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Would Mandatory National Service make the CF stronger?

  • Thread starter Thread starter MuayThaiFighter
  • Start date Start date

Do you think military service should manditory in Canada?


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If The Big One ever hits Vancouver, the HUSAR tasks will be far beyond the capacity of the VFD (whatever might remain of it), or any other mutual aid fire services. The HUSAR teams from Calgary and Toronto would take quite a while to reach the scene, and once they got there could only handle a limited number of sites. The Army, as proven in Haiti during OP HESTIA, has a very limited HUSAR capability (although we could support HUSAR in various ways, and do lighter, lower-risk rescue work).

So, what capacity exists in the Lower Mainland, or the rest of BC, to rapidly generate trained, equipped and mobile HUSAR teams capable of reaching the affected area in a timely way? This might be a good target for a resurrection of CD in a limited way: create something like the Heavy Rescue Squads that augmented the Fire Services during WWII in England. These could be trained and held in readiness on a volunteer or part-time basis, or maybe made part of a National Service scheme.

Cheers
 
pbi said:
If The Big One ever hits Vancouver, the HUSAR tasks will be far beyond the capacity of the VFD (whatever might remain of it), or any other mutual aid fire services. The HUSAR teams from Calgary and Toronto would take quite a while to reach the scene, and once they got there could only handle a limited number of sites. The Army, as proven in Haiti during OP HESTIA, has a very limited HUSAR capability (although we could support HUSAR in various ways, and do lighter, lower-risk rescue work).

So, what capacity exists in the Lower Mainland, or the rest of BC, to rapidly generate trained, equipped and mobile HUSAR teams capable of reaching the affected area in a timely way? This might be a good target for a resurrection of CD in a limited way: create something like the Heavy Rescue Squads that augmented the Fire Services during WWII in England. These could be trained and held in readiness on a volunteer or part-time basis, or maybe made part of a National Service scheme.

Cheers

Regarding Vancouver. Something you know, but I did not.:
"If the major earthquake predicted for the lower mainland of British Columbia were to occur, studies done in 1989 for Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation indicate that 10-30% of residential construction would become uninhabitable and up to 30% of transportation routes unusable. Fifty to 100% of un-reinforced masonry buildings would collapse. Up to 60% of older schools and hospitals (constructed prior to 1940) that have not been strengthened would become unusable. In a 1990 study, Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation compared the damage done in the Loma Prieta earthquake of 1989:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1989_Loma_Prieta_earthquake
with what could be expected in the Greater Vancouver area following a major earthquake.
The report concluded that the level of damage in the Greater Vancouver area would be greater than that experienced in California, due primarily to differences in seismic building codes and geology."
http://www.toronto.ca/wes/techservices/oem/husar/background.htm

Re: Vancouver earthquake:
"Up to 60% of older schools and hospitals (constructed prior to 1940) that have not been strengthened would become unusable."
I watched this heart-breaking documentary a few days ago on exactly that subject. "...the earthquake that hit the Sichuan province on May 12, 2008":
http://www.hbocanada.com/details/?id=49399

Incidentally, regarding British Columbia, I read this in today's paper: "Numerous government and civilian emergency agencies teamed up to see how they would work together in case there ever was a disaster at sea aboard a B.C. Ferry.":
http://www.canada.com/Where+were+paramedics/2924174/story.html



 
I recall seeing a documentary a few years ago about a potential major quake in the Lower Mainland. One of the most frightening images was of the "liquifaction" of areas (mostly, but not only, suburban) that were built on landfill or reclaimed land. According to the documentary, the sustained heavy vibrations would cause the water underlying the filled areas to mix with the fill, causing  big sinking-mud ponds to appear. Buildings, roads and utility lines would collapse or sink.

This would almost certainly affect the emergency services: if not by the immediate damage/disruption of stations and apparatus, then by problems with mobility and with off-duty or volunteer crews getting in to augment the on-duty shifts. Even without liquefation, building collapses in the downtown area would probably include fire and EMS stations, and cause rubbling of response routes. Unlike a hurricane or even a tsunami, there is no warning time in an earthquake that would permit emergency service evacuation out of the epicentre.

It would obviously depend on the magnitude of the quake, but my guess is that Vancouver might not really be capable of helping itself without relying on  resources greater than the standing fire rescue services.

I know that the CF has done some work in preparing: I've seen the prepositioned sea containers with the emergency gear, but even that will be of limited use, probably only in the neighbourhoods immediately around the containers, until enough lift can be aranged to move the contents.

There is a bit of a precedent. During the 1950s the Govt of  Canada did have a program to provide fire services in possible nuclear target areas with auxiliary fire apparatus that could augment the existing inventories, probably in the hands of CD firefighters.  Some of these were still around in the 60s or even later. Similar idea to the UK's "Green Goddesses" that came out of mothballs for the National Fire Service strike in 1977.

Cheers
 
pbi said:
There is a bit of a precedent. During the 1950s the Govt of  Canada did have a program to provide fire services in possible nuclear target areas with auxiliary fire apparatus that could augment the existing inventories, probably in the hands of CD firefighters.  Some of these were still around in the 60s or even later. Similar idea to the UK's "Green Goddesses" that came out of mothballs for the National Fire Service strike in 1977.
Cheers

I looked that up.:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/november/14/newsid_3154000/3154632.stm

 
At least in the case of a nuke strike, there would be a central area roughly circular in shape that would be completely devastated with everyone in it dead. This would not be the case in an earthquake. There still would be extensive damage and there would be an urgent requirement to conduct rescue and/or recovery operations in the whole area.  In other words, the challenges facing us after an earthquake would be greater than in the case of a post-strike re-entry situation.(We relics of the Cold War were conditioned to think that way. Sorry if it seems hard-hearted.)
 
Old Sweat said:
(We relics of the Cold War were conditioned to think that way. Sorry if it seems hard-hearted.)

After "duck and cover", I think with Distant Early Warning, the idea was that many could be evacuated. "The heart of the city is cleared in 34 minutes. .... Sure the bomb falls. Many will be killed.":
http://www.veoh.com/browse/videos/category/news/watch/v148908956T6Rh9WE#
( Notice the kids - and a baby in a child's arms - and no seatbelts! Didn't have them, or car seats, except the ones with the little stearing wheels, back then. They weren't mandatory until 1975 in Ontario. Of course, when mom is trying to out drive a nuke, automotive safety features would have been the last of anyone's worries! )
With ICBMs, mass exodus became less likely. Although we did see it during the Mississauga evacuation in 1979, and more recently, during Hurricane Katrina.
 
The idea that a modern city (say, the size of TO or Greater Van) could be evacuated in an orderly, efficient manner under the threat of an imminent nuclear attack is the sort of silly pipedream that only somebody who writes government pamphlets could come up with.

Traffic conditions are bad enough now, without panic and blind fear.

I lived in Mississauga during the derailment: that evacuation was successful (a city of over 200,000 people was largely emptied out), but it has to be remembered that the actual area affected by the plume from the derailed tank cars was very small in relation to the size of Mississauga. Most of the evacuees (ie: my family) were in areas that were never affected by the toxic chemicals, amd probably never would have been.  (Although I don't fault the authorities for erring on the side of caution) Also, the emergency services were not damaged or disrupted by the event, and the Mississauga fire dept in particular was able to activate mutual aid arrangements to "cover in" while most of its manned apparatus was at the scene.

Almost none of those happy circumstances would prevail in a major earthquake, which was the underlying thought behind my idea to have an auxiliary disaster service along the lines of the old CD, or the THW that the Germans have (had?), manned by people doing National Service.

Cheers
 
pbi:

Don't forget the power/necessity of hope. People in large areas NEEDED to believe they could be evacuated comes a nuclear attack...and they still do. Otherwise, people would start leaving their dwelling as soon as international tensions
appeared and we would de facto lose the war. Therefore I'm not sure that the pamphlet-producing bureaucrat you are making fun of would have believed in the evacuation, only (cynically enough) in the need for civilians to believe in it.
 
Back on topic folks. The thread isn't about Civil Defence. It's about mandatory service as it pertains to the CF.

Milnet.ca Staff
 
I will have to move back a bit off topic here:

Jerry Pournell pointed out in Chaos Manor that Civil Defence in the 1950's was generally a voilunteer organization, loosly analogous to Neighbourhood Watch. Duri9ng test exercises, it seemed to work well (although we must grant these exercises were more like TEWT's than rigerous eveluation exercises).

Jerry points out that with the "professionalization" of emergency services, it became a job rather than a calling, and suggests that was one of the key reasons FEMA was so unable to deal with the effects of Hurricane Katrina. (The total incompitence and unbelievable lack of movement and action by the City and State governments in the lead-up and first 72 hours after Katrina hit are also big factors, although it seems they simply assumed "Big Brother" would magically appear and make things right.)

How does this relate to Manditory National Service?

Volunteers who join to fulfill a need (either external or internal) will generally be far more motivated and effective than "civil service" drones, or people who have been dragooned into the job. I am using the term volunteer a bit loosly, since professional training, organization and logistics makes a huge amount of difference, but people like us who join voluntarily have self-selected for the position; this is where we want to be.

A very tiny percentage of conscripted people may discover that this is their calling in life, but the wastage to find these people will be phenominal, and the organization will be a turgid, slow moving mass of deadwood. Far better to stay with volunteers.
 
Interesting take on NEETS (see video). They quote some huge number of British youth who are uneducated, and unemployable.  Charles Adler had a unique piece on "National Service".
http://www.sunnewsnetwork.ca/video/featured/prime-time/867432237001/national-service/1108315956001

I thought YTEP and Katemavik were great programs. As for a brief total military service it would have to be more medic/engineer/civic/ stuff as the last thing we want to do is train ex-gang bangers for a yr to be more capable or trained criminals. 

please watch the whole video. I think alot of the London riot are about the have and havenots. I watched an interrview with a hooded looter and no remorse "watching my new plasma, I guess Christmas came early"
 
From CBC and with respect to copyright rules.
Nearly a million young Canadians are out of work and more than half aren’t even looking for a job, according to the first-ever study of its kind by Statistics Canada.

They represent roughly 13 per cent of all young people between the ages of 15 and 29, the federal agency said.

And while that’s high compared to Canada’s overall jobless rate, which stood at 7.2 per cent in April, among Canada’s G7 peers only Germany is in better shape with a youth unemployment rate of 11.6 per cent, the study noted.

Unlike previous studies of unemployed youth, the report is the first to include young people who aren’t in school but are also not looking for work.

The phenomenon, dubbed “NEET,” which stands for Not in Employment Education or Training, is an area of growing concern to policy makers around the globe.

In some countries, high levels of youth unemployment have led to riots and demands for social and political change. In Greece and Spain, more than half of those under age 25 are out of work due to the growing debt-crisis in the euro zone.

However, in Canada, a significant chunk of young people who opted not to work cited other factors, such as a desire to stay home with young children, Statistics Canada found.

“Almost half a million young people are not in the labour force. The NEET indicator suggests something negative is going on. But we don’t know that for sure,” said the study’s author, Katherine Marshall.

“The youth in the NEET state are actually a very diverse group, particularly so in Canada. So it has to be taken with a footnote that not everybody in the NEET state is at risk of being discourage or disengaged,” Marshall said. “A large minority is parents with young children, or they’re at home doing unpaid work, or volunteer work, or leisure. These aren’t necessarily negative activities.”

But an association whose members work directly with unemployed youth said the data could be masking some underlying issues.

“Looking for work is very, very hard and very, very stressful. A lot of people when they don’t find work quickly get demoralized,” said Matt Wood, executive director of First Work, an association of Ontario Youth Employment Centres.

The numbers don’t include the millions of young people who may be staying in school longer because so few good jobs are available, he said. Nor do they show how many are working at part-time, temporary or contract jobs, he added.

The pace of technological change means most jobs require at least some training, which few employers are willing to provide, Wood noted.

Meanwhile, some jobs are going unfilled because of a mismatch between employers’ needs and young people’s skills, Wood said.

Canada needs a more coherent youth employment strategy, he said.

Among the 904,000 young Canadians considered “NEET” last year some 391,000 were actively looking for work while the other 513,000 were not, Statistics Canada reported Wednesday.

Among those looking for work, only 55,000, or 1 per cent, had been doing so for more than six months. That’s one of the lowest rates among Canada’s economic peers, the G7 group of countries.

Gender, education and marriage all had an impact on young people’s employment track record.

Young men were having more trouble than women finding jobs. The less educated and unmarried were also more likely to be out of work.

Eight out of 10 who said they weren’t looking for a job cited family responsibilities, health issues or other activities as their reasons.

Of the 2 in 10 who wanted a job but had stopped looking, most said they’d become discouraged, or were waiting to be recalled or were unable to work.
 
mad dog 2020:
1)  How about a link for the CBC piece?

2)  The last time you posted about YTEP 16 months ago almost to the day....
http://forums.army.ca/forums/threads/98829.0.html
.... the response seemed a bit, underwhelming.

3)  National service/compulsory military service has been discussed at length elsewhere here:
http://forums.milnet.ca/forums/threads/105089.0/all.html
http://forums.milnet.ca/forums/threads/24424.0.html

Anything new to add, bud?
 
Considering we don't have the resource base to train the soliders and service members we do have in the pipeline (see the PRETEC battalion in Borden, for example), funneling additional personnel into the CF on essentially short term "make work" programs would simply leave thousands of people sitting around in uniform and never getting the job and life experience that I think you are implying as a benefit for National Service.

We would need literally thousands of experienced NCO's just to do the teaching/training (we need that right now), in addition to the Officers and NCO's needed to run things in the units. The short term benefit to having a national service pool may be to bring understrength units up to full speed (especially service support units), but then we also have to manage the fall off wave(s) as each draft comes to the end of their contracts.
 
I know my youngest is finished his first year of college.  He cannot find work for love nor money.  He's put in dozens of resume and applications and no serious bites.  I did not know the market was so shitty here.
 
jollyjacktar said:
I know my youngest is finished his first year of college.  He cannot find work for love nor money.  He's put in dozens of resume and applications and no serious bites.  I did not know the market was so shitty here.

It is and it isn't....the higher paying jobs are mostly snapped up pretty quick or gotten through networking. Suggest to him to apply to places where he can grow into a better position over the next couple of years by proving himself this year and maybe next. The companies will largely respond favorably if they understand that the student is willing to grow into the job.

my  :2c:
 
Actually he has been trying at a variety of places just so he could have some work.  He's striking out, which is a surprise as he has an excellent work record.  Even the Commissionaires did not give him a call back earlier this year.  ???
 
Where is "here"?

Your child might give serious consideration to moving out west, Saskatchewan and Alberta have dire labour shortages. There are also many "hidden" job markets; Reccesoldier has noted vegetable farmers have to import foreign workers into SW Ontario as most people are turning up their noses at these jobs, and the same seems to apply to jobs in the fisheries market, where companies import people from Eastern Europe to fill the positions the locals are not taking.

These may not be high paying or "Gucci" jobs, but they are jobs.
 
Thucydides said:
.... Reccesoldier has noted vegetable farmers have to import foreign workers into SW Ontario as most people are turning up their noses at these jobs, and the same seems to apply to jobs in the fisheries market, where companies import people from Eastern Europe to fill the positions the locals are not taking ....
Just heard on the radio this morning that coffee shop owners in Red Lake, Ontario are hiring foreign workers because nobody else is taking them.
 
Thucydides said:
Where is "here"?
Halifax Regional Municipality.  He is still between his first and second year of college, so moving is not an option.  This place has always been shitty for part time work, but, things seem to be even harder at the present. 

 
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