WhamBam

No offence meant and I simply love Canada but can Canada undertake any military operation of even a small size independent of the USA.

I think many people see Canadian military power as an extesion of USA and can't see them taking an independent action at least in the foreseeable future.

Officer of Engineers

Been doing it for 40 years. We did UNPROFOR without American involvement.

The current operation in Afghanistan is an independent operation.

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Chimo

WhamBam

Sir these are UN peacekeeping and NATO operations. The second one is definitely under US leadership.

Officer of Engineers

Not sure what you're getting at. These were complete and wholely independent battle groups who operated without support from other contingents.

If you mean this is a coalition deployment, it is but the Canadians (and British and Dutch for that matter) are completely responsible for their AO.

I think we better define what is an independent operation. D-Day while an allied operation was actually 5 independent operations (5 beaches). The Canadians were responsible for Juno Beach and thus, that was an independent Canadian operation even though it supported an overall scheme.

WhamBam

I am no military expert like you so I may be totally wrong here. I only said that though Canada may be a military power certainly capable of independently handling AOs and independent operations within an overall scheme, I have never seen it being counted in the league of superpowers at least in military terms. It has always played an important part in fights started by others and it has played a supporting role although admirably.

I can understand that being partners in the WOT and helping out in Afghanistan, other UN operations is definitely valuable. But it is difficult to see Canada getting involved in something which is not led by the USA or UN.

Officer of Engineers

If you're asking can Canada win wars alone, no we cannot. We cannot even start wars on our own. A single brigade group is not enough to win a war. However, a single brigade group can win battles and often enough will dominate the battle. If it's the right battle, then it can even decide more.

gunnut

Canada is not a super power, but definitely a regional power that can project force onto another continent.

You don't hear much about it because most people look at military power in terms of how many men in uniform, how many fighters, how many tanks, got any nukes? how many destroyers, how many missles.

It doesn't help if your tank army can't reach me to do any damage to me. Meanwhile my single brigade can really hurt your overseas interest at a place you just can't reach.

Pakistan has a huge army. That army probably will not hit Canada any time soon. But Canada has a brigade in what was formerly a Pakistan's sphere of influence, removing that influence bit by bit. It's not an all out war, but it hurts Pakistan's interest.

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"Only Nixon can go to China." -- Old Vulcan proverb.

WhamBam

Point taken .

gamercube

And it is also true that without the rest of the coalition forces to back them up, any Canadian force would not survive a week in Afghanistan if they were attacked by Pakistani forces. It is irrelevant whether Pakistan can project force onto Canadian territory. Military power, at least as I see it, would define a country's ability to defend itself, rather than attack other countries (project force), as you seem to think. I'm not even sure if Canada has the ability to project a sizeable force on its own without allied help.

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Hasta la Victoria siempre!

Feanor

What region would that be? Eskimo sub-arctic? I always thought regional power meant at least local dominance in some region or other. For example Ukraine would be a regional power, if it was in Africa. In Eastern Europe it's a small political pawn.

Officer of Engineers

Of course we can, it would take a Pak corps to take on a Canadian Mechanized Brigade Group and that would take more than a week to mobilize.

So you want to wreck your own home beating the bad guy instead of wrecking his home while beating him.

We've been doing it for 40 years. Land Force of the Canadian Forces is the 2nd most deployed army in NATO right behind the Brits.

North Atlantic count? Maritime Command is responsible for the ASW duties between North America and Europe. Even the US counts on Canadian protection in the transit.

Feanor

Are we talking Greenland-Iceland here? Or are we talking Britain-Newfoundland, line?

Officer of Engineers

Try New York - Normandy

gunnut

That's what seperates a local power with a regional/superpower. You want to meddle in other's affairs before they can meddle in yours. You want to reach out and touch someone before someone touches you. The ability to affect events half a world away is very important.

Of course Canada and US are in an extremely advantageous positon to have each other so closely related and the 2 oceans to protect the borders. That really frees up a lot of resources to develop other abilities rather than concentrate on defense against neighbors.

Then again, Mexico has almost the same geographical advantage as the US and Canada, but never developed into a force projection power.

gamercube

Not if their airforce gets there first and bombs the hell out of the mechanized brigade.

But how do you define a "bad guy?" To me, a bad guy would only be the one that attacks you first. And in today's age, no country that had nukes and ICBMs can be a possible target for attack (unless it's by terrorists, which are a whole different case altogether).