OTTAWA –
Canada’s military is “ready” to meet its commitments if Russia’s war in Ukraine spreads to NATO countries, but it would be “challenging” to launch a larger operation in the long term, with continued shortages of personnel and equipment , according to Chief of Defense Staff Gen. Wayne Ayer.
Ayer told Joyce Napier in an interview on CTV’s Questions that aired Sunday that while forces in Europe are “ready for the tactical mission they’ve been given,” he has bigger concerns about strategic readiness. He said there was a lack of people and equipment and additional concerns about the ability to sustain a larger mission over the long term.
The Canadian Armed Forces are still struggling to retain personnel, with nearly 10,000 fewer trained personnel than they need to be at full strength and equipment stocks below what is needed.
“We have challenges in all of these,” Ayer said, adding that the numbers reflect what has been “dropped over decades as we’ve focused on more immediate (needs).”
Eyre said the Canadian military would be “hard pressed” to launch another large-scale operation like in Afghanistan, as an example, without having to redeploy its resources around the world as threats evolve.
“The military that we have now will increasingly be called upon to support Canada and to support Canadian interests, to support our allies overseas, but also at home,” Eyre said, citing Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, climate change, impacting the Arctic landscape and increasing digital and cyber security threats.
“It’s always about prioritizing and balancing our deployments around the world, not just with what, but when and with whom … and getting that balance right is something we’re working on,” he said. “Can we use more? Yes, definitely. But we work with what we have.”
“We’re prioritizing and balancing based on what our allies need and what the demand signals are, just to make sure we’re achieving the strategic effect that the government wants us to achieve,” he added.
Meanwhile, Defense Minister Anita Anand told CTV’s Question Period last week that Canada must “be able to walk and chew gum at the same time” and balance its NATO commitments with securing the Arctic and promoting peace in the Indo-Pacific .
Eire said his number one priority is to recruit Canada’s armed forces to full strength, with a 9.3 per cent attrition rate between regular and reserve forces, up from 6.9 per cent last year. The Canadian Armed Forces Retention Strategy was released just last month.
“We’re facing the same challenge that every other industry is facing in terms of a really tight labor market,” Eyre said. “Every other military in the West faces the same challenge.”
He explained that the organization is working on streamlining its recruitment process, among other changes, to meet growing needs, with the aim of increasing numbers “as quickly as possible”.
“Ideally it would have been yesterday,” he said. “We’re looking at where we can accelerate recruiting, training and optimizing our training program.”
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