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  5 octobre 2021 | Local, Aérospatial, Naval, Terrestre, C4ISR, Sécurité

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  17 janvier 2019 | Local, Aérospatial, Naval, Terrestre

  Canadian military falling well short of its target for recruiting women

  Murray Brewster · CBC News New statistics also show efforts to bring in more Indigenous, visible minority recruits failing The Canadian military has barely moved the needle on its ambitious plan to recruit more women, just over a year after the Liberal government introduced its gender-focused defence policy, new figures reveal. The stated intention of Chief of the Defence Staff Gen. Jonathan Vance was to have women make up 25 per cent of the Armed Forces by 2025-26. Statistics released by the Office of the Chief of Military Personnel show that while the number of female recruits coming through the door has increased slightly, it has not been enough to boost overall representation. As of the end of April, women made up only 15.4 per cent of both the combined regular and reserve forces. The story is the same for Indigenous Canadians and visible minorities — those recruitment numbers remain just as anemic as they have been for several years. Indigenous Canadians make up about 2.8 per cent of the Armed Forces; DND has set a goal of getting that share up to 3.5 per cent. Visible minorities make up 8.2 per cent; the target percentage is 11.8. But the military and the Liberal government have more political capital invested in the effort to get more women into uniform. It's central to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's mantra of gender equality, and to Canada's desire to put women at the heart of a reformed international peacekeeping system. The drive to recruit more women comes as the military attempts to overhaul its culture in the wake of a damning report in 2015 by retired Supreme Court justice Marie Deschamps, who said a "sexualized culture" within the military was behind an endemic problem with sexual harassment and misconduct. Female recruitment picking up — but slowly There were 860 women enrolled in the military in the last fiscal year, which ended on March 31 — an increase of eight per cent over the previous year. It's not enough, said the chief of military personnel. "Those are still not meeting the number we need to have in order to meet the 25 per cent target and we're conscious of that," Lt.-Gen. Chuck Lamarre told CBC News in an interview. The slow pace of female recruitment has forced senior brass to take more direct control, he said. "We recognize it's going to take a much more disciplined approach, a much more targeted approach to go get more women, more visible minority and more Aboriginal folks to come join the Canadian Armed Forces," said Lamarre, who insisted the Armed Forces can still hit the target, which was first established in early 2016. The direction from Vance back then had been to increase the representation of women in the forces by one per cent per year over a decade. The new statistics show the military has seen healthy increases in the number of women applying to be officers, or to join the navy or air force. But National Defence is having a harder time convincing women to join the army, and to become non-commissioned members of the rank and file. Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan said it will take time, but there signs of change, notably the desire of women to become officers and leaders, a cultural shift that the DesChamps report said is necessary. "As time goes on, I am confident we will be successful," Sajjan said in a conference call with reporters Tuesday morning from Vietnam. "We are very happy that we are recruiting women into leadership roles." Lamarre said he believes the military is fighting against perceptions about the kind of career being offered. "People have a tendency to self-select out before they give it a shot, and I think that's a mistake," he said, pointing to the military's struggle to get women to consider signing up for trades such as aircraft, vehicle and maritime mechanics. "We are attracting more women into the officer corps, but I think we need to broaden that even more. Part of it is demystifying some of those occupations. Some of them look to be hard and exclusively centred towards men. That's not the case at all. We have some great examples of women who are operating in every occupation." Military's image problem persists Others — DesChamps among them — argue that the perception of the military as a tough place to be a woman hasn't gone away. Despite the military's high-profile campaign to stamp out misconduct — known as Operation Honour — and the increasing number of sexual assault cases being tried in the military justice system, many say that little has changed when it comes to the macho nature of military culture. "In the last three years, in my opinion, more could have been done" to stop harassment and make the military a more welcoming career choice for women, Deschamps told the Senate defence committee last week. "What I have seen is, not a lot of progress has been made." The federal government has faced two class-action lawsuits launched by survivors of sexual assault and misconduct in the military. The cases entered settlement discussions last winter after it was revealed government lawyers filed a statement of defence that said National Defence "does not owe members of the Canadian Armed Forces any duty to protect them from sexual harassment and assault." https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canadian-military-falling-well-short-of-its-target-for-recruiting-women-1.4691356

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  26 décembre 2019 | Local, Naval

  Canada's new frigates could take part in ballistic missile defence — if Ottawa says yes

  Murray Brewster Canada's new frigates are being designed with ballistic missile defence in mind, even though successive federal governments have avoided taking part in the U.S. program. When they slip into the water sometime in the mid- to late-2020s, the new warships probably won't have the direct capability to shoot down incoming intercontinental rockets. But the decisions made in their design allow them to be converted to that role, should the federal government ever change course. The warships are based upon the British Type 26 layout and are about to hit the drawing board. Their radar has been chosen and selected missile launchers have been configured to make them easy and cost-effective to upgrade. Vice-Admiral Art McDonald said the Lockheed Martin-built AN/SPY-7 radar system to be installed on the new frigates is cutting-edge. It's also being used on land now by the U.S. and Japan for detecting ballistic missiles. "It's a great piece, and that is what we were looking for in terms of specification," McDonald told CBC News in a year-end interview. Selecting the radar system for the new frigates was seen as one of the more important decisions facing naval planners because it has to stay operational and relevant for decades to come — even as new military threats and technologies emerge. McDonald said positive feedback from elsewhere in the defence industry convinced federal officials that they had made the right choice. "Even from those that weren't producing an advanced kind of radar, they said this is the capability you need," he said. The whole concept of ballistic missile defence (BMD) remains a politically touchy topic. BMD — "Star Wars," to its critics — lies at the centre of a policy debate the Liberal government has tried to avoid at all costs. In 2017, Canada chose not to join the BMD program. That reluctance to embrace BMD dates back to the political bruising Paul Martin's Liberal government suffered in 2004-05, when the administration of then-U.S. president George W. Bush leaned heavily on Ottawa to join the program. In the years since, both the House of Commons and Senate defence committees have recommended the federal government relent and sign on to BMD — mostly because of the emerging missile threat posed by rogue nations such as North Korea. Liberals reluctant to talk BMD The question of whether to join BMD is expected to form part of the deliberations surrounding the renewal of NORAD — an undertaking the Liberal government has acknowledged but not costed out as part of its 2017 defence policy. Missile defence continues to be a highly fraught concept within the federal government. Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan made a point of downplaying a CBC News story last summer that revealed how the Canadian and U.S. militaries had laid down markers for what the new NORAD could look like, pending sign-off by both Washington and Ottawa. Asked about Sajjan's response, a former senior official in the minister's office said it raised the spectre of "Star Wars" — not a topic the Liberal government was anxious to discuss ahead of last fall's election. The current government may not want to talk about it, but the Canadian navy and other NATO countries are grappling with the technology. Practice makes perfect Last spring, a Canadian patrol frigate, operating with 12 other alliance warships, tracked and shot down a supersonic target meant to simulate a ballistic missile. A French frigate also scored a separate hit. For the last two years, NATO warships have practiced linking up electronically in defensive exercises to shoot down both mock ballistic and cruise missiles. A Canadian frigate in the 2017 iteration of the exercise destroyed a simulated cruise missile. At the recent Halifax Security Forum, there was a lot of talk about the proliferation of missile technology. One defence expert told the forum Canadian military planners have been paying attention to the issue for a long time. The frigate design is an important example. "I think what they've tried to do is keep the door open by some of the decisions they've made, recognizing that missile proliferation is a significant concern," said Dave Perry, of the Canadian Global Affairs Institute. "They haven't shut the door on doing that and I think that is smart." Opponents of BMD, meanwhile, have long argued the fixation by the U.S. and NATO on ballistic missile defence is fuelling instability and giving Russia and China reasons to co-operate in air and missile defence. Speaking before a Commons committee in 2017, Peggy Mason, president of the foreign and defence policy think-tank Rideau Institute, said the United States's adversaries have concluded that building more offensive systems is cheaper than investing in defensive ones. "The American BMD system also acts as a catalyst to nuclear weapons modernization, as Russia and China seek not only increased numbers of nuclear weapons but also increased manoeuvrability," said Mason, Canada's ambassador for disarmament from 1989 to 1994, testifying on Sept. 14, 2017. She also warned that "there would be significant financial costs to Canadian participation" in the U.S. BMD program "given American demands" — even prior to Donald Trump's presidency — "that allies pay their 'fair share' of the collective defence burden." https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/frigate-ballistic-missile-defence-canada-1.5407226