:
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[English]
Mr. Chairman, it is a great privilege for the Navy Command Chief Petty Officer Claude Laurendeau and I to appear before your committee today.
I would like to leave the committee with three key messages today. First, your navy's readiness is above all about protecting Canada's maritime interests at home. Second, those same interests require the navy to be ready to operate globally. And third, naval readiness is all about empowering the great Canadians who choose to serve their country at sea with the tools they need to get the job done.
Mr. Chairman, no single word personifies the navy more than readiness. It is at the very core of our service culture in our motto, “Ready. Aye. Ready.”
[Translation]
In French, it's "Toujours là, toujours prêt."
In January 2010, two warships departed Halifax for Haiti, which only days before had been struck by an earthquake that left tens of thousands dead.
Their departure occurred within hours of a government decision to respond in Haiti. Over the ensuing weeks, as part of a larger Canadian Forces relief operation, the ships and their crews performed a wide variety of tasks to help Haitians restore a semblance of order and hope to their ruptured lives.
[English]
Mr. Chair, my job is to generate combat-capable maritime forces by translating the resources that I have been allotted into readiness. As the Chief of the Defence Staff has stated, readiness is about getting the right assets to the right place at the right time to achieve the right effect, from saving lives at sea to controlling maritime events through the actual or latent use of force. I will address how we approach readiness.
[Translation]
But first, allow me to describe what it means in a domestic context.
We maintain a "ready duty ship" in both Halifax and Esquimalt, with which Canada Command may respond quickly to events year round in our Pacific and Atlantic ocean approaches.
[English]
However, a major disaster at sea or ashore would require more than a ready duty ship. In 1998, for example, one of Canada's worst disasters at sea occurred when Swiss Air 111 crashed into St. Margaret's Bay. As that mission evolved from an urgent search and rescue effort into a major salvage operation, it encompassed eight warships, including one submarine, several fleet auxiliaries, and a range of maritime patrol aircraft and helicopters. In a similar vein, the navy's response earlier this year to Hurricane Igor, while smaller in scope, nonetheless involved the dynamic retasking of ships at sea to a mission of rapidly unfolding and urgent need in Newfoundland.
This year's flooding in Quebec and in the Prairies demonstrated another important facet of readiness, the employment of the naval reserve's part-time citizen-sailors from across the country in an important public safety role.
Mr. Chair, domestic maritime readiness requires an awareness of events unfolding in Canada's three oceans, a region roughly three-quarters the size of Canada itself, encompassing the activities of thousands of vessels at sea off of our coastline—the world's longest. Achieving awareness in our home waters is among our most complex information challenges. But that is exactly what we are doing, along with our federal partners in our coastal marine security operation centres. Considered among the best examples in the world of how to organize for collaborative information-sharing and coordinated whole-of-government action at sea, these centres permit the fleet to be at the right place at the right time.
[Translation]
That "right place" is sometimes found at great distance from Canada. For example, we help keep cocaine off Canadian streets through the counter-narcotic patrols we conduct in the Caribbean Basin and in the eastern Pacific. Among the more recent Canadian participants in this ongoing effort was the Victoria-class submarine HMCS Corner Brook.
[English]
Mr. Chair, the oceans no longer isolate Canadians from far-distant events the way they once did. That is why HMCS Vancouver is deployed today in the Mediterranean, the result of a government decision to keep her in a region of strategic interest to Canada. She recently completed a highly successful mission off Libya, a mission that saw her and the Charlottetown, the frigate she replaced, enforce a maritime embargo; conduct maritime intelligence and surveillance; escort and defend NATO mine hunters operating to keep ports open for re-supply; conduct littoral combat operations; and most importantly, defend civilians ashore through activities that enabled precision targeting of NATO air strikes against the pro-Gadhafi forces.
The Vancouver's current mission required no additional training. As a high-readiness frigate, she is prepared to undertake missions across the entire spectrum of operations, from non-combat evacuation, on the one hand, to naval combat on the other.
This flexibility makes warships among our government's most agile instruments of national power and influence. The Vancouver is deployed forward not just to allow NATO to prosecute a counter-terrorism mission, but the mission also demonstrates Canada's strategic interests, reassures our allies, and helps to prevent conflict in a region where the political change agenda is white-hot. It contributes to the safety of ocean commerce upon which, in this globalized era, our prosperity as a trading nation vitally depends.
Finally, she provides a “Swiss-army-knife” set of potential response options to unfolding events.
[Translation]
Both HMCS Vancouver and HMSC Charlottetown are part of Canada's high readiness task group, which is our principal maritime asset for major contingencies at home or abroad. The task group consists of: one air defence destroyer, which also acts as the command platform for an embarked commander; two or three general-purpose frigates; one underway replenishment ship; their embarked helicopters; and, when dictated by the mission, one submarine.
[English]
The task group is the vehicle through which Canada projects leadership abroad at sea, as we did most recently in 2009 when a Canadian commodore exercised command of an international counter-terrorism mission in the Indian Ocean. His ability to do so was based on two things: first, the task group's readiness to operate independently against an organized adversary, which permitted other nations to entrust national assets to Canadian tactical command; second, trust by our allies in Canadian naval competence built over decades with our closest partners.
Mr. Chair, every vessel in the fleet follows an operational cycle that takes an individual ship or submarine and her crew from intensive maintenance periods and refits, through a progressive set of technical trials, team training, and warfare certifications to a state of high readiness. For every ship at high readiness, there are several others at different points in this operational cycle, much as a hockey coach has three lines on the bench in support of the line out on the ice.
The operational cycle moves ships and submarines in and out of Canadian industry as well as through the navy's materiel, technical, and training systems. Readiness at the fleet level is orchestrated through a 10-year fleet plan, which we use to integrate individual ship operational cycles with major fleet-wide activities such as the ongoing Halifax-class frigate modernizations, as well as the phased transition from today's fleet to the fleet of tomorrow.
[Translation]
Mr. Chairman, the Canadian Forces invests heavily in its people, and the navy is no exception. As mariners, our sailors are required to perfect their skills in the daunting waters of the north Atlantic and northeast Pacific, and increasingly in the high Arctic.
As warfighters, they are second to none. As ambassadors, they represent Canada not by their words but rather by their deeds.
[English]
Our sailors are the foundation of readiness, much of which, like warfare itself, comes down to intangibles, including their sense of purpose, their belief that they are making a difference, and the trust they hold in their leaders to attend to their welfare and that of their families for the often dangerous and always difficult work they do. We may operate among the most complex machines on the planet--these modern warships and submarines--but sailors are always first at the core of your navy's readiness.
Mr. Chairman, you will recall that I stated at the outset my three key points about the navy's readiness. We must be prepared to act in the national interest first at home and then abroad, and at the heart of this capability is the Canadian sailor.
Chief Petty Officer Laurendeau and I are driven by these priorities every day, because we believe that the demand signal for the Royal Canadian Navy to act in the national interest will continue to grow over the next several years.
We look forward to your questions today, but we also encourage the committee to visit the fleet at your earliest opportunity to witness first-hand how we proudly live by our motto, “Ready. Aye. Ready.“
[Translation]
or "Toujours là, toujours prêt."
Thank you.
:
Thank you very much for the question on submarines.
We are at the end of a long beginning. In fact, I can tell you proudly that HMCS Victoria sailed out of Esquimalt Harbour yesterday as planned, to commence a very deliberate series of workups, trials at sea, aimed at bringing that submarine and her crew to a state of high readiness early in 2012. These will include diving operations and full weaponization, meaning the firing and certification of that submarine on the Mark 48 heavyweight torpedo. This is great news.
Later in 2012, on the east coast, HMCS Windsor, six months after Victoria, will follow her in that path, such that by the end of 2012 we will have two high-readiness submarines operating on both coasts—which has always been intended.
HMCS Chicoutimi, currently in deep maintenance—the first submarine in deep maintenance through the Victoria in-service support contract on the west coast with the Canadian Submarine Management Group—will complete her deep maintenance in early 2013. She will ramp up to high readiness, so that we will achieve a steady state in 2013, which we have been working so hard towards for several years. We will continue to maintain one high-readiness submarine on either coast, a third submarine at a lesser degree of readiness but available for operations nonetheless, and a fourth submarine always in that deep maintenance, as the contract stipulates with the Canadian Submarine Management Group. We will run that cycle, sir, through to the end of class for that submarine. Those submarines will be available for operations first and foremost in our three ocean approaches, but they'll also be available for missions continentally.
For example, the Corner Brook was transiting around to the west coast earlier this year and participated in the Canada narcotics mission in the Caribbean basin and the east Pacific, and actually played a key role detecting and tracking what the adversaries had been able to bring to that illegal activity, that is, fully submersible self-propelled vessels carrying tonnes of cocaine. The Corner Brook was able to play an effective role in the east Pacific as she transited up. This is the sort of mission she will be able to participate in, as well as being ready to be deployed anywhere for Canada.
:
Yes, sir, certainly. Thank you very much for the question.
The Arctic is assuming a greater and greater strategic interest for Canada and, certainly, from a sovereignty surveillance or patrol and presence perspective, the government sees the Canadian Forces sustaining a greater and more persistent presence there. From a naval perspective then, through the Canada First defence strategy, and ignited by the national shipbuilding and procurement strategy announced by the government earlier this year, we will see the Arctic offshore patrol ship 628 being built on the east coast soon, with the first ship being delivered in 2015 and one every year thereafter. That will increase substantively our ability to operate in the high Arctic through the navigable season, including in and through first-year ice and what we call old-ice occlusion. That project also includes the Nanisivik naval facility at the high end of Baffin Island, which will see a refuelling facility that will help to sustain our deployed presence there.
I would say to you that when ships deploy from Halifax to go to the Arctic, it's about the same as deploying across the Atlantic to the English Channel; and equally from the west coast, it's about the same distance as deploying to Japan. When we deploy ships domestically out of Halifax and Esquimalt into the Arctic, it is a major operation. Therefore, the infrastructure that will be developed in Nanisivik will certainly aid that.
We are also working very closely with our whole-of-government partners here. With all federal departments that have maritime jurisdiction, we are working together in the Arctic to be able to respond collaboratively across a whole number of events, tasks, challenges. That's what we do every summer, as you are aware, as we deploy for Operation Nanook.
:
Thank you, Mr. Norlock, for that excellent question, and thank you for your comment on the navy league. I would like to say to you and your colleagues that I know that all of you in your constituencies support the navy, air, and army cadet events. I thank you for that on behalf of all of us. I believe that these are the finest youth development programs in Canada. They are jewels. If all Canadian parents were aware of these opportunities for their children, this program would be even more popular.
Your comments about the Second World War are germane. We had 1,800 sailors in the Canadian Navy in 1939; we had 100,000 in 1945. The two areas in the country that attracted the most young men into the navy were Winnipeg and Calgary, and I'm not sure why that was. It could be that the wheat looked like the sea, as it were, but just a different colour.
Some hon. members: Oh, oh!
VAdm Paul Maddison: Maybe folks just wanted to get as far from the farm as they could.
It's interesting to note that from 2004 to the present, while the Canadian Forces grew mainly in the land combat trades to enable the success of the mission in Afghanistan, the Royal Canadian Navy actually became smaller. That was not good. It was understood that it was where the recruiting focus had to go. We reached a point two or three years ago where we had to raise the flag and realize that if we did not give the navy a greater recruiting priority, we would not be able to sustain the readiness we needed to put the ships to sea to meet the six core CFDS missions. The Chief of Defence Staff tasked the Chief of Military Personnel, who runs the recruiting group in the Canadian Forces, to make the navy the priority. In the recruiting centres across Canada, we took in more and more sailors, and this was very good. It allowed us to get on track to recovery, and I'm pleased with where we are.
The challenge the chief and I have today is that 20% of our sailors are going through their basic training to get to their first operational functional point. This puts stress on our schools and our fleets, but it's the right kind of stress to have. The trends are all positive. The distressed trades, especially the marine systems technical trades and the naval electronics technical trades, will recover by about 2017, which is fine. The key is to continue to sustain that attraction.
What's important for me is to maintain an institution that is well led and has a clear vision, that treats people with respect and supports their families, and that attracts people to the service of their country at sea. That's where I put a lot of effort. When I visit our ships, when I talk to our sailors, as the chief and I did last week when we visited the Vancouver the Mediterranean, I see people who are happy, professional, switched on, trained, enjoying what they're doing, and feeding on the respect and recognition they get from Canadians. With that kind of environment, we will have no problem continuing to attract the finest Canadians.
I would say to you, without any bias whatsoever, that when I talk to other heads of navies, they always comment on the quality, the education, the self-confidence, the enthusiasm, of our young sailors, and they ask how we're able to do this. I think it's across the three services. We should be very proud in Canada that we continue to attract our finest men and women into uniform.
:
Thank you, Mr. McKay, for the excellent question.
I'll start off by saying that I think it's all about activity in the Arctic. It's all about increasing human activity in the Arctic. That is the challenge that is being presented to us and to all polar nations: how do you deal with the increased human activity from a maritime shipping perspective, and with the increased activities in the Arctic from increasing seabed resource extraction activities—enabled by technologies that just weren't available until recently—and with the effects of climate change and its impact upon our first nations? How do we deal with all of these pressures?
For me, the Arctic is like a parable in the 21st century of the kinds of pressures that are beginning to make themselves known upon the world's oceans, which have a direct bearing on Canadian national interests and the fact that the globalized economy floats. It needs to be kept open and rules-based, following the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. Wherever there are illicit activities or trends that challenge the rules-based international order, I think we as Canadians need to be paying attention.
A few years ago it was brought to my attention that those who design ships for transoceanic commerce—the Maersks and the Daewoos of the world—had drawn up designs for ships that would be Arctic-capable in the 2020s and 2030s. What this signalled to me was that the shipping coming out of Singapore bound for Europe, instead of going west across the Indian Ocean, would go northeast of Japan, over the transpolar route, and into Europe that way. Why? It's because it's shorter and would save money.
What that tells me is that we as Canadians, from a naval perspective, need to continue to focus our priority on the Arctic and be able to develop a persistent “maritime domain awareness”, as we call it, a recognized maritime picture of what is happening in the Arctic, and to do so through a combination of deployed ships, space-based and other surveillance assets, working with our federal partners, the RCMP—
:
Thank you very much, Mr. Strahl, for the question.
Canada is unique in one respect, that one in every five and a half or six Canadians lives in the Greater Toronto Area. Yet, just because of history, we do not need to sustain a persistent naval presence in the Great Lakes. So, going back to Mr. Norlock's question about how we attract Canadians to the navy, we have something that I refer to as Maritime blindness in this country. Most Canadians just haven't had the opportunity to make that connection between their country, the quality of life they enjoy, and the relationship of that quality of life to the economy, and how the economy, as I said, floats.
The whole intent of the Great Lakes deployments every year is to bring the navy to Canadians the way we can do on the Atlantic and Pacific coasts, but which is a real challenge here in the heartland. The intent is that we take a frigate like the Montreal, which is well led by Commander Tennant, and we say to the crew, “You are ambassadors for the Canadian Forces first and for the navy second. This is an opportunity for you to go out over the next six weeks or so and visit these great communities”—the larger cities like Toronto, Hamilton, and Montreal, and the smaller places like Trois-Rivières, Matane, and Cornwall—“and to connect with Canadians.” It's an opportunity to connect with leaders across the corporate, academic, political, and philanthropic sectors to sort of deputize them and energize them along their lines of influence to bring the naval message to Canadians, but also to attract students, cadets, educators, their parents, and families on board to see and to hear the message of what the Canadian Navy does that really matters to Canadians.
Inevitably, what I see happening is that folks are initially really impressed by the technology—by this 5,000-tonne warship with a helicopter on the back. It very quickly arcs to their being impressed with the men and women who are standing there so enthusiastically telling them about what they do for Canada. For me, that's always a win. That translates into attraction. We actually measure that. People come on board and say, “I'm intrigued. I'm 21 years old, and I like what I'm seeing here. What choices are available for me?” We get that person's email address and give them some vectors towards a recruiting centre, or we follow up. We've been able to measure that these Great Lakes deployments every year have actually helped us on the recovery journey we're on in bringing the distressed trades back to health.
Next year, in 2012, of course, our Great Lakes deployment will also be aligned with the bicentennial celebrations around the War of 1812. It's another very powerful opportunity for the navy to be there in those communities, to be persistent with those messages, and, for example, to tell the story about Libya. It's a very powerful opportunity for us.
:
Thank you very much, sir, for the question.
First of all, I would say that the national shipbuilding and procurement strategy is a real forcing function in helping to energize those programs with these major crown projects and capital programs that are coming forward. My responsibility, as commander of the navy, is to define the requirement, the capability, of the ships that are planned to be introduced into the order of battle. It is to recommend those requirements to the Chief of the Defence Staff, and through him, to the ministers.
The Canadian surface combatant, for example, is a class of ship that will be built in Halifax and will be the follow-on to the modernized Halifax class frigates, such as HMCS Montreal, and the replacement for the Iroquois class destroyers, which are approaching end of life.
My responsibility is to look at the future security environment. What's happening at sea today? What are the lessons from Libya and from recent operations in the Horn of Africa and the Arabian Gulf? What are the trends in terms of the naval arms race in southeast Asia, and what's happening in the Arabian Gulf? Where do we think, in concert with the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, that strategic national interests would really be affected in the future at sea? It includes looking at the Canadian Forces' defence strategy mission set, which includes, at the low end, humanitarian operations and at the high end, prevailing in combat. It includes looking at the threat and defining the requirement.
The requirement for the Canadian surface combatant is, first and foremost, that it be a ship that can deploy at range and can be sustained anywhere around the world, including up in the Arctic, for a sustained period of time. It must have the ability to act decisively and successfully in the increasingly complex and sophisticated operating environment in the world's littorals, such as off Libya, where we need to work with air forces and, in the future, land forces. That requires certain weapons, certain self-defence capabilities, and certain propulsion capabilities in terms of speed. It requires certain fuel and endurance capabilities. It requires habitability on board and accommodation for a certain number of sailors such that we have the redundancy on board to deal with battle damage and emergency situations.
All of that is put together into a statement of requirement. That moves forward to industry. What we are doing now with the Canadian surface combatant is going to what we call a funded-definition phase. Industry will be brought together to look at the requirement and build teams that will bid on the eventual contract for the ship. The teams will consist of the yard on the east coast, which in this case will be Irving Shipbuilding; a combat systems integrator, which is a company that brings the weapons and sensors together; a platform systems integrator, which is the marine systems side of the house, dealing with power generation, electrical power distribution, auxiliary engineering systems, etc.; and a design agent, which is a company that specializes in designing very complex, dense warships.
This consortium will come together to look at the statement of requirement and, of course, at affordability in terms of the money that has been allotted in the investment plan for the Canadian surface combatant. At the end of the day, a selection process will occur. Of course, there's dialogue with the department throughout in terms of capability and the cost trade-offs. At the end of the day, the right platform with the right capability at the right price will go into the yard for the first steel to be cut. The Canadian surface combatant will be out around 2018.
:
That's an excellent question and I thank you for it.
One of my responsibilities in terms of readiness is to always to sustain the high-readiness task group. The high-readiness task group consists of the flag ship, two or three frigates, the underway replenishment ship, and maybe a submarine, along with maritime patrol aircraft and helicopters, all enabling that mission anywhere around the world.
The Department of National Defence maintains what we call a global engagement strategy. This is a recent development, and I think a very positive one, over the last couple of years. What that allows me to do in generating those capable forces at sea is to look at where best to employ them—for example, in the Arctic every year, yes; in the counter-narcotics mission in the Caribbean and the east Pacific, yes; and the forward deployment now in the Mediterranean, yes.
Earlier this year, I deployed a ship across the Pacific to participate in an advanced exercise with the Australians, the Americans, and other Pacific partners, off Australia and then forward to Singapore and to engage in a diplomatic way with our allies in South Korea and Japan.
So we can't be everywhere all the time. But there certainly are places where we want to have a presence and we want to continue to be interoperable with our allies, to be there beside them and to exercise leadership.
When the opportunity arises, as it did in 2009, for a commodore to embark and sail with the Canadian task group, in leading a multinational mission in a counter-terrorist mission in the Indian Ocean, that's a real opportunity for Canada to be viewed very positively by our allies and other regional players. So we will continue to do that. We'll continue to generate....
My responsibility is to set those priorities of where we will deploy and to establish the policy, the doctrine, and the standards necessary to ensure that our sailors continue to be the best and most competent; that our ships are maintained and our systems groomed to that highest degree of readiness; that they go through a very deliberate, measured, and assessed training period to bring the crew and the ship up to that right degree of readiness; and that we continue to provide the right oversight. That's what we will continue to do.
When I look at the future operating environment, I actually see it becoming more complex, more sophisticated, and more challenging. That is something that certainly concerns me as we move forward.
:
Thank you very much for the question.
The naval reserve in Canada, first and foremost, is a strategic reserve. These are part-time citizen sailors who play a key role in engaging in their local communities and establishing a Royal Canadian naval presence in communities that are far from salt water, who get that message out and allow bridges to be built and dialogue to be encouraged. They allow folks to learn more about their navy, what it does for them, and encourages them to be able to ask the right questions, especially when it comes to choosing to serve. So, first and foremost, that's what our several thousand naval reservists do. We have 24 naval reserve divisions in Canada from coast to coast and, of course, in all of your constituencies, I'm sure.
Having said that, they are primarily involved in strategic engagement locally. One of the principles for our naval reservists is that they must be trained and prepared to go to sea, because at the end of the day a reserve is all about surge and capability when the need presents itself, such as when the militia was surged to support the Canadian Army in the mission in Afghanistan.
So all our sailors in the naval reserve choose a trade as officers or sailors and are trained in those trades. One of the key missions they do for the navy is crew our Kingston-class minor coastal defence vessels, the 12 that we have in the inventory.
What the chief and I are moving toward, because we found that this model is not sustainable, is what we call the “one-navy concept”. I would like to see our naval reservists not only go to sea in the minor coastal defence vessels, but also have opportunities to go to sea in the larger major combatants—the frigates, the destroyers, and the underway replenishment ships—and that our regular force sailors also have the opportunities to sail in our Kingston class. We've begun to do this. I want to create a one-navy mindset, a culture where naval reservists and regular force sailors look at each other on an equal level. I think this is a powerful way to go forward.
First, I'd say that when you said civilian it made me think about the public servants who are such an important part of the navy. I'm not only talking about the folks here in Ottawa, but really the fleet maintenance facilities in Esquimalt and Halifax, those civilian workers have a far larger effect for the navy than I think you would see on the air force or army side. These workers are actually critical in enabling the technical readiness of our ships and submarines to go to sea. So when I talk about the defence team in the navy, it's regular force, reserve force, and very much civilians who are the members of the team.
With respect to strategic engagement, we have about 20 honorary captains in the navy, all of whom have volunteered for what they see as an honour. They come from all political sides, from corporate leadership, and from academic leadership, and what they do for us is to act as ambassadors. They energize and activate their lines of influence, and whenever they have an opportunity, they will speak, like the chief or I do, to whatever gathering they're with. It's simply to bring that message forward and to bring feedback to me about ways in which I could better engage with Canadians.
True Patriot Love is a great example of an organization that recently held what was called the Atlantic Maple Leaf Dinner in Halifax. It raised $700,000 for the Soldier On program for our families as well. We couldn't imagine this kind of initiative and leadership by the corporate and public sectors or private citizens 20 years ago. For folks like Chief Laurendeau—and, again, here I recall the recognition of the Forces in the Senate two weeks ago—this sends an incredibly strong signal about the new relationship based on respect and trust between Canadians and their Canadian Forces.
:
Thank you very much, sir.
I would say at the outset that one of the unique and very positive attributes of a country deploying naval capability is that it is self-sustaining. There is no need to flow a lot of infrastructure and supporting capacity into another country to enable that to larger or lesser degrees. The naval task group is a completely independent, self-sustaining capability.
We have deployed for six months repeatedly in the past, and we have become quite good at that. During Operation Apollo from 2001 to 2003, in the wake of 9/11, we sustained a continual presence in the Arabian Gulf as part of that international campaign against terror.
When we do deploy, the key is certainly the underway replenishment ship. It is not just about fuel, but also ammunition and supplies. It's a medical support base. It's a maintenance support base for helicopters. It's a critical enabler to that globally deployed presence.
We also send what we call a forward logistics team. We have a small forward team deployed in the Mediterranean now, from Vancouver. It's a small team that enables spare parts to get through customs. They fly over to make sure the helicopter can fly and the diesel generators get fixed, and those kinds of things, or to get folks home who have a compassionate issue that needs to be addressed.
We do that. That's why the joint support ship, which is one of the key planks of the Canada First defence strategy, and the first of the west coast projects to be built through the national shipbuilding procurement strategy, is such an important one. This will replace the aging Protector and Preserver steam-driven underway replenishment ships, and will sustain that forward deployed presence you speak of.
:
Thank you, sir. That's an excellent question.
The relationship between the heads of service is extremely positive right now and it has been for several years. From a joint perspective, the Canadian navy and the Canadian air force have been operating together for decades. Ever since we in Canada perfected the technology necessary to embark Sea King helicopter detachments and fly them off ships in sea-state 5 conditions, and to be really integrated into our ships' companies as an integral combat system in that ship, we've had that very close joint relationship with the air force.
In Afghanistan—where we had an air-land campaign in that landlocked nation—I still generated 50, 60, 70 sailors for every rotation, sailors who were there in Afghanistan on the ground, dressed in CADPATs and looking very much like soldiers. They were clearance divers who were outside the wire playing a key role in the counter-IED mission. They were junior officers in the intelligence joint operations centre in Kandahar. They were supply technicians. They were cooks. And so we were there. In fact, today I have a commodore, three captains, a chief petty officer, and about 40 sailors all part of the training mission in Afghanistan. So there you see that joint and integrated culture moving forward.
From a land and navy perspective, how we operate together is a bit of a challenge. General Devlin and I talk about this frequently. We saw it clearly in the wake of the earthquake in Haiti, where we saw our ships operating off the coast of Leogane and Jacmel. We were going ashore to do good in support of the Haitians who were suffering, and we were working alongside soldiers and airmen and airwomen there and actually bringing the soldiers back to the ships for some respite and then taking them back into the mission ashore.
General Devlin and I, and General Deschamps, are working together on how to increase our interoperability and integration from a platform at sea. When we deploy next into the Caribbean, for example, I will invite an army sub-element or a small platoon or section to come on board and to work with my team, our sailors, and to go ashore in some of our partner nations in the Caribbean and work there.
We also are working very closely together with special operations forces and our well-trained naval boarding parties to take it to the next level in our capability, which is the ability to engage, from the sea, a vessel that is non-cooperative. For example, this could be a vessel that might be involved in a terror-type mission, involving hostage-taking, or in a piracy-type mission. There are a whole number of means by which we are pushing that joint and integrated capacity forward.