The Canadian army does not have enough vehicles to support the brigade in Latvia as well as a similar size training exercise in Canada, a committee of the Commons Chamber was told Thursday.
General of Major. Robert Ritchie, the director of the Strategic Joint Personnel (the Army’s Nervous Center), told the Defense Committee that more than 400 vehicles of all kinds have been deployed for the NATO deterrence mission in the Baltic Nation.
“We do not have a mirror complement to that team in Canada, nor is it required,” Ritchie testified, referring to A radical change in combined weapons training implemented last year.
“Vehicles that individuals are using for that [Latvia] The implementation are what they need to carry out the training prior to the deployment to understand the systems and have confidence and confidence in the use of that equipment. “
Ritchie did not specifically approach how deep was the shortage of vehicles in Canada and how it affected the training for other smaller missions or national deployments.
But the fact that the army does not have enough vehicles to support a brigade in the field and carry out a concurrent training exercise in Canada, for a force of the same size, it is a concern that several defense analysts and observers have shared in the sequels of the liberal government plan to rebuild and re -assemble the forces.
The army has faced criticism for changing combined weapons, where foot soldiers exercise together with tanks, artillery and airplanes to improve their coordination skills, from the base in Wainwright, high., To Latvia.
Critics, including a former army commander, say that change means that soldiers are less ready to fight immediately and have to learn at work.
The change, according to critics, was carried out in part due to the reallocation of internal budget in the National Defense Department and a general shortage of funds. CBC News was the first to inform about the review of training in the spring of 2024 and at that time the department denied that the funds play any role.
On Thursday, Ritchie further defended the decision, saying that soldiers are receiving land training and under conditions that could have to fight.
“There is a deterrent effect by virtue of training in the location in the front line for which the multinational group is defending,” Ritchie said.
He added that a “conglomerate of reasons has led us to the decision to transfer training prior to implementation to Latvia, which was exceptionally well received by Latvia and all allies.”
However, the documents of the Department of Internal Defense, obtained by CBC News, say that there have been problems with the training in the field in Latvia. During the most recent deployment, Canadian soldiers did not have a “place during work training.”
“This required a more academic approach to preparations” for the main exercise known as Oak Resolve, the documents said.
The European trip of Prime Minister Mark Carney ended after visiting Canadian troops in Latvia, where Canada leads an NATO mission. Carney announced that the presence of Canada’s NATO in Latvia will continue until 2029, with the aim of having a complete picture of 2,200 persistently deployed there at some point in 2026. But the researcher and professor of the Royal Military Military College, Christian Leuprecht.
The training problem has been aggravated by a critical shortage, and in some cases paralyzing, of spare parts that has forced the brigade to park vehicles, including the main battle tanks of Leopard 2A4.
The factors that force the army to park vehicles include “Canada’s supply chain problems, parts portfolio” and the new “compressed” training regime, which has seen troops complete its combined weapons training in Latvia, instead of in Canada, said a separate set of internal documents obtained by CBC News.
Ritchie recognized the problem to parliamentarians and said that the federal government injection of $ 9.3 billion in defense this year is helping to address that problem.
“The recent budget commitment has allowed the delivery of orders for main spare parts, and we have undertaken at speed,” said Ritchie.
But he pointed out past decisions that “eroded a couple of things”, namely, the reservation of the Army of Spare parts and that some “long -standing providers turned to other contracts.”
