Stalking

By Military Woman

Question: I have heard a lot about “sexual misconduct” in the military but not very much about stalking. Is stalking a problem for military women? 

Answer.  First, let’s agree on what stalking is. Stalking is when a person, who has no legal reason to, continues to contact, follow, talk to, or send things to you, or people closely connected to you, despite repeated requests for them to stop.  

Stalking is categorized as a type of “criminal harassment” in the Criminal Code of Canada. Stalking can be linked with other crimes, such as sexual assault, indecent exposure, threats, voyeurism, the sharing of private images without consent and trespassing.

Who stalks? Stalkers can be total strangers or casual acquaintances, but are most likely current or past intimate partners.  Women are the stalkers in about 20% of cases, but rarely do these cases end in intimate partner violence (IPV) against men. Unfortunately, the reverse does not hold true. One woman is murdered every six days in Canada by a present or past male partner. Margaret Atwood once observed, “Men are afraid that women will laugh at them. Women are afraid that men will kill them.” Stalking is a very gendered experience and is therefore considered to be a type of gender-based violence (GBV).

How common is stalking? In North America, between 8 and 19% of civilian women and 2 to 6% of civilian men are estimated to be victims of stalking. These rates in the US veteran population are thought to be doubled, or around 35% for women and 15% for men. The Journal of Interpersonal Violence recently reported even higher stalking rates for current US active duty populations, up to 60% for women and 35% for men. 

In the absence of available statistics on Canadian military and veterans, we don’t know if Canadian rates are higher, lower or the same as US rates. We do know that Canadian military women are more likely to have a past or current intimate partner relationship with another military member than a civilian woman would.  We do know that having a common military workplace may make it easier for would-be stalkers to access personal information about their current and past military intimate partners. Access to information such as a person’s place of work, home address, schedule and work/social contacts helps stalkers to stalk. We also know that military women have higher separation and divorce rates than civilian women or military men. This is of particular concern when you consider that data from the Canadian general population that suggests a woman in Canada has six times the risk of being killed by a past intimate partner than a present partner.

Reporting stalking is also complicated, especially in a military context where the victim may still fear negative consequences to their own career and/or their previous partner’s career. It’s further complicated if there are any ongoing financial reliances relating to child custody or spousal support payments.

How can you help someone who thinks they may be getting stalked? Believe them. Listen non-judgmentally. Encourage all evidence to be saved and documented (a stalking log is available at www.ncvc.org/src). Ask if they know (or suspect) who their stalker is. Review their perceived risk or threat level and brainstorm how to minimize it. Think about ways to block any ongoing access by the stalker to knowledge about the victim and their family and/or schedules.  Develop a safety plan on how to avoid the stalker and how to deal with any unexpected encounters. Research workplace rights and supports including the police, a lawyer, the Sexual Misconduct Response Centre (SMRC), and websites such as YellowManteau.com. Decide when and how to report to authorities.

What to do if you are being stalked now? Step one is to acknowledge the problem. Family, society and even military workplaces can deny, minimize, normalize and/or perpetuate inappropriate relational stalking behaviours. Research your options. Ask for help, third party interventions are often required. 

Knowledge and policy gap. Canadian military (and RCMP) women statistics for stalking remains largely unchartered territory. It’s a gap that we look forward to being addressed in this government’s “National Gender Based Violence Plan.”

The Making of a General: Guy Granville Simonds

By Vincent J. Curtis

Rather than be sent home from Italy humiliated, Simonds instead went to England in January, 1944, as GOC 2nd Canadian Corps. At 41, he was the youngest Corps commander in British Commonwealth forces. Simonds immediately got rid of F.F. Worthington, the father of the Canadian Armoured Corps as GOC 4th Armoured Division, replacing him with George Kitching. He also replaced other McNaughton holdovers.

McNaughton left the Canadian army in Britain poorly trained. Above the company level training was bad, and all-arms combat went unpracticed. Simonds had a lot of preparing to do and little time to do it in. Making matters worse, Crerar was appointed GOC 1st Canadian Army, Simonds’ titular boss, though Montgomery was GOC 21st Army Group, Crerar’s boss.

Simonds began by writing down his battle outlook for his staff, division, and brigade commanders. He described the German method of defense, and held that the key to defeating it lay in repelling its counterattacks while maintaining sufficient reserves that forward movement could be resumed. Any plan had to include forward movement of artillery support. Stylistically, this was refighting the Battle of Hill 70 – bite and hold – with an exploitation phase added. Since divisional artillery could only support one brigade, attacks would be along narrow frontages. That was the standard battle formula.

The 2nd Canadian Corps was activated in France in July, 1944, and Simonds led the Corps through Operations Atlantic, Spring, Totalize, and Tractable before Monty let Crerar on the scene with the activation of the 1st Canadian Army. Atlantic saw the Canadians cross the Orne river, seize the southern half of Caen, and advance towards Verrières Ridge. Spring was the disastrous attempt to seize the ridge, and saw the destruction of the Black Watch and the breaking of the South Saskatchewan Regiment, who were left unsupported on an exposed forward slope of a hill overlooked by German mortars and artillery.

After Spring, Simonds wanted Charles Foulkes, GOC 2nd Div, who was responsible for the debacles (and, coincidentally, an old and future rival), fired. Crerar prevented it, and eventually Foulkes was appointed Simonds’ equal as GOC 1st Canadian Corps, and later CGS after the war ahead of Simonds. Rod Keller was, however, let go as GOC 3rd Div after Totalize, and Simonds fired George Kitching as GOC 4th Div immediately after Tractable. Today, Simonds would be accused of micro-managing his division commanders.

Coming from a military family and spending his entire life in the Regular army, Simonds had probably never been treated with kindness in his life. He seems never to have learned the value of treating subordinates with kindness occasionally. By his own admission, the tightly-wound Simonds was bad tempered, headstrong, and unable to tolerate fools. He maintained a cold, glacial appearance, and he commanded rather than led. He was innovative, hard-driving, and driven himself, as well as ambitious, ruthless, highly self-confident, and
arrogant. 

Simonds had poisonous personal relations with Crerar, and could not trust him. His Brigade and Divisional commanders simply weren’t as competent as they should have been. The cold, brainy Simonds was probably too impersonal towards his subordinates, commanding where he should have coached or encouraged. When a boss thinks he is surrounded by idiots, the subordinates tend to act accordingly. But after Verrières Ridge, the destruction of Worthington Force, and with Crerar looking to shaft him, it takes a mature man to maintain composure.

As a gunner through and through, Simonds cherished the belief that “artillery conquers, infantry occupies.” Advancing the guns cost him time in his operations – time the Germans used to regroup. He attacked along narrow fronts without thinking that a secondary attack would stretch the German defenses and might create opportunities of its own.

Confining himself to Corps HQ, the formulaic Simonds lacked the battlefield “touch” that Currie demonstrated at 2nd Ypres, and Simonds’ chief antagonist in Normandy, Kurt Meyer, had. His personality, gunner prejudices, and his poorly prepared instrument impaired his operations in Normandy. Still, the technically proficient Simonds was a giant among Canadian generals in World War II.

Let's Be Honest

By Michael Nickerson

Fun fact: women don’t want to kill innocent people. Who knew? It was a complete surprise to me. I’ve always been under the assumption that my wife, mother and friends of the female persuasion were merely one step away from sticking a steak knife into any child silly enough to cross their path after a long day at the salon. But thanks to the mandarins at National Defence, we now know better. 

But gosh darn, the insight and wisdom doesn’t stop there, no sir. Thanks to David Pugliese and his reporting in the Ottawa Citizen, we now have a window into our military’s take on the wants and needs of those who constitute (at last count) fifty percent of the country’s population. Now we know how they think, what they expect in life, and ultimately what is keeping them from ‘daring to be extraordinary’ as the advertising goes. 

Well let me tell you, as a privileged white male it’s been a real eye-opener. For instance, women don’t like being away from their families and friends for long periods of time. Morning pushups are a real turnoff. Being sexually harassed is not a plus. Suffering from PTSD is a definite downer, and the whole combat/killing thing just does not sit well when it comes to recruiting women to be involved in that combat/killing thing. Who knew?

What’s implicit to some degree in this is the idea that men live for pushups and grueling runs, are quite happy to kill people, innocent or not, don’t mind a little PTSD or living rough on the street, and are content to be separated from their families for as long as possible. It’s a guy thing apparently. 

So given all this eye-popping market research, what do you think is the solution to attracting more women to join the military? Marshmallow roasts! Shorter skirts! Male chaperons! Telling women that camouflage is stylish, face paint is just a sexier form of makeup, medals are like earrings, and combat boots are the latest thing on the Paris fashion runways. Sign up, ladies, and we’ll have you on the cover of Vogue in no time!

Now you’re probably guessing who came up with these suggestions. Some might assume it was a cadre of sexist old men wondering what the wee little fillies might want to make them more comfortable in uniform. But no, it goes to the “Tiger Team” for these suggestions, a group consisting of mostly women (90%) enlisted from all branches of the military to brainstorm on how to meet Chief of Defence Staff Jonathan Vance’s goal of having twenty-five percent of the Canadian military be staffed by women come 2026. Sadly, they chose lies over honesty. Marshmallow roasts?!

It’s in the great tradition of advertising: push the positive and minimize (or simply do not mention) the bad. This is all well and good when selling such things abrasive toilet paper or the career opportunities available at the local call centre; you can always walk away from both. It’s quite another when you’re trying to recruit people, male or female, into the military.

To put it mildly, the job requires commitment, sacrifice, hardship, and the potential for long-term disability without recourse to union protection. There continues to be issues of sexual harassment, and veterans have rightfully called for recognition and support.

Yet it is also a noble profession, a much needed profession in our country, and one that offers much in terms of experience and training that truly lasts a lifetime. But it speaks volumes for the insecurity and failings of military leadership when more time is spent trying to trick people into the job than in being upfront and treating people as the adults they must be to ultimately handle the job. 

It’s a seriously tough gig. Not many people can handle it. So be honest about that and leave the marshmallow roasts for someone else. You’re not training people for firefights around the campfire after all.

Trifecta

By Michael Blais

Veterans are not alone in having good reason to be dismayed with respect to Veterans Affairs Canada’s performance when one considers the trifecta of adverse headlines which this department has garnered over the past month. Hopefully, Prime Minister Trudeau will share our concerns as it was promises he made to veterans in exchange for their votes during the past two election’s which have been broken and/or marginalized.

Serving members, veterans and their families will recall an infamous exchange between an ex soldier and Trudeau during a town hall meeting in Edmonton, February, 2018. Afghanistan War veteran Brock Blaszczyk had issued a challenge to Mr. Trudeau regarding the Liberals much heralded Pension for Life and the Equitas lawsuit.

“I was prepared to be killed in action. What I wasn’t prepared for, Mr. Prime Minister, is Canada turning its back on me” Said Blaszczyk. Trudeau replied “Certain groups are asking for more than we can afford, right now.” 

Afford? Veterans Affairs Canada, under a Liberal mandate, has to date returned hundreds of millions of parliamentary approved dollars unspent, sending close to 350 million dollars back to treasury. This practice is ongoing with the latest report citing 105 million returned by VAC the very same year in which Trudeau claimed veterans “were asking for more.” Despite unanimous support for a parliamentary vote in 2019 to ensure budgeted funds delegated to veterans care which remain unspent at the end of the fiscal year would be carried forward until services have been restored.

Could this money not have fulfilled Trudeau’s promise to acknowledge Blaszczyk’s national sacrifice by re-establishing the Sacred Obligation pension as the Prime Minister promised?

Trudeau’s promise on backlogs have been abrogated by the reality of recent media headlines.

“Backlog of applications for veteran’s benefits grows by the thousands,” proclaimed The Canadian Press.

Delays in adjudication and services persist unabated. Despite the Liberals infusion of over 5 billion dollars, the rehiring of hundreds of front line positions which had been deemed redundant by the conservatives, the backlog status has somehow grown worse? Pas possible!

Forty-four thousand applications are currently in motion, while approximately twenty-three thousand have been processed yet are stagnant, waiting for adjudication. Most of these claims are combat arms related, which is important in the sense of debunking the long standing Liberal promise to expedite combat arms decisions on claims relating to hearing impairment, tinnitus, traumatized feet, ankles, knees, backs, necks and shoulders, maladies which are all too common to the life of former infantrymen, tankers, sappers and gunners.

Damaging headline number three for VAC would be in Nova Scotia’s ongoing provincial inquiry into the horrific deaths of Cpl Lionel Desmond and his family. This coroners inquiry has raised critical questions which strike to the very heart of VAC’s credibility with respect to the department’s ability to effectively provide expedient mental health services to veterans in the wake of the Afghanistan War. 

Justice Warren Zimmer’s extraordinary decision on the 11th day of the proceedings, to read Cpl Desmond’s military medical files into the court record when confirmed that VAC did not share this vital information when they contracted Catherine Chambers the community based psychologist to treat Cpl Desmond after a four mouth absence of care. The Zimmer felt it important to detail the degree of negligence demonstrated by VAC when they failed to share Cpl Desmond’s medical records with Chambers.

She testified she was unaware hospital doctors recommended on-going therapy, inclusive of brain scans, neuro-cognitive testing and potential monitoring for Post-Concussion Syndrome. She was unaware Cpl Desmond suffered from PTSD, major depression and anxiety, poor cognitive abilities and paranoia concerning the motives of health care professionals. Dr. Chambers wept as she informed the judge that knowing now what VAC had failed to disclose to her that December, she did not believe Cpl Desmond would have been a candidate for “community based psychotherapy but would have required further inpatient care.”

Veterans are not falling through the cracks. Veterans are being abandoned and in respect to Cpl Desmond and his family, abandoned into a catastrophic dimension.

Will Trudeau hold anyone at VAC to account? I doubt it.

Manic Monday. Wacky Wednesday. Freaky Friday

By Mike Blais

Soldiers in-theatre often have unique, shall we say descriptive terms to blunt the adversarial impact of any given situation through humour rather than alarm. Not surprisingly, Mefloquine’s nickname’s are related to the day of the week wherein soldiers were ordered to take this drug in order to stave off the never ending scourge of malaria. Manic.

Wacky. Freaky.

Objectively, the drug has proven to be an effective anti-malarial deterrence.

Malaria is a virulent disease. Strategically, it is necessary to effectively inoculate soldiers prior to deployment to malaria plagued operational theatres as a vital component to mission success. The Americans would not have been successful against the Japanese during the Pacific campaign of WW2 without strictly regimented use of powerful quinines due to the profoundly mission-adverse impact which rampant malaria would have inflicted upon their combat forces ability to function, let alone fight.

Mefloquine’s discovery was consequential to American engagement in another theatre of war, this time in South-East Asia wherein malaria posed a clear and present danger to American troops. In fact during the Vietnam War, Americans sustained 24,000 cases of malaria. Noteworthy?

The term Post Traumatic Stress Disorder was coined during this era and this term have now been applied as the catch all for veterans suffering from mental trauma symptoms inherent to military service in both war and peace.

Most of these symptoms are also currently identified by Health Canada, with respect to the Mefloquine generation of quinines, as serious “side effects” by Health Canada.

Coincidence?

DND embraced Mefloquine after choosing valiant paratroopers of the

Canadian Airborne Regiment as involuntary “guinea pigs” for the anti-malarial drug’s “clinical” trials during the infamous deployment to Somalia (92-93). Subsequent to those “successful” trials, Mefloquine was provided as DND’s primary anti-malarial deterrence up until 2017 wherein it was withdrawn from general use and provided only when medical contradictions negate use by other medications.

Health Canada responded to widening concerns from Canadians about the seriously adverse effects of Mefloquine in 2016. The population was cautioned about anxiety, depression, paranoia, hallucinations, psychotic behaviour and suicide ideation for years after exposure

The Canadian military also conducted a Mefloquine review, while contrarily assuring affected veterans, the troops and the nation that Mefloquine posed no long-term adverse effects?

How can two assessments be so diametrically opposed? 

Was there a cover up, as so many veterans believe?

What were the consequences to those adversely affected by mefloquine toxicity, particularly veterans of Canadian Airborne Regiment in respect to the “clinical” trial during their Somalia deployment?

Are there veterans of Somalia and other Mefloquine deployments who have been potentially misdiagnosed by DND doctors as suffering from PTSD. Consequently were they then subject to treatment plans and anti-psychotic medications that were not effective because Veterans Affairs Canada refuses to acknowledge Mefloquine may be ultimately responsible as the persistent, long term source of their mental trauma?

Indeed, did the Canadian government of the day willfully forfeit their Duty of Care responsibilities to the men of the Airborne

Regiment of Canada, subjecting the valiant to clinical trials bereft of individual consent or appropriate oversight

Could it be that this insidious drug was the underlying, malignant curse that corrupted the very essence of the Somalia mission?

Could Mefloquine be the common denominator to the inexplicable behaviour affecting the CAR’s deployment?

Could Mefloquine be the dominant factor in the brutal murder of Shidane Arone (the Somali team brutally beaten to death in captivity by the paratroopers)?

Could this “psychotic” incident have been prevented were the “rules” of clinal trials which are accorded to the civilian population, been applied to the military?

Veterans have resorted to the courts for answers to these questions and many more.

The legal firm of Howie, Sacks and Henry LLP has agreed to represent veterans in a class action lawsuit. Should you feel that you have been affected by Mefloquine during your service, contact them on line or at 1 877 771 7006. Tell them you are a veteran, you were prescribed Mefloquine and you wish to speak to Paul Miller.

Broken Cups and Cold Tea

By Michael Nickerson

The 70th anniversary of NATO was to be a celebration. A fine and noble postwar organization reveling in the stability and success it had brought the world. Pour the champagne! Let us salute this fine institution, maintaining peace in our time.

The problem is that NATO resembles not so much a strong and noble alliance as a marriage on the brink of destruction desperately trying to put on a good smile for the guests and failing miserably. All’s good here, nothing to worry about…what do you mean, brain dead? Maybe you should check your brain first before talking! I’m nasty? Let’s get serious and stop blaming the other guy. Disruptive, am I? Did you just call me two-faced? Well so is your mamma!

It was a wonder there wasn’t a food fight given the petulant behavior during the summit, though one could be excused for throwing some mashed potatoes across the room when your dinner guest is Donald Trump; that or making fun of him at a royal reception within earshot of a CBC microphone. That two-faced Trudeau, what a card!

But while Trudeau got the headlines, German Chancellor Angela Merkel got the best line. Calling out French President Emmanuel Macron for suggesting NATO was effectively brain dead, the alliance’s den mother opined thus: “I understand your desire for disruptive politics, but I’m tired of picking up the pieces. Over and over, I have to glue together the cups you have broken so that we can then sit down and have a cup of tea together.” Bravo Chancellor! 

Of course this would be all so very hilarious if it were a sitcom and not an organization of 29 countries spending over a trillion dollars on defence and vainly hoping they’ll find some reason to use all that expensive kit. Formed with a purpose after the Second World War, the organization has been in an existential tailspin since the fall of the Soviet Union. And it’s been a midlife crisis full of pain, tears, and an awful lot of blood.

NATO’s overreach and martial enthusiasm following the breakup of Yugoslavia in the ‘90s has been well documented. NATO’s role in Afghanistan following the sole invoking by the United States of Article 5 (the “my war is your war” clause) has led to 18 years of pointless death and destruction in the region, outlined in great detail most recently in The Afghanistan Papers by The Washington Post. This is to say nothing of NATO’s bombing campaign in Libya that effectively resulted in a flood of weapons and further destabilization of much of northern and western Africa.

So instead of a calm, considered rethink of the purpose of NATO and the responsibility of its members the great debate in NATO is not what should it be doing, but how can it spend more money on lethality while not knowing what to do with it. Brilliant!

Yes, I refer to the two percent rule, that arbitrary and nonsensical spending requirement all NATO members agreed to follow, pointless as it may be. Initiated at the insistence of the United States in 2006 and codified in 2014 the mandate is very simple: we, the United States spend astronomical amounts of money on military spending, more than the world combined, almost four percent of our gross domestic product; and you dear NATO members don’t, so pony up at least two percent or you’re on your own. It’s a bit like a crack addict getting angry that no one is smoking as much as he is, now get puffin’ or get your ass out of the crack den. The difference of course is we’re not talking about crack. I guarantee you crack does less harm.

So what does drinking tea have to do with all this? Think of it as a metaphor for sanity, sober second thought, the antithesis of a crazed cocaine addiction. NATO needs to mend its cups, sit calmly down and pour some tea before it all goes cold.

Why Was Currie a Better General Than Simonds? - Part 2

By Vincent J. Curtis

At Vimy, Currie’s lessons were first applied, much to the surprise of the Germans. As a result of the new technology of sound-ranging and with the aid of aerial photography, the Canadian Corps located the main positions of the German artillery.  When the assault went in, Canadian artillery suppressed, when it didn’t destroy, German defensive fires.  Canadian troops had been training for months, practicing the assault behind the lines. Every man knew the job of every other man. The task-organized platoons were winning in detail against the usual German defensive measures. The 1st Canadian Division, commanded by Currie and which had the farthest to go, reached its final objective noon the next day. The 4th Division conquered “The Pimple” on April 12th, closing the battle for Vimy Ridge and providing the only flash of light for the Allies in the spring of 1917. The Canadian amateurs out-did the German, British and French regulars.

Byng was promoted to command the 3rd British Army, and Currie was promoted to Lieutenant General and commander of the Canadian Corps. Now we see on a larger stage the tactical eye that Currie had developed.

Currie was ordered to take the town of Lens by assault.  Currie proposed he attack a hill to the north of the town instead; it was less well defended and possession of the hill would make the German possession of the town untenable.  Thus the battle of Hill 70 was fought.  Having taken the hill, Currie placed artillery and heavy machine guns on it in a manner that interdicted the routes of German counterattacks.  Running the kill zone cost the Germans heavily; Currie was left in possession of Hill 70, and then of the town of Lens.  The battle cost the Germans 20,000 casualties and the Canadians 9,000.

In preparation for his attack on Passchendaele, Currie ordered the construction of roads as well as a massing of artillery and heavy machine guns. In his mind’s eye he could see the battle unfold.   Currie objected to Passchendaele, saying it would cost him 16,000 casualties, and in the end it cost 15,500!

Currie demonstrated superior talent throughout the Hundred Day campaign. At Amiens, after making a head-fake north, the Corps moved rapidly south, detrained, and quickly attacked without artillery preparation.  The result was the “black day for the German Army.” In September, 1918, the Corps tore a 7,000 yard-wide hole in the German line at Drocourt-Quéant, said to be the “greatest single achievement by the British Expeditionary Force in the whole war.” Currie then squeezed the Corps through a 2,700 yard hole at Canal du Nord to break the Hindenburg Line, confusing the Germans with a sequence of zig-zag attacks reminiscent of manoeuvre warfare tactics.

After Valenciennes, pursuing to Mons, Currie employed an embryonic form of blitzkrieg, mixing infantry and tanks assaulting on the ground, supported by artillery and tactical air power.  The capture of Mons culminated the campaign on the day of the Armistice.

In early 1919, Currie was promoted to General and appointed Inspector General of the Armed Forces. Deep cutbacks in military spending and the bureaucratic deep state in the Ottawa establishment thwarted Currie’s plans to reform the military, and he retired from the army in 1920 at the age of 44 with 23 years’ service.

Currie was not a man of military science. He took his courses and was an enthusiastic student. No doubt he liked the subject matter. He had a mind’s eye for tactics, and the coolness and courage to be able to use it.  He had time and opportunities to develop his war knowledge through experience – in this war on this front. Being only a high school graduate did not hinder him, given his talent and the opportunity to gain experience.  Though not personally inspiring and cool towards his troops, he worked amiably and participatively with subordinates who had themselves proven their worth.

Because Currie had time to gain experience, he was able to develop his talent.

Veterans - Choosing Forward?

By Michael Blais CD

I spoke briefly with Prime Minister Trudeau after the national Remembrance Day service. I am disabled. Over the years, I have often sat beside the same valiant WWII veteran in the reception line. Now, neither of us is able to stand through the entire service.

“Will we be choosing forward for veterans?” I asked while briefly shaking his the Prime Minister’s hand. “Or will we be forgotten?”

Veterans were acknowledged during the Throne Speech, a vague reference to the billions of dollars the Liberals have committed since 2015 and a promise of continued attention on mental health. Of note, Veterans Affairs Canada (VAC) sought an additional $857.6 million in supplementary funds from the treasury this year, spending a total of $5.3 billion on veterans during 2019-20.

How can it be, after committing $5.3 billion this fiscal year, that so many veterans remain disenfranchised?

Because there is no equality in recognition of their national sacrifice? 

Because they are subject to divergent levels of respect?

Prime Minister Trudeau promised a Liberal government would re-establish a pension for life (PFL) in exchange for veterans’ votes in 2015, yet the Liberals’ PFL, in respect to national sacrifice provided, abysmally fails to meet the threshold
established with the Pension Act. Consequently, we have Afghanistan War veterans’ sacrifice acknowledged by two disparate pension standards with the Liberals’ much heralded pension for life obscenely bereft at a meagre 30 cents on the dollar.

One war, one standard?

The Liberals’ 2015 pledge to increase TPI (Totally and Permanently Impaired) veterans’ income loss replacement to the 90% threshold is likewise deficient when program equality standards are applied. Restrictions limiting the 90% threshold to ONLY those supported through VAC’s Earnings Loss Replacement Program. Afghanistan War veterans who have sustained the severest degree of mental and/or physical trauma and deemed Totally and Permanently Impaired on release or within Manulife’s two-year assessment period have been excluded and receive only 75% of their military wages through the SISIP Financial program.

There is no equality in recognition of their national sacrifice and, despite the severity of the wounds incurred in war, thousands of veterans have been denied, no, willfully excluded from the promised 15% increase.

One war, one standard?

Other programs are equally delinquent.

The disparity between eligibility standards in respect to the Pension Act’s Exceptional Incapacitation Award and the Permanent Injury Award / Career Impact Allowance are obscene. The New Veterans Charter (NVC) criteria provides far easier access, provides three levels of acknowledgement in respect to their trauma. Afghan War veterans supported by the Pension Act have one and due to stringent criteria designed to exclude, more often than not result in denial.

One war, one standard?

What about the much heralded Combat Injury Award? $75,000 for Afghan War veterans covered under the NVC but not critically injured Afghan War veterans who would certainly qualify had they not been injured/wounded prior to 2006?

One war, one standard?

Caregivers Relief Benefit versus Attendance Allowance? Once again, eligibility criteria disparities abound. There is no singular standard and when inequitable criteria requisites of each program are assessed, many Pension Act recipients are again confronted with exclusion or denial.

The harshest example of inequity is defined on how Canada’s Memorial Cross widows are being treated and the profound consequences therein. I suspect Canadians would be appalled to note that there are some Memorial Cross widows who are living well below the VAC-defined poverty threshold standards.

The New Veterans Charter acknowledged the fault and resolved widows’ despair through income loss replacement provisions and vocational resources … but only to widows whose loved one perished after 2006.

Choose forward?

I would suggest, before we choose forward, we start caring for all veterans equally without discrimination or reservation due to disparate programs. Veterans are not falling through the cracks. They are willfully, through corrupt, inequitable policies, being denied and excluded, forced into a life of poverty and despair. Before we can further advance, we must consolidate and fight for a comprehensive approach that accords equality in recognition of national sacrifice that leaves no veterans behind.

One veteran, one standard?

One war, one standard?

We can do better.

Why was Currie a better General than Simonds?

By Vincent J. Curtis

The question I hope to answer over the next several columns is why Arthur Currie was a better general than Guy Simonds. From his experience in the Boer War, Sam Hughes believed that the Canadian amateur was a better soldier in fighting war than the British professional. Hughes’ evidence was the manifest success of the Boer commandos in holding off the British for so long and worsting them in many encounters. Is the superiority of Currie over Simonds an example of the superiority in war of the amateur over the British trained professional, or, in the Canadian context, of the militia officer over the Regular, as Hughes believed?

The explanation of why Currie was superior can be found under the headings of training, experience, talent, personality, and instrument. By instrument I mean that the Canadian Corps of 1917-18 was a superior fighting instrument to the 2nd Canadian Corps of June – August 1944. As will be shown later, this too has to do with experience.

The philosopher Aristotle said that science was knowledge of the general, while experience was knowledge of the particular. Hence, it was possible for the man of pure experience to hit upon the correct solution to a problem faster than the man of pure science because the man of experience may have seen a similar problem solved before. With this stipulated, let us now examine the knowledge and experience of Arthur Currie

Currie was born in 1875, and received a high school education. He found employment as a teacher in Victoria, B.C., later he became an insurance salesman and then a land speculator. At the age of 21, he joined the 5th (B.C.) Field Artillery Regiment in 1897 as a gunner. He was commissioned in 1900 and progressed rapidly through the ranks. He came to command his regiment in 1909. Currie was an enthusiastic student, said to take every course available. Being artillery, the tactical courses would have been about the brigade and divisional battles and the artillery fire planning for each.

A friend and subordinate of Currie’s was Garnet Hughes, son of Victoria M.P. Sam Hughes, who was Minister of Militia and Defense from 1911 to 1916. When war broke out in August, 1914, Hughes appointed Currie GOC 2nd Brigade, 1st Canadian Division in September, 1914. In October, from Valcartier, Currie took his Brigade to Britain.

The 1st Canadian Division was in the line in April, 1915, at Ypres, when the Germans launched their very first gas attack. Poisonous chlorine caused the French colonial troops to break for the rear, leaving the flank of the Canadian position hanging. Currie demonstrated coolness, bravery, and a real tactical instinct when he led his brigade to counterattack into the flank of the advancing Germans. He persuaded a couple of British brigades to help out and together the German breakthrough was stanched. As a result of his actions, Currie was promoted to Major General and the command of 1st Canadian Division.

Between April 1915 and April 1917, the Currie method of meticulous preparation and artillery support was demonstrated at Mont Sorrel in June, 1916. The Corps only participated in the Battle of the Somme near the end. By 1917, the Canadian Corps was commanded by Julian Byng, who tasked Currie with studying the battles of the Somme and Verdun and to make recommendations. Currie questioned both senior and junior French officers and compared the impressions of the senior officers with the experiences of the junior.

Currie found that French success resulted from careful staff work, thorough artillery preparation and support, surprise, and a high state of training among the assault troops. The Canadian platoon was reorganized into task groupings to better deal with common tactical problems: the machine gun nest, clearing a section of trench, and beating off German counterattacks. Over the course of two years, Currie came to master the set-piece battle and accepted the strategy of bite and hold.

At Vimy, the fruits of the study became manifest.

Calling All Veterans

By Michael Blais

Veterans will remember that at the height of the Conservative administration’s mandate, the Office of the Veterans Ombudsman (OVO) was created. Colonel (Ret’d) Patrick Stogran CD was chosen to be the first ombudsman, a choice PM Harper soon came to regret. Stogran, ultimately overcome with frustration, resorted to engaging the national media, with a truly extraordinary press conference which was broadcast live throughout the nation.

Prime Minister Harper was not amused.

Ombudsman Stogran’s tenure was not renewed.

Eager to regain control, the PM selected Stogran’s successor wisely. Guy Parent’s passionless, analytical style contrasted vividly against the searing presence of Stogran.

His propensity for accompanying the minister’s entourage on far too many VAC sponsored WW1, WW2, Korean Conflict commemorative trips led to the perception he was more interested in top-shelf travel, accommodations, “sucking up to the minister” rather than serving the wounded. Veterans who should have reached out to the OVO declined, as the level of distrust, whether warranted or not, eventually corrupted the very essence of the veteran-OVO relationship. The next VO soon discovered, this distrust legitimately threatened the OVO’s mandate.

Enter retired naval officer Craig Dalton, a veteran.

Cross country consultation has ensued, with a dedicated effort to reach out to the veterans’ community. Dalton “got an earful” when disenfranchised veterans levied salvos of complaints.

I have met the OVO several times now, with the first meeting being shortly after I dispatched a welcoming email which bluntly defined the state of toxicity which existed within the OVO-veteran relationship and the need for definitive leadership and effective reforms.

Give credit when credit is due! Dalton’s consultation process over time has proven effective and comprehensive, it provides motivation and the catalyst for reform.

Veteran’s voices have resonated.

We met the OVO again -post consultation- on 12 November, Canadian Veterans Advocacy (CVA) Director Sylvain Chartrand joined us. The dialogue was robust; medical cannabis, Reserve Force inequities, mental trauma, VIP provisions, Pension for Life, equality in recognition of national sacrifice to the Pension Act standards.

We spoke to the necessity of standing for One Veteran, One Standard fairness, harmonization of reformative programs to ensure full inclusion, not like the current
New Veterans Charter-Pension Act obstructions designed to exclude and or
deny Canada’s most disabled veterans.

Which are for example, why are SISIP veterans, who are by definition Canada’s most seriously disabled veterans, (as acknowledged by Manulife’s stringent Totally Permanently Impaired status), excluded from the 90% income loss replacement promises

Consequential to consultation, Dalton requested a review of the OVO mandate. Ideally, investigative authority reforms and the provision of reporting to parliament will be embraced to eradicate the levels of distrust, which is generated every time the OVO submits a report to the minister. Other than dispensing vague platitudes and lip service, these reports do nothing to resolve the issues.

Authority restrictions? Please note OVO’s inability to comprehensively investigate Veterans Affairs’ 160 million dollars “accounting” error which deprived 270,000 Pension Act veterans for several years? How many of the WWII and Korean War Pension Act veterans died before justice was served? Were their dependents FULLY compensated? Was anybody at VAC held to account for grotesque negligence of duty? 

Dalton is eager to restore the broken trust. He understands where the breaches in trust exist; he is willing to change the dynamics to restore the balance. 

We can assist, we can do our part to help him seize the objective. Dalton requested that we refer veterans’ seeking redress through the CVA in respect to VAC’s systematic problems/failures or on a personal level to contact his office directly. 

Here is the number: 1-877-330-4343.

We Must Do Better

By Michael Nickerson

Congratulations Canada! You’ve got yourself a brand-spanking new minority government. Yeehaw! Of course we’re not talking about any minority government. No sir, we’re talking about a government that is not just politically fragmented, but geographically and culturally fragmented as well. No small feat when you start with a loaded deck of a majority. It takes work. It takes dedication. But most of all, it takes a real knack for aiming high and hoping no one notices you’ve misfired. Way to go Team Justin™!

Now after such political bloodshed, one must take stock; learn, grow, dare I say, mature. And what were the messages and lessons we learned during this most interesting election? Well, we learned that concern over political meddling in judicial affairs and big business is fleeting at best. We learned pragmatism won’t win you votes, but moral conviction won’t either. To be sure, slapping shoe polish across your face at parties won’t cost you an election, but being less than forthcoming about your work history and state of citizenship won’t earn you one. Winning the popular vote won’t do much for you either, come to think of it.

But we can take some other lessons from this election as well. I dare say that chief among them is that the ultimate outcome was not decided on any substantive debate or policy proposals, but on who pissed who off less, be it leader, candidate or party. Tribal affiliations over substantive social good as it were; us versus them; id over ego; rocks over the disarming Neolithic grunt of our more considered ancestors.

I can hear some of you who have logged serious proverbial flight hours in life saying that it has always been thus. Having clocked five decades on this planet myself I tend to agree, though being a student of history far preceding my birth I find this lazy acceptance not just disturbing but ultimately dangerous and an existential threat. Yes kids, it’s time to get serious.

Consider if you will a recent event that transpired in northern Syria during our great Canadian exercise in democracy. You might have heard of it: a little game called “Screw the Kurds,” a game Canada played only two years ago.

During this latest round Donald J. Trump agreed over a Sunday afternoon phone call to give the president of Turkey free rein to wipe out any Kurds beyond his southern border in Syria. Much mayhem has ensued, thousands of lives lost, tens of thousands displaced, all involving two NATO allies with nary a peep of response from Canadians. After all, Justin likes shoe polish and Andrew lies on his resume, the west wants a pipeline and the east doesn’t care…pox on both your houses.

Call me crazy, but I’m thinking some issues matter more than a battle of personalities and tribes. What is happening in the world beyond our borders, to say nothing of the vitriol and hate that is happening within, should concern every Canadian citizen. We all like to talk about the next generation in terms of climate change, social equality, and the challenges that will be faced. 

However, as an example, we have ignored the world around us for decades, be it with cutbacks in foreign engagement, diplomacy, aid or any preparation militarily for conflict. And while we have become complacent, the world has become angrier, more insular, ignorant, and generally emboldened to embrace the worst instincts of human nature. Canada has stood by for some time now watching it unfold, with only token responses to placate a domestic audience.

Tribalism and hate do not become us at home; one look at the most recent electoral map will make it clear that’s where we stand. But what’s more, it keeps us from thinking beyond ourselves. If this election has demonstrated anything, it’s that we must do better. We must engage and invest outside our borders; pay attention to the world and not our navels. If we can’t be better I assure you our higher aspirations will all be for naught.

Tanks, Tanks, Tanks

By Vincent J. Curtis

The Normandy campaign concluded at the end of August, 1944, after the Germans were almost entirely cleared from France and the 1st Canadian Army was advancing into Belgium. Many “lessons learned” have been written about the campaign, but what can be said about it from the perspective of 75 years on?

In a “what-if” scenarios, let’s ask, “what if the Canadian Army had been equipped with the Mk I Centurion tank?” This thought experiment isn’t all that far-fetched, as the Centurion was fielded in May, 1945. It was on the design boards in early 1943. What would have happened if the Canadian Army had been equipped with Centurions and its 20 pdr gun, in Normandy?

It is likely that the 2nd Canadian Corps would have torn through the German army like a chainsaw through softwood. One of the main reasons the Germans were able to hold their own for so long in Normandy was their superiority in tanks, in particular the Panther and the Tiger. These tanks could, and usually did, defeat large numbers of Shermans from long range. The 75 mm gun on the Sherman couldn’t penetrate the frontal armour of a Tiger even from point-blank range, while the long-barreled German 75 mm and 88 mm guns could brew up a Sherman from over a mile away.

Canadian armour was getting beaten in detail by these superior German weapons – in those little battles that occur within the larger one. The Canadians did not have quickly to hand the means of defeating Panthers and Tigers. What was in their hands was the British 17 pdr gun, which could defeat Panthers and Tigers from long range. The 6 pdr anti-tank gun with which infantry battalions were equipped was useless except for close range side-shots. The PIAT anti-tank projector had an effective warhead – if you could crawl within a hundred yards of the target and hit the thing.

The only tank that could tackle a Tiger or a Panther was a Sherman Firefly, a Sherman which mounted that 17 pdr gun.

Tac Air, in the shape of formations of Typhoons, were effective against Tigers and Panthers, but the ground troops were not equipped with ground to air radio sets, making close cooperation impossible.

The Canadians in Normandy were losing four and five Shermans for every Panther and Triger killed. If that ratio were dead even, or two to one in our favor, the Germans could not have held up the Canadian advance for nearly as long as they did.

What lesson can be drawn from this ‘what-if’ scenario? The immediate lesson is that Canadian combat troops have to have in their hands the best, most modern equipment to deal with the enemy. Not just the best that we can think of, but equal if not better than what the enemy has. Everybody knew about Tigers since March, 1943. So, why weren’t our generals and our engineers trying to figure out ways of dealing with these new battlefield tactical problems?

Was Clarence Decatur Howe working day and night? No. Did engineer MacNaughton look at the bazooka and see a 106 mm recoilless rifle? No. Was Crerar hounding Howe for a new weapon? No. Why weren’t Crerar and Simonds developing TTPs (tactics, techniques, procedures) for ground troops to defeat these menaces? Being generals, they ought to know something about ground combat. They ought to know before their battalion commanders the tactical problems their platoons are going to face.

As recently as 2006, it was seriously proposed by our generals that we didn’t need tanks anymore and that the new doctrine of ‘maneuver warfare’ would overcome any tactical problem. No replacement for the Leopard I’s were in prospect during the Chretien years, and rather than embarrass the government, our generals put out the superior doctrine story – even though Genforce employed tanks and maneuver warfare doctrine already!

The need to put into Canadian hands equipment that is not just the best, but better than what the enemy has is one lesson from the Normandy campaign. There are others like TTPs.

How To Prevent PTSD In War Zones, No Really

By Terry Nimchuk

I sit with Veterans everyday. They tell me their war stories and we work through their Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). From Improvised Explosive Devices to recon, to capture; everything possible on “regular” days in combat situations. Most of them don’t get to my office until many years after the events took place that landed them with me. The time in between is spent spiraling through emotions, thoughts and memories that are terrifying, disruptive and sometimes life ending. 

PTSD symptoms are what happens naturally to everyone who survives a traumatic experience. The disorder begins when the person gets stuck in that natural recovery process and some aspect of the event won’t let them move forward. That’s where I come in, sometimes years later, after they have been living in the torment for so long, and after the traumatic event has caused so much more collateral damage then could have ever been predicted.  

Its not just nightmares, and sleeplessness that goes on for years; its guilt and shame; and relentless flashes of memories; and having seemingly innocuous stimuli trigger your memory and send you right back in an instant, to the point where you fully believe you are back in that war zone fighting for your life. You are detached and unable to realize that you are home with your family, safe, thousands of miles away from the hell you went through years before. 

Truth is, I can’t start to treat PTSD right away. First, we need to deal with everything PTSD has caused to go awry in a Veteran’s life. Relationships suffer, spouses, children, parents, siblings, and friends, everyone in a Serviceman/woman’s life is affected by their PTSD. The fallout from relationships alone can sometimes take longer to address than the PTSD itself. One aspect makes the other worse; it becomes a tangled web of despair. 

Isn’t there a way to stop this before it starts? A physical injury gets tended in-theatre; why not a mental one?

Can we deploy a mental health personnel with every medic team? Would this impact the high occurence of PTSD cases seen at Veterans affairs? 

Without a doubt. 

If a Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) member could have immediate access to a mental health professional; trained in trauma and crisis debriefing, and get help for their mental wounds just as they would for any physical wounds, this would greatly decrease the occurrence of PTSD. 

The CAF takes amazing physical care of its members while they are in. There are numerous specialists and doctors to take care of the physical damage of war. Medics are everywhere, doctors, trauma surgeons, you name the physical injury and it is taken care of, to a level that we civilians could never appreciate.  

The mental health care is there too, however, it is widely viewed as a career ender. If you tell the base doctor that you are suffering from a mental condition such as depression, or PTSD, it is viewed very differently. Current serving members will hide a mental condition out of the fear of what it will do to their career, but what if it never got that far? Why do service personnel have to report to the doctor, but not to mental health personnel to get checked out after any incident? 

Right now, to my knowledge, the closest thing soldiers have in combat zones is a Padre, and even those can be few and far between. While many find comfort in a Padre’s services, they are not trained extensively in mental health. They can’t offer these men and women what they need to mitigate the potential onset of PTSD. I was told by a medic that service personnel would seek her out specifically, just because she is a woman and women are viewed to be more compassionate in these situations. Couldn’t we have a well-trained mental health professional there? 

I love my work, I honestly do, it is the most rewarding thing I have ever done in my life, and I am grateful everyday that these men and women trust me to help them through this immeasurably difficult time of their lives. My sincerest hope is that one day I, and those like me, will no longer be needed.

Veterans Affairs Canada: Streamlining or Bureaucratic Obstruction?

By Michael Blais

Back in 2011, Minister Steven Blaney would be the first to introduce me to the wondrous farce of streamlining services for veterans. Minister Julian Fantino subsequently took the concept to a new level, by parachuting in former CDS Walter Natynczyk as Deputy Minister to implement a conservative slash and burn agenda with military precision. Minister Erin O’Toole fully embraced the concept, and he supervised the dismantling of VAC through reduction of hundreds of front line employees and by closing district offices at the conclusion of the combat mission in Afghanistan when many veterans of the war were coming forward for assistance.  

Veterans were not amused.

Liberal ministers Kent Hehr, Seamus O’Regan, Judy Wilson Raybould and Lawrence MacAuley continued the “streamlining” charade albeit from a liberal perspective. When held to account or challenged on departmental  failures, DM Natynzcyk was  faithfully at hand, blunting warranted criticism, undertaking the “we must do better” pantomime with varying degrees of sincerity year after year despite his ‘Command’s’ pervasive failures to fulfill the promises which politicians offer to veterans seemingly every election in exchange for our votes.

Veterans were not impressed.

This election is no different. Both the NDP and Conservative party leaders have declared they will clear the backlog if elected. Neither say how or why their efforts would be any different than those which the current government has undertaken. Factually, the Liberals did re-open the district offices as promised. Factually, hundreds of vital staffing positions cruelly negated by the Conservatives have been fulfilled and in theory, as more are employed and trained, the backlog problems should dissipate. The Liberals promised the case managers:client ratio would be reduced from the Conservatives’ untenable 40-1 down to 25-1. Three years later, there has been some progress and VAC claims to have attained a 33-1 ratio.

This is indeed better, but it is far from perfect. Thousands of veterans continue to wait beyond Mr. Trudeau’s promised 16 week threshold. Delays in adjudication on all levels persist, ranging from acknowledgement of mental and physical trauma to the subsequent approval of treatment options for medications. Exclusion and denial.  

Q. Why is this?

A. Bureaucratic obstruction.

The National Post recently reported that VAC case managers spend 50% to 70% of their time processing paperwork. Case managers claim they are obstructed in providing expedient service due to “complicated or unnecessary business procedures” and layers of burdensome, unnecessary documentation. Veterans Affairs is not an insurance company. The obstructive, resource wasting, unnecessary documentation the DM and senior mandarins have implemented is adversely affecting the department’s ability to conform to the government’s promises. Let’s consider VAC employees to be the proverbial canary-in-the-coal-mine, as they sounded the alarm in respect to the catastrophic impact Conservative cuts would have on the veterans community. They are now once again sounding the alarm.

Q. Who suffers the consequences?

A.Veterans.

Who can blame veterans who become profoundly disappointed when seeking “promised” election entitlements, only to confront a system seemingly designed not to streamline, nor to accelerate due process in conformance of the Liberal mandate, but rather it is designed to complicate the process with layers of unnecessary documentation, multiple physicians reports and abysmal delays, far beyond the promised adjudication time frames.

Who is to blame?: Inept ministers or the adversities inherent within the cycle of ministerial replacement? The Liberals appointed four ministers during their last mandate none of whom proved capable of effecting the promised changes on backlogs, adjudication times or expedient service.

There has been one common and continuous leadership element at Veterans Affairs throughout these ministerial rotations:Deputy Minister Walter Natynczyk.  

I admire the general’s record of military service, but after years of performance-objective failures, I personally no longer feel he is capable of demonstrating the leadership required to bring the department up to the standards promised. Bureaucratic progress on key issues has been glacial, and often obstructed by mandarins dictating policies corrupted by the “insurance company” mentality approach, which includes forcing veterans to cope with stringent processing documentation requirements designed to frustrate, obstruct, delay and deny.

Consequently, it is no surprise the trust between veterans and VAC’s bureaucratic leadership has been broken.

Without significant changes at VAC’s leadership, the status quo will remain.

Q. Who suffers the consequences?

A. Tragically, the disabled veterans and their families.

Closing the Gap

By Vincent J. Curtis

Operation Tractable kinda-sorta ended on Aug 16th, 1944, with the capture of Falaise by 2nd Div. But the gap wasn’t closed.

On the 16th, the 4th Div and the 1st Polish Armoured Division were ordered to take Trun and link up with the American 3rd Army at Chambois. The 1st Polish outflanked the German defenses and, dividing itself into three battle groups, sent one to Chambois, one to Hill 262 (Mont Ormel), and another to the south of Trun, easing the its capture on the 18th by 4th Div.

The gap, about four miles wide and through which the German 7th Army had to pass, was spanned by the Dives River. The Dives formed an impassable barrier to vehicular traffic except at two points, Moissy and St. Lambert-sur-Dives. The hamlet of Moissy had a ford, led to by a single lane dirt track; next to it was a narrow foot bridge.

St. Lambert, a village of 150 souls, had a two-lane bridge that was strong enough to support a Panther tank. The gap area was flat, wide-open, and easily observed from the heights around Trun, ideal killing ground for artillery and Typhoons.

Capturing Trun, the 4th Div was nearly spent, but did send a battle group forward to seize St. Lambert. The battle group comprised B and C Coys of the Argyll & Sutherland Highlanders, about fifty men each, and C Squadron of the South Alberta Regiment, the armoured recce unit of 4th Div. In overall command was Major David Currie of the SAR. The task of Currie Force was to stop the passage of 100,000 Germans.

Backstopping the Dives position, three miles to the east were two Polish battlegroups on Hill 262. They had with them Capt Pierre Sevigny an artillery FOO for the 58th Bty, 4th Medium Regiment.
After crossing the Dives, escaping Germans had to pass around Hill 262, and the Poles scourged them with tank and small arms fire as well as Sevigny’s artillery fire. Over the 36 hours from the 20th to 21st August, Capt Sevigny was to win Poland’s highest military decoration, the Virtuti Militari. His work inflicted thousands of casualties on the Germans and enabled the Poles to hold out against German attacks trying to re-open the gap. Four depleted SS Panzer divisions east of the Dives repeatedly attacked the Poles, who fought them until they ran out of ammunition – and then fought them hand-to-hand. 

Currie Force approached St. Lambert at dusk on the 19th - and was repulsed with the loss of two of its fifteen Shermans. Pulling back 1,000 yards, Currie used the night to personally recce the defenses. Attacking again at dawn, Currie Force gained half the village by noon, forming another gauntlet escaping Germans had to pass. Currie Force repulsed repeated counterattacks, and near dusk surged ahead to capture the rest of the village.

As the battle progressed, columns of death began to sprout from the choke points. The corpses of men, horses (Wehrmacht transport was still largely horse-drawn) wrecked vehicles, artillery pieces, trucks and tanks were piling up along the roads, choking passage even more.

Discipline in the Wehrmacht began to crack. Prisoners were being taken first by the dozen, then fifty and then a hundred at a time. Pte E.H. McAllister of the Argylls was credited with capturing 160 men. The famous picture of David Currie winning his VC shows a German officer surrendering to Argyll George Mitchell, CSM of C Coy, with Pte John Evans off to the right. (A moment after the picture was taken, Mitchell buttstroked the Officer for looking arrogant.)

Before noon on the 21st, 4th Div pushed ahead from Trun, with the Canadian Grenadier Guards relieving the Poles. Over 50,000 were trapped, and the German 7th Army surrendered, Paris was liberated three days later.

For several feats of personal military prowess, his skillful and determined attacks and defense, and for demonstrating an epic coolness under fire for 36 hours, Major David Vivian Currie was awarded the Victoria Cross.

Spoil That Ballot!

By Michael Nickerson

Elections are tiresome things, aren’t they? Weeks of promises, platitudes and no end of photo ops, lovingly reported by the media coast to coast. It’s a sad state of affairs that much of the country has become jaded to our electoral process, holding their noses and casting a ballot, hoping the new pig at the helm will smell a bit better than the last. Out with the old leader, in with the new, and let the whole depressing process go round again. 

A rather dismal take on things don’t cha think? Yet I’m willing to bet if you’re either a veteran or active service member then that gets pretty close to the mark, for very good reasons. Time and again Canada’s military and its veterans have been used by every major party like a piece of arm candy to garner votes and praise, always to be left in the gutter once the cameras stop clicking.  

So what to do? Well to paraphrase a quote famously attributed to Albert Einstein, it’s insane to keep doing the same thing over and over again and expect a different result. So if you’re thinking of voting for any of the five major federal parties (and no, Maxime Bernier, that doesn’t include yours) on the basis that they’re actually looking out for you, well stop that right now, because that’s just insane (see above).

Unfortunately the options get pretty slim after that. In theory one possibility for that vote of yours is the Veterans Coalition Party of Canada, which you’d think is perfect for anyone who has ever worn a uniform. And God love ‘em, their heart is in the right place. Problem is, it’s not just a one issue protest party whose vote tally would really send a message, but one that has developed a platform full of funding and policy contradictions far beyond its original purpose. Sadly a vote for the VCP is not so much one of protest, but stupidity.

As any voter will (or should) know (and new ones pay attention here), a federal election ballot does not provide a check box for “none of the above,” “you must be kidding,” “I’d rather choke on a hockey puck before voting for this lot” or similar such options. The only way to lodge a protest vote at all is to spoil it, via writing your name, checking all the boxes, or just leaving it blank. Such ballots are “rejected” and tallied, though no reason given as to why.

Thus spoiling a ballot is only slightly better than sitting at home and shooting your television on election night. Unless of course you let people know that you did it and why. Then we have a whole different ball game that would make Einstein proud!

Now before we start having fun, I should make it clear that it is illegal to take a picture of any ballot, spoiled or otherwise, and it’s also a definite legal no no to publish such a picture. So don’t do that (my lawyer has spoken).

It is not illegal however to announce to the world in any way, shape or form how you voted and why once you leave a polling station. You can say it on Facebook, Twitter, and all sorts of social media options I’m too old to even know about. And you can write letters to the editor of your local paper, even a national paper, and say why you’ve had enough of the status quo. Active service members under a do-not-talk-to-media dictum can write in as anonymous. The key is to finally give voice to that vote, and substance to the “rejected” tally. 

If newspapers, television outlets and social media get inundated with stories of protest votes, the concerns of military members and veterans alike might finally be noticed. Yet it’s going to take a real change in voting behaviour that I suspect does not come easily to those who work and have worked for that very freedom. But spoiling that ballot may be the only way to get some much deserved attention.

Veterans and Medical Cannabis

By Michael L Blais CD

President & Founder Canadian Veterans Advocacy

The issue of Medical Cannabis (MC) is ever evolving, or devolving as in the case of Veterans Affairs Canada under the Liberal government. 

Background: Consequential to an alarming Auditor General’s MC expenditure probe, the Liberals launched a three pronged review inclusive of providers, doctors and yes, veterans. Concerned about privacy breaches, the department requested the need for me to identify ten veterans prescribed MC who were willing to travel to Ottawa (at VAC’s expense) and meet Minister Kent Hehr to discuss the impact MC was having on their lives.

I endeavoured to ensure comprehensive participation; young, old, war veterans, UN peacekeepers, male, female, NCO, officer, representative of both mental and physical trauma. I hoped through inclusion we would collectively convince Minister Hehr of MC as an effective treatment option for harshly traumatized veterans and to assure him that the policy conforms to Veterans Affairs Canada’s mandate “to improve the quality of lives of our veterans.”

The discussions conducted at Center Block, Parliament Hill, were enlightening. Minister Hehr appeared engaged, compassionate and empathetic. However, the bureaucrats followed and it soon became clear they were more interested in mitigating MC expenditures, which were identified in the Auditor General report, and not alleviating the mental and/or physical trauma of veterans.

The new policies to follow were oblivious to our discussions, bereft of compassion or empathy, and mainly designed to curtail costs. The General Practitioner’s prescription, if over the three grams of dried cannabis flower (per day) limit, would not be fully honoured. 

Opiates? No problem, but for additional cannabis referrals, and for those sustaining mental and physical trauma, referrals in both fields would be required. The time consuming, stress/pain-inducing cycle would repeat every two years. Oft times, extensive travel would be required. 

Despite forcing a disabled veteran through a series of unnecessary, resource wasting “hoops”, VAC retains the right to deny/restrict, systematic exclusion without representation, contrary to the Veterans Bill of Rights which supposedly ensures he/she and third-party doctors are involved in any decisions.

Veterans seeking MC are often deemed the “Forlorn Hopes”. There are no alternatives; the best “hope” scenario is a miracle. In the interim, quality of life is dictated by mitigating pain, preferably without those addictive, soul-destroying pharmaceuticals. For many, before the availability of MC, the daily regimen included maximum doses of powerful, mind distorting opiates and/or antipsychotic medication, Codeine, Percocet, Oxycontin, Morphine, nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (which can induce gastrointestinal bleeding), Lyrica for neuropathic pain, sleeping pills, and other drugs that may negate pain but often destroy the self and the family unit in the process.

Some 10,000 veterans are being prescribed medical cannabis. Around 1,700 have been granted an exemption over the three-gram per day limit. One can only wonder of the 10,000 people, how many were prescribed over the three grams per day, have been arbitrarily denied and consequentially, provided opiates or persona distorting “mind” drugs to mitigate pain. 

I have been pain/mobility disabled for almost three decades. While never abused, opiates rendered me emotionless, depressed, obese, incapable of feeling true empathy or love and free falling through the cycle of despair. Medical cannabis helped me reduce the daily regimen of maximum doses of opiates, disrupted the addiction cycle, afforded reintegration without being perpetually narco-distorted, to embrace a life now cherished. This generation, bloodied of mind and body by war in Afghanistan, is professing relief not through pharmaceuticals, but medical cannabis.

Veterans can provide the scientific proof we need to curb the problem of over-prescribing pharmaceuticals. Where else in Canada is there a cadre with such a wide spectrum of the vicious mental and physical trauma inherent with war? Where else is there a controlled study group provided addictive pharmaceuticals first, then, horrified by the side effects, are now experiencing definitive, real time relief from MC?

Should we not be learning why cannabis is alleviating war induced mental and physical trauma instead of enabling the opiate crisis? 

Why are we marginalizing or ignoring the very specialists VAC dictated, those physicians who, unlike VAC, have personally interviewed/examined the veteran before rendering judgment?

VAC’s current MC policy is corrupt on multiple levels, focused on cutting expenses, not providing care to veterans with the level of compassion required.

Finally Feeling the Heat

By Michael Nickerson

Have you heard the one about the frog in hot water? Throw the poor creature into a pot of boiling water and it leaps out, but put it in a cool pot and gradually warm up the water et voilà! Boiled frog! One has to wonder just who the sadist was that came up with this disturbing little factoid, but it’s a story often repeated when it comes to global warming and climate change. In short we’re a bunch of amphibians blissfully boiling ourselves to death, oblivious to the problem around us. 

Not having tried this experiment myself for fear of being evil I can’t speak to its veracity, but there are signs that the good species Homo Sapiens is clueing in that things are getting downright toasty. Not because of any statistical information or scientific reporting. Such talk has generally been met with either indifference or conspiracy theories to the effect that leftist eggheads are out for our Hummers. No, having to flee a forest fire or swim out of your flooded living room on an annual basis seems to be getting people’s attention. Washed out crops, severe drought, rising tides, and blistering summers seem to have people thinking this isn’t all down to a short-term bout of energetic solar flares or the Chinese government. 

But don’t look so glum. This is great news! Well not if you’re a polar bear or snowmobile manufacturer granted, but definitely if you’re a member of the military looking for proper-sized budgets and respect. See the problem has always been that the threat has never been in our own backyard. Starving Africans, warring Arabs, belligerent Russians, tsunamis, earthquakes? Not in our backyard. But gosh darn there’s some stuff going on in our backyards now; very wet stuff, soggy stuff, or crackling hot stuff, depending on the region.

As CDS Jonathan Vance recently pointed out in a CBC interview, the forces are stretched beyond thin rescuing, sandbagging, and generally supporting towns and provinces with one climate disaster after another. And this will only get worse in the coming years. Heck, it’ll get worse by the end of this summer if trends continue. And the forces are tapped.

Of course this is not a new state of affairs. Our forces have been tapped out one way or another for decades, with each election cycle bringing new promises of funding, support, and commitment to the troops that Canadians generally take for granted. Our soldiers are more symbols than people: peacekeepers wearing blue berets, war heroes fighting for justice in oppressed lands. In essence people doing things Canadians know not what, helping people they’ll never meet somewhere else for reasons more academic than visceral.

Is it any wonder that there was no serious outcry over one report after another of underfunding, lack of equipment and personnel, or of soldiers and veterans falling through the cracks? Didn’t really affect us, now did it?

Well, by God, it does now! It’s one thing to lament the state of our military and its members when it doesn’t really impact you, and quite another when those members are saving your hide, your family and friends, your property, and your means of putting food on the table. That’s when you feel some obligation to keep those people happy. Tipping the minimum just won’t cut it when you’re drowning.

Now you might find it perplexing that with the issue of climate change being so de rigour in the run up to this fall’s election, there hasn’t been some serious talk and financial commitments towards those dealing with the real, immediate fallout of the problem. But not to worry, because it’s going to be a long hot summer and another soggy spring is not far away. Canadians are finally feeling the heat. And they’re most certainly feeling it in their personal lives. I’m betting the frog finally jumps and people start showing some real gratitude to the forces protecting them as well. Shame it took the earth burning up to finally achieve it.

Totalized

By Vincent J Curtis

Operation Windsor saw the capture of Carpiquet village. Next came Operation Charnwood (8-9 July 1944) which saw the capture of Carpiquet airfield and the town of Caen north of the Orne.  Then followed Operation Atlantic, which was run in conjunction with the notorious Operation Goodwood (18-19 July, 1944).  Atlantic saw the Canadians capture Caen south of the Orne and create the bridgehead necessary for an assault on the Verrières Ridge.

The battle for Verrières Ridge was a bloody nightmare for the Canadians, with a lack of coordination and a repetition of bad methods leading to over 2,500 casualties. Operation Spring (25-27 July, 1944), which gained a toe-hold on a part of the ridge, was an especially notorious fiasco.

The American breakout in Operation Cobra suddenly made it possible to entrap the entire German army in France in a pocket southwest of Falaise, with the Canadians forming a pincer from the north.  Operation Totalize (7-11 August 1944) was Canadian II Corps commander Lieutenant General Guy Simonds’ plan to advance from Verrières Ridge to Falaise.

Montgomery considered Guy Simonds to be highly capable, and perhaps Canada’s best general. That opinion saved Simonds’ career and Simonds returned the admiration by making himself physically resemble Monty. Among his other failings, Simonds was a martinet who despised most of his subordinates, and not a few of his superiors, as barely competent.  

This attitude impaired his effectiveness as a general. His leadership style stifled innovation and initiative other than his own. For all his self-regard, Simonds still needed the enterprise of subordinates to exploit
the opportunities his operations created.

The Germans developed blitzkrieg following their experience facing the Canadian Corps after Amiens. The Canadians had dominated No Man’s Land with patrolling and trench raids, and German infiltration (Hutier) tactics are no different in fieldcraft from reconnaissance patrolling. But the Canadians, interwar, never experimented with infiltration tactics, or trained as battlegroups. By early August, 1944, it was obvious that Sherman tanks needed infantry help dealing with German anti-tank nests.

For Totalize, Simonds invented the Kangaroo armoured personnel carrier, which was made by “defrocking” a Priest self-propelled gun of its weapon, leaving room in the Sherman chassis for a section of men. There was the help.

Totalize was a familiar set-piece battle but using bigger hammers, closer timing between blows, and other techniques of ancient renown. Tactically, Totalize was a case of hi-diddle-diddle- straight up the middle, the middle being the Caen-Falaise road. Heavy strategic bombers would carpet bomb both sides of the highway south of the start-line. Upon completion of the air mission, artillery would open up and the first wave of tanks and APCs would drive south in a night attack, bypassing pockets of resistance along the way. Tracers from Bofors 40 mm guns and target marking artillery shells were guides to direction.

Great innovations from Simonds, but then gremlins crept in to undermine the plan. There was no radio comms with air. Some bombs dropped on 3rd Canadian Division HQ and wounded Major General Rod Keller. Bombing the route of advance created a tank obstacle course which was run en mass at night by inexperienced APC drivers. Simonds ordered a halt at noon on the 8th to bring up the artillery after the first objectives were taken.  The Germans regrouped and a second dose of heavy bombing failed to destroy counterattacking panzer groups. Totalize stalled.

Trying to restore momentum, Simonds ordered Worthington Force to capture Hill 195. The result was the most infamous event of Totalize.  An inexcusable navigation error had Worthington Force, a battlegroup of the British Columbia Regiment and the Algonquins, seize Hill 140, seven kilometers from the assigned objective. Unsupported by Canadian artillery or Typhoons, it was annihilated by a counterattack of German Panther tanks.

Totalize culminated with the capture of Hill 195 on the 11th by a lone infantry regiment that infiltrated at night into the position.

Equality in Recognition of National Sacrifice

Volume 26 Issue 8

By Michael Blais

The Federal election is looming and once again veterans will consider voting for the party that best serves their needs. The past four years have been bittersweet and while there have been significant improvements on many files of contention, the proverbial elephant in the room, the Pension for Life, remains a major point of controversy.

Many NVC veterans continue to feel disenfranchised, betrayed, perhaps victims of a grotesque bait and switch game Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and the Liberal Party were waging during the past election in exchange for our votes.

I can recall travelling to Belleville, ON, to witness Trudeau’s presentation of the Liberal Party veterans’ platform. Objectively, I was pleased. The Canadian Veterans Advocacy was primarily founded on the principle of restoring Canada’s sacred obligation to acknowledge and respect national sacrifice equally, without discrimination or reservation to the Pension Act Standards that I,
and a majority of VACs clients receive.

Never Pass a Fault, eh?

There must be equality in recognition of national sacrifice.

It was to these standards alone which we spoke to our current Prime Minister. Our first encounter was rather tense, to the point where the Liberal Veterans Affairs critic at the time felt compelled to leap to his feet and inform me that I could not speak to the “leader” in such a manner. Do tell! Prime Minister Trudeau, to his credit, never broke eye contact, raised his hand, tersely told Jim Karygiannis to sit down, and then asked me to continue. 

To summarize, Mr. Trudeau, if want to be the Prime Minister of Canada, you damn well better know what national sacrifice is, and your role as a the guardian of the torch, to restore the sacred obligation before you are called to send Canada’s sons and daughters into harm’s way. The message appeared to resonate and after years of confronting Conservative and NDP resistance, there was progress toward advancing the equality cause. 

Subsequently, Mr. Trudeau extended an invitation to meet on Parliament Hill after the Remembrance Day national ceremony to discuss the Pension for Life. It was a very special day, with an infinitely more amicable meeting, wherein the NVC LSA vs. Pension Act “faults” were clearly defined, and a singular resolution was championed: to “re-establish” equality
to the Pension Act standards!

Accordingly, when Mr. Trudeau declared the Liberal Party would “re-establish” the Pension for Life, I was in fact pleased. There was but only one lifetime pension to “re-establish” and I can assure CVA supporters, this was the only solution we spoke of. The choice in wording was not random, the promise was definitive and at the time it appeared sincere enough to convince many veterans, including myself, to cast votes for the Liberal Party in the 2015 Canadian federal election.

Was it a grotesque deception?

Today, or in the very near future, as the “Pension for Life” notification letters arrive, veterans will be profoundly disappointed, just as I am.

What the Liberal Party has provided is certainly not what Trudeau promised to veterans in exchange for their votes - is it? Thirty-cents on the dollar when compared to Pension Act provisions?

Is it better than nothing? Is it enough to retain veterans’ votes? Certainly the Liberal’s Pension for Life is an improvement over any Conservative or NDP initiative in the past. Which begs the question: what is Andrew Scheer or Jagmeet Singh’s position on the Pension for Life? Will they seize the opportunity Trudeau has presented? Will the Conservative Party or the NDP step up and pledge to restore the sacred obligation equally, and without reservation? In doing so, will they recoup veterans’ votes lost during the Harper or Mulcair era?

Or will veterans be dismissed as irrelevant, subject to the same litany of lip service every Remembrance Day or battlefield commemoration and promptly be forgotten the next morning?