to
I don’t see any shortfall whatsoever. Many of the countries want quality training that we provide but it’s not mass training. As we learned in Afghanistan, what works is training the trainers and providing them the kind of expertise and experience that
we have. I look to the privates and corporals who have rotated through Afghanistan, Libya, peacekeeping missions in the Middle East and Haiti who are highly trained, professional and disciplined. It doesn’t require a warrant officer or a major to teach; it could be a corporal. That’s what we are learning again in Afghanistan. A corporal with four years of experience, with his primary leadership qualification course, is a great instructor. And that is what our partners would like to have.
Q Does greater engagement require new skills and competencies? We train for general-purpose combat capability. And when you train to that level of intensity, you ensure all of the leaders have the skill sets, the discipline, the training to do anything across the spectrum of conflict. As we proved in Afghanistan, we can prosecute combat operations and at the same time, with a more gentle touch, conduct training. From my perspective, we have it about right.
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FEBRUARY/MARCH 2012 11
L Leadership Things change for one of two reasons: evolution and crisis. Evolutionary change is really hard because you are trying to get everyone into the same space and understanding of the problem. Q I take your point, but on knowledge transfer are there management issues around demographics and the changing of people? I’m pretty pleased with the lessons learned process, which is highly honed as a result of our experience in Afghanistan and Libya. Ensuring that lessons learned are applied saves lives. Key was how quickly you go from observing a change, assessing it, determining a solution, and then apply it. It is now part of our culture to apply those lessons learned and change behaviour.
Q At the tactical level, that lessons learned process has changed significantly and appears to work well, but you’ve struggled at the strategic level. Do you feel you now have a better handle on that? I think it is always more challenging at a national strategic level because the further you are from the sound of the guns the less everyone understands. When you are close up to the sound of the guns you need to change, you need to adapt, you need to be agile because it is life or death. As you move back from the tactical theatre to the operational and then the strategic, there is always inertia that grows. And yet you do need to change and transform to enable success at the front. Things change for one of two reasons: evolution and crisis. Evolutionary change is really hard because you are trying to get everyone into the same space and understanding of the problem. In a crisis it’s easy – everyone understands the same problem. What you’ve described is the result of that evolutionary change. At the same time, you need to exercise and demonstrate strong leadership to change the path. It goes right back to the original purpose and focus of the CF, which is to enable operational success.
Q There are a number of initiatives 12 FEBRUARY/MARCH 2012
underway related to the Reserves. What are your top priorities to insure the health of the Reserves? The partial mobilization of the force really came from Reserves who were deployed, but also from Reserves who went onto fulltime duty in order to back fill many of the positions left vacant as people went onto operational deployment. Back in 2006, I think we had 4500 reservists on fulltime duty and last December we were at 11,000. Many of those were pulled up off the armory floors, from the naval divisions, from the various squadrons, so part of the effort now through the Strategic Review and other exercises is to ensure that we are investing in those Reserve units again, to make sure that the purpose of full-time reservists is to train reservists; because of mobilization those key people were pulled away. We need to leverage their experience, to make sure those lessons are passed on and knowledge is transferred to those coming through the front door.
Q You’ve been visible at a number of events related to military and veteran health. Given that some battle injuries only manifest themselves years later, and given how many members of the CF participated in Afghanistan in particular, how big a problem do we have? I think it is a significant issue. Keep in mind that everyone is different, that our chemistry is so different and the stresses of our operations affect us all differently, that our family circumstances are different and we know that the role of family is absolutely fundamental to a person’s ability to deal with stress and recover from an operational stress injury or post-traumatic stress. It’s a very complex network. I was first faced with this back in Bosnia in ‘98-‘99 when I had some cases that had really started from previous events in places like Rwanda and
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Somalia and later manifested themselves in Bosnia. It does come back to the individual, though. Everyone on an operation has had a different operation. We can’t categorize people. Even if they were in Afghanistan, there were different places in Afghanistan subjected to different conflicts, different circumstances. So understanding each and every one is tough to do. I’m so pleased that our medical folks, working with our allies and the best international specialists, have accelerated the transformation of our medical system over the past few years. It’s not perfect. I’ve got to say that right up front. But I’ve said this to the leadership of the Canadian Forces: we’ll all be judged by how well we care for our wounded, our ill and our injured. I want to make sure we do the very best we can, recognizing that no solution is ever perfect unless we can get that person back up to where they were before the injury, whether that injury be a physical or mental wound.
Q Outside your door I saw the quote from Sun Tzu: “Regard your soldiers as your children, and they will follow you into the deepest valleys. Look on them as your own beloved sons, and they will stand by you even unto death.” What does it mean to you? We have a tremendous profession of arms, but with our principles of duty, integrity, loyalty and courage, we ask tremendous things of our men and women. Having served with other nations’ militaries, I think we have the best force in the world. But we have to ensure they are always set up for mission success. They go into operations with the confidence that they have the very best probability of achieving their mission and doing so while mitigating the risks so they can come home safely. So it is about respecting them and always keeping in mind who they are as human beings.
Intelligence
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Major-General Chris Rousseau
is Chief of Defence Intelligence. He previously served as Director of Operations, Defence and International Security, at the Privy Council Office. This article is adapted from a presentation to CASIS.
Embracing intelligence technology Just before 5:00 pm on January 12, 2010, a 7.0 strength earthquake struck Port au Prince, Haiti. As the magnitude of the crisis became clear, Canada committed significant army, air force and naval assets to support the disaster response. Just before noon the following day, the Disaster Assistance Response Team reconnaissance team left for Port au Prince, followed soon thereafter by initial DART elements and naval ships from Halifax. To support government decision making, the defence intelligence apparatus went into full gear, preparing background information, briefing senior policymakers in Ottawa and preparing troops in Halifax, Kingston and Trenton about to deploy. The earthquake triggered an acute need for geospatial intelligence and the crisis response process served to gather and disseminate the information needed to enable not only the strategic decision makers but also the tactical leaders preparing to deploy. It quickly became apparent that current and accurate mapping data of Haiti was deficient. CDI’s Directorate of GEO Intelligence reallocated resources to ensure that operational mapping products were quickly updated and then distributed to Canadian, American and other forces deploying to Haiti.
Sharing information Defence intelligence helps to facilitate decisions about military deployments and other defence activities that require the consideration of a large number of complex variables. Whereas some agencies are threat oriented – and for the longest time during this century we were as well – defence intelligence is about more than threat. It is also about characterizing the environment, whether physical (geography and climate, known as brown situational awareness) or cultural (the human terrain or white situational awareness). In an era where no one agency or ally has all the capabilities to meet the extensive intelligence requirements of modern operations, where mandates cut across departments and agencies and where burden sharing is essential, intelligence sharing is fundamental to the way we do business. Our ability to successfully respond to increasing intelligence demands will require effective solutions, including the development of new information sharing frameworks with key partners. We rely on support from our allies to have the global reach that our overseas operations require. In order to receive this support, we need to contribute to the common “pool” even if there are legitimate concerns over what can result from information sharing. Balancing the requirements of our operations with respect for international and domestic laws will remain one of the most significant challenges for the intelligence community. We also need to build closer bridges at home with our domestic partners in the security and intelligence community. While we have made important strides with CSEC, CSIS, ITAC, Foreign
Affairs and others, there still remain too many barriers between departments and agencies that prevent more effective relationships: everything from policy restrictions, cultural differences and security clearance standardization, to a lack of a true cross-government career stream for intelligence professionals. We can start forging closer relationships by adopting a community mentality that is larger than any one department or agency. We simply cannot afford, given the importance of our security and the overall size of our security and intelligence community, to focus on where our mandates differ rather than looking for more effective and efficient ways of partnering together. Our experience in Afghanistan, especially with the All Source Intelligence Centre, has provided valuable lessons learned in terms of fostering closer partnerships.
Adapting technologies It may seem counterintuitive, but absorbing new technologies and capabilities represents a continual challenge for defence intelligence and the wider intelligence community. From UAVs to social networking, from mobile communications devices to biometrics, new collection, analysis and information management tools will continue to be introduced at a rate that often outpaces our ability to absorb and adapt to them. These tools can pose considerable challenges to our policy, legal and security frameworks. We must continue to improve our agility to ensure that we harness the advantages of new capabilities as quickly, appropriately and effectively as possible. We face a deluge of data. In the not too distant past, the ratio of information collectors to analysts was low and we could service all the output from collectors. Today, collectors in all spheres (IMINT, SIGINT, HUMINT and OSINT) far out number analysts; raising the number of collectors adds little to the effectiveness of the system. Only by raising the number of analysts – or more realistically raising their efficiency – can we raise the effectiveness of the system. However, even with the best and most numerous sensors and the perfect IT tools to transport, collate, relate and search this data, we are still challenged with asking the right question. As Deep Thought explained in A Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, the answer can be incomprehensible if we don’t understand what we are asking. There is no “app” for that. And so, whether providing disaster relief for the next Haiti, or deploying to the next Afghanistan, we will continue to depend on and foster allied partnerships; we will continue to adapt to emerging technologies; and finally, in order to ask that right question, we will continue to need well-trained analysts and quality leadership. www.vanguardcanada.com
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P Procurement Tom Ring
is the assistant deputy minister for the Acquisitions Branch at Public Works and Government Services Canada.
An unprecedented procurement
C
anada’s shipbuilding industry is now on the cusp of resurgence thanks to the federal government’s National Shipbuilding Procurement Strategy (NSPS). Years of work went into making the NSPS a revolutionary procurement activity free from political influence or regional favouritism, one that, in the words of the third-party fairness monitor who helped oversee the NSPS, was “rigorous, fair and transparent.” In June 2010, the government of Canada announced the NSPS, a plan to select two Canadian shipyards to build large ships for the Royal Canadian Navy and Canadian Coast Guard. It would also issue contracts for over 100 smaller ships and calls for bids on repair and maintenance worth $500 million a year. Valued at $33 billion over 20 to 30 years, the NSPS would represent the largest procurement in Canadian history when complete. Last October, the two winning bidders were announced. Halifax’s Irving Shipbuilding will construct 21 combat vessels. These include patrol ships designed to conduct sea-borne surveillance, joint support ships and destroyers and frigates. British Columbia’s Vancouver Shipyards Company was selected to build seven noncombat vessels, including science vessels for the Canadian Coast Guard and a polar icebreaker. “The NSPS is unprecedented in terms of what I’ve seen in procurement during the last 10 years,” says Terry Williston, a former senior public servant responsible for marine procurement who has spent the past two years advising Public Works and Government Services Canada on the NSPS. “Usually, the government will develop its requirements internally, create a request for proposals and send that out to industry. There is very little in the way of discussion between suppliers and government at this stage,” says Williston. “What the government did with the NSPS was start a strategic, long-term relationship with shipyards. In 2009, shipbuilders were invited to a forum and asked for their input and that dialogue became the building block of the NSPS.” A team of marine procurement specialists was brought together to form the National Shipbuilding Procurement Strategy Secretariat. The Secretariat was answerable to a committee made up of deputy ministers from Public Works, Industry Canada, Fisheries and Oceans Canada and National Defence. After the announcement of the NSPS in June 2010, the govern14 FEBRUARY/MARCH 2012
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ment met with shipyards on a monthly basis to hammer out details. What would the request for proposals look like? How would the competing firms be evaluated? Unprecedented collaboration with suppliers wasn’t the only thing that made the NSPS unique. From the outset, it was determined that there would be no opportunity for political involvement; Minister of Public Works Rona Ambrose was only informed of the winning shipyards less than an hour before they were announced to the press and only after all bidders had already been told of the outcome. The deputy minister of Public Works announced the winning shipyards at a press conference on October 19, 2011. To ensure the process would withstand the scrutiny of the media, politicians and industry, the government engaged several third parties to help it come to its final decision. British shipbuilding experts from First Marine International scrutinized the competing shipyards, auditors from the professional services firm KPMG helped validate the process, accounting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers combed through the competing firms’ financial data and a fairness monitor was brought onboard to oversee the process in its entirety. “I’ve had full access to everything I’ve wanted, including meetings, emails, documents, reports and solicitations,” says Peter Woods, the fairness monitor. He adds that, of the 50 such projects he’s reviewed during his career, this process “was one of the best, if not the best.” The government first set out to complete a good procurement process. What it found was that by engaging proponents to help shape the process, putting control in the hands of the Secretariat, using third parties extensively and building a trusting relationship with suppliers early on, it had an innovative and unique new way of doing business that was beneficial to both the government and industry. The next phase of the NSPS saw the signing of umbrella agreements, arrangements under which the government negotiated contracts with the shipyards to build ships for each project in January 2012. The success of the NSPS doesn’t need to end when contracts are signed. Senior management will be asking how the attributes that made the NSPS successful can be applied to other areas of public administration in the months and years ahead.
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e executive InTERvIEW
HORIZON 2012
The economic downturn may be curtailing defence budgets in most Western countries, but 2012 still promises to be an intriguing year of transition and investment in the Canada Forces as it continues to re-capitalize equipment and infrastructure. Vanguard invited executives from across the defence industry, which is undergoing a transition of its own, to share their thoughts on issues most likely to play a prominent role in 2012. Here are a few.
Keeping content canadian The U.S. defence market is larger than the next 20 largest defence spending countries combined and is the outlet for much of the production of defence-related products and services in Canada. Therefore, we are all watching with great interest and some anxiety the downward trend in the U.S. Department of Defense budget, especially in the investment accounts that fund acquisitions and R&D. We see similar downward pressures in the rest of the world driven by the global economic situation and other geo-political considerations. However, there are a few exceptions to this downward trend: Brazil, Saudi Arabia, and India continue to show annual increases in defence outlays and represent new markets for Canadian companies. It is safe to say that Canada is a bit of an exception too. The longterm plan for equipping the Canadian Forces, as reflected in the Canada First Defence Strategy, looks quite robust, provided the economy remains in good shape. dave Stapley We can expect some downward is corporate senior adjustments as a result of the vice president of end of the combat mission in AfInternational Business ghanistan; however, in general, the Development and budget is stable. This is attracting Government Relations a large number of foreign compafor DRS Technologies nies to the Canadian market and increasing the competition for local firms. This is not necessarily bad, provided that homegrown companies get to participate on a level playing field, which is an issue of significant industrial and economic concern.
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Recently, the government has spent a great deal of money buying major systems outside the country and for good reason – we don’t build things such as C-17 and C-130 aircraft or CH-47 helicopters. But we do recognize that this outflow of defence procurement dollars is creating jobs and fuelling the technology engines of foreign companies with limited, if any, real benefits flowing back into Canada and our economy. Currently, the Canadian defence industry is undergoing major restructuring, which may result in a lot of lost jobs. Ironically, at the same time, we are seeing unprecedented expenditures on new procurements and upgrades of existing systems. Arguably, this ironic result is a failure of public policy; this has not always been the case. There are many historical examples in avionics, communications, armoured vehicles, mission systems – I could go on – where sound procurement strategies, including focused offset and industrial strategies, led to world-class capabilities for the men and women in our own military, and were then exported to other allies around the world. In fact, we have been a beneficiary of such policies and decisions in government in the past. In particular, this policy framework provided for collaborative government and industry investment in the area of sophisticated communications for the Navy, eventually leading to a world-class capability that is now deployed on Canadian Navy ships and sold to navies in the U.S., Australia, Korea and Japan, to name a few. In the near future, we will hear a lot more on this topic of filling the gap between the CFDS, which in my view is an excellent policy framework, and where the rubber meets the road in actual procurements. Filling this gap should help ensure that the Canadian national industrial and economic interests are not lost in the process.
Executive Interview E Room for growth in volatile times U.S. government plans to cut defence funds by 10 percent came as little surprise, with many Western nations spending less on security and defence. Despite continued volatility in the global economy, the Canadian defence industry has potential for growth this year. For starters, the federal government’s rollout of its $33-billion National Shipbuilding Procurement Strategy is a major investment that will create jobs for the production and long-term logistical support of Canada’s marine fleet. Contracts to upgrade the country’s Tactical Armoured Patrol Vehicles – a program worth around $1.3-billion – are also expected to be awarded in 2012. Beyond our borders, emerging economies are leading the market for defence. India is expected to spend US$180-billion by 2020. Brazil is poised to invest heavily in security as host of both the 2014 Grant McDonald FIFA World Cup and the 2016 is office managing Olympic Summer Games. Breaking partner (Ottawa) and into emerging markets like Brazil, national aerospace India and China is not without risk; and defence leader for it requires a nuanced understanding KPMG in Canada of local regulations and culture, protection of intellectual property and knowledge of the procurement system. These offshore markets, however, provide rich opportunity for long-term growth. At a time when many defence companies have cash on the balance sheet, mergers and acquisitions also provide avenues to increase their footprint and expand the supply chain. While deals like the US$18.4-billion acquisition of Goodrich by United Technology Corp. are rare, there is an appetite in the Canadian market for smaller acquisitions. The defence sector in Canada is moving into a period of moderate growth. The impact of large-scale domestic projects will be tempered by decreasing defence budgets internationally, and particularly in the U.S. In the face of leaner spending, and fierce international competition, it is critical for Canadian companies to be agile, to remain at the forefront of innovation and respond quickly to new opportunities in this truly global market.
Arctic fusion of surveillance data As Prime Minister Stephen Harper has said: “Canada has a choice when it comes to defending our sovereignty over the Arctic. We either use it or lose it.” Canada’s overall objectives in the Arctic span sovereignty, security and economic benefits. In all cases, critical to meeting these objectives are good surveillance and intelligence. The only feasible method of monitoring the Arctic on a regular basis in all weather is using space-based radar surveillance. Today, RADARSAT-1 and RADARSAT-2 provide this, and in the future, the RADARSAT Constellation Mission (RCM) will provide reliable, wide-area coverage in the Arctic. As global climate change modifies ice patterns and weather patterns in the Arctic, more transportation, resource exploration and other activities will grow. The ability to monitor this area broadly on
a reliable basis is essential for Canada to observe the increasing activity. Complementing and leveraging broad space-based surveillance are other technologies that Canada needs David Hargreaves to continue to develop to maintain its is vice president and knowledge of the Arctic. These ingeneral manager of clude long-range, all-weather airborne Surveillance and surveillance, maritime surface surveilIntelligence for MacDonald, Dettwiler lance and underwater surveillance. and Associates This layered, multi-platform, multisensor approach enables Canada to maintain a constant watch on Arctic activity and an ability to focus on areas of interest and/or threats. With the increasing quantities of sophisticated surveillance information, the final piece of the surveillance and intelligence puzzle is the information fusion centre. Collecting, fusing, verifying, correlating, extrapolating and interpreting multiple sources of surveillance is a critical function that serves to present the resulting information in a form that can be more easily understood by key decision makers, leading to effective and efficient actions to maintain Canada’s sovereignty, security and economic benefits. Without good surveillance and intelligence, Canada is essentially blind in the Arctic and, as Prime Minister Harper correctly suggested, runs the risk of losing our Arctic sovereignty.
The merger of acquisition with training There is a transformation occurring in logistics and training across the Canadian Forces that is in part a result of the economic environment, but more so the way missions have evolved. Highly targeted and executed in diverse environments, Canadian warfighters need highly specialized equipment to be successful – and they need it immediately. In many cases, the acquisition of new equipment moves directly from the manufacturing floor into the field where soldiers must operate, maintain and sustain the equipment without ever having worked Gabe Batstone on it before. In 2012 alone, major is the chief operating systems including the Victoria-class officer of NGRAIN submarines will be online and operational; we will see Canada’s shipbuilding industry rise; and the reset of equipment returning from Afghanistan will be in full swing. Traditionally, the procurement cycle and its related training/operational support have been two relatively disparate systems. What we are now recognizing is that the operational tempo requires the defence industry to merge the two by developing the right training and operational support for systems entering the field – and this must be done in tandem. This change, which ultimately merges two independent processes, is an evolution that needs to be addressed holistically and as part of the same equipment lifecycle to sufficiently address the needs of our soldiers. Take, for example, the Canadian Army. It is acquiring approximately 2,200 field heaters to replace legacy models. It is near to impossible to provide training to each soldier on how to operate www.vanguardcanada.com
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E Executive Interview and maintain these heaters prior to their use in the field. So the Canadian Forces School of Electrical and Mechanical Engineering is taking advantage of simulation-based technology that will be deployed with the equipment to provide the information at the time of need in the field. This is an economical and highly distributable method of delivering training and operational support for any equipment entering the field and is expected to be the way forward as more systems move from the floor to the field without the opportunity for schoolhouse training. This systemic approach has the inherent flexibility to accommodate operational and training requirements for the equipment reset after Afghanistan because it is highly deployable in nature and is delivered with the equipment. It also addresses the need to provide support for people completing infrequently performed tasks on highly modern systems. National Defence must examine how best to deliver and deploy equipment and simultaneously address the training and operational support requirements as part of a single procurement and sustainment process.
Family planning for UAVs This year, the Canadian Army is embarking on the first steps of procuring a family of UAVs. This is a laudable endeavour and clearly necessary for any 21st century fighting force. It will start with the procurement of a micro UAV, explicitly required to support the STANAG 4586 interoperability protocol, and will continue with procurement of a common STANAG 4586 control station solution for mounted operations. This approach is certainly a good one and has a degree of foresight that addresses some of the army’s future as well as current
needs. However, it could benefit from expanding the vision even more, recognizing that a family of UAVs is itself only a sub-set of the future soldier’s needs. The reality is that shortly after Mike Meakin these systems are fielded (if not beis president and co-founder of InnUVative fore), the dismounted soldier will Systems and vice-chair recognize the need for embedded of the NIAG SG-157 unmanned solutions, controlled effort to define a from tablet-like interfaces that are cross-domain unmanned easily carried and operated by the system control station soldiers themselves. In addition, the solution for NATO history of manned operations has demonstrated that the ability to combine air, land and sea operations greatly amplified the safety of the troops as well as the effect on the enemy. The requirement for unmanned systems to likewise team with each other and with manned operations is already being recognized and developed by our allies, so it only makes sense to reflect these needs in our own procurements as well. The army is laying the groundwork for the future of unmanned systems in the Canadian Forces. Like any foundation, it is best to ensure that it is sufficiently strong to allow expansion even beyond the immediate intended structure. Expanding the vision for this future family to include both the eventual needs of the dismounted soldier and combined operations across domains only makes sense. As any parent knows, family planning can be a daunting task but the reward in the end is when you see your children accomplish things that you never even imagined.
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by Chris Thatcher
Joint Strike Fighter
J
What is 5th Gen capability?
“Remember the market scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark?” Stephen O’Bryan asks, referring to the sword-wielding assailant, who confronts Indiana Jones only to be shot moments later. “That’s fifth generation.” O’Bryan, vice president of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program for Lockheed Martin Aeronautics, has been asked to define fifth generation capability a lot in recent months as politicians attempt to understand what they are buying when they consider replacements for legacy fighter jets. So the colourful movie analogy has become a simple metaphor to capture the difference between so-called 4th and 5th generation fighter technologies. Although he now coordinates all national and international business activity around the JSF, the former U.S. Navy Fighter Weapons School (Top Gun) pilot accumulated over 3,700 hours in F/A-18C and carrier variants. The differences are stark, he says. While stealth capability reaps much of the headlines, it’s the way in which data from hundreds of sensors is processed that sets the aircraft apart. The F-35 features over nine million lines of code, significantly more than even the F-22 Raptor, which contains just over two million. Much of the F-35 debate in Canada has concentrated on the aircraft’s delivery schedule and cost, and whether the eventual price tag might mean a reduction in the minimum 65 jets the Air Force says it needs to meet its mission requirements, or even the procurement of a cheaper alternative like the F-18 Super Hornet. So what makes the F-35 a technological leap forward from its predecessors? Alan Norman is Lockheed Martin’s chief test pilot and the lead for the F-35, a 23-year veteran of the U.S. Air Force with over 6,000 hours of flying time, including numerous flight tests on the F-22. He says 4th generation or legacy fighters have reached their limit when it comes to incorporating state-of-the-art equipment. “To take that next step, that quantum leap … we needed to put together technologies in one platform that gave us very unique … capabilities. You can’t make a 4th Gen airplane do what a 5th Gen airplane does. You have to design it in from the beginning.” In a recent webinar, Norman began with the JSF’s advanced
stealth capability, from its design and engine alignment to its internal weapons bays, all of which ensure “low observability.” He noted that those design elements have been achieved without compromising the aircraft’s performance. “We’ve already been to 1.6 mock, we’ve already pulled 9 Gs [in test flights],” he said. But like O’Bryan, he quickly focused on the fusion of sensor data. The F-35’s sensors are able to operate without pilot intervention, performing their required tasks, alerting other sensors to what they find, and integrating that information into what Norman calls “total situational awareness.” “The pilot can come into the loop … and decide, ‘I’d rather be looking at a certain target or a certain thing on the ground and I’d like all you sensors to be helping me out with that,’ or the sensors can do things on their own,” he said. “It’s almost akin to taking R2D2 up with me and having him run all my little systems that I used to have to run in a 4th Gen airplane. That frees me up to be a tactician versus a technician. I can worry about what I am doing in the battle space versus how I am operating my systems.” That information can also be passed back and forth between pilots and with ground stations. “I can see what they see, they can see what I see. That opens up the airspace in a completely different way then we have done before. In essence, I have become a supersonic node in the information highway.” That same sensor capability also applies to system diagnostics and maintenance. All three variants of the F-35 are also distinguished by their multi-mission capability, Norman said. Not only is the JSF a wellarmed, formidable threat in air-to-air and surface-to-air situations, it is also an intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) and electronic operations platform, tasks usually reserved for specialized aircraft. “We can perform [ISR] missions that we never could do before with a fighter.” Bill Gigliotti, a Top Gun graduate and an F-35 test pilot with over 6,000 flying hours, notes that all missions can be performed without reconfiguring the jet. “On a single sortie, the aircraft can execute all these missions: a young fighter pilot of the future [might] encounter air-to-air threats and be an air dominance fighter while gathering that ISR, providing electronic attack, doing commandand-control (C2) back to ground forces and [C2] assets that he is supporting while prosecuting an air-to-surface target.” “In fact,” adds Norman, “we can help legacy fighters on our side do even better because we can pass information to them that they can’t get on their own.” The question facing governments from Canada and Australia to Turkey and Japan is, of course, is that “quantum leap” worth the price? www.vanguardcanada.com
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A Arctic security lee carson
is president of NOrstrAt consulting and a senior associate with Hill+Knowlton strategies, helping organizations and companies build components of canada’s Northern strategy (www.norstrat.ca).
WHAT’S NEXT for Canada’s northern strategy?
The Arctic Response Company Group’s 2 Platoon boards a CC-130 Hercules aircraft departing for Pond Inlet during Operation Nanook 10 in Resolute Bay. Photo: DND
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Arctic security A in July 2009 chuck strahl, then Minister of indian Affairs and Northern development, and Lawrence cannon, Minister of Foreign Affairs, released “canada’s Northern strategy,” an integrated plan to strengthen canada’s sovereignty, protect our environmental heritage, promote economic and social development, and improve northern governance.
A month later, standing aboard HMCS Toronto in Frobisher Bay, Prime Minister Stephen Harper further clarified the goals of the plan. “To develop the North, we must know the North,” he said. “And to protect the North, we must control the North.” Those two short sentences nicely sum up the strategy. Development of the North represents an enormous opportunity for all Canadians. But it must be done carefully and with full consideration of the cumulative impact of all its pillars, on the northern environment and on the well-being of all who live in it. The strategy, in essence, commits the government to doing its part to establish the necessary infrastructure to facilitate success.
Marking progress To the government’s credit, much has already been accomplished since the strategy was announced, often in collaboration with industry and northern peoples. In space, RADARSAT II is providing daily, all-weather satellite surveillance of the northern environment, including our shrinking polar icecap. And the replacement to RADARSAT II, a constellation of three satellites that will provide even more frequent coverage to aid navigation, is under development. A new satellite mission is also in the design stage, which will provide much needed polar weather data and satellite communications. On land, the government has begun the design of a new High Arctic research station to be located in Cambridge Bay and has committed to the expansion and the re-equipment of Canada’s northern militia, the Rangers. On the sea, a huge milestone was reached this past October with the selection of two shipyards to deliver the government’s National Shipbuilding Procurement Strategy. Seaspan of Vancouver will shortly begin construction of the Coast Guard’s new heavy icebreaker, the John G. Diefenbaker, while Irving of Halifax will begin construction of the Navy’s new Arctic Offshore Patrol Ships. Meanwhile, under the sea, government workers, industry and academia have teamed to map the northern extent of our continental shelf using Canadian innovations in subsea robotics. Beyond those tangible and important milestones, other equally important steps have been taken to lay the foundation for further progress. For example, a public opinion survey conducted by the Munk School of Global Affairs concluded that Canadians from all walks of life and from all regions care deeply about the North and support the government’s efforts and investments in setting the conditions for its sustainable development. And several government departments have “got the message” about the importance of the North and developed their own departmental plans to play their supporting part in the whole-of-government strategy.
taking stock While all these accomplishments are significant and laudable, how well do they help us meet the prime minister’s goals of better knowing and controlling the North? A quick glimpse at a framework of the necessary systems to accomplish that suggests we still have a ways to go. For example, “knowing the North” requires: • Charts of the sea: modern, accurate bathymetric charts neceswww.vanguardcanada.com
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A Arctic security Progress is being made, albeit slowly, on geological mapping of the North under the Natural Resources Canada GEM project. Wide area surveillance of the air, the land and the sea is in-hand due to a number of systems now in place or under development. Arctic forecasting is expected to improve greatly once the Polar Communications and Weather satellite mission implementation is approved, built and launched. And the Canadian High Arctic Research Station, now in the early design stage, is expected to make a significant boost to Canada’s scientific endeavors in the North. Meanwhile, on the “control” side, the announced ship projects by the Coast Guard and the Navy will ensure a significant improvement in our ability to respond to incidents wherever they might occur. Expansion to our Polar Continental Shelf station in Resolute and to the Rangers will increase our footprint on the land. And a Royal Canadian Air Force project currently being considered would greatly increase the government’s persistent presence in Arctic skies. Finally, the Polar Communications Weather satellite mission will provide high bandwidth communications across the far North.
Plugging gaps
Exercise Northern Bison 2011 Photo: DND sary to allow mariners safe passage through our Arctic waters and to facilitate prompt rescue or aid when that is needed; • Maps of the land: topographic and geological, required to encourage exploration and development; • Surveillance: current knowledge of what’s happening in the Arctic today – in the air, on the land, on the sea, and under the sea; • Accurate weather forecasting: in an area as vast, remote and harsh as the North, accurate weather and ice forecasting saves lives as well as money; and • Science: science and knowledge are synonymous, and sound baseline knowledge of the environment is a necessary prerequisite to understanding and monitoring the impacts of development. Similarly, to control the North requires: • Presence: not just “boots on the ground,” but also on the ice and the water; • Response capability: Canada must have the tools and capabilities in place to deal with whatever can and will happen when development occurs in this vast, remote and harsh region, including pollution response and cleanup, conduct of successful search and rescue operations, response to humanitarian crises like that unfolding in Attawapiskat, or response to military threats; and • Decision support: this includes reliable northern satellite communications and command and control tools.
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The biggest remaining gap is under the sea, and this extends across the framework. Navigation charts of Canada’s Arctic archipelago, the largest in the world, are woefully inadequate. Three ships ran aground in a single month last summer, including the Clipper Adventurer cruise ship with Margaret Atwood aboard. Not only do inadequate charts increase the chance of such accidents, they also hinder and increase the risk for rescue efforts. Similarly, we also suffer an undersea surveillance gap in our situational awareness. It might seem ironic, but although foreign national submarines collected much of our bathymetric chart data, we have no means of detecting when those submarines are operating in our waters today. When Defence Minister Peter MacKay commented in Parliament back in October that “I know nuclear subs are what’s needed under deep water, deep ice,” he acknowledged our lack of undersea presence and response capability. (Whether the only solution to that gap is nuclear submarines is a separate issue).
Great opportunity Canada’s northern strategy is a necessary response to worldwide environmental and geo-political changes that cannot be ignored. Those same changes represent what I believe is Canada’s greatest opportunity and challenge of the 21st century. The government deserves much credit for not only announcing a comprehensive, whole-of-government strategy to deal with these changes, but also for its strong start, marshalling the support of departmental bureaucracies and the public, and kicking off a sizeable number of important infrastructure projects to help “know and control the North.” Now is the time to fill the remaining gaps in the suite of projects, notably those that provide knowledge, awareness and presence in the undersea, and to push through the implementation of those already announced and under consideration.
Arctic security A Dr. James Fergusson
is the director of the centre for defence and security studies at the university of Manitoba.
W IE
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Arctic space-based surveillance In 1986, senior Canadian defence officials proposed to the United States that Canada would develop a radar satellite constellation for the North American defence mission with global utility. In 1995, the Canadian Space Agency’s (CSA) RADARSAT-1 was launched into a sun-synchronous polar orbit. Twelve years later, RADARSAT-2 was launched into the same orbit. Two years earlier, the government announced funding for MacDonald Detwiller & Associates to undertake a feasibility and design study for a three-radar satellite constellation. In 2010, the Harper government, along with the CSA, budgeted funds for the construction of the constellation, with the first launch planned for 2014. During this period, National Defence established Project Polar Epsilon 1 to build ground stations on the east and west coasts for the reception and analysis of RADARSAT-2 data. The department is currently proceeding with Polar Epsilon 2 designed to exploit the radar satellite constellation for enhanced, persistent cover-
age of the Arctic and maritime approaches to Canada, which will include the integration of the maritime automatic identification system. Epsilon 2 may also include an additional ground station located potentially in the High North or the prairies to provide more efficient data collection and analysis. This roughly 30-year odyssey from vision to completion has been driven by the combination of North American defence cooperation with the U.S. and national sovereignty and security requirements. Without the emergence of the Arctic as a government priority, however, vital government support and funding would likely have been absent, especially for the constellation component.
the Arctic equation Since the transfer of British sovereignty over the Arctic archipelago and North West Passage (NWP) to Canada in the late nineteenth century, Canadian knowledge of foreign activities in the Arctic are www.vanguardcanada.com
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A Arctic security for other government departments and their respective mandates. noticeable by their absence. But then, there was little, if any activFor the National Defence security mission, in conjunction with ity except for exploration to notice. The harsh climate, frozen pasthe Coast Guard and RCMP, the constellation will provide cueing sages and lack of technology ensured Canadian sovereignty and for terrestrial, maritime and air assets for target reconnaissance security by default. and target interception as required. This, in turn, demands signifiDuring the Cold War, little changed except for the potential cant investments in acquiring and deploying the necessary assets threat of Soviet bombers flying over the Arctic to targets in the for a relatively rapid response. Initial steps, indicated through the south. This generated the conditions for the establishment of the Canada First Defence Strategy, including the Distant Early Warning line in the 1950s, recent naval shipbuilding program to acquire modernized in the 1980s, the creation of NORAD in 1957, and establishment of The need to replicate a fleet of first-year ice capable vessels and the establishment of an Arctic deepwater re-fuelforward operating locations for Canadian the existing Maritime ing and logistics facility at Nanisivik on Baffin interceptors. An initial surveillance capabilIsland. An adjacent airfield provides air access ity emerged with the creation of the RangSecurity Operations the facility. A small army training base has ers program and limited aerial surveillance Centres on each coast to also been established at Resolute Bay. Both capabilities with the Arcturus platform. But is likely to become a facilities are located in the eastern Arctic. still, the realities of the Arctic environment While year-round permanent military presproduced little need for terrestrial surveilpriority for the Arctic. ence is unnecessary, depending upon Arctic lance. warming patterns, a summer ice-free seasonal In the maritime sector, the development presence may be required. In addition, as of Arctic capable icebreakers provided activity increases, similar consideration may need to be given to some degree of greater access by foreign nations, and a nascent establishing a military presence in the western Arctic. Already, for Canadian capability to monitor its Arctic waters. But there was example, calls to locate military search and rescue capabilities furno significant Arctic maritime threat. The Arctic waters were also ther north have been heard. The future expansion of a Canadian the home of Soviet and American nuclear ballistic missile and atForces presence in the north will carry a very steep price tag. The tack submarines on station. The extent to which they transited Arctic will remain an expensive theatre of operations. through Canadian arctic waters remains unknown. Regardless, The ability to exploit the radar satellite constellation to its fullthe lack of technology to monitor their passage underwater and est extent will also require close cooperation and integration high costs associated with the technology, which sank Canada’s amongst the CF, Coast Guard, RCMP and other government nuclear submarine program in 1989, alongside strategic considerdepartments, as well as local authorities. Notwithstanding highly ations, foreclosed this aspect of surveillance. contentious concerns of an emerging military threat in the Arctic, All changed with global warming and the shrinking of the permathe security questions primarily relate to constabulary functions nent Arctic ice cap. While estimates of when we might see a summer outside of National Defence’s legal mandate. ice-free Arctic vary significantly, maritime traffic is growing, with proMoreover, the constellation itself is not a military owned or operjections of the Arctic becoming a major global transportation route. ated asset. In effect, the primary role of National Defence and the CF Whether the NWP will also become a major route is a little more is to facilitate the execution of the legal mandates of others, whether difficult – the rotation of the earth will drive ice flows into its enthrough the provision of analyzed imagery or direct military support trance points, potentially restricting traffic. Regardless, the need for to others executing their mandates as cued by this imagery. In so doCanada to be able to monitor projected maritime traffic is growing, ing, the need to replicate the existing Maritime Security Operations and this extends beyond the NWP. In addition, climate changes are Centres on each coast is likely to become a priority for the Arctic. also opening access to on- and off-shore resources. Their exploitation, alongside environmental concerns and their impact upon local communities, further drives the vital need for Canada to possess full New security environment situational awareness of the Arctic as a whole. The Canadian Arctic has made the radar satellite constellation possible. The sovereignty issue is more rhetoric than reality. No nation contests Canada’s ownership of its Arctic archipelago, and the Monitoring the Arctic NWP, despite Canadian protests, will remain an international strait, Like the nation, the Canadian Arctic is a huge expanse of territory rather than internal waters. The security issues driven by increased and adjacent waters. The radar satellite constellation, along with maritime access to and through Arctic waters are the major concern RADARSAT 1 and 2, is one piece, albeit the essential one, of the driving the government. The constellation is a vital piece of the monitoring and response puzzle. Its wide-area surveillance capagovernment’s response to this new security environment. bility with 36-minute active dictation per orbit for the constellaAt the same time, the North American and global significance tion as a whole will provide at least daily coverage of the entire of the constellation should not be ignored. Constellation imagery Canadian Arctic and maritime approaches. provides a valuable Canadian contribution to North American deIn addition, the constellation possesses a coherent change detecfence cooperation. Its global potential will also be of great value tion capability. These capabilities provide domain and situational for allied overseas operations. awareness, and damage assessment for National Defence, as well as 24 FEBRUARY/MARCH 2012
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T TECHNOLOGY Dr. Walter Dorn,
professor of defence studies at the Royal Military College of Canada and chair of the Department of Security and International Affairs at the Canadian Forces College, is author of Keeping Watch: Monitoring, Technology and Innovation in UN Peace Operations. Ryan Cross is a researcher in the Department of Psychology at the University of British Columbia.
Intel and early warning Peacekeeping’s high tech imperative In traditional peacekeeping, United Nations soldiers served as observers of static military forces, patrolling between opposing belligerents to reduce the chance of firefights. The peacekeepers’ main task was to “observe and report.” When the Cold War ended the mission mandates expanded to a new and vast set of challenging tasks such as: humanitarian aid distribution; disarmament and demobilization of former combatants; security sector reform; election organizing; economic assistance; peacebuilding (both physical and social) of war-torn infrastructure; sanctions monitoring; and peace enforcement. In the 21st century, ambitious civilian protection mandates were added to all newly created UN peace operations. All this means that UN forces must now monitor large areas for a wide range of activities including nefarious covert efforts to spoil peace processes and to attack civilians. Peacekeepers must locate and intercept clandestine arms shipments, uncover evidence of atrocities for courts and tribunals, and help fragile states govern during transitional periods. Such is the enormous burden of modern multi-dimensional peace missions. Furthermore, the environments of peacekeeping missions are more complex than in the past. Belligerents cannot be easily identified or located, often mixing with civilian populations. Other actors, such as non-governmental organizations and nascent hostgovernments, have become key players and partners in complex UN missions. This has amplified the UN’s requirements: a keen sense of situational awareness; proactive information/intelligence gathering; a surveillance capability; and the ability to exercise effective responses through professional command and control over UN forces. Fortunately, in the modern age, technologies can help considerably with these demanding requirements. Unfortunately, the technological side of peacekeeping has not evolved alongside the operational side, even as the need is great and many technologies are readily available. In contrast to peacekeeping, war-fighting has benefitted immensely from new and wide-ranging technologies and methods, especially in network-enabled operations based on advanced Command, Control, Communications and Computers, Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (often shortened to C4ISR). Advanced technological capacity had tremendous success recently in the UN-sanctioned, NATO-run aerial operations over Libya. Not a single allied solider was killed and precision-guided 26 FEBRUARY/MARCH 2012
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munitions were able to pinpoint Gadhafi forces while causing minimal civilian fatalities on the ground. This example of technologically intensive warfighting, involving the latest in surveillance and monitoring technology – for a war fought on “humanitarian grounds” – illustrates the gap between high-technology operations and the peacekeeping operations that the UN conducts. For example, blue helmet forces recently instructed villagers under threat of attack to bang “pots and pans in order to sound the alarm” of a pending attack to alert UN forces nearby. Unfortunately, when UN peacekeepers are deployed today, peace is waged by technologies of the 1980s or older – sometimes dating back to World War II. Exponential advances in monitoring and surveillance technology have so far been unleveraged by the UN, resulting in a distinct disadvantage for the world body that is responsible for the maintenance of international peace and security. Shortcomings in information-gathering and early warning have accounted for many failures in UN missions. This should not be the case in our modern globalized world. Cost-effective technologies are available to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of military operations so they can better achieve the ambitious mandates set out by the Security Council. Here are some technological examples.
techNOlOGY t
Camera systems placed in hot spots can allow the UN to monitor outbreaks of conflicts, especially in areas where peacekeepers are not physically present. The UN showed that this was possible when in 2008 it placed six cameras in a demilitarized zone between Greek and Turkish Cypriot forces (i.e., on “the Green Line”). This was a modest but important “baby step” for the UN. More ambitiously, high-resolution cameras on aircraft can benefit from the “bird’s eye” view and cover large areas; satellites even more so. Non-governmental initiatives such as the Satellite Sentinel project provide early warning of attacks, e.g., in southern Sudan, using commercial satellite imagery that the UN could also purchase and analyse. The use of GPS tracking systems to record the location and speed of UN vehicles can increase the security of UN personnel, allowing the organization to know when vehicles are stopped or in danger, and where they need to be rescued. This is particularly important in locations far from cities where communications are weak and independent local forces dominate. Commercial cell phone technology has been advancing in leaps and bounds, including in the war-torn areas of the world. Cell phone usage approaches some 80 percent of the world’s population. The profound and well-documented increase of information availability and transfer needs to be harnessed by the UN. Smart
phone technology allows for even smarter information sharing. After the Haitian earthquake, for example, aid agencies and the U.S. military collaborated and exchanged information on opensource platforms. Information on buried individuals, public health services and issues, vital logistics lines, security threats, infrastructure damage, natural hazards, etc., were uploaded by phone to a central website for all to see. In central Africa, near-real-time crisis mapping of the Lord’s Resistance Army atrocities was enhanced by a dynamic database of attacks, geo-tagged, in an “open” database. An entire field of specialization, known as “Crisis Mapping” is developing in this domain; it is imperative for people on the ground that UN peacekeeping harness, support and leverage this technology in the service of peace. While traditionally peacekeeping has been a daytime job, most of the nefarious actors in war-torn lands use the “cover of darkness” to conduct their illegal or threatening activities at night. In recent years, advances in night-vision technology and surveillance technologies have improved drastically allowing the UN, in principle, to overcome the “night barrier.” With night vision goggles, peacekeepers could conduct operations around the clock, including robust operations. Nighttime awareness can be further enhanced with ground surveillance radars and acoustic/seismic sensors. Similarly, when the UN conducts sanctions monitoring or weapons interdiction, it must have properly equipped missions to observe at night when illegal and clandestine shipments are usually made. For example, in the Congo arms smugglers have moved large quantities of small arms and light weapons into the country, while moving the country’s precious minerals out, all the time outmanoeuvering the UN nocturnally. A study of the missions’ ability to achieve its mandate of a weapons embargo on militants found that the mission “needs to be provided with the appropriate lake patrol and air-surveillance capabilities, including appropriate nocturnal, satellite, radar and photographic assets.” Combining, synthesising and understanding various surveillance streams is no small task. A multitude of competing requirements need to be met, including real-time mapping of NGO and UN movements, tracking and identification of possible arms smugglers, or night time attacks, to name a few. Fortunately, the UN has made considerable progress in incorporating analytical centres into its peacekeeping missions, even if not the technologies. Since 2006, UN missions have included “Joint Operations Centres” and “Joint Mission Analysis Centres,” using mostly human-supplied information. Data from monitoring technologies can be used to collaborate or disprove the intelligence from human sources. This would be at the cutting edge of the emerging concept of “intelligence-led peacekeeping.” Effective intelligence-led operations require that the United Nations couple its traditional good offices with advances in technology. This will provide the world body the tools to build on past successes, and obviate gaps from the past. The basic principles that define peacekeeping – consent of the parties, impartiality and the use of force in a defensive manner – are enduring. What is needed now are modern technological means to help implement these principles for peace and security in the modern era. Canada is ideally suited to help provide these vital force multipliers. www.vanguardcanada.com
FeBruAry/MArcH 2012 27
T Training
A U.S. pilot flies an Apache helicopter in a detailed simulation on EX Winged Warrior.
Acting Sub-Lieutenant Noelani Shore and Captain Yvette Grygoryev are public affairs officers with 1 Wing in Kingston.
A case for
Simulated training paves the road to high readiness Members of 400 Tactical Helicopter Squadron (THS), based in Borden, Ont., hit the ground running this year, applying their skills and training in a virtual environment on Exercise Winged Warrior (Ex WW). The exercise, which ran from January 16 to 27, in Petawawa, continues to break new ground as advancements in virtual training evolve to meet the demands of the changing operational tempo of the tactical helicopter community. This year, more than 46 technicians, software experts and roleplayers combined their wealth of experience to ensure 65 members from 400 THS were confirmed at a state of high-readiness to deploy on operations anywhere in the world. Ex WW used the army’s new Common Collective Training Scenario, and for the first week, members from 400 THS worked alongside the army on 2 Canadian Mechanized Brigade Group’s exercise Virtual Bear. This Army exercise prepared elements from 2 CMBG for international contingency operations. “We can learn to do things better and more effectively through exercises like Winged Warrior,” said Colonel Christian Drouin, 1 Wing Commander. “We want to be ready for our next mission, whatever and wherever it may be.” Ex WW originated as a live-flying, live-fire field exercise, but in 2006 it was transported into a virtual environment. Before it went virtual, executing the exercise meant gathering all of a squadron’s assets including aircraft, personnel, ammunition and supporting ground troops. In the six years that members of 1 Wing have been trained in a virtual world, it has grown rapidly in scope, capability and fidelity, with the support of the Directorate of Land Synthetic Environments (DLSE) from the Army’s Land Force Doctrine and Training System. The software training systems simulate a realistic 3D environment that is interactive for multi-users, and it can be customized to achieve specific training objectives. The systems allow commanders at all levels to enhance operational synergy. There were several significant improvements on the technical side this year, including a new version of the program Virtual Battle Space 2 (VBS 2), allowing users to practice small unit tactics in a larger photo-realistic terrain area with variable environmental 28 FEBRUARY/MARCH 2012
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conditions. There was also the integration of KnowBook, a program which provides a much higher fidelity representation of the cockpit and flight dynamics of the CH-146 Griffon helicopter. This year marked the seventh Winged Warrior exercise for Doug Brown, senior integrator and lead technician. Since the hardware needed to create Ex WW is not housed in a permanent facility, there are plenty of surprises, he said. The next exercise, scheduled for this summer, will use a new version of VBS 2 that promises significant advancements: “I am anticipating enhancements in exercise communications and terrain for the next one,” Brown explained. In the virtual battle space, pilots and aircrews can practice the most current aviation tactics and procedures and adopt the full functional battle-rhythm of an operational aviation battalion. Captain Greg Juurlink, a line pilot at 403 Helicopter Operational Training Squadron, has been an augmentee for 400 THS since August, when the training for the road to high readiness began. He was also an augmentee for 408 THS, and deployed to Afghanistan on Roto 8. In 2008, the Ex WW became the pre-mission confirmation for the Canadian Helicopter Force Afghanistan. The scenarios Juurlink encountered during his first Ex WW in 2009 were eerily similar to later events in Afghanistan. “During the exercise, my crew was exposed to enemy fire, forcing us to retreat to a nearby Forward Operating Base (FOB). As it would happen, on my ninth mission in Afghanistan, my helicopter was the first Griffon ever hit by enemy fire. It happened to be in the same location as on Ex WW. We had to execute an emergency landing in the same FOB we landed in on the exercise. “It was interesting to look back to see how we handled it on the exercise compared to what we did in real life. It was pretty much the same but I felt very prepared for it when it did happen. Even though it’s a simulator, it feels real. Your adrenaline, heart rate and breathing all climb,” he added. Drouin is confident in the level of training of 400 THS, and he says that the preservation of lessons learned in Afghanistan is critical. “We want to make sure we have ways to preserve the experience and knowledge we gained in Afghanistan, both the good and bad,” he said. “This will better prepare us for the next operation we will serve.”
Intelligence
I
Bonnie Butlin is executive director of the
Canadian Association for Security and Intelligence Studies (CASIS) and co-chair of the National Capital Security Partners’ Forum.
Building agility into Canadian security Two events of significance for Canadian national security took place in February: the release of Canada’s new counterterrorism strategy, “Building Resilience Against Terrorism,” and the emergence of the National Capital Security Partners’ Forum (NCSPF) at its sold-out Feb. 15th event in Ottawa. Both the counterterrorism (CT) strategy and the NCSPF are building agility into the Canadian security network, and with it, resilience. The CT strategy will build agility through a slower, top-down broadening and restructuring of the security network through developing new international and domestic partnerships and shared awareness among Canadians, affecting Canadian security beyond counterterrorism efforts. The recently emerged Forum is building agility in a rapid, bottom-up reorganization of the security community through networking security-related associations and personnel into the Forum. The convergence of the two will be noteworthy. Comparing along four markers of agile networks – scale, ambition of objectives, unification of motivations and intentions (but not operational control), and network durability – the CT strategy may succeed on the first three, and the Forum is already achieving results along all four. The strategy signals five changes to the security network – one that may increase network scale; two consistent with increase ambition; and two that may merge network motivations and intentions. The strategy may increase the security network’s scale with the federal government, moving toward new load-sharing security partnerships internationally, vertically at all levels of government, and horizontally with the private sector, NGOs and Canadians. The strategy signals more ambitious security objectives, calling for an added robust capacity to act on threats earlier and proactively, and a capacity for clear and focused precision in addressing complex threats. It may also contribute to uniting motivations and intentions among security network partners, through unprecedented frank communication on threats and risks, and clear communication of strategy. The resulting shared understandings and common direction would ideally merge motivations and intentions within the network, particularly within the highlighted relationship of intelligence support for law enforcement, although the latter may merge operations, possibly limiting agility. Last, the strategy reflects a government push outward to create durable partnerships within the security network. It is unclear, however, what pull factors may draw network partners toward government within the network, making durability and unification of motivations and intentions uncertain over time. The Forum operates on an unprecedented scale in Canada,
with some 40 associations networked or plugged into the NCSPF alone. Forum structures have since emerged in Toronto, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland & Labrador, the B.C. Interior, Greater Vancouver, Vancouver Island, and the Yukon, and additional structures will launch in Alberta and elsewhere. A national-level Canadian Security Partners’ Forum (CSPF) is now coordinating among them. Representation includes tens of thousands of security personnel who effectively are the Canadian security capacity, consistent with U.S. Central Command Commander General James Mattis’ indication at the recent Conference of Defence Associations conference that a personnel-focused approach is the way forward in achieving agility, effectively replacing NATO effects-based operations approaches. The Forum’s objective is ambitious – the professional expansion of the Canadian security network’s capacity writ large – and is resonating within a security community wanting to elevate Canadian security effectiveness, credibility and legitimacy, and effectively unifying motivations. The Forum is a plug-and-play enabler for the security network, including often resource-strapped associations, facilitating open communication and collaborative opportunities among its network, yet neither competing with, nor interfering in operationallevel command and control within associations. In addition to this pull, the Forum provides push, populating the nation-wide security network with links among previously isolated associations and personnel, enabling shared awareness and common intent. Through self-synchronization and rotating leadership, the Forum’s security personnel are communicating and forwarding the best that security has to offer from the level of the individual upward. These push and pull factors are enabling partnership durability within the Forum network. The top-down CT strategy and the bottom-up Forum approaches are mutually supportive. As the government reaches out to partner with the NGO sector, the Forum is already improving security agility. Both strive for offensive capabilities, though the CT strategy is threat-centric and relies on higher-level activity with population buy-in, while the Forum is proactive and capacity-centric/personnel-centric. Combined, they signal the emergence of a more agile security network that will rebalance Canadian comprehensive efforts. With security able to play a more proportionate role, military back-filling within Canadian efforts will be alleviated. The next NCSPF event, National Security vs. Corporate Security, is at the NAC in Ottawa on May 31. www.vanguardcanada.com
FEBRUARY/MARCH 2012 29
T The Last Word Peter Stoffer is the New Democrat critic for shipbuilding. He was a founding member and Chair of the Parliamentary Shipbuilding and Marine Caucus.
Made in Canada? to heavily invest in the aerospace and auto manufacturing sectors In the next 30 years, the federal government will oversee the spendat every level, then Canada can do the same for our shipbuilding ing of $30-40 billion dollars through the National Shipbuilding and marine industry. Procurement Strategy (NSPS) to build both combat and non-comAs a case in point, last year we learned that the government was bat vessels for the Canadian Navy and Coast Guard. in discussion with the United Kingdom about the possibility of As the largest government procurement contract since World collaborating on a new Global Combat Ship program to replace War II, this initiative will lay the groundwork for Canada to both the Royal Navy’s frigate fleet and the Canadian Navy’s destrengthen and revitalize its shipbuilding and marine industries stroyers. Discussions were underway as to whether Canada could and it will position us to again become a global leader. modify the hull design of the U.K.’s Type 26 Global Combat These ship contracts, if managed properly, can bring decades of Ship to “accommodate the equipment and additional personnel work to the chosen shipyards along with massive economic spinsrequirements” for the replacement of Canadian vessels. offs to business and industries across Canada and growth in reAfter facing an outcry from stakeholders in the shipbuilding ingional and provincial economies. dustry, the government scuttled these plans to collaborate with Yet details remain scant about how involved Canadian compaBritain. While I insisted the government state clearly that “all” nies will be in regards to vessel design and manufacturing of the vessels under the NSPS be built and designed in Canada, Pubship components. While Prime Minister Stephen Harper visited lic Works Minister Rona Ambrose only went Irving Shipyard in Halifax and Vancouver so far to say that the government was comShipyards in January to sign agreements in Without a strong mitted to “procure” all of our ships here in principle, he acknowledged that many more domestic marine Canada. decisions need to made with regards to vesMuch to my dismay, that same week the sel design and specifications. “It is always our manufacturing or government issued a tender to hire consulgovernment’s aim to reduce costs, but there tants to adapt German and Spanish military will be Canadian design components involved supplier base, Canada in all of this,” he said. will miss this golden supply ship designs for the Navy’s replacement supply vessels. It is unimaginable that As the Official Opposition Critic for Shipopportunity to the government would consider adapting forbuilding, we want to ensure that Canada’s become a global eign vessel designs when the Navy has spent shipbuilding and marine industry will be inconsiderable time developing its own design volved in every aspect of this procurement leader in the shipplans for the replenishment supply vessels. project, including design, engineering, manubuilding industry. As one of the shipyard union representafacturing and building the vessels from stem tives said to me, “Why can’t the government to stern. Every component of these vessels, be forthcoming with the shipbuilding industry about talks with where possible, should be designed or manufactured in Canada, other countries? Designing and building ships in Canada is someincluding the overall vessel design, electrical work, computer and thing we should be proud of.” weapon systems, and steel production. Evidence shows that there is strong public support for “made According to a recent article by Peter Morton in the Chronicle in Canada” military vessels. Last year, a poll commissioned by Herald, industry insiders have estimated that as much as 60 perDND on military procurement (obtained by the Canadian Press) cent of the ships’ materials may not be “made in Canada.” What showed that two-thirds of Canadians supported the government we fear is that offshore suppliers from the United States or Europe in purchasing its military equipment in Canada – even if it meant or China may manufacture the bulk of the ships’ components or higher purchasing costs. This tells us that Canadians recognize design the vessels; components will be purchased “off-the-shelf” the value of spending their tax dollars on projects that create ecofor “assembly in Canada” at the chosen shipyards. nomic spinoffs and benefits for Canadian business, suppliers and With a project of this magnitude and a cost to taxpayers of $30manufacturers, as well as the strategic importance for Canada to $40 billion dollars, we must insist that Canadians receive the maxibuild its own vessels for our nation’s sovereignty needs. mum value for their tax dollars. Without a strong domestic marine As more details become available on vessel specifications in the manufacturing or supplier base, Canada will miss this golden opcoming months, I will continue to advocate that we need to make portunity to become a global leader in the shipbuilding industry. these ships as Canadian as possible. As I have pointed out many times before, if Canada was willing
30 FEBRUARY/MARCH 2012
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