Preserving capacity, General Tom Lawson, Chief of the Defence Staff, Keys to Canadian SAR
Issue link: http://vanguardcanada.uberflip.com/i/155544
S Special Forces humility that is appreciated. You only have to learn a dozen words in somebody else's language to give them the impression you are there to help. Q is language training increasingly key to this aspect of the global network? We've clearly got interests in this hemisphere and while I can pump out guys who speak French or English to almost any part of the globe, I'm a little weak in the Spanish department. That is why when I sit down with my counterpart from Southern Command, we agree to focus on places like Jamaica and are starting to lean towards other partners in the Caribbean. But we've got to build that, so I put a couple of operators on Spanish training this summer. We won't have a program like the U.S., so we have to target the right NCOs who need language skills to teach weapons classes and so forth in places like the school in Colombia. The flip side of that is recruiting people for their language skills, but that isn't something I can talk about publicly. Q is there a good example of investment in a partnership that is now paying dividends? The best example is the CanJet hijacking that occurred in Jamaica in 2009. That was early in our engagement, but the fact that they resolved it themselves and in a manner that did not cause any casualties was a direct measure of success. Subsequently, that Jamaican unit was involved in backing up the local constabulary in the Dudus Coke extradition – a clear measure of effectiveness. We were intimately involved in the development of their basic operator course, which they run now entirely. We were making headway in Mali training the 33rd parachute regiment. They were the ones sent north to deal with Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb as they spilled out of Libya, but you might argue that regiment was supposed to be protecting the president, so maybe we were too successful. With larger exercises like Flintlock, you see the progress from exercise to exercise. Certainly, what the U.S. and Colombia accomplished is a great example. Colombia's army, police and other agencies were working in stovepipes and realized they needed interagency teams at the local level. That model has been relatively successful and could be exported across the Americas. Q As you build this global network, are there interoperability issues beyond communications systems that persist in the SoF community? When we were doing combat operations in Afghanistan there were many occasions where we were completely integrated, and that's because of similar TTPs, the same tactical level communications equipment, and a shared understanding of how we were going to operate. But that is definitely a Five Eyes thing, though I'd say we are there in thinking with the French. In Afghanistan there are NATO special operations task groups operating at the tactical level, often a mix of western and Afghan soldiers, and at the International Security Assistance Force level there is the multinational ISAF SOF headquarters to which all of 26 AUGUsT/sePTeMBer 2013 www.vanguardcanada.com those NATO special operations task groups report. Anything to do with the targeting paradigm of SOF – find, fix, finish, exploit and analyze – is part of that. That model is functioning well, so there is a deliberate effort by NATO SOF HQ in Mons to capture the lessons so it can be deployed in the future. I mentioned the American TSOCs. Well, NATO recognizes it needs the ability to generate multinational special operations component commands (SOCC) for future NATO missions, and we are part of that discussion. Just as Canada would earmark a battle group, we earmark elements of CANSOF to be part of future SOCCs because that is how we will operate. Admiral McRaven understands that intelligence in a SOF realm comes from all sorts of sources, so you need to have a multilateral, multinational approach if you are going to garner the biggest benefits from it. Q As nAto creates this capacity, is there any discussion of the Smart Defence approach for SoF? Most forces have to deliver everything because it is often about sovereignty. For example, one of the toughest domestic nuts to crack is a ship at sea or an airplane with a hostage situation onboard – that is tremendously complex – and everybody in the community needs that capability. What I find interesting is the willingness to share. The Dutch are very good at maritime counterterrorism and are willing to share; the Norwegians are amazing in the winter warfare environment and we're happy to learn from them; the U.S. brings the big enablers, the ability to crunch big numbers, and they are masters at this targeting cycle. The U.K. are absolute masters in physical surveillance and close target reconnaissance from their experience in Northern Ireland. And we bring to the table our sniper ability, a skill set that is world renowned. Sharing allows us all to grow and ensure we have those critical capabilities if we are called out for a mission of national importance. Q Admiral mcRaven has spoken of SoF-developed technology to combat asymmetrical threats. Are there any Canadian examples? I like to say we are a 70 percent bottom-up driven organization – 70 percent of the really good ideas come from the shop floor. Every unit has its own force development cell, sometimes just one guy, that develops solutions to various problems. My favourite example was the Special Operations RHIB (Rigid Hull Inflatable Boat). The navy has a RHIB for boarding parties that does 15 knots. But as missions are getting more complex, like the one off Libya or in the Arabian Sea, more is being asked of boarding parties and we recognized there was a requirement for something that performed better. However, it had to be the same size and weight as the current RHIB to fit a ship's crane. So our guys, working with Kanter Marine of southern Ontario, delivered 8-10 diesel powered boats; should we get a mission that requires SOF operators to project from a Canadian ship, we now have a boat that is capable of making that happen. We have had similar input with the helicopter fleet and the Block 3 CP-140 Auroras. We have a seat at those tables. Sometimes it is just to ensure an aircraft is fitted for, but not with, widget X, so that if we need that piece of equipment we can plug it in. We have a requirement for an armoured vehicle to move our folks around, not necessarily onto an objective but inside a