Commentary
On the eve of Remembrance Day, Canadians learned that their army is cutting reserve employment, cancelling training exercises, and reducing opportunities for part-time soldiers. This comes as Ottawa promises unprecedented defence spending and military expansion. The contradiction is staggering, and the consequences could be devastating.
Having served in both the regular force and army reserve over three decades, including 10 years as Honorary Colonel of the Governor General’s Foot Guards, I recognize this familiar institutional reflex. When budgets tighten, regular force establishments are protected while reservists absorb the punishment. It is bureaucratically convenient, strategically reckless, and fundamentally dishonest.
The Canadian Armed Forces calls these reductions a reallocation toward higher readiness priorities. That is bureaucratic camouflage for cutting training days, eliminating full-time reserve positions, and weakening unit leadership. You cannot improve military readiness by systematically dismantling the organizations responsible for generating it.
Canada’s own defence policies expose the hypocrisy. “Strong, Secure, Engaged” established a primary reserve target of 30,000 personnel, reaffirmed in “Our North, Strong and Free.” The Chief of the Defence Staff’s 2024 reconstitution directive explicitly committed to growing both regular and reserve forces, yet today’s decisions move in precisely the opposite direction.
This is not simply a disagreement over accounting. It reflects an institutional culture that continues treating the reserves as a subordinate manpower pool rather than an indispensable component of national defence. Regular force leadership cannot credibly promise expansion while stripping away the very infrastructure required to deliver it.
The evidence has been available for years. The auditor general’s 2016 examination identified inadequate reserve training, equipment shortages, and insufficient personnel. Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee subsequently expressed serious concern that reservists were effectively being treated as second-class soldiers, yet a decade later the army appears determined to compound those deficiencies.
The strategic implications extend far beyond individual armouries. Reserve units maintain military expertise, recruiting networks, community relationships, and leadership structures across Canada. Eliminate experienced instructors, reduce training opportunities, and consolidate formations, and those capabilities cannot simply be recreated when an international crisis erupts.
History demonstrates why this matters. Canada’s citizen-soldiers provided essential manpower during two world wars, while reservists subsequently reinforced operations in Afghanistan and supported domestic emergencies. The regular force provides indispensable professional capability, but Canada’s ability to expand during prolonged conflict depends upon a functioning, trained, and properly supported reserve.
Ukraine has demonstrated that modern warfare demands manpower depth, sustained mobilization, and the capacity to replace battlefield losses. NATO’s deteriorating security environment reinforces the same lesson. A military structured primarily around a relatively small professional establishment, without meaningful expansion capacity, risks becoming a force capable of fighting but incapable of sustaining a major war.
There is also an economic argument that military headquarters seems determined to ignore. Reservists combine civilian employment, professional expertise, and military service, providing capabilities without requiring every soldier to occupy a permanent full-time position. Properly resourced, the reserve offers an efficient means of increasing national military capacity, not an inconvenient expense to be sacrificed.
The creation of the 1st Canadian Manoeuvre Division should strengthen Canada’s deployable army, not come at the expense of the 2nd Canadian Division’s reserve formations. Building one capability by hollowing out another is not modernization. It is institutional cannibalism masquerading as strategic transformation.
The minister of national defence must intervene immediately. Suspend reductions to essential reserve training and leadership positions, publish their operational consequences, and establish protected funding for recruitment, training, and unit readiness. Parliament should demand measurable growth targets, transparent reporting, and accountability from commanders responsible for delivering them.
Canada also needs a serious national mobilization strategy, with clearly defined reserve roles, properly equipped units and an expansion framework extending beyond today’s authorized strength. That requires sustained investment in instructors, armouries, equipment, and employer support. Anything less reduces ambitious manpower announcements to political theatre.
Our regular force soldiers deserve respect, resources, and capable leadership. So do our reservists, who volunteer to serve while maintaining civilian careers and family responsibilities. They should not be forced to subsidize institutional priorities through diminished opportunities to train and serve.
At a moment when Canada is promising to rebuild its military, the army is dismantling part of its foundation. Senior commanders must stop confusing administrative savings with operational effectiveness. You cannot grow an army by shrinking its reserves, and you cannot defend tomorrow’s Canada by sacrificing today’s capacity to mobilize.
Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
