Editor’s Corner

Welcome to the Spring 2016 edition of the Canadian Military Journal. As usual, these words are being penned while we are still in the icy grasp of winter, but the end is very much in sight…

Lots of variety for our readership this time out… To begin, we have one Special Report in the issue, and it deals with a very timely subject. Major Lena Angell, the Senior Public Affairs Officer for Operation Provision, the CAF contribution to the Government of Canada’s commitment to the resettlement of Syrian refugees to Canada by early-2016, reports on this Whole-of-Government effort as viewed through the lens of the initiative’s status at year’s-end 2015. And while various circumstances have dictated a slower pace of implementation than was previously anticipated, this Special Report casts a favourable light on this example of close interdepartmental cooperation in Canada’s response to this grave humanitarian crisis.

Issues affecting women in uniform is also, at its core, a very timely subject. To this end, Sub-Lieutenant Kareem Negm, a recent graduate of the University of Victoria’s Political Science program who has been with the Regular Force Royal Canadian Navy for fifteen years, “…challenge[s] the assumption that gendered barriers no longer exist. The overall purpose of this study is not to discount the formidable achievements of those female warriors who have served and continue to serve. Rather, it is my intention to elicit a sense of caution in assuming that all is well on the gender front. The crux of my argument centers on the fact that women in uniform are not representative of their proportions in society. After all these years, the female presence in uniform remains a relatively-token existence, not only in the Canadian military, but it is also reflective of militaries throughout the world. As such, the CAF remains a fundamentally male dominated space, which suggests that gender barriers, either real or perceived, continue to act as deterrents to recruitment and retention. In short, why are women still under-represented in the military?”

Moving right along, Ben Zweibelson, a retired US Army infantry officer with multiple combat deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan, and currently the Course Director for Design Programs at the Joint Special Operations University, US Special Operations Command in Tampa, Florida, argues that, with respect to military planning “…our exclusive analytical approach and linear style decision making opens us up to vulnerabilities and creates barriers to a more critically reflexive practice. Our institutionalized habits focus only upon analytic and linear models and are unreflexive in exploring critically why we think this way and what alternative ways of thinking may be available. I propose a non-linear approach to ‘sensemaking’ termed holistic non-linear world view as one alternative paradigm to the analytic-linear world view.”

Next, Major Ryan Kastrukoff, a highly-experienced fighter pilot currently serving as an instructor pilot in the CT-155 Hawk on 419 Tactical Fighter Training Squadron at CFB Cold Lake, examines the concept of commander’s intent versus the assignment of specific missions, and offers that “…providing intent instead of specific missions creates space for subordinate commanders and soldiers to use their initiative to achieve the goal once battlefield conditions change.” Kastrukoff further maintains that “…major advances in information technology have changed the battlespace and now require an adaption in organizational structure to best focus and leverage individual initiative, especially in the information battlespace.” After presenting three case studies highlighting the inefficiency of using the current organizational structure, “… a proposed organizational change is then presented that incorporates features of crowd-sourcing and collaborative online workspaces to improve the acquisition, development, and implementation of fast-evolving complex technologies used by the Canadian Armed Forces.”

In our last major article, Professor Jason Cooley of the University of Hartford examines the evolution of transnational revolutionary organizations, specifically beginning with the international communist movement that seized control of Russia in the early-20^th Century. In its aftermath, its leaders turned “…to bringing people to power in other nations who would also be concerned about eradicating economic injustice.” That said, while these transnational revolutionary organizations frequently tried to engineer insurrections, none managed to overthrow their detested leaders. “The supporters of the Islamist movement shared communist antipathy for the West, but they were not determined to eliminate economic injustice. Instead, they were more interested in halting the spread of Western culture in Muslim nations… While the Islamist movement was occurring, multiple transnational revolutionary organizations were created. Initially, these entities were controlled by a revolutionary state similar to the most formidable networks from the communist era. [the Comintern and the Cominform Ed.]. However, as more time elapsed, they began to function in an independent fashion.” Professor Cooley then goes on to specifically chronicle this evolution “…by taking Hezbollah, al Qaeda, and the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria into consideration.”

Four very different opinion pieces in this issue… Taking the point, Major-General [Ret’d] Marc Terreau, an acknowledged expert in defence ethics and a former Chief of Review Services, offers a spirited endorsement of the Defence Ethics Program and the Chaplaincy’s place within it. General Terreau is followed by Major Dan Doran, a Reserve Force combat engineer, who then takes a fresh look at attrition and retention in the reserves, contends that there are attrition problems and unique challenges facing the Reserve Force, and suggests “…possible alternatives that would go a long way in mitigating at least some of these unique challenges through a more strategic outlook on human resource management within the reserves, and accepting hard realities on the perceived/desired vs. functional capabilities of the reserves.”

Next, Kara Leman, a Workplace Wellness Project Coordinator and a former Health Promotion Specialist with the Canadian Armed Forces, recounts the brave struggle of a junior member of the Canadian Armed Forces with depression and the consideration of suicide, a struggle he openly acknowledges in the hope that it will encourage others to seek help. Finally, Earl John Chapman and R. Paul Goodman, both officers associated with the 78^th Fraser Highlanders of Montréal, take a fresh look at the actual geographical location of the Battle of the Plains of Abraham in 1759 by evoking recent developments in geo-referencing. They contend that “…imprecise or erroneous depictions have been offered to historians, the interested public, and battlefield tourists over the last 180 years.”

Our resident defence commentator, Martin Shadwick, then takes a look at the Stephan Harper legacy with respect to national defence. Ultimately, he contends it was “…mixed, as is the case with most Canadian prime ministers. Given the sobering realities inherited from previous governments – be they a ‘hot war’ in Afghanistan, or a growing backlog of aging and inadequate equipment – the Harper government arguably managed defence comparatively well in its earlier years. That said, a number of measures might have fostered a stronger Harper legacy on defence…”

Finally, as usual, we close with a number of book reviews for our readers’ consideration.

Until the next time.

David L. Bashow
Editor-in-Chief
Canadian Military Journal