Canada's military hit glitches at Vimy centennial

Tom Spears, Ottawa Citizen

Published on: February 11, 2018

Bureaucratic breakdowns and late planning left the
Department of National Defence scrambling as it
attempted to plan an event that had been on the
calendar for 100 years, new documents reveal.

A little more than two weeks before a military contingent of 285 had to arrive in France for the Vimy centennial event last April, DND still hadn’t finalized their orders.

The Defence Department was preparing for Vimy 100, the anniversary of one of Canada’s most renowned battles, the same commemoration that left Veterans Affairs with its hands full, previous documents have shown. Veterans Affairs, which was in charge of the event, drew complaints from tourists when the toilets and drinking water ran short and buses left people stranded.

DND had different problems and documents newly released under access to information legislation paint a picture of the military’s tribulations in trying to run an operation in France as time ran short.

Among the problems outlined in the documents:

• The department had neglected to find lodging until it was too late, with the result that its personnel had to be driven from Belgium.

• There wasn’t enough time for military bands to rehearse.

• DND decided to create a “bespoke operation” where decisions in France had to come from Ottawa, not from commanders on the scene.

• A lack of communication caused issues. Senior personnel in France from the two Canadian departments — DND and Veterans Affairs — weren’t always allowed to talk to each other, leading to critical planning information being received late or not at all.

For the most part, the issues DND faced came down to timing.

According to the “after action report” — a standard internal analysis document — obtained by this newspaper, final operational orders from DND didn’t go out until March 20, just 16 days shy of a series of events beginning April 6. That led to a tight schedule made worse by the fact that many staff are traditionally on leave in March, using up vacation time that otherwise disappears, the report says.


And with a tight schedule came other pitfalls.

DND sent 85 musicians — along with other personnel, including gun crews for an artillery salute — to France to perform at the event, and according to the department, a lack of preparation time led to an error-filled performance.

The musicians didn’t even have time to perform a full rehearsal.

“The result was a number of miscues and errors” that detracted from the overall event, the report says. (Spectators didn’t seem to notice the miscues, however. Letters from visitors afterward were highly complimentary of the performances.)

No one, the report says, ever told those participating that the Vimy ceremony was a “Government of Canada signature event” and should take precedence over the contingent’s other performances in France.

While the report says the number of events scheduled made it difficult to book rehearsal time for its personnel, another issue that plagued the department was late travel planning.

Accommodation was a bigger problem. “Accommodation contracting was started late and as a result lodging in the activity area was not available. This resulted in the contingent being lodged an average of 90 minutes’ drive from the operational area.

“This caused a ripple effect on the ability for the contingent to adequately prepare and synchronize the rehearsal. Travel became the main constraint to the tactical execution,” it says — “including delivery of meals.”

DND was also late in arranging air transport.

In addition to the time crunch, there was also confusion resulting from direct control by Ottawa.

The directorate of history and heritage at DND had been running commemorative operations since 2003. The report says that these staff offered suggestions to Canadian Joint Operations Command (CJOC) but headquarters instead wanted a “bespoke operation” where it ran the show directly. The result was “unclear direction on how to proceed” and this “led to considerable confusion at the tactical level (i.e. for those in France) particularly in regards to tactical level logistical planning.”

“This lack of clarity appeared to be particularly disconcerting for VAC (Veterans Affairs); at times it was unclear to whom VAC needed to speak to ensure the tactical level effect was delivered,” it says.

The fact that all orders had to come from Ottawa “became a hindrance to the delivery of the events.”

And then there was the lack of communication between DND and Veteran Affairs.

“The tactical level commander was not permitted to liaise directly with the VAC operations staff at the VAC TF (task force) level. This resulted in the tactical commander either receiving critical information late or not at all, leading to conflict between the VAC production company and the (DND) contingent.”

Maj. Indira Thackorie of DND’s public affairs office said the “after action report” has already been useful because it has allowed the military to plan for smoother results at events since Vimy 100, including the 75th anniversary of the Dieppe Raid last August, and future events, such as the centennial of the end of the First World War.

“We’ll do something in Belgium, probably on the 11th of November” and perhaps others dates near that time, she said.

“We are in Europe right now preparing for that. We are looking for accommodations as we speak, trying to learn from all this.”

The planning for accommodation at Vimy was done a year in advance but still ran into a shortage of hotels, she said. There was high demand from tourists, and European hotels tend to be small, she noted. Some of the contingent stayed at Mons, in Belgium.

And next time, Thackorie says, there will be more rehearsal time.

“We did have rehearsal time on the monument itself, but from the ground level their perspective was we could have used some more. And then we take that criticism and the next event that we plan we say, hey, this rehearsal time didn’t work for Vimy. Let’s see if we can squeeze some more rehearsal time in.”

http://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-news/canadas-military-hit-glitches-at-vimy-centennial