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We are witnessing the future of war on the battlefields of Ukraine

Published

1 year ago

12 minute read

From the MacDonald Laurier Institute

By Richard Shimooka

We would be wise to learn the lessons the Ukrainians have fought so hard to learn

Historically, certain wars have stimulated the development of future defence thinking. The 1905 Russo-Japanese War previewed many features of the Great War a decade later, including the lethality of machine guns and howitzers, as well as the ubiquity of trench warfare. The 1973 Yom Kippur War between Israel and its Arab Neighbours was particularly influential for present wars—the Arab combatants’ use of new anti-tank guided missiles challenged many existing doctrines. This is not to say that all groups absorb the lessons directly or effectively. Many of the great powers, including Russia (who fought in the 1905 war), failed to adopt the lessons laid bare in that conflict and suffered grievous casualties in the first years of World War I as a result.

Approaching two years since the invasion, the war in Ukraine has the potential to have an outside impact on the future of war for a variety of reasons. Its timing comes as a number of new technologies have emerged, many of which have come from the civilian space. These include the proliferation of drones, low-cost satellites, and high bandwidth networking—all of which to date have had major effects on the outcome of the war.1 Over the past two years, both sides have adapted their doctrine and capabilities to reflect a cycle of learning and adaptation which gives a clearer understanding of where these technologies are headed.

Some of these trends are a validation of overriding trends in warfare, particularly around the collection and use of data afforded by networked systems. This is evident in the maturation of the “reconnaissance-strike” complexes in Russian and Ukrainian doctrine. Essentially, this is a streamlining of the process of identifying and attacking targets with precision fire, usually from some form of artillery. The United States and NATO have been pursuing a roughly similar—but much more advanced and all-encompassing—concept known as “multi-domain operations.” There are several common denominators between both doctrines, including the effort to expand detection over wider areas, as well as hastening the decision-making process which can improve the lethality of any weapon system attached to it. While it may not be able to employ traditional airpower, the use of long-range artillery (including the recently provided ATACMS missile system) shows the effectiveness of this approach to war. It also allows for a greater economy of force—a critical consideration for Ukraine due to its disadvantageous economic and strategic situation facing a state three times its size.

A key feature of progress in this area is its organic nature. Since the start of direct hostilities in 2014, Ukraine has done well to build up some of these connective capabilities adapting civilian systems for military purposes, such as the Starlink satellite network and apps for mobile devices. A large portion are ground-up approaches, developed even by military units to suit their particular operational needs. This was part of the total war approach that the Ukrainian government has instituted, often leveraging their emerging tech industries to develop new capabilities to fight against the Russian Federation. Many allies have similar efforts, but too often focus remains on a very centralized, top-down approach, which has led to substandard outcomes. Some balance between the two poles is likely ideal.

Another major consideration is the revolutionary impact of drones on air warfare. Traditional manned airpower, like F-16, Mig-29s, and even attack helicopters, remain as relevant as ever in Ukraine. While no side possesses true air superiority, some localized control has been established for short periods, resulting in potentially decisive consequences. However, the war has followed the trend of other recent wars with low-cost, attritable drones playing an important role. While this has been evident in the strike-reconnaissance doctrine discussed above, the so-called kamikaze loitering drones, such as the Russian Lancet and armed first-person view commercial drones, have played an important role as well.

One important aspect is what is known as the “mass” of these capabilities—not individually, but as a collective system or swarm of multiple individual units that can be lost without a major degradation of their lethality. At present, the link between traditional and emerging airpower domains is fairly disjointed over the battlefield in Ukraine, perhaps due to lingering service parochialism. But once combined they will only multiply each other’s lethality.

There is, however, one question concerning this new frontier of airpower’s ultimate influence in the future. It hinges significantly on the efficacy of new anti-drone systems, like those being developed by the United States Army and NATO allies. These potentially may blunt or even remove the deadly threat these UAVs pose to modern ground forces. But as of now they are in their infancy and very few are present in Ukraine today. If they are unable to make a major impact, then the future of conflict will be radically different.

Over the past thirty years, Canada, the United States, and its allies have often been able to deploy troops abroad to many stabilization and peacekeeping missions, in part due to the relatively benign threat environment they were entering. There was confidence that deployed soldiers would not incur significant casualties, which would arouse domestic opposition to the missions themselves. If the lethality of these unmanned drone systems remains unchecked, then, considering their greater ubiquity, it may drastically constrain the ability of Western countries to intervene and assert their muscle abroad, even in low-risk environments.

Finally, and perhaps most critically, is the need for an adaptive defence industrial base (another word for military supply chains) with the capacity to meet a wide need for war. The Russian Federation, for example, faced wide-ranging and intrusive sanctions from the start of the conflict that precluded them from obtaining a number of key resources for their war effort, ranging from raw materials to advanced technology components. They have been able to weather these challenges due to a combination of factors: a deliberate effort to develop an autarkic industrial base that started after 2014, a less technologically advanced military, and sanctions-avoiding policies such as smuggling and diversifying their foreign supplier base to more reliable allies.

While Western allies are unlikely to face the same restrictions in a potential future conflict on the scale that Russia has, in some ways they have greater challenges. These countries rely on much more sophisticated military capabilities that have levels of complexity far in excess of Russian systems. The sheer diversity in all of the raw materials inputs and various subcomponent providers, as well as the networks to make them all work, means that they are actually much easier to disrupt. Shades of this were evident during the initial months of the COVID-19 epidemic when the production of civilian goods was affected by shortages and supply chain disruptions.

Furthermore, underinvestment in the defence industrial base has left the capacity to ramp up production in most areas perilously slow, even two years after the conflict started.

More effort must be spent on creating a much more resilient industrial base that has the capacity to ramp up production to meet the needs of modern war. This requires significant front-end investment by governments in capacity building as no private firm is willing to spend money in that fashion without any guarantee of a return. At the same time, building capacity must be targeted and appropriate to the actual needs of Canada and its allies—taking lessons from Ukraine without understanding their context would be a mistake. That war and its material demands are unique to it.2 Discerning the actual needs and developing accordingly should be done through careful analysis and wargaming, much like the recent Center for Strategic International Studies analysis on U.S. missile needs in a potential war against China has done.

In the end, a clear trend that seems to bind all of these areas is the need for adaptability and critical thinking. Warfare is fast becoming more lethal and decisive. Modern armies must be able to respond to those changes as quickly as they occur—or better yet, lead those changes against their adversaries. That, for one, cannot occur in an organization that is continually starved for funding like the Canadian Armed Forces is today.

But it may also require a radical reorganization and re-think of how defence policy, strategy, operations, and doctrine are developed and implemented—not to mention personnel and industrial policy. As the conflict in Ukraine has laid bare, bringing in the brightest minds and giving them greater leeway to develop responses is key, as is harnessing the potential and building the capacity of domestic industrial bases. These are essential and urgent lessons we must learn. They have been hard won by the sacrifices of the Ukrainian people for our benefit. It would be a shame to waste them.

Richard Shimooka is a Hub contributing writer and a senior fellow at the Macdonald-Laurier Institute who writes on defence policy.

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Judge dismisses Canadian military personnel’s lawsuit against COVID shot mandate

Published on November 20, 2024

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From LifeSiteNews

By Anthony Murdoch

Associate Judge Catherine Coughlan rejected a lawsuit from more than 300 past and current members of the Canadian military who lost their jobs or were put on leave for not taking the experimental, dangerous COVID shots.

A Canadian federal judge has thrown out a lawsuit filed on behalf of some 330 past and current members of the nation’s military who lost their jobs or were placed on leave for refusing the experimental COVID shots, because she alleged that their lawsuit lacked “evidence” that the jabs were harmful.

The Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) members had sought some $1.3 million in damages from the government for having their charter rights violated due to the military’s 2021 COVID mandates, according to their lawsuit.

In a November 13 ruling, Edmonton-based Associate Judge Catherine Coughlan ruled in favor of the Trudeau government, and thus military’s COVID jab mandate, to strike down the case. Coughlan remarked that the plaintiffs’ case lacked “material facts” along with “evidence” and was filled with “vexatious language.”

READ: Canadian father files $35 million lawsuit against Pfizer over son’s jab-related death

“The only indications of bad faith are found when the pleadings baldly assert that, among other claims, Canada failed to carry out safety and efficacy testing for the vaccines, and that the Directives were premature and ‘promoted the fraudulent use of the biologics’,” she wrote, overlooking reports of thousands of injuries due to the shots in Canada alone.

As a result of the lawsuit being tossed, all plaintiffs are now on the hook to pay some $5,040 out of pocket in legal costs.

As reported by LifeSiteNews in June, documents obtained by LifeSiteNews show that the number of jab injuries in the CAF rose over 800 percent in 2021, with the most being credited to Moderna’s experimental COVID shot.

The CAF members’ lawsuit was filed in June of 2023 and overall sought some $1 million in damages, along with an extra $350,000 in general damages. The lawsuit also had a condition that there be a declaration made that mandating the COVID shots for military members was a violation of their charter rights.

READ: Israeli boy featured in COVID vaccine campaign dies of heart attack at age 8

Under the CAF’s mandate, hundreds of military members were fired, or one could say, purged for not getting the COVID shots. This is in addition to the thousands of public servants fired for not agreeing to take the COVID shots.

The CAF eventually ended its COVID mandate in October 2022, which was months after the federal mandate was lifted, but members are still “strongly encouraged” to take the experimental shot.

The federal government under Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced that its federal COVID shot workplace mandate would be dropped in June 2022, as would the mandate requiring domestic travelers have the shot to board planes and trains.

In November of 2023, a CAF member who spoke to LifeSiteNews under the condition of anonymity observed that the military considers members who refuse the COVID jab “a piece of garbage.”

READ: COVID shots have 200-times higher risk of brain clots than other jabs: new report

In March, LifeSiteNews reported on large personnel losses causing the CAF to consider dropping its remaining requirements altogether.

Although Canada has a Vaccine Injury Support Program (VISP) program, active members of the CAF, as well as veterans, are not eligible for the civilian program. According to Christensen, this leaves many COVID jab-injured CAF members and veterans with no recourse other than Veterans Affairs Canada.

COVID shot mandates, which came from provincial governments with the support of Trudeau’s federal government, split Canadian society. The mRNA shots themselves have been linked to a multitude of negative and often severe side effects, such as heart diseases, stroke, and death, including in children.

The shots also have connections to cell lines derived from aborted babies. As a result, many Catholics and other Christians refused to take them.

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Canadian veterans battle invisible wounds of moral injury and addiction

Published on November 16, 2024

By

Header photo caption: Canadian Forces veteran Gordon Hurley in Hawija, Iraq, 2017. [Photo provided by Gordon Hurley]

Moral injury, a unique psychological trauma, drives many Canadian veterans to substance use disorders as they struggle with inadequate support

When he was stationed in Bosnia in 1994, Steve Lamrock would drive a truck loaded with food through villages full of hungry people.

As a Canadian Armed Forces platoon quartermaster, one of Lamrock’s duties was transporting food to other soldiers involved in the United Nations Protection Force’s peacekeeping mission in the war-torn country.

“I had people starving to death, children starving to death,” he recalled, his wife seated beside him for support. “I could see, weekly, the deterioration in certain people in the community and the elderly from a lack of nutrition.”

Often, there was a surplus of rations.

“The UN policy was, if you can’t give exactly equal to both sides, you don’t give anything away,” he said, adding that it could trigger violent raids if you provided food to just one faction.

“So we would throw out food when there’s people starving to death.”

Moral dilemmas like these haunted Lamrock long after he retired from the military in 2009. Tormented by nightmares, he turned to alcohol to cope. “When I drank so much I passed out, I wouldn’t dream or remember the dreams as vividly or as often,” he said.
Canadian Forces veteran Steve Lamrock. [Photo provided by Steve Lamrock]

Lamrock — whose 24-year military career included tours in Afghanistan, Bosnia, Croatia, Kosovo and Iraq — was identified as suffering from psychological distress caused by the perception of having violated one’s moral or ethical beliefs. Experts are now calling this moral injury.

Moral injury is not formally recognized in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, an authoritative manual on mental disorders. But experts and veterans say moral injury affects many individuals who serve in the military, and requires better institutional support and treatment than are currently available.

Moral injury and addiction

“[Moral injury presents as] shame, guilt and anger that occurs when someone is exposed to an event that goes against their moral values, standards or ethics,” said Dr. Don Richardson, a psychiatrist and scientific director of the MacDonald Franklin Operational Stress Injury Research Centre in London, Ont. The centre studies the impact of stress injuries on military personnel, veterans and first responders.

Moral injury can result not only from witnessing or causing harm, but also from being affected by an organization’s actions or inactions, Richardson says.

The term moral injury was first introduced in the 1990s by American psychiatrist Dr. Jonathan Shay, who worked with veterans of the Vietnam War. It gained wider recognition following the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, when traditional treatments for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) — such as Cognitive Behavioural Therapy — were proving to be only partially effective.

While fear is often at the core of traditional PTSD cases, feelings of guilt, shame, anger and betrayal are more strongly linked to cases of moral injury, says Dr. Anthony Nazarov, associate director of the MacDonald Franklin Operational Stress Injury Research Centre and an expert on moral injury.

Nearly 60 per cent of Canadian Armed Forces personnel deployed in NATO operations in Afghanistan reported exposure to morally injurious events, according to a 2018 study co-authored by Nazarov. Those exposed to such events demonstrated a greater likelihood of developing PTSD and major depressive disorders.

Dr. Ronald Shore, a research scientist and assistant professor in psychiatry at Queen’s University, says individuals suffering from moral injury often develop coping strategies due to a lack of support to help them process traumatic experiences.

One common coping mechanism is substance use, he says.

“You’re constantly feeling like something is wrong with you, that you’ve done something wrong … that leads to that self-regulation with addiction,” Shore said.

Lamrock says his experiences in Bosnia — and the habits he developed afterwards — deeply affected him and his family.

He recalled promising his young daughter they would do something fun after a night’s rest. “‘No, you won’t, Daddy, you won’t get up,’” she had replied, knowing he would likely be too hungover.

“That was my motivation to quit,” he said.

Betrayal

It is common for veterans suffering from moral injury to feel angry or betrayed due to the military’s actions or lack of support.

“[A person feels] betrayed by policies, betrayed by leaders, betrayed by organizations,” said Nazarov.

This has been the case for Gordon Hurley, 37, whose 14-year career in the Canadian Armed Forces included tours in Afghanistan, Africa and Iraq.

“When you get out, there’s nothing,” Hurley said. “If you think that Veterans Affairs is going to support you … they will, but you’re gonna have to fight for it.”

Hurley was medically discharged from the military in 2021 due to various physical and mental health challenges, including PTSD. He says Veterans Affairs requires him to continually prove the severity of his injuries to maintain disability support and benefits, such as reimbursements for retinal surgery and rehabilitation.

Hurley says that having to repeatedly prove his injuries to Veterans Affairs has been frustrating. “You were the ones who released me from the military … for these injuries, but now you are asking me to prove them back to you?” he said.

The Canadian Armed Forces redirected inquiries about support for veterans with moral injury and substance use disorder to Veterans Affairs Canada.

In an emailed statement to Canadian Affairs, Veterans Affairs spokesperson Josh Bueckert said mental health-care practitioners who work with veterans are “well aware of moral injury” and recognize the condition is often associated with operational stress injuries.

Bueckert said the department provides funding to organizations such as the Atlas Institute for Veterans and Families, which has a moral injury toolkit for veterans.

He also noted the department offers veterans a range of mental health resources, including access to 11 operational stress injury clinics and a network of 12,000 mental health professionals. Bueckert said veterans also have access to treatments for substance use disorder and for conditions such as “trauma-and-stressor-related disorders.”

Hurley acknowledges all these benefits are available, but says they are hard-won.

“All those benefits listed you get, but unless your condition has been [approved by the department], you do not receive those benefits,” he said.

‘Never-ending battle’

Josh Muir, 49, served nearly 14 years in the military and was deployed twice to Afghanistan. After sustaining soft tissue damage, hearing damage and spinal injuries in a 2010 improvised explosive device attack, he was medically discharged from the military — something he says he opposed because the military had become his entire identity.

“As soon as I’ve crossed this threshold, I no longer really have a clear picture of who I am, what I am, what use I might play in the future, and where to go from here,” he said.

He described feeling discarded by the military. “I was very quickly turned from a valuable asset into a liability that needed to be rid of as quickly and as expeditiously as possible,” said Muir, who turned to alcohol as a crutch.
Canadian Forces veteran Josh Muir and his son Max at a beach in Vancouver, April 2024. [Photo Credit: Atlas Institute for Veterans and Families]

Shore, of Queen’s University, says recovering from moral injury and substance use disorder can require rebuilding one’s identity as the sense of purpose and belonging one gets from being part of the military fades.

Therapies such as acceptance and commitment therapy help veterans accept difficult emotions and commit to taking actions that align with their values. Another treatment called narrative therapy helps veterans separate their problems from their identity. These therapies can be effective at helping veterans recover, says Richardson, of the MacDonald Franklin Operational Stress Injury Research Centre.

Richardson also encourages veterans to seek peer support through groups like Operational Stress Injury Social Support or True Patriot Love Foundation.

David Fascinato joined the military in 2005 and served in psychological operations, including a deployment to Afghanistan in 2010.

Fascinato, who has since left the military, has struggled with mental health issues and moral injury. He says he has come to realize that veterans need organizations that offer community, purpose and tools to rebuild their sense of self.

This realization led him to co-found Team Rubicon Canada, a volunteer disaster relief organization that conducts missions in Canada and abroad. “Doing things with others for others, that’s where it helps reduce substance misuse and provides an off-ramp,” he said.

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Fascinato has also found purpose by serving as executive director of Heroic Hearts Project Canada, an organization that supports veterans and first responders with alternative mental health treatments such as psychedelics.

Richardson and Shore view psychedelic-assisted therapy — which uses psychedelics to disrupt ingrained neural patterns — as a promising treatment for moral injury and substance use disorder..

Shore says support for psychedelic trials with veterans is still limited due to safety concerns and insufficient research. However, Canadian veterans are seeking psychedelic therapy in overseas retreats in places like Mexico and Peru.

Hurley says he was only able to recover from his alcoholism after seeking treatment at a psychedelic retreat in Tijuana, Mexico in 2022. “Only after I did ibogaine did I get released from [alcohol addiction],” he said, referring to a type of psychedelic drug.

While the production, sale and possession of psychedelics remain illegal in Canada, Health Canada in 2023 amended its Special Access Program, which allows health-care providers to request psychedelic medications for patients with life-threatening or treatment-resistant conditions.

In Muir’s case, he was able to gain control of his addiction and mental health issues after completing a two-month residential program at a treatment centre on Vancouver Island. The cost of the program was covered by Veterans Affairs.

While Muir is grateful to have his treatment costs covered, he says he would like to see Veterans Affairs generally improve the support it offers veterans, including offering more personalized assistance in the transition to civilian life.

He describes his experience with the Canadian Armed Forces’ transition program as taking in “information via fire hose,” with overwhelming seminars and a lack of personal guidance to navigate the process.

“There’s little services and ceremonies,” said Muir. “But ultimately you have to go back to you being a small cog in a large machine.”

“I felt like I was going to become Army Surplus, just like the items in the store that sit there after their function has been superseded by newer models.”

“I think it’s absurd,” said Fascinato. “We have to pick up the proverbial sword and shield, or in this case pen and pad of paper, and seemingly wage this never-ending battle for access to care that shouldn’t be this difficult to get.”

This article was produced through the Breaking Needles Fellowship Program, which provided a grant to Canadian Affairs, a digital media outlet, to fund journalism exploring addiction and crime in Canada. Articles produced through the Fellowship are co-published by Break The Needle and Canadian Affairs.

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