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Tactical Armoured Patrol Vehicle - RG-31, LAV Coyote, and (partial) G-Wagon Replacement

I would really love to know where this urge to be a third rate municipal police department came from ?
The divide between regular and reserve seems to this outsider to be even more pronounced then it is then the rest of the CF.
That divide I mentioned, verges on utter contempt.
I would have thought an actual war like Afghanistan would have woken up a few people in the headshed and changes would have been made .
 
Helmets on:

There was a time when MPs used to man traffic control points (TCPs) during road moves. The MPs were also supposed to be the ones involved with PW handling.
Truth....
And would dash ahead and sign all the routes and significant points on route.

Just a small detour. Did you know that there are regulations under the Canadian Geneva Convention Act that mandates tribunals for the determination of whether or not a given detainee is entitled to POW status? Legal officers are involved in that as the tribunal and back in the early 1990s for our annual summer field exercise the ResF legal officers in Prairie Area ran an exercise for all the RegF and ResF legal officers in the West to learn and exercise how to do that. We employed some MPs as the investigating members.

(I'd bet dollars to donuts that no one has done one of those exercises since then)

🍻
 
And would dash ahead and sign all the routes and significant points on route.

Just a small detour. Did you know that there are regulations under the Canadian Geneva Convention Act that mandates tribunals for the determination of whether or not a given detainee is entitled to POW status? Legal officers are involved in that as the tribunal and back in the early 1990s for our annual summer field exercise the ResF legal officers in Prairie Area ran an exercise for all the RegF and ResF legal officers in the West to learn and exercise how to do that. We employed some MPs as the investigating members.

(I'd bet dollars to donuts that no one has done one of those exercises since then)

🍻
First I’ve heard of this. But I’m not surprised nothing ever happened.
It’s not shiny and doesn’t make big noises
 
...back in the early 1990s for our annual summer field exercise the ResF legal officers in Prairie Area ....
Do you remember the office sign we set up for you and your accomplices?

Dewy, Screwhem and Howe.
 
We didn't even have MP's in the Navy before unification. A group of burly seaman under a Chief Petty, known as shore patrol, were on hand in rotation to go and retrieve sailors who had a drink too many, were too rowdy or were making a nuisance of themselves, when the civilian cops called them to do so. The defaulters were held in barracks until sober enough to return to their ship where Coxn's and Master-at-arms brought appropriate charges, all dealt with internally.

If truly criminal acts were committed, the civilian police was called in and the sailor usually faced a civilian court.

The Navy did not feel the need for its own police force or investigative group.
In Germany, our guys were getting beaten up by the US MPs, mainly for being mouthy when drunk. They (1Svc) made me an RP and gave me a huge French Canadian Black guy to assist, the RP armband would not fit around his arm! We took a 5/4 ton into town when at Graf and went from bar to bar picking up any really drunk Canadians we could find and bringing them home. Fun job and the bar owners often treated us with meals thanks to us removing problems from their establishment. The drunk would tell me to "Eff off" and I point to the big guy and say "How about a comfortable ride home?" It's amazing how many drunks you can fit into the back of a 5/4 ton!
 
In the good news/use case front for the TAPV, 1 Svc Bn is using them for the first time in the field right now as part of their convoys/DPs on exercise. Gives them some dedicated protection that can mount firepower that also isn't primarily used for something else. Looking forward to hearing how it went.
Do they have any TLAVs they'd be willing to trade to the Armoured Reserve units in 3 Div for our busted up TAPVs so we can have something other than Polaris Rangers? Asking for a friend...
 
I suspect that the only place you would find a TLAV these days is museum.
At least with the TLAV you could at least train people in the questionable joys of track maintenance.
And that's a shame.
 
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Blame the CAF leadership.
Blame it on army leadership... As the field role for MPs is an army centric issue. Ships don't embark MPs except in very specific circumstances, and the air force doesn't tend to take many POWs...

Let's also remember the context of when these decisions were made. It was the time when the entire army was getting out of conventional warfighting, so the MPs ditching that stuff was just par for the course.
 
Do you remember the office sign we set up for you and your accomplices?

Dewy, Screwhem and Howe.
Yeah. :giggle: We had some great field exercises in Prairie Region.

Funny thing is when I went from DAJAG/Prairie to DLaw/Special Projects in Ottawa as part of DLaw/Training, I tried to get buy-in to start doing annual exercises in all the regions across the country. (The only ones that had copied us at that point was Atl Region). Long story short, both the DLaw/T and the DJAG/COS at the time said: No!. It cost too much. Admittedly in Prairie I had really worked the buddy net for vehicles, weapons and ammunition. Lots of help from quite a few units there including the sigs who weren't even a part of the ARes at the time. Seems when you want to upscale those things you need to get a budget. The issue was that JAG never really had a money problem for ResF as there were always under-paraders and spare cash for civilian staff vacancies that could be shifted around in the O&M.

Instead of doing valuable training I found myself a job writing the JAG PRL administration manual which was useful in and of itself but really not the best use of my time. I could never really get anyone on the RegF side getting too interested in OpLaw training exercises (we did lots of courses) - this was in the pre-Afghanistan days - as everything OpLaw was either at a very high level or SOF.

Once again we've drifted off topic.

🍻
 
Helmets on:

There was a time when MPs used to man traffic control points (TCPs) during road moves. The MPs were also supposed to be the ones involved with PW handling.
Truth....
Most all of their field duties had to be taken up by the Armour Corps. Most were already secondary roles to us anyway.They are a useless entity in the field. Best leave them on base with their cruisers and black uniforms where they can't fuck anything up. Take all their green equipment and redistribute it, to actual army units that will use it.
 
Most all of their field duties had to be taken up by the Armour Corps. Most were already secondary roles to us anyway.They are a useless entity in the field. Best leave them on base with their cruisers and black uniforms where they can't fuck anything up. Take all their green equipment and redistribute it, to actual army units that will use it.
Our Recce Platoon did a lot of route and traffic control as well .

Take note of the highlighted section. ;)
 
Most of their field duties fell on the reserve units who then were treated so badly that if you treated a person that way you'd probably be facing some some sort of criminal charges .
How's that for irony ?
The story I got was the only people who actually knew how to perform the MPs war time duties were the reservists . Afghanistan should have been a wake up call for them.
Apparently however reality is something that occurs to people other than the Regular Force MPs.
Handling POWs and convoy protection is for losers and only real men can hand out parking tickets....
Pogo was right, "We have met the enemy......"
 
Most of their field duties fell on the reserve units who then were treated so badly that if you treated a person that way you'd probably be facing some some sort of criminal charges .
How's that for irony ?
The story I got was the only people who actually knew how to perform the MPs war time duties were the reservists . Afghanistan should have been a wake up call for them.
Apparently however reality is something that occurs to people other than the Regular Force MPs.
Handling POWs and convoy protection is for losers and only real men can hand out parking tickets....
Pogo was right, "We have met the enemy......"

I recall the fun and games after a 'power mad exceeding his authority like crazy' MP charged into the JR's Mess in our armoury one night, following training, and physically tried to drag out a NCM that he had accused of something that turned out later to be nothing.

It kind of reminded me of this:

Pbs Nature Battle GIF by Nature on PBS
 
Most all of their field duties had to be taken up by the Armour Corps. Most were already secondary roles to us anyway.They are a useless entity in the field. Best leave them on base with their cruisers and black uniforms where they can't fuck anything up. Take all their green equipment and redistribute it, to actual army units that will use it.
So many TACSEC tasks, so little time. Throw in a chemical recce or six and you've got a real beauty of an ex.
 
I suspect that the only place you would find a TLAV these days is museum.
At least with the TLAV you could at least train people in the questionable joys of track maintenance.
And that's a shame.
Museum pieces? Sold! Literally anything will do haha.
 
Most of their field duties fell on the reserve units who then were treated so badly that if you treated a person that way you'd probably be facing some some sort of criminal charges .
How's that for irony ?
The story I got was the only people who actually knew how to perform the MPs war time duties were the reservists . Afghanistan should have been a wake up call for them.
Apparently however reality is something that occurs to people other than the Regular Force MPs.
Handling POWs and convoy protection is for losers and only real men can hand out parking tickets....
Pogo was right, "We have met the enemy......"

I suspect you have had an unpleasant encounter or three with the provost corps in your past.
 
Most of their field duties fell on the reserve units who then were treated so badly that if you treated a person that way you'd probably be facing some some sort of criminal charges .
How's that for irony ?
The story I got was the only people who actually knew how to perform the MPs war time duties were the reservists . Afghanistan should have been a wake up call for them.
Apparently however reality is something that occurs to people other than the Regular Force MPs.
Handling POWs and convoy protection is for losers and only real men can hand out parking tickets....
Pogo was right, "We have met the enemy......"
All I saw the MPs do over there was investigate traffic incidents and minor collisions with civvie vehicles, who had no traffic rules. Without leaving camp.
 
I suspect you have had an unpleasant encounter or three with the provost corps in your past.
Not really but back in the day when their powers of arrest were more limited. I found myself reading a couple of them the riot act for overstepping both their authority and the bounds of common sense.
They tried to get into a private event and began to try throw their weight around. It got very unpleasant very quickly. They had a young lady in tears .
I had words with them, starting with I want to know your superior's name and rank. ... Now .
I have to admit I've never seen anyone turn that pale before.
Usually I was on the other end of those conversations.
To be fair I've seen a lot of MPs were utterly professional and a credit to the uniform. What's happened to them in last couple of decades is in my mind both disgraceful and dangerous for for the Military Police and the Army.
They've been reduced to small town police department complete with the small town attitude.
They're not ,they're soldiers with the duty of setting standards and maintaining them . Policing is just a small part of what they're supposed to do.
 
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