Engaged in one of the most complex asymmetrical conflicts it has ever encountered, its resources stretched and its people at a premium, the Army faces considerable challenges. In addition, the Land Force is also part of a major transformation project affecting the entire Canadian Forces. Lieutenant-General Andrew Leslie, Chief of the Land Staff, spoke with associate editor Chris Thatcher about the effects of transformation, the Army’s vision beyond 2021, and the people it will need to get there.
What has transformation meant for the Army? How has it affected your ability to deploy soldiers?
The Army is generating roughly 2000 soldiers for international missions at any one point. We also have thousands who are dedicated to protecting Canadians at home. The institutional army, which has a remit to train, equip and provide leadership – the foundational base – for soldiers who are then used by one of the force employers, often ends up with more demands for soldiers then we can meet. We need a bigger army. I’ve been assured that we will be growing by about 3075 Regular Force soldiers over the next couple of years, but I kind of need them right now. That is not going to happen because we have an institutional capacity issue in terms of finding enough instructors and facilities to train the soldiers at a faster rate because we are so busy doing operations.
Why do I bring that up in the context of transformation? The original idea was to have a clear demarcation between force employment and force generation. Force employers are the four headquarters that actually use the troops after they have been prepared. Transformation crystallized the responsibilities of force generation and force deployment. But what we’re now seeing is a blurring of the lines. The Army only does force generation, but some of the force employers are starting to get more and more involved in force generation, which arguably calls into question the logic behind the initiative. I’m not saying it’s good or bad, but if that was the original premise, and that premise is not being followed through, then there are some questions that need to be resolved amongst military professionals.
The second impact of transformation has been the creation of new headquarters. Almost 2000 people have been taken out of the existing services to form the cadres of these new headquarters and the elements that work for them. They have been replaced within the Army, but we’ve taken warrant officers and captains and replaced them with privates; they have not been replaced with the equivalent experience levels. And the Army is running short of experienced folk in the 15-20 year range to actually provide the mid- and junior-level leadership. In time we will make that up, but by definition it takes 15 years to produce a 15-year veteran.
With the combat experience that our young soldiers are bringing back from overseas, others and I want to promote them faster then has been done in the past. We’re facing a shortfall of a 1000 master corporals in the Army. We’re getting pretty close to the 800 mark (I wanted that done by December), which means we’re going to have an even bigger training load just for master corporals next year, as well as sergeants, warrant officers, captains and majors.
Eventually, we are going to have to have a full debate on how many people we want to staff in non-deployable headquarters, and where on the priority list do battalions, regiments and brigades fit into all this, because they have been the source, in the main, of most of the folk for these headquarters.
The current plan is to stick with this. But there is going to be a review at some point. And I look forward to taking part because there is an argument to be made that we have a lot of headquarters for the size of our Army.
You served as director general of strategic planning as the transformation concept was being shaped. Have circumstances, either because of Afghanistan or other experiences, changed some of the thinking around transformation?
One should always question where you use valuable people and what it is they are doing in defending the interests of the nation. That has always been there and creates a healthy dynamic tension. The big idea, transformation, was the establishment of the four headquarters. And there was good debate as to whether we should have one or four. The Chief at the time made the decision on four. The current Vice Chief of the Defence Staff, Vice-Admiral Denis Rouleau, is standing up a team to not only look at this idea of force generation/force deployment – not revisiting old business or re-inventing the wheel – but to also look across the entirety of the CF and DND as to who is doing what and in what priority. That process will probably last another six to 12 months.
At an event earlier this year, you spoke about acquiring strategic quality rather than strategic quantity – what did you mean by that?
It’s my belief that we have the best army in the world for its size, reflective of the Canadian values that our young soldiers bring to the fray, the remarkable ability to understand other cultures, to discern between the shades of grey – our francophone battle groups and brigades, by the way, are particularly good at this. We’re tough fighters when we have to be. When an error can have strategic consequences, mass has a certain value. But quality arguably is just as important, if not more so, especially in missions such as Afghanistan. Mass has enormous value when it comes time to hold. But when you are doing the clear function and the build function of the clear, hold, build idea, you want really well trained, smart, capable folk engaged in those activities, and I would argue we have that.
You’ve mentioned the need to develop that capability in a combined fashion: Is that happening?
The results of the very complex activity we’re doing in Afghanistan means that a combined arms team within the Army has never been stronger, in my experience. Infantry does that which infantry do best. The artillery is doing their task, nested within the overall concept of the battlegroup commander, as is true of the armour, engineers, reconnaissance, medics, transportation, supply – the list goes on. The idea of the affiliated battlegroup is no longer as ad hoc as it was – they train together the same way that they are going to fight. In terms of the combined arms, the Army and Air Force are working far more closely then they ever have before, especially with the addition of the helicopters and their crews overseas. We have learned some valuable lessons from integrating more closely with the Navy during a variety of experiments conducted over the last two years. The whole intent is that we not operate in silos and stovepipes.
What about the civilian aspect of this? Are we seeing greater collaborative development?
We all leverage each other’s strengths and cover off weaknesses. The prime example is Afghanistan, a very complicated venue where the Provincial Reconstruction Team has growing numbers of civilians who bring their expertise to the fray. By working and training more closely with our civilian counterparts from other government departments and nongovernmental organizations, everyday we are learning new lessons.
You’ve noted previously that the Army’s lessons-learned process has changed dramatically. How so?
In the past we had great folk in Kingston and on the Army staff, and in the various brigades, who would produce over the course of a year a couple of booklets on tactical issues that were based on solders’ experiences or thinking by lessons-learned experts, mainly focused on process and “what ifs.” What changed of course was Afghanistan, where we moved very rapidly from “what ifs” to what we did and here’s how we can do it better. Combat has an amazing ability to focus your mind. The typical Canadian soldier these days is not the least bit shy about voicing opinions. And all of us listen very closely. Those ideas are being transmitted into actionable lessons far faster then every before, by teams that we deploy with the soldiers to provide immediate feedback to lessons-learned centres in Kingston and elsewhere, and also by a returning veterans who have definite ideas on how to get it done better, faster, smarter. As a result, we have changed structure, doctrine, the way we train, the way we organize ourselves to train, the way that we think about training, and the way in which we conduct operations. The Army has undergone more change in the last three years than in the previous 30.
The Canadian Army has become one of the most heavily digitized. What now sets us apart?
In 2003, when I and 2500 of my closest friends first deployed to Afghanistan, the idea of an all-source intelligence centre was started by a team – smart young warrant officers, majors and lieutenant-colonels – where the intelligence functions were all nested within the battlegroup and brigade headquarters. “Intelligence-driven” became a mantra. But maps were 1/50,000, with shiny plastic covering them and soldiers using grease pencils to indicate what they were doing, when they were doing it. And almost all the traffic between the soldiers and their command vehicles was done by voice radio.
Now the Canadian Army is the most digitally advanced in the world. We’re not perfect, but when you go into a brigade or battlegroup headquarters, its crude in the sense that it is a rough wood building, but it closely resembles the bridge of The Enterprise, where you have huge screens on which real-time feeds from UAVs or aircraft or helicopters are portrayed. Most of the communications happens digitally, with updates on positioning right down to the vehicle level, with information and secret reports being transmitted right down to combat team and platoon, with feedback and amendments happening automatically. The model for this is actually a combat information centre on a frigate. It is essentially the same approach with the same awareness, information feeds, sequencing and queuing of work and responsibilities. We’ve learned an enormous amount in the last three years. We’re at the cutting edge right now.
Land Operations 2021
The Army has set out an objective to be equipped, trained, and led for Adaptive Dispersed Operations: what will ADO look like?
Think of the Cold war paradigm where, very simplistically, the red folk lined up on one side and the blue folk lined up on the other, and usually a combat team commander, a young major, would have 150-200 soldiers to work with. He could see most of them and his operational bubble in terms of ground was at most five to 10 kilometres. His area of awareness and influences was usually eight to ten times that, but he had a finite chunk of terrain and finite responsibilities, usually best articulated in how many foe were going to die within allocated kill zones.
Today, our young majors have chunks of terrain allocated to them which are hundreds and hundreds of kilometres square – thousands of kilometres in some cases – where they are dealing with indigenous populations of many different tribes and sub-tribes, where the remit is not only on closing with and destroying the foe but, understanding the local dynamics to figure out where to rebuild, where to prioritize effort in re-supply and providing food stuffs to locals who may be starving. He’s got to worry not only about the harder baskets of his operational spectrum – fighting – but he himself is often semiautonomous. He’s got vast information flows. He may have infantry, tanks, reconnaissance, artillery, engineers, electronic warfare, medical assets, supply assets, civil military experts in his midst; he may have international organizations he has got to work with, nongovernmental organizations, a CIDA rep, a Canadian government rep, RCMP training teams from local police forces, and he must deal with indigenous army and police forces. And when he has a second to breath, he must interact with tribal elders at a shura. That’s adaptive dispersed operations. We believe no matter where we go after Afghanistan we will be dealing with much the same degrees of complexity.
What do you need to do to get from where you are now to there?
We’re almost there. We’re not trying to solidify or codify doctrine. We’re looking out five, 10, 15 years. Wherever we go next, there will be nuances. In terms of a journey, I’d say we’ve changed more in the past three years than in the previous 30. And we are 60-70 percent there in terms of our thinking, our doctrine, our culture and our equipment.
Is there anything specific that has to happen to clear that last 30 percent?
Time. Time, soldiers and money. Not necessarily in that order; soldiers are always first.
This is a hi-tech force optimized for counterinsurgency or COIN-like operations. What are we drawing from Afghanistan that will further shape this? You’ve noted before that special operations allow for nuanced war. Is that more prominent?
There are all sorts of changes that have been made recently. The old idea of being intelligence-driven has now come to the fore, where you try to gain as much information on human geography, interpersonal dynamics, physical geography, the expectation/anticipation of what the foe is about to do and where you think you might sequence your events to deal with them, not in terms of an isolated act but as a series of acts that are linked at platoon, combat team, battle group and brigade level.
In terms of the use of special forces – I would never use the words genetically gifted because those words will come back to haunt me – think of them as a surgeon’s scalpel or a laser beam where they do enormously complicated and dangerous things extraordinarily well. But their remit is not to be part of the forces that hold the line. They don’t do the presence, the local liaison, the stuff that we do in the conventional forces. But what they do, they do under the command of the deployed brigade commander. And the lessons learned and synchronization of things is far better than I’ve ever seen.
Is this about becoming a JIMP-enabled (Joint, Interagency, Multinational, Public) force?
We are becoming it but we are not yet as good as we could be. We’ve come light years in a very short period of time, but it is probably going to take another cycle, another generation, to get us to our full potential. Sometimes there is still the issue of cultural stovepipes – Air, Land, Sea and Special Forces. Sometimes there are issues of information flows – who gets what when. Sometimes priorities are not as well nested as they could be, especially when you are dealing with complex coalitions where allies have their own ideas of what is important in that village tomorrow. Though I’m sure there is room for improvement, Canada does a good job of integrating that. Some of our friends and allies still have a bit to learn. We’re trying to help them develop that. The Canadian soldier has established a worldwide reputation for being able to get the job done under amazingly difficult circumstances.
Are there major challenges to becoming JIMP-enabled that still need to be addressed?
Some of those are procedural; some we’re still trying to solve. The big concern I have is with the continuing integration of the civilian components. In terms of the joint between Air, Land, Sea, Special Forces, that’s coming along nicely. And as the new generation of leaders grows in rank and wisdom, they will make it far better than I’ve ever seen it during my time as a soldier. In
terms of getting the civilians to come out and train with us – both government and non-government – that’s started but there is still dramatic room for improvement. In terms of interagency – that’s not only applicable to Canadian government interagency but all the interagency players that operate in the JIMP bubble – it is extraordinarily difficult at times to come up with a common understanding and vision of the short term future with some non-Canadian international organizations.
Large organizations like the Red Cross are very good – they are ferociously independent and I understand why. We have learned a lot from them. It’s the smaller international organizations, one or two steps above the mom and pop ones, wow, you think you are on the same wavelength and you realize after they have gone off and done something that leaves you scratching your head, you are two ships passing in the night.
More than one commander has noted that the human dimension is your greatest challenge. How do you resolve some of these larger human questions within these types of conflicts?
You start with the quality that comes from every Canadian soldier who joins the army. Most Canadians are not rigidly bound by cultural barriers or previously held beliefs; we are willing to try and understand the local culture. And it’s training: exposure to representatives of the local culture before you deploy. We have over 100 Afghan Canadians in Wainwright who role-play to prepare our soldiers. As you build experience in JIMP-type operations, the veterans come back and mentor, teach those who are about to replace them. I would submit that the Canadian Army is very good at this – whatever this type of complex JIMP-enabled mission is. But there is still lot’s of room for improvement.
To get to 2021 and the ADO concept, is there equipment you need that is different from what you have now?
Our soldiers have to be able to respond quickly and they have to be well trained. They have to have confidence in their equipment and their leadership and, more importantly, in each other. A huge issue is protection. You can’t become so focused on protection that you stay in your camps; you have to be out and about, no matter where we go next. It’s likely that the type of foe we’ll be facing will be much the same as we’re dealing with in Afghanistan: they will try to attack us through mines, or IEDs or rocket-propelled grenades.
The army will continue to be LAV-based – 650 LAVs – with the ability for a modest, harder edge, ergo the 100 main battle tanks, of which about 40 will be deployable at any one time. We’ll obviously have the ability to do more benign activities, but we’re going to train hard for the middle right of the spectrum on the assumption that if you are trained on the middle right of the spectrum you can do mid and high intensity conflict with a bit more training.
The government is investing a lot in C-17 and C-130J aircraft, and eventually the Joint Support Ships. Soldiers aren’t much value unless you can get us to where it is complicated and dangerous.
What about the networked component of this? How much has been invested in future soldier programs?
We’re well underway in terms of the future soldier survivability packages and various ensembles that we’re putting together for the next five or 10 years. I’ve mentioned the digitized army. We’re about to go through a new upgrade of command-and-control architecture that will move the right information into the right hands better, faster, smarter. The big constraining issue for us now is at the tactical level, once you get away from the big pipes of information and try to cross that air gap between brigade headquarters to battlegroup, and battlegroup to combat team and platoon – that’s going to require some really clever thinking. In a country such as Afghanistan where there is no infrastructure to and everything is carried on the airwaves, there is limited satellite availability – it’s there and more is arriving – bit it’s competition for space.
What’s the role of simulation in preparing for this?
We’ve come light years. We now have trainers in a container – games – which replicate all the skills sets you might find in a rifle section or platoon. I smile because they think they are playing a game, but we’re really training them how to do their jobs better under extraordinary circumstances. We can now link tank simulators between various locations such that everyone thinks they are sitting next to each other; we have digitized command and control war games. Of course we’re all interested in making the best use of resources – that’s money and people and time – but the aim is not to introduce simulation to eliminate spending time on the ranges firing live ammo or working with real government folk when we do our big exercises; it’s to make it all better, faster, smarter. Soldiers joining our ranks today take it for granted that the systems they are going to be working in are sophisticated, much more so then existed five short years go. Their technological awareness is breathtaking.
PERSONNEL
Junior and senior NCOs, the backbone of any Army, are leaving. Are these not the very people you will need to get to 2021? How do you encourage them to stay?
To keep 3000 soldiers overseas, we have to have 15000: we’ve got 3000 deployed, 3000 just returned home, 3000 forming into the next team to go, 3000 doing individual training, and 3000 doing collective training. Then you have the trainers on top of that. The army is 20,000; we’re growing by 3000. The reserves number 20,000, of which just under half are on full time service. We have a demographic issue where we have a bubble of folk who joined roughly 20-30 years ago who are getting close to retirement. We desperately want them to stay because they have maturity and experience and they’ve got five or more missions under their belt. These are our best teachers. What are we doing to keep them? Quite frankly, we’re not doing enough. I know that a study team has been set up and is chewing its way through a variety of options. But in my mind we’re not doing enough to keep those great folk in a red-hot economy. So while half of my brain is, like most Canadians, worried about the international economic climate and the impact of a recession on the nation, the other half is saying, I kind of hope many of these folk who would normally stay three to 12 years in the Army will take a look at the job conditions across Canada and decide to stay another five or 10 years. We’re seeing a slow trickle from the civilian economy back into the Army.
Do you need a certain type of person for a JIMP-enabled force? Petraeus’ pentathlete leader?
They are there. I understand General Petraeus’ vision and his articulation of the 10 criteria of the ultimate leader. But I would argue that in many, many cases our young warrant officers, sergeant majors and corporals are exactly the type of person that General Petraeus was describing three or four years ago.
Are you short specialized trades?
There are a lot of trades or military occupation classifications that we need more of. Quite frankly, it’s more of just about everybody. Not in numbers; quality versus quantity again. Just about every trade we have in the Army is slightly short. For example, vehicle technicians: we’re using our vehicles very hard over rough terrain, both overseas and at home. We’ve got a lot that are broken. And I’m led to believe there may well be a whole lot of vehicle technicians in the auto sector who may consider the army as a viable career. If they’re physically fit and they want to do amazing things, come one down.
Are you able to do partnerships to offset some of that?
We are but the scale is modest. There is a great deal of process involved in assigning work to civilian industry to help us fix vehicles or do training. It happens but not as quickly as I’d hoped for.
Lastly, to operate the way you have, you’ve had to become much better at looking after soldiers. Given the tempo of Afghanistan, have you been able to adjust?
The Army is only as good as the families and regiments that allow their young men and women to join and to take part in active operations. We have come a long way in the last three to four years as a direct result of the Afghanistan experience and the tragedies of those killed, wounded and injured. The regimental families have stepped up in terms of caring for the shattered families of those who have died or been grievously injured. The chaplaincy branch is extremely focused on this; the medical system is responding. I would argue that we probably take as good if not better care of our wounded and those who suffer trauma than just about any other army in the world. But that does not mean it is good enough. Nor does it mean there is not an awful lot more we could be doing.
This would be especially true for adaptive dispersed operations?
Absolutely. The folk who do the daily grind of the Army business are frankly getting tired, very tired. That’s why, when the government said the military mission ends in 2011, although I firmly believe in what we are doing, my reaction is, ok, got it. Your army will need a bit of time to re-set itself – six months, 12 months – post 2011. The Army will be providing about 3,000 to 4,000 soldiers for the Olympics, so when you wrap those two issues together, 2011 is happening about the right time. 2011 is 2011 and I’m ok with that.
An interview with LGen Andrew Leslie