Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cs.utexas.edu!rutgers!att!cbnews!military
From: henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: how useful is an "integrated" military?
Message-ID: <10323@cbnews.ATT.COM>
Date: 18 Oct 89 02:49:33 GMT
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From: henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer)
>From: gamiddleton@watmath.waterloo.edu (Guy Middleton)
>Several years ago, the Canadian armed forces were merged into a single unit,
>the Canadian Forces.  No more Army, Nave, or Air Force -- a single command
>structure.  At least that is the impression given to the public.
>So, a question:  was the apparent unification of the forces merely a public
>relations exercise, or what?  If not, was there any benefit?

The Canadian Forces have been slowly drifting back to an Army/Navy/AirForce
structure, with some exceptions.  The idea is sound in theory, but imposed
from above on an existing military, it didn't work as well as hoped.

One big complication, here as in the US, is that each major sub-unit tends
to set up a fairly expensive headquarters apparatus, so there is much
political pressure to minimize the number of sub-units.  This is why, for
example, the USAF's Aerospace Defense Command disappeared.  It was absorbed
into Tactical Air Command, not because their missions were at all similar,
but because it looked like a good way to cut expenses, and ADC no longer had
the political clout to fight it.  I smell similar factors in some of the
internal-structure changes in the Canadian forces in recent years.

                                     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
                                 uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu