Preserving capacity, General Tom Lawson, Chief of the Defence Staff, Keys to Canadian SAR
Issue link: http://vanguardcanada.uberflip.com/i/155544
Special Forces S (TTPs). And that's done through the NATO Special Operations Headquarters in Mons; they have a schoolhouse, the NATO Special Operations School, in which I have three members, sometimes teaching, sometimes doing straight headquarters work. That concept has resonated very well with Admiral McRaven, and now the U.S. is starting to export it to other regions around the world. There will be a school eventually stood up in Columbia. Those sorts of schoolhouses help build the networks for all levels, not just the highest. Q Since the training and the systems are relatively new, this is very much about personal relationships. SOF is about people, not hardware. It very much is a people business. Admiral McRaven likes to say, you can't surge trust. I prefer to say, you've got to be present if you are going to build trust in order to gain access. To me it is an equation. So, to build up our own personal network, in the coming year we will gain six more positions outside of Canada: one in Paris because the French are very active in the SOF world – if you need an expert on the Sahel, go talk to the French; one related to Africa Command in Stuttgart; two more to the U.S. to strengthen our relationship; and two to Australia, an operator into 2 Commando, their CSOR (Canadian Special Operations Regiment) equivalent, one into the Australian Special Ops Engineer regiment, the partner unit of the Canadian Joint Incident Response Unit. To me, it's important we expand our networks, because they become a combat multiplier. Q Relate this to the expansion of Canada Command's area of responsibility to the entire Western Hemisphere and the Expeditionary Force Command effort to enhance "preparedness" through better use of military attachés and liaison officers? It matches it exactly. It happens on three levels: liaison officers, exchange of operators and small unit exchanges. If I send an officer to Paris, he goes as my liaison officer. Sharing of intelligence has always been a difficulty but it is much less of a challenge in the SOF world, and I credit Admiral McRaven because he has done a lot to break down those barriers, especially outside of the Five Eyes community. On joint training, we now do that with a lot of different nations. A great example is the Dutch. Based on a personal relationship with my counterpart, we've looked at each other's capabilities: they are very interested in our unified command headquarters setup because they still have a navy element and an army element and there is a bit of tribalism. At the same time, the Dutch are very skilled in maritime counter-terrorism and there are a number of things that they do that are of interest to us. Q Do you have criteria for how you select those you train? In a lot of ways, they are selected for me by the department through the Global Engagement Strategy. If I'm told these are countries where we want you to engage, we'll conduct a needs assessment. But the criteria for selecting a country are: the relationship has to be modest, it has to be enduring, and it has to be reciprocal. Even if we build capacity in a country like Niger, we get a lot out of it because we are operating in an environment that is alien to most Canadians, and we learn a lot on the cultural front. Q Are there trust issues, though, especially with non-western partners? You do have to get over cultural impediments, but I credit our CANSOF professional development centre. One of the things they are charged with is cultural awareness training to make sure people do not go in blind, and we do our best to make sure operators are educated before they get on the ground. And with longer running programs like in Jamaica, for example, it's often a small team with a commander and a second-in-command. Well, the next time we go, that second-in-command is now the commander, so there is always rolling continuity. And you're building up cultural awareness inside the unit. When I see the training that has been delivered, like we recently provided for Flintlock 13 in Mauritania, I don't know if it is in our blood but Canadians just seem to get it. We are naturally good trainers. We don't carry any colonial baggage, we're not a hegemon or superpower, so nobody feels threatened by us. And the techniques we use courtesy of our training stand us in good stead. There haven't been any green on blue incidents in Afghanistan involving Canadians ... Not just Special Forces. At Kabul Manoeuvre Training Centre where they train the rawest of the recruits, that is where the risk would be the highest and we have not had a single incident. I'm not pointing the finger at other countries, I just know our guys are certainly confident and they deliver in a professional manner but they don't exude any arrogance and there is a bit of Canadian Special Operations Forces in training. Photos: Combat Camera www.vanguardcanada.com AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2013 25