[TheLetterX]

Hey gang, how's it going?

Just finished reading the book Canada's Secret Commandos: The Unauthorized Story of Joint Task Force 2. And I was wondering if anybody else had read it and if anybody had any feedback or comments on it. Personaly, I've never been in the army, thought about it but decided to go into the IT field but I still have a small fascination with the military and this JTF2 group is simply amazing!

Something to be proud of! Tempting to go check out their base since I live about 30 minutes from it!

[mcpuck]

Where do you find a book like that?

[Richard]

Just take the title he gave you and order it from your local book store.

[TheLetterX]

mcpuck mcpuck:

Where do you find a book like that?

Any major book store should have it actually, just look in the military section. Another good one is Shadow Wars.

[Bigboy]

i just bought it the other day, so i'll be able to comment on it soon

[chrisfer]

Read the book also, a good read, we never seem to here enough about our own guys. From other research I have done it seems we had a couple of dozen of JTF boys in Afghanistan and some sniper teams. Apparently all were thought of very highly and just recently on Bush's visit he has given the Presidential Unit Citation to the members of JTF-2 for their operations in Enduring Freedom. A rare thing for a non-U.S. unit. Much more secretive then other countries SF's it appears they equal the level of U.S. Special Forces and may only be less trained in certain operational aspects ie: HALO, Underwater work, then the SAS, SBS or Seals.
If anyone knows where more info can be dug up let me know.
They have thier own site on the DND's website but not much info.

[Atreyu]

There was no point to writing this book. It is full of speculation, and should never have been written. What's next...publication of the training syllabus???

[Tman1]

Ya know, untill two years ago, before Afghanistan, Ive never heard of the JTF-2 or whatever. Ive never even heard of the CSIS. Whate does that mean? Im not informed, although I read the Newspaper everyday, or their not that important, or their just so secret more so then the CIA??? What gives

[Atreyu]

Theyre secrecy ensures thier success. Look at this link. http://www.forces.gc.ca/dcds/units/jtf2 ... cast_e.asp

You want to know more..just go to DHTC and try and look around. You'll understand more than you would like. Let sleeping dogs lie!

[TheLetterX]

UofSaskatchewan UofSaskatchewan:

Ya know, untill two years ago, before Afghanistan, Ive never heard of the JTF-2 or whatever. Ive never even heard of the CSIS. Whate does that mean? Im not informed, although I read the Newspaper everyday, or their not that important, or their just so secret more so then the CIA??? What gives

I have to give a thumbs up for the Canadian government to keep certain things a secret from it's own population. JTF-2 was very well guarded secret for a little while and still is towards the population at large and with good reason. While other countries will flaunt their SOFs like the SAS, SBS and the Australian SAS, Canada decided to keep them a secret still to this day.

As for CSIS, it stands for Canadian Security Intelligence Service and think of them as our version of the FBI but with a more CIA feel to them but the very big difference between CSIS and CIA is the fact that CSIS will only focus on local events within Canada. They won't send out spooks to other countries to go on kill missions but rather, cooperate with the CSE (Communications Security Establishment) to intercept possible communications that might affect Canadians. And then if they need to, act on the information if they can within Canada.

[fred22]

they have a webpage.
http://www.forces.gc.ca/dcds/units/jtf2/default_e.asp
I think myself there is far to much emphasis on SF in the literature. The snipers in Afghanistan were mostly regular infantry from the PPCLI. They(JTF2) are looking to double their strength which means they lower the standards or drain all the keeners from the regular infantry regiments. Not a great trade off in my opinion. The three reg force infantry regiments are the core of the army along with supporting arms and they are so undermanned that when they deploy they are augmented to the tune of 20 to 30 percent by reservists on the spear point . Enlarging the SF like this is not a good thing in terms of the combat effectiveness of the entire army IMO. If the overall size of the army were increased dramatically then maybe yes.
Cheers
fred

[chrisfer]

Fred22 is definately right about one thing we need more armed forces, having to gather men from different units and put them together to form a task force is ridiculous. Each Battalion should be fully mannned and trained together. It's amazing that each consecutive gov't (mostly liberal) forgets 2world wars, Korea, middle east, terrorism etc. and feels Canada is just so nice no one would want to bother us. But I'm getting distracted. As for SF, try to realize that they are not a high powered secret weapon that we have ready to disable any threat. They have specialized training, weapons and tactics that differ from Reg Infantry so that they can accomplish the missions that they are tasked with. I believe the need for secrecy of JTF-2 is more a design of a secretive gov't trying to hide expenditures then anything else. Having a well known SF force can be a detterent to potential attackers. The JTF-2 should expand and fill the roles the U.S. SF forces fill now. As Afghanistan has shown SF can play a very crucial role if they are given the right mission in the right place at the right time.
Don't think of them as Elite commandos, think of them as a specialized branch of the military assigned missions other branches are not trained for.
On a side note does anyone know the capabilities of the Canadian armed forces to respond to an NBC attack on our country. Personnel equipment, response times?.

[canadian1971]

The Devils Brigade!!!! Now those boys kicked some ass!!

Canadians and Americans was it not? I heard after the war, when they were being broken up, that when the Canadians fell out of formation,(or was it the Americans?), the other country, out of respect for thier friends, never closed ranks(which would be the norm would it not?). Please correct me if I'm wrong.

I saw a documentry on the Canadians in Afganistan. They were talking to an American officer who said he asked one of the Canadian snipers(pretty sure they were PPCLI) to stop a vehicle that was traveling on a road some 1500 meters away. The officer said...?"I thought he would shot out a tire, or the engine block, but no, he shots the driver in the head. I think I'll be more specific next time"?(not exact, but along those lines).....and a big grin on his face as he said the last part.

Our forces maybe small in number, but as the old saying goes...."It's not the size of the dog in the fight, it's the size of the fight in the dog!"

[Atreyu]

I was nearly 6 years in the regular force. Not to put anyone down, but have any of you actually served in JTF2 or any other specialized units? FYI, JTF2 is not our only specialist unit, and I'm no refering to the C.A.R. (God bless the Airborne). The personelle in any specialist units have lives of thier own along with families. I'm merely saying that once you have been on and conducted any type of Op, you too would appreciate secrecy. There are instances where members of individual units, and in some cases, the soldiers personally, have had bounties put on thier lives for things they have done. Publicising the exsistance of the unit is fine, but no more than that. That is one very simple to understand reason why specialist soldiers rarely give interviews and when they do so they insist on anonyminity.

As for us needing a larger military, the lesson of unpreparedness was never heeded after the disaster of the Great War. The reason the Canadian Forces are so well trained is that they have no choice. Thier own government won't even give them the tools they need to do thier jobs. In terms of training quality, the Canadian Forces were, at one time, second only to the I.D.F. (Israeli Defence Forces). Now... who knows. Personally, I have a plan...once the 3 reg regiments are brought up to strength -LOL- start the Black Watch (RHR) again, and re-activate the C.A.R. ! Proper structure of a reg't is 30 men to a platoon, 3 platoons to a company, 3 companies to a battalion, and 3 battalions to a regiment. Lets see if the gov't can get anywhere close to that. LOL

Just my 2 cents.

[fred22]

Hi there,
One does not have to serve in a specialist unit to realise their worth and limitations. JTF 2 is like a good scalpel but one needs an axe to chop down a tree. In as regards to their secrecy it is as it should be but given conventional warfighting and peacemaking roles they are an adjunct to what should be the much more numerous regualar infanteers.
I really like the idea of making the Black watch a reg force unit again. They were a proud and highly lethal bunch.
A good way to get good bang for the buck is to increase the size and realistic training for the reserves. properly funded and trained the citizen soldier from Canda has few equals. Thirty percent of the rifles at the battle of Medak pocket were reservists and they did very well indeed.
The CAR in my opinion got what they deserved. There were numerous outstanding individuals in the unit but jump capabilty is of little use to us now and those boys thought they were a law unto themselves. They bought shame on the uniform and the reputation of our army.
Cheers
fred