Canadian Army has 42,000 soldiers: 23,000 regulars, 19,000 reserves and 5,300 northern rangers. This small force is well trained. Canadians think of our military in terms of peacekeepers not in its ability to fight in a war. Most Canadians support our troops, they are just unwilling to join the ranks.
The government puts ads on tv to encourage more Canadians to join any branch of the military. However, they always fall short in their recruitment drives. This problem is bigger than our military budget issues which gets all the attention, being only 1.3% of GDP in 2019.
US spends 3.4% of its GDP and in 1960 Canada spent over 4% of GDP on our military. Australia is now at 1.9% and so should we be. With the extra funding we could fill in all the gaps in our military. To truly have a capable fast response force ready to deploy, where ever and whenever needed. This would be doing our part to make the world a safer place for all.
The only solution to recruitment is to target other groups of Canadians more aggressively. Women make up only a small portion of our military. They could be the best source of new blood. Canada could also target new immigrants with “new citizens are proud to serve” or some other more direct policy.
Maybe if we spent more on our military and turned it from a peacekeeping force into a military force we would get more recruits.
image sources
- 800px-RMC_Sandhurst_2009: Ahodges7 | CC BY-SA 3.0 Unported