23 juin 2020 | Local, Sécurité
By Jolson Lim and Victoria Gibson. Published on Jun 22, 2020 1:49pm
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The RCMP is planning to add up to two new “Counter Assault Tactical Vehicles” to its arsenal, worrying critics who say it is a waste of taxpayer money and represents a growing militarization in policing in Canada.
The vehicles the RCMP plans to buy are “light-weight high mobility” armoured vehicles to be operated “primarily in urban areas,” according to procurement documents. The vehicles are to “discretely blend into public settings, and provide protection against small arms while remaining highly maneuverable.”
A request for industry feedback was published in late April. A contract is scheduled to be awarded in February 2021 with final delivery for summer 2023.
The purchase would add to the RCMP's stock of armoured vehicles that include 18 “Tactical Armoured Vehicles” owned since 2012 and two Cougar vehicles donated by the Department of National Defence in 2010.
These vehicles are intended to shield police officers in so-called “critical incidents,” such as armed standoffs, hostage takings and search and rescue missions.
The purchase of armoured vehicles by police in Canada has come under increasing scrutiny in wake of new protests over anti-Black racism and police violence. Halifax city council recently cancelled the purchase of an armoured tactical vehicle for its municipal police and re-allocated the $368,000 it planned to spend to the city's diversity office and for anti-racism initiatives.
Critics questioned the RCMP's plans to purchase the new vehicles.
“It shows police and politicians are failing to listen to what Canadians are saying about defunding police,” said Kevin Walby, associate professor at the University of Winnipeg's department of criminal justice.
“Each time the RCMP or other police agencies do something like buy more technology, it simply provides further evidence that police are archaic institutions that are non-responsive to real public needs and calls for justice.”
NDP MP Matthew Green said the planned purchases should be scrapped.
“It speaks to the shift away in our law enforcement, from keeping the peace as peace officers, to an extension of a paramilitary,” he said. “It's a bleeding of responsibilities between the military industrial complex and local policing.”
The existing fleet includes 18 vehicles delivered by Navistar Defence Canada in 2012 and manufactured in Mississippi. The contract was worth $15.2 million, with the cost to buy each vehicle more than $800,000.
The vehicles are essentially armoured personnel carriers refitted for civilian police. Similar vehicles were used in the Afghanistan conflict by the British military, Navistar said in 2012.
The RCMP was unable to confirm the possession of such vehicles prior to deadline last Friday. Earlier last week, when asked by iPolitics for a list of all armoured, tactical and “military-style” vehicles, a spokesperson cited “operational and security reasons” in refusing to disclose the items. iPolitics had initially asked on June 4 for a list of all RCMP vehicles excluding core vehicles such as sedans, SUVs, ATVs and motorbikes.
In 2014, the National Post reported that the RCMP's policy requires armoured vehicles to be used by emergency response team members only during critical incidents and not for crowd control. The vehicles can protect against bullets and explosives and carry a full tactical squad. They include gun ports, sentry hatches and a protected observation station.
Walby, who has researched tactical teams in Canadian policing, said armoured vehicles are primarily used by police in active shooter situations and for serving high-risk warrants, but he does not believe there are enough circumstances to justify having them.
“I would raise questions about the actual utility of them. I would raise questions about whether or not tactical members even think they are useful compared to the other fleet of vehicles that they have,” he said.
However, Mary Ann Campbell, a clinical psychologist who conducts psychological assessments of tactical team members for Saint John, N.B. police, said the vehicles are needed to protect police in special circumstances.
“It's not used for crowd control. It's not driven around as part of patrol services either. It's really used for the tactical team,” she said.
Campbell said there are “many factors that come into play” when weighing whether armoured vehicles should be used by civilian law enforcement and are representative of police militarization. Ultimately, she sees them as a “tool” for police that must be handled with care.
“The fact is, weapons and things like armoured vehicles are a part of how officers do their work,” she said. “If there's trust in the police force, there's trust in how they use this equipment — and not abuse it.”
Five RCMP armoured vehicles were deployed during the 2014 Moncton shooting that left three Mounties dead. The vehicles were also on scene during the 2014 Parliament Hill shooting. In May, an armoured vehicle was used in a drug-related search in Selkirk, Man., an operation that led to the arrest of two people and the seizure of one sawed-off shotgun, ammunition and drugs.
On June 15, an RCMP armoured vehicle and tactical team were deployed in response to a “mental health call” in Alberta Beach, Alta.
The vehicles can also sometimes be found in local parades and public events. Many local law enforcement in Canada own armoured vehicles. In one case, in Saint John, a private company donated an armoured vehicle to municipal police.
Pamela Palmater, a Mi'kmaq lawyer, Ryerson University professor and activist, said money that goes to buying and operating such vehicles is better spent on initiatives to fight poverty, support mental health and ensure clean drinking water for First Nation communities.
“We've really got to look at what are the issues here, and do we need tanks to resolve them,” she said.
Palmater added that it's often Indigenous peoples who face militarized responses from the RCMP, ones that may involve the deployment of heavily armed officers, helicopters and drones. She cited the January protests on Wet'suwet'en territory as an example.
Green said “over-investments in the militarization of police come at the expense of our ability to invest in the social determinants of health and the basic quality of life for people living in Canada.”
Sent a series of questions last week, including why more armoured vehicles were needed by the RCMP, a spokesperson for Public Safety Minister Bill Blair declined to comment, instead directing iPolitics to the agency stating such questions were operational in nature.
With files from Kirsten Smith
18 août 2023 | Local, Aérospatial
Roughly 120 Canadian Armed Forces personnel have arrived in Yellowknife, NWT, to assist with wildfire management efforts, with support from RCAF aircraft.
6 novembre 2019 | Local, C4ISR
Perth, Western Australia, November 6, 2019 – Barrett Communications have recently been awarded a multiyear contract to supply the Canadian National Defence Department (DND) with Very High Frequency (VHF) radio communications equipment. This new contract follows on from the earlier contract awarded to Barrett in 2016. The Barrett PRC-2080+ VHF radio systems are designed for multi-role military applications providing rugged reliable field proven communications. The PRC-2080+ system is offered in hand portable, manpack, vehicle, base and rebroadcast system configurations, giving flexibility for its deployment in the field. Andrew Burt, Barrett Communications CEO commented “We have many exciting developments and contracts coming from the America's right now. We are pleased to have secured this contract demonstrating the confidence the Canadian DND has in Barrett communications equipment.” View source version on Barrett Communications: https://www.barrettcommunications.com.au/news/barrett-secures-canadian-dnd-contract/
19 juin 2020 | Local, Aérospatial
You can pick your own term. Generation 4.2? Gen 4.3? However you choose to define the upgraded Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) CF-188 Hornet, the fighter jet will have “operational parity” in a complex operating environment until the early 2030s. “It's not Gen 4, but it's not a true Gen 4.5 like the (F/A-18E/F) Super Hornet. It will be somewhere between there,” said BGen Todd Balfe, a CF-188 pilot and special advisor to the Fighter Capability Office. “The term we use is, it brings us to operational parity against current threats. That is an implicit statement recognizing we don't have operational parity right now. And that supports our [objective] of bridging towards the future fighter.” Under a program known as the Hornet Extension Project (HEP), the Air Force will upgrade its entire fleet of 94 aircraft to meet international aviation regulations and ensure interoperability with the United States and other allies, including NATO. It will also enhance the combat capability of 36 jets to operate globally against current threats. The program addresses what the RCAF is calling quantitative and qualitative capability gaps. The delivery and upgrade of 18 operational Australian F/A-18A Hornets, which will expand the current fleet of 76 to 94, gives the Air Force the necessary quantity to meet concurrent NORAD and NATO obligations. Upgrading the sensors, weapons, countermeasures and mission support of approximately two squadrons worth of fighters will resolve the qualitative concern. Previously two distinct projects to comply with changing civil aviation regulations and allied capabilities and to modernize combat capability, HEP will be completed in two phases. The first phase, set to begin shortly on all 94 Hornets, will include automatic dependent surveillance-broadcast (ADS-B) to replace the current transponder, Honeywell GPS/INS systems, Collins Aerospace AN/ARC-210 RT-2036 (Gen 6) radios, airborne Joint Tactical Radios, upgrades to the Lockheed Martin sniper targeting pod, enhanced mission computers and data transfer units, and software updates for the Advanced Distributed Combat Training System (ADCTS) for networked flight simulation exercises. “It will allow the aircraft to operate in civil airspace out to 2032, but more importantly ... to interoperate with allies,” said Balfe. “Our NATO allies and our U.S. allies are upgrading the interoperability standards on all their fleets of aircraft.” The second phase, to be completed on the 36 Hornets with the most remaining operational life, will follow shortly after. Though select weapons and sensor systems were upgraded prior to Operation Impact over Iraq and Syria in 2014 and 2015, the CF-188 has not had a major overhaul of its combat capability for almost 15 years, Balfe acknowledged. The most significant enhancement will be to the sensing capability, in particular the radar. The Air Force will replace the AN/APG-73 mechanically scanned radar, a multimode airborne radar system developed in the 1980s by Hughes Aircraft, now Raytheon, with a vastly improved APG-79(V)4 Active Electronically Scanned Array (AESA) radar, now standard on so-called fifth generation fighters and many allied upgraded fourth generation aircraft. “An AESA radar gives you much greater detection, less probability of being detected, and more capability to track and identify airborne and even surface targets,” said Balfe. “It is a scaled down version of the radar that is in the Super Hornet.” The Fighter Capability Office looked across allied F-18 operators for examples and “quickly landed upon the U.S. Marine Corps,” which operates a C variant of the Hornet, he said. “They have embarked upon a very similar upgrade path ... so much of the engineering effort has already been done. We will partner with the Marine Corps and put that in our aircraft.” The Hornets will also receive a new F/A-18A Wide Band RADOME to “be able to accommodate the full capability of the AESA radar,” he added. The new weapons package will include the Sidewinder AIM-9X Block II air-to-air short-range missile, the AIM-120D advanced medium range air-to-air missile, and the AGM-154 Joint Standoff Weapon (JSOW), an air-to-surface glide bomb with an unclassified published range of at least 100 kilometres “All the weapons are currently integrated on Marine Corps F-18s” and are used by select NATO allies, noted Balfe. “They are a significant increase in capability and survivability for our pilots.” Given the age of the Hornets, which were designed in the 1970s and produced in the 1980s, there would be limited value in modifying the airframe or enhancing the electronic warfare system to further increase survivability — the RCAF is anticipating about seven years of service life once the upgrades are completed in 2025. But the Air Force will add new expendable chaff and flare, the ADM-141C Improved Tactical Air-Launched Decoys, and an Automatic Ground Collision Avoidance System (Auto GCAS). “The system was not technically feasible before,” said Balfe. “It is now. The Marine Corps has found a solution.” Lastly, the RCAF will expand mission support and security with a new Joint Mission Planning System (JMPS) and security upgrades to portable, temporary secure facilities to conduct simulated weapons training and mission planning for pilots. “These new weapons come with a higher level of security,” he said, noting that the CF-188 operates at secret or below while newer fighters require top secret level classification. Though the enhanced combat capability might not match that of a true Gen 4.5 or greater aircraft, it will serve as a “transition activity” to the future fighter, which remains “on track,” said MGen Michel Lalumiere, chief of Fighter Capability. The government still expects to award a contract in 2022 for 88 advanced fighter jets to replace the current Hornet fleet, despite twice adjusting the request for proposals deadline, now set for July 31, and the challenges of coordinating paperwork and other activity among the Fighter Capability Office, the Air Force, other government departments and the three contending companies while working remotely during the coronavirus pandemic. Balfe suggested the combat systems introduced during HEP Phase 2, many of the which will be the same or similar on the future fighter, “will enable us to begin the transition of our people, our mindset, our procedures and our way of thinking for the capabilities that are going to come with the future fighter. We think HEP is a great bridge toward that path.” While data from the various sensors will still be “fused” by the pilot rather than an onboard computer, systems in CF-188, the enhanced sensing and data transfer will mean a clearer operating picture among RCAF pilots that can be shared to a degree with allies. “It will bring our pilots into a different level,” he said. One key approval milestone was reached on June 16 when the U.S. State Department approved the possible military sale to Canada of the AESA radar along with technical and logistics support, the RADOME, radios, data transfer units, the various missiles and tactical guidance units, the ADCTS, Auto GCAS, JMPS and other systems for an estimated US$862.3 million, according to the Defense Security Cooperation Agency. The combined HEP program is estimated to cost about $1.3 billion. The Air Force is anticipating an initial operating capability of six Hornets through both Phase 1 and 2 in 2023. Full operational capability of the entire 94 aircraft is expected in 2025. “We are doing this very rapidly,” noted Balfe. That timeline includes the introduction of 18 Australian flyable aircraft as well as delivery of a spares package and up to seven more F/A-18A jets for parts by 2022. So far, five have been delivered and two have completed testing and evaluation after undergoing a conversion program that includes Canadian operational flight program software, cockpit configuration, a naval aircrew common ejection seat, night vision imaging systems, external lighting on the tail, changes to the landing gear and installation of the Lockheed Martin sniper targeting pod. “The allocation (of the Australian aircraft) will be based upon squadron needs and aircraft fatigue,' said Balfe. “One of the benefits besides helping close that quantitative capability gap, they give us a bigger pool of aircraft over which to distribute the stress and strain of [fighter operations]. They also allow us to have aircraft out of service while they are going through various phases of upgrades under HEP.” Enhanced combat systems may put the CF-188 on a par with current threats for the next decade, but they don't negate the need for a more modern fighter, Balfe observed. “We have a limited window where the upgraded CF-188 will have operational parity. Past that window, roughly 2032, it will most likely not have operational parity any longer.” https://www.skiesmag.com/news/major-upgrades-canada-fleet-cf-188-hornets