Military Relief
Elissa Golberg and Rahul Singh discuss in the shift in the military away from combat towards disaster relief with Philippe Lagassé.
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Hi everyone, and welcome to the CIC and CDFAI's Future of Fighting discussion, "Defending Abroad," with Elissa Golberg, Canada’s permanent representative at the UN and Rahul Singh, the founder of GlobalMedic. I am a professor of public and international affairs at the University of Ottawa and the moderator of the Future of Fighting Series. I will be moderating this discussion - and the five that follow. We’re looking forward to bringing in questions from the online public, so please add them to the live-chat or, for those on Twitter, use #CICLive. -
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Rahul, you've asked up to rethink the role of the Canadian military in the world, with an aim toward encouraging a focus on humanitarian interventions. Could you tell us what steps you think we need to take in order to arrive at this different view of our military and what it can contribute to global affairs?
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I read Elissa's piece about the whole of government approach and agree that we need comprehensive responses. the main issue or shortfall that I would like us all to overcome is the lack of speed, agility and quickness of our response. I think these changes could have a positive impact
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Good afternoon Philippe and Rahul. I believe that the Canadian government has greatly enhanced its timelines and agility - through the use of both civilian and military assets. Look at Haiti, where an initial assessment team was on the ground in 18 hours, and the embassy had already begun to respond.
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We need to continue to train together, to enhance our common assessments, policies and processes in order to act comprehensively, we need to remain flexible, and build on lessons from our recent experiences (recognizing that each engagement requires an engagement requires an approached tailored to the specific regional context). We have done this well in Haiti and Libya building on our experiences from Afghanistan. We also need to enhance the early, substantive and sustained engagement of civilian experts.
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I would be more cautious here - it very much depends on whether the NGOs wish to be affiliated with the military. The are many organizations that would not wish the military to provide support, such as escorts, as they fear it may inhibit their ability to operate due to local perceptions.
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There isa big difference between attaching military units to NGOs and stabilizing a nation. The US marines were assigned to foot patrols to provide general security. That general security in Haiti made it easier to deliver aid. I agree that military escorts is not always appropriate for NGOs but that general security is a need
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Other key lessons from Afghanistan included the importance of having clear metrics, priorities and sober assessments of progress; having flexible machinery across departments; and the need to have access to the right people with the right skills ready to deploy.
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I think a solution that would help the whole of government approach is deploying a small package of aid with the initial teams. The assessment teams should be expanded to include some basic intervention teams that could be up and running so initial aid is delivered while the assessment teams look around to see what else is needed
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Canada is already extremely effective in responding in a whole of government manner to complex crises, and we have built on our experience since the Balkans to use a range of tools from the whole of government kit to aid us. I actually don't like to use 3D, because there are so many more departments and agencies that can play an essential role - such as the RCMP and Corrections Canada.
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In 2005, the government created START, which provides a focal point in Government for enhancing our ability to analyze, react and deploy to complex crisis drawing on the whole of government team, as well as linking in with international organizations and NGOS. This approach remains a work in progress, but has positioned Canada well with respect to our international partners.
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There are different models that will be required depending on the nature of the crisis at hand. The Government has established different Standard Operating Procedures and capacities which it can turn to depending on the scenario. A stand alone Afghanistan Task Force may be appropriate in some circumstances, but not all. They key is to ensure that there is a nucleus of whole-of-government people and capabilities that are pre-trained and able to respond effectively when crises strike.
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There is tremendous capacity within the NGO community. There is the work that Rahul's team does; there is also MSF and national Red Cross Societies. CIDA funds the Canadian Red Cross hospital. The Canadian Forces medical staff are tremendous, but are drawn on really for those catastrophic circumstances where civilian capacities are overwhelemed.
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In terms of government of Canada civilian expertise, let's not forget that we already have people around the world, operating in very challenging environments at our embassies, or through international organizations such as NATO or the UN. In instances where there is a catastrophic event or a conflict, we can supplement those personnel.
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Beyond that, the government has been working on developing a wider roster of civilian expertise, and enhancing the pre-deployment and in-country support that we provide. We learned a great deal here from our experiences in Afghanistan, Sudan, Haiti and Pakistan. In addition, we have been working on increasing the global capacity to rapidly identify and deploy civilians.
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Elissa, is whole of government enough or should we be thinking more seriously about whole of governments, namely integrating departments, agencies, and militaries in a multinational fashion to further strengthen the international community's ability to act and to make the best use of the resources that are available in the current economic climate?
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We do indeed think about whole-of-system responses, and the importance of plugging in Canada's whole-of-government capabilities (and frankly whole-of-Canada capabilities, as we shouldn't provinces and territories or Canadian civil society) into larger international efforts. We do that through the UN, through NATO and through multinational efforts.
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The NGO community needs to work together more. Different agencies with different skills sets need to work together to deliver aid more effectively. This is hard. It is a territorial realm, people want to defend their funding sources. But it is getting better and more agencies are collaborating
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My last words. We as a global community need to be better at responding more quickly. At GlobalMedic, we try to do our part and make our teams better and more responsive. I feel that the Canadian government needs to improve this area and put more focus on how we can help those in need right away, immediately in the hours and days following the disaster.
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The reality is it is both. On the one hand there is a great deal of longer term policy work that we are doing internationally to reduce the ad hoc nature of our collective responses. But in parallel, we do still have to respond to situations as they occur. In such circumstances we must determine who has the most appropriate knowledge of the country in question and the expertise - whether military, civilian or police - to bring to bear.
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