Saving Money in the PRes (From: The Defence Budget)

[ArmyRick]

I would like to see attrition be one way...but it seems like both reg and res force have alot and I mean, alot of "hang ons". People who are long past their best expiry date and never seem to leave until they are CRA. I am not talking RSM, CO, Div Comd and CWO, etc. Those key positions are managed by "well aged" soldiers.

I am referring to 30 year service combat arms corporals or 35 years service captains type situations (not just those two ranks either, irrelevant is dead weight). Either your advancing and part of succession plan or 20 is done, get out (or 25 for younger guys). Harsh but seriously, we can not molly coddle everybody.

I would also look at perm Class B positions OUTSIDE P RES units and get rid of them. When you start cutting troops, there is no way to justify these positions.

HQ from Brigade and up. Cut, cut, cut. Ya, like that will happen. Should but probably will not.

For the P RES support line serials get rid of a mandatory annual PWT shoot and go to a bi-annual PWT (like some other stuff on PWT). Trust me, you do not forget how to shoot overnight. Save ammo $$$. People in these positions get out there, wiggle through a PWT2, pass and do not touch a weapon until next year. They are shooting so we can put a check mark in the box. Stop it.

For P RES, slow down or reduce concentration exercises (Ya, that hits my regiment). Focus P RES for most of the time on individual-section-platoon skills (infantry example).

 

[Remius]

ArmyRick:  I agree with most of what you wrote.  Getting rid of hangers on.  I'd also drop the guys that get class Bs and disapear until they need something.  Captains sitting in made up jobs just to keep buddies on strength.  Or the warm weather warriors that don't come out when the weather sucks.

I disagree though with your ideas about PWT and area concentrations.  Shooting is vital.  While you won't necessarily forget how to shoot it is a perishable skill that we should maintain.  Concentrations are an excellent tool to validate IT and is sometimes the only chance to put all the pieces together short of deploying.  Cutting these leads to holes in operational capability.

 

[Kirkhill]

Like Crantor I agree with most of what you wrote Rick.  Again, like him I think that PWT is a core skill.

If it were my dollars to save I think I would be discarding any kind of group training in the Reserves and focus entirely on individual training.  Instead of using dollars to take a small body into the field for a tactical exercise of limited value spend it on ammunition for both personal weapons and the occasional crew served weapon.

Together with skills like  comms, navigation, cross country driving in available vehicles, first aid, a bit of explosives and pyro, you could make a very interesting syllabus for the occasional soldier, and leave a body of people with skills that could be integrated into a reg force organization as necessary.

Shooting government ammunition is very popular.

 

[OldSolduer]

Like Crantor I agree with most of what you wrote Rick.  Again, like him I think that PWT is a core skill.

If it were my dollars to save I think I would be discarding any kind of group training in the Reserves and focus entirely on individual training.  Instead of using dollars to take a small body into the field for a tactical exercise of limited value spend it on ammunition for both personal weapons and the occasional crew served weapon.

Together with skills like  comms, navigation, cross country driving in available vehicles, first aid, a bit of explosives and pyro, you could make a very interesting syllabus for the occasional soldier, and leave a body of people with skills that could be integrated into a reg force organization as necessary.

Shooting government ammunition is very popular.

What you have all said is good, and it is a debate the PRes has to have. We cannot be all things to all people. We need our role and we need to stick to it.

 

[Halifax Tar]

What you have all said is good, and it is a debate the PRes has to have. We cannot be all things to all people. We need our role and we need to stick to it.

I wonder if you think the ideas would work for the Naval and Air reserves.  Or are these three such different beasts that they would need three different approaches ?

 

[Remius]

To be honest i think the NAVres has it right.  I believe they don't exercise during the year but have training events on tuesdays and on weekends but they certainly aren't always on ships or doing true naval exercises during the year (coastal units not withstanding) but focus on sailor and soldier skills until tehy are deployed for summer taskings and class b on MCVDs.  I could be wrong though. 

This would be a good approach for the army reserves.  Focus on IT and section level (maybe platoon) drills and validate that during summer concentrations.  Most units can't exercise beyond the platoon level anyways and CSMs and Coy commanders would only truly benefit during the concentrations anyway.  They likely don't get much at the unit level beyond admin.  Some exceptions exist but are rare.

 

[a_majoor]

A bit conflicted on the CT portion.

On the one hand, CT allows you to validate the skills you have in a realistic manner and gives the trroops something to work towards. Without some sort of validation/reward training and many of the simulators become worthless as troops lose motivation.

OTOH many reserve exercises turn into a mad scramble to pack as much "training" into a 72 hr period as humanly possible. Things are rushed, done in a half assed manner or can't be pulled off because the forcasted numbers of people didn't get off the bus. Few proper AARs ever get done either. This leads to total cluster f***s like SG 13; where the troops attacking fixed enemy positions (in a quarry and in a MOUT site) took up to 70% casualties. They didn't train well enough to pull that off, so the huge collective training bill for a concentration had very little result (and how many lessons learned from that are going to be incorporated into SG 14 I wonder?).

So by all means do CT, but focus on one particular aspect per training event, and treat it like practicing a team sport: do the drills, have an AAR, reset and do it again. Rinse, repeat.

 

[ArmyRick]

To cover off what I am talking about reference PWTs.

For most infantry units, I would like to see the hustle to get EVERYBODY PWT shot every year dropped. Its a waste. Yes shooting is a core skill. Its very relevant for most soldiers. What I am against is having Joe Clerk and Bob Supply Tech in the Springfield Rifles, dragged out, shoot their token (thats how it is treated) PWT. They do it NOT for the aim of ensuring they maintain good soldier skills but for the aim of saying "Yay, we have 86% qualified PWT vice 82% in our unit".

So what is the alternative? How about returning to proper range weekends. Shoot, shoot, shoot, (practice) and then do your PWT. SHoot for the purpose of getting better or maintaining your skills. Look at what really happens. In both worlds.

Thucydides, you hit the nail on the head. If we are gonna do CT, lets do it right and make it worthwhile and steer clear of cluster f*cks

 

[ArmyRick]

Since money is disappearing lets have the non-pointy end troops shoot PWT every second year (save ammo $$$). Just one small idea. Read carefully what I wrote above and think. Something or many things have to go. Money is tight and getting tighter.

Or we could say lets do it all, give up none of our training while money disappears. Units like 2 RCR can have 250 all ranks and Algonquin regiment can have 35 all ranks on unit strength. Bad idea huh?

There has to be a MAIN EFFORT and that is where the training must be focused.

 

[Rifleman62]

ArmyRick:

Since money is disappearing lets have the non-pointy end troops shoot PWT every second year (save ammo $$$).

Every year I would ask Bde HQ for all natures of ammo unexpanded by all the units near the end of the fiscal year. Negotiate with Bde staff off and on as the FY end approached.

Our Annual Trg Plan always had range shoots for Sep, Apr (unexpanded ammo wkend) and Jun. Shilo Ranges were booked for a Apr wkend for all natures, as it was easier to turn off than to turn on at the last minute. Weather could/was a problem though.

All ranks in the unit at least did a familiarization shoot with the C6 and C9 MG's , grenade launchers, insert M-72, Carl G. Jun was a workup shoot, PWT,

{Shoot, shoot, shoot, (practice)

and Sep was the qualifying PWT .

Everyone qualified with the pistol every year as nobody used the 9MM ammo but us. We also fired the 9mm in the indoor ranges prior to the range shoots. Twice we had the RCMP (D Div was 2 blocks away) conduct tactical pistol trg. How many soldiers get to fire a pistol? We did at least twice a year, outdoor and once indoor.

The soldiers loved it. They had confidence in their ability, and skills as SOLDIERS. Cool factor in the JR also.

This was a PRes Svc Bn.

There is ALWAYS ammo turned in. Use it!

 

[ArmyRick]

Your completely missing the point. Completely. Go back, re-read. This is about finding SAVINGS in defence spending. I am not running a thread about IBTS.

What must be sacrificed? What must we give up? Dollars are going to get clawed back. Yes, there may be surplus ammo, can not always rely on it. Bonus if you can get it. You should know that. If hope is not a COA, then neither is begging, praying, dealing, etc, etc.

If you were a brigade commander for a P Res brigade and someone said you had to cut XX million dollars out of your budget, where do you think it should come out?

I will say this, we be prepared to find efficiencies somewhere in cost savings in the near future and propose them. Otherwise we get told something like "you can recruit five people this year" or "your unit gets 4 weekend exercises this training year". Following my drift?

 

[a_majoor]

Probably the biggest saving for the PRes is the same as where savings in the RegF shoud come from: the bloated overhead.

Realistically, few reserve "Battalions" or "Regiments" parade more than an actual Coy sized unit in any location, and many nights and weekends we see reinforced platoons/troops on the road, overseen by a LCol, RSM, a hocky sock of Majors, Captains, MWO's etc. Bde Headquarters are also great places to visit with a flamethrower, during my time at 31 CBGHQ we had a double handfull of ACOS positions manned by LCols who had finished their command tours (this on top of the "real" positions like BComd, COS and one specialist Col; the Bde Surgeon). Remember too this is on top of the 15 LCols and staffs for the 15 units.....

Most units could be comfortably run by a Major, and virtually all the ACOS positions were the sort being sniped upthread. If we really have a special project that needs that much horsepower, these LCols could be drawn from the Sup Reserve list, given a 30 day contract to get the job done and a thank you note at the end. As for the need for senior officers to run the various branches, my boss, the G6, was a Capt, and I worked as acting branch head at my rank when my boss was away for a tour.

 

[MilEME09]

Probably the biggest saving for the PRes is the same as where savings in the RegF shoud come from: the bloated overhead.

Realistically, few reserve "Battalions" or "Regiments" parade more than an actual Coy sized unit in any location

Just to clarify, most PRes "battalions" are only authorized to have the strength of a Coy caping out at around 120~ personal at max authorized strength. Now there are exceptions to this, but it just shows how top heavy the CF is, in my unit we have a LCol CO, Maj DCO, 2 Maj OC's, 2 Maj Coy 2 IC's, 8 Capt's filling various op's and training roles, 2 Lt's as platoon commanders, and finally 2 2Lt's as platoon 2IC's. If a unit only has one bloody platoon why the hell does it need a OC and a platoon commander? it can be merged into one position. Most of these officers I'd love to see knocked out because they don't know a thing about even running a proper range let alone command troops in the field. Not to mention most of them could declare their toes MIA....but that's a different story and issue

 

[chrisf]

So if we eliminate collective and concentration training, how do you folks propose to effectively train logistics and support elements?

I've spent far too much time suffering through leaders in the militia who have absolutely no grasp of anything beyond a 48 hours with a 20 man platoon... What the hell is a a resupply? We brought more than enough rations and water for the whole weekend and the truck has a full tank... What the hell are comms? We're close enough to shout at each other... You don't need a maintenance plan, we can just turn everything in on Sunday.

Obviously there's a finite pot of money, but completely eliminating everything except individual training??? Unless it's john Rambo going through that individual training, the results won't be pretty.

 

[ArmyRick]

A sig op,

Watch the attitude. I was reg force, I understand life on both sides of the fence. Militia? It's the primary reserve. Militia is a term long gone.

As far as collective training, we are very limited in what we can do on the weekend and at best we do one an ARCG week long ex in winter and usually a week long ex in the summer if budgets allow.

First off, for weekend exercises, I have seen attempts to pull brigade units together to loosely form a battle group size exercise (small BG). Often it turns into a giant shyte show. Usually very little training value for the troops and not much more for command staff.

Command ex such as JANUS I found to be good and budget worthy training tools, not to mention its a lot easier dealing on time and space when you do not have troops to deploy.

Focus on basic individual skills, move to section skills (or crew or gun det, you get the point). Then moving to platoon level training. It is useless to train collectively when the lower level training effect has not been achieved. Yes I get that logistics, combat support, etc has to be trained. Not at the expense of lower level trig.

 

[Halifax Tar]

So if we eliminate collective and concentration training, how do you folks propose to effectively train logistics and support elements?

Its funny you bring this up.  My working with the Army Reserve is little but we did take a number of army reserve sup techs with us on 1-10.  These troops were good soldiers with a solid foundation of soldiering skills.

Once it came time to drive a forklift, pack a pallet, pick stores or use the supply system they were very inexperienced to the point where they couldn't read a location system; and seemed put off by having to do supply work,  most thought they were some kind of infantry soldiers with a second job.

I have to wonder what is easier to teach, basic soldiering skills or competency in ones trade.  Perhaps when it comes to Army Reserve CSS folks we should be ensuring an understanding of their primary job and a competency in that field is established as the basic soldiering skills needed for a CSS troop can be brought up to speed with a few months pre-deployment training.

 

[Kirkhill]

... Yes I get that logistics, combat support, etc has to be trained. Not at the expense of lower level trig.

.... and Professionals study Logistics....

I am firmly of the opinion that whatever Reserve structure is adopted the biggest bill should be / must be the bill for a full time support staff to maintain the kit, plan the training and execute it. 

Reservists, generally, just don't have the time to learn the intricacies of running an organization much less actually do all the work to ensure all the moving parts keep working.

If there is to be a Reserve training system that is effective then it has to be staffed by Reg Force PYs.  And that includes Reg Force mechanics and techs - the very trades that appear to be in short supply.

I believe that the bill can be reduced by having the Reserve focus on individual skills and supply them with civilian model, two axle vehicles that anyone with a common driver's licence can drive and that can be supplied and maintained through local dealerships.

All collective training would be done under the auspices of and in conjunction with Reg Force training.

I think I am going to have to apply for a Danish passport (I must have some Viking blood in me somewhere).  I find myself constantly seeing common sense solutions there.

The Danes have Armed Forces that are made up of the all aspects of Danish society.  They still have the "trained but unwilling" conscripts although that portion of the force is decreasing annually.  They also have "Full time" soldiers that are both fully trained and fully willing but the contracts on which they are engaged are variable - everything from home service to Afghanistan.  Not everybody signs up on the same terms.  But all members of a unit seem to be engaged on a common contract. 

The Danish Reserves are time expired trained soldiers that can be called back to the colours - either for active service or for training as required.

The final element of the Danish system is the Homeguard.  This element is made up of local unpaid volunteers, with no military background, that are trained by a Regular Force element in individual/crew/section skills to supply point defence to the local community as well as disaster relief.

Danish Homeguard  Their terms of reference are broadly similar to those of our Canadian Rangers.

Danish Army Personnel - Case Study

 

[Edward Campbell]

.... and Professionals study Logistics....

I am firmly of the opinion that whatever Reserve structure is adopted the biggest bill should be / must be the bill for a full time support staff to maintain the kit, plan the training and execute it. 

Reservists, generally, just don't have the time to learn the intricacies of running an organization much less actually do all the work to ensure all the moving parts keep working.

If there is to be a Reserve training system that is effective then it has to be staffed by Reg Force PYs.  And that includes Reg Force mechanics and techs - the very trades that appear to be in short supply.

...

So you're saying, I guess, that the full time, professional, standing army should be weighted more towards combat support and combat service support specialists with greater, concomitant emphasis being given to reserves that can provide lots of adequately trained individual (and even a few small unit) augmentees to regular force combat arms units ... right?

 

[Fishbone Jones]

So you're saying, I guess, that the full time, professional, standing army should be weighted more towards combat support and combat service support specialists with greater, concomitant emphasis being given to reserves that can provide lots of adequately trained individual (and even a few small unit) augmentees to regular force combat arms units ... right?

Reg Force in the rear with the gear and the PRes as cannon fodder? :Tin-Foil-Hat: ;D

 

[MilEME09]

So you're saying, I guess, that the full time, professional, standing army should be weighted more towards combat support and combat service support specialists with greater, concomitant emphasis being given to reserves that can provide lots of adequately trained individual (and even a few small unit) augmentees to regular force combat arms units ... right?

Makes no sense to me, your just taking techs away from the reg force, the major problem with PRes CSS I find is the CoC really has no clue what we need for training as techs. As a result we have techs that have done their trade a hand full of times in 10 years. These members are more then willing to put the time in to get trucks running, re-barrel rifles, and get supplies for the unit and run clothing stores, but the chain gives us maybe a day every few months to do things and have a poor image of what we do even if we tell them what we do.