State of Canadian Forces

Freaker: I agree with you on the subject of Russians and Russian supplies

. If we get the 40 Il-76s then we would be able to get a larger force into action, together instead of spread out. If we buy the C-17s then our forces will not all reach the attack zone together or we will have to wait until the C-17s can make enough trips.

However you dont seem to have great faith in aircraft carriers. Getting aircraft, in large quantities, closer to combat zones should be a priority.

Sgt. Mills

SgtMills, I'm not against aircraft carriers as such, just a little worried over the potential cost of such a vessel in relation to its usefulness.

If something like the "San Antonio" class were available that could also carry some Harrier jump-jets that would be fine with me.

A Harrier may be able to land, but not take off form one of those with any sort of payload. That was why i mentioned the Wasp class ships (i didn't remember the name at the time). They have a similar role to the San Antonio ships, only they also have a flight deck for several harriers.

Harrier jump-jets are old, and nearly obsolete, still very cool mind you. Hence i mentioned the Joint Strike Fighter, a plane desigened to, eventually, replace the Harrier. They will be produced in huge numbers, for both the Americans and British, so parts will not be an issue. May be a bit expensive but for the capabilities of the aircraft, it is a pretty good deal. But everything seems to be comming back to cost, doesn't it.

Freaker, my views on the Russian Aircraft come from working on them. I have loaded IL76’s and Antonov 12’s and many other Russian transports. They are not well made aircraft and are limited in payload, altitude, fuel loads, instrumentation, reliability, availability of spares etc.
I’m not predjudiced against Russian or Soviet equipment. The country however (Russia) is a shit state. Most western business’s have just given up and pulled out. I would not be buying any shares in any companies with huge assets in Moscow. The mafia rules.

The C17 can carry almost double the payload of the IL76 and is much wider and able to accommodate most combat vehicles and airportable rotary wing aircraft. It’s the way to go.
Its Lada compact car vs a GM full size pick-up. You want 40 Lada’s or Yugo’s?
I agree the San Antonia class assault ships would be a start but we still lack credible air-support, a through deck cruiser/ helicopter carrier would give much more flexibility for the CF. It can deploy troops, take on VSTOL aircraft, hold choppers and for those warm fuzzy types amongst you, we could do some tree hugging from it, build schools and wells, provide famine relief, palletized social workers by the bucket load etc.
I’ve said it before, we need to provide our own air support, not beg the Yanks or Brits to cover us. Think flexibility. And flexibility is what it’s all about with limited budgets and political will.

DG's point on the age of the Harriers is valid, I just don't think the CF would get involved in the JSF project, unfortunately most R&D dollars from the Feds go to Bombardier.
Off the shelf AV8B's would be cheap and could carry enough CBU's to annoy bad guys.
Canada needs to remember. The Military role is to kill the enemies of the State and or take real estate from bad guys, kill them and give it to the good guys.

Give our trained killers the tools to do the job.

Inverted, to comment on your suggestion about amphib assault ships, I agree with you, here's an article if you're interested: http://www.sfu.ca/casr/bg-sealift.htm

As for the airlifter issue, I don't know why people are even discussing this. I'm a bit of an air force junky myself, so I can say that I know a thing or two about modern aircraft. And I can tell you, buying a cargo plane based on a 30 year-old design from a third-world country is not going to do us any good...not even going to go into the political mumbo-jumbo about a NATO nation buying military hardware from the Ruskies. What happens when, in about 10 years, the Il-76 goes out of production and no more spare parts are made. Ever. You see, airplanes are complicated machines, and they need working parts to operate. And when there is no supply of working parts, there is no plane. As I have stated in one of my earlier posts, I believe the only (although costly) way to go is to purchase 6-8 C-17s, which would probably take about $3-4 billion out of the taxpayers' pockets. Money well spent. If the air force backs the C-17 fleet with maybe 10-15 C-130Js, then we don't have to worry about buying any new airlifters for about 30-40 years.

People (including some high military brass) aren't giving enough credit to strat air/sealift. A large emphasis has been placed on the army, updating and expanding the land forces. Rightfully so. But what alot of people don't realize is that in order to MOVE the army, you need ships (see link, at top) and planes to move the land element from point A to point B.

Now, as for carriers, come on. People here are talking about having 'real world opinions', then why are the mentioning of carriers even in this forum :?:

Yeah, it would be nice to have a carrier or two...it would also be nice if I won the lottery tomorrow.

A price of a (single) new, or even used aircraft carrier would run into the billions. That money could be better used to upgrade and re-equip the army.

Thanks

(BTW, what do you guys think about my pics in the CF image gallery?) :wink:

Nate, I’m not talking Enterprise here, I’m thinking a 20,000 ton vessel that can take 8 VSTOL a/c, not 155 US Navy aircraft. Canada can do it. The problem is we think too small all the time. We are too used to the US defending us.

Okay, fair enough. But with our already limited funds, do you think purchasing an aircraft carrier would deliver the best 'bang-for-our-buck' for the canadian forces? An aircraft carrier, like any other modern-day warship, is still very expensive, no matter how small or simplistic. Could that money not be used elsewhere?

Sure, it would be nice if Canada had a booming, deep-sea Navy. But in a country with more defence projects being procured and less funding to procure them, is an aircraft carrier really at the top of the list?

Hi guys,
Stratiegic airlift is great but what is it for? It is to rapidly inject forces at long distances. Given you can do it with a fast ship fairly quickly where is the canadian requiremnt for it. Why not arrive a week or two later with serious scales of equipment and troops to do the job. If a country is landlocked it usually has some sort of highway leading into it at least so once agin why spend money on expensive ass and trash haulers?
A carrier? We cannot even man the ships we have now folks, who wants a carrier on top of that? thats just nuts. What we need to do is aduqautley man what we have and provide aduquate logistical support for them. If we invest in new vessels i would suggest something smaller and more lightly armed which would be useful for coastal patrols.
The air force needs more pilots and planes. Why not tell prospective canoe heads if we teach you to fly then it's 7 years in the regs and five in the reserves. The Americans use ANG for Norad duties so why not us? The reg pilots can concentrate missions overseas and the important stuff like CAS since most of our recent opponents in the air have been less then stellar. If the air force gets a new bird now a Chinook would be far more usefull then a C_17 given what we do.
The reserves are what they are because they have been fucked at the military and poltical level. The politicians seem to want a babysitting and employment service while the regs just want a readily aavible supply of warm bodies to flesh out the far too many for the very small army committments our government makes. It is hard to run units efficently when you do not get enough money to train,your kit is taken on a regular basis ,the great cougar napping comes to mind , your reg force counterparts consider you shit and don't mind saying so. The rserves could provide small cohesive units availble for domestic security and even deploy overseas if they had aduquare support from the military and government. This will not probably happen as the military has an institutionalised contempt fdor the reserves which comes from faults largely created from within. If one examines the historical context militia officers seem have done rather well
General Andrew G.L. McNaughton
Major-General B.M. Hoffmeister
Major-General A.B. Matthews
Major-General D.C. Spry
General Sir Arther William Currie.
These are some of our best soldiers period and ther are many more like it.
Sgt. Major John Robert Osborn VC
Lt. C ol. Charles Cecil Ingersoll Merritt VC
Major John Keefer Mahony VC
Major David Vivian Currie VC
You might say that is ancient history so what but these guys were reservists and they had a fairly tough row to how and they did it well. It was the reserve regiments that stormed Juno beach and took Ortogna. For example
this the infanrty outfits at Juno Beach
3rd Infantry Division
o 7th Reconnaissance Regiment (17th Duke of York's Royal Canadian Hussars)
o 7th Infantry Brigade
• Royal Winnipeg Rifles
• Regina Rifle Regiment
• 1st battalion, Canadian Scottish Regiment
o 8th Infantry Brigade
• Queen's Own Rifles of Canada
• Régiment de la Chaudière
• North Shore (New Brunswick) Regiment
o 9th Infantry Brigade
• Highland Light Infantry of Canada
• Stormont, Dundas and Glengarry Highlanders
• North Nova Scotia Highlanders
o Cameron Highlanders of Ottawa (Machine Gun)
Now if they can mange that why not some overseas deployments today? The Americans and British both deploy complete reserve units to real wars like PG1 and 2. Are they stupid or do they just have a better grip on how to train fund and utilise reserves ?
Cheers
fred

Yes, strat sealift sounds good, in theory. I have stated in recent posts that we should also have some sealift capability... http://www.sfu.ca/casr/bg-sealift.htm

But, only 90% of the world is accessable by sealifters. I say 'only' because if there is a conflict anywhere else in that 10% of the world, then strat sealifters are useless to us. Do we want to take that chance? What if there is a conflict in Kazakhstan, and the U.N. has created a mandate to intervene by military means...what then?

Fred, I'm not saying ditch the idea of sealift, but I think we should build a strategic lift force that utilizes both air and sea. Sure, it is expensive to operate both, but war is expensive. I think strat lift and supporting our army is where the majority (note: not all) of our defence spending should be going to.

The United States has 3 San Antonio Class vessels that are going to be declared surplus (see link at top). These are excellent ships that are capable of supporting reasonable amounts of ground forces, can support a helicopter capability, and can even land ground forces in hot spots via LCAC (Landing Craft Air-Cushioned). The Best thing about these ships is that they are NEW! No more buying second-hand crap...

Now, as for the Reserves, I agree with you 100%. There have been some great Canadian men and women that have fought in the Reserves, and there still are. I believe we should pass the legislation and utilize the Reserves instead of having our regs fight the wars with increased op tempo while our 20,000 reserves sit back at home, trained, equipped, but without a war to fight.

Thanks

But think about if that were loaded up with supplies and sent to South East Asis after the Tsunami? It is nearly ideal for things like that. Load a few trucks full of suplies onto each Hovercraft, drop them off and return ship for more. In combat, the main purpose of such a ship is that you have all of your forces there and can be quickly deployed and given airsupport.

There are two problems: one is cost, as mentioned many times. The second is the need support one of those ships with half of our Navy, and that poses a really big problem if we get two or three of them. Seeing as you can only expect 2/3 of the Navy to be in opperation at any given time. Everything would be with those ships protecting them, leaving nothing anywhere's else.

To answer your question SgtMills, this quote was taken off the 'Canadian American Strategic Review' website:

"Instead of LPDs, the US finds that RO/RO transport is in higher demand. Of the original 46 planned LPDs, only 12 will now be built. Of those 12, only 9 are needed by the US. The remaining 3 may be available for export. They suit General Hillier’s image of a transformed CF, would be available far sooner than a ‘keel-up’ design, and might be a bargain."

As for San Antonio vs Nassau, the San Antonio, in my opinion, delivers the best of both worlds. As Dgthe3 stated, we need a vessel that can deliver disaster relief and internatonal aid AS WELL as delivering military hardware to the area of conflict. The San Antonio does have the capability to carry 2 LCACs, being ideal for disaster areas and warzones alike. The S.A. class also has a flight deck, although not nearly large enough to carry V/STOL a/c, it can carry light and medium helos, and has a hanger for sustained operations.

Now, the key diference is the San Antonio is a brand-spanking new design and is ready NOW (or, the near future anyways), while the Nassau is based on a 25 year-old design.

Thanks