PATRON H.R.H. THE PRINCE PHILIP DUKE OF EDINBURGH OTTAWA BRANCH THE NAVAL OFFICERS ASSOCIATION OF CANADA Box 505, Station B, Ottawa, ON K1P 5P6 “To make all levels of Government and the general public clearly aware of the vital need for, and value of adequate and effective Maritime security forces to protect and further the interests of Canada.” (Branch Constitution, Article III.) 44.01 “Trying the depth of the water and the quality of the bottom line.…” May, 2008 The New NATO With Table Mountain in the background, in September 2007 HMCS Toronto sails off Cape Town, South Africa as part of Standing NATO Maritime Group One. See the story by the Commanding Officer, Cdr Steve Virgin, starting on page 8, along with the cover story on the new NATO starting on page 4. Soundings May 2008 1 ______ ___________________________________________________________________________________________________ From the President By Richard Gimblett With luck, this issue Russ expanded his of Soundings will be posted mandate beyond our local In this edition: to our web-site before the confines (quite rightly to my Branch Annual General view, and with the support Meeting on May 5 th ; more of National President Ray likely you will be reading Zuliani) to undertake a P.2 From the President the mailed-out hard copy in detailed survey of the needs arrears of that event. It is and aspirations of our P.3 Library hard to believe that yet present national another of our regular membership as well as P.3 Spring Reception September-May “gathering” potential members in the seasons is coming to an fleet and ashore. Combining P.4 New NATO end. In many respects, the that material with similar year seemed to be going by efforts over the past decade, P.7 Armistice Sunday in slow time, but now with and applying the latest the benefit of 20/20 statistical analytic and P.8 Toronto and SNMG1 hindsight, it proves to have marketing techniques, he been an exceptionally busy arrived at some forty-five P.11 NOAC Strategic year – and dare I say a wide-ranging but detailed Business Plan productive one. recommendations along Identifying highlights with an ambitious but P.13 Sub-Lieutenant on is always a risky business, cohesive implementation Down for fear of leaving plan. The Executive something out and causing Summary from the report is P.15 Bytown Bridge unintended slight to those reproduced elsewhere in who have worked so hard, Soundings , and I commend P.15 Salty Dips largely in the background, it to your close review. Russ pulling it all together. is scheduled to address P.15 Joint Meeting with However, I want to point to both our local and the SNAME, et al. two items of special national AGM on this topic, interest. and I know there is much P.17 Remember The first is that I am grist for discussion. I delighted to report that in honestly feel that we have P.17 Eulogy for GG my hands is Russ Fowler’s arrived at the make-or- “Strategic Business Plan to break point on this issue, P.19 Bytown Heritage Address Declining NOAC and the decisions we make Membership.” Prepared for (or don’t) in the next few P.20 CNAG us as an Organizational months are critical to our Consulting Project in future. P.21 Carleton Report meeting the requirements of The second highlight the MBA programme at was the very successful P.22 Summer of ’64 Part 1 Royal Roads University, relationship we have Russ’s study will hopefully developed with our sister P.27 Officers and prove to be not just another organization of the Society Directors academic tome that will be of Naval Architects and filed to gather dust with Marine Engineers (SNAME), P.28 Branch Information previous efforts into this largely at the instigation of increasingly pressing issue. Glenn Walters , current 2 Soundings May 2008 _________________________________________________________________________________________________________ president of the regional theme being recognition of Christmas Reception, soon SNAME branch, but the 50 th anniversary of the to be repeated in its Spring fostered also by the St Lawrence Seaway. Edition. See you there! common Submariners More generally, we Yours aye, Rich Association link he shares can look back on a quite with our Vice-President Bob successful year of activities, Bush . The omnibus session including the range of on the Arctic that we hosted speakers at our monthly in February at the Museum branch meetings and the of Civilization was wildly occasional “Gratis Growlies” successful, and is a model luncheon sessions at for future endeavours. Bytown Mess. And not to Already they are looking forget the more purely ahead to do something next entertainment side, there year, with one possible was of course our George Kolisnek The renovations of the room have New Director-at-Large greatly improved the capability for book shelving Concerned about the for coming We welcome lack of space on these and multitude of George Kolisnek to topics, the Librarian is requesting from the the Branch Board of membership their guidance for acceptance of Directors as Director- book donations and for shelving of books. The deadline for comments is 31 May 2008. at-Large, to be confirmed at the Editor’s Note: Welcome aboard, Carl, upcoming Branch as the Librarian and as a member of the AGM. His duties will be to take on special Board of Directors, to be confirmed at the projects as they arise. upcoming Branch AGM. Spring Reception Ottawa Branch Library By Ken Lait By Carl Gagnon This is just a reminder about the The most signi- upcoming annual Spring Reception . ficant change in the The Fall/Christmas Reception was a library was the change great success and we are looking for another of watch; in September good turnout at the Spring Reception. This 2007 Carl Gagnon took is your opportunity to grill those snowbirds over the library from you haven’t seen yet and to renew G.G. Armstrong . acquaintances that may have been The library snowbound through this very long winter. It counts, on its lists, more than 920 titles and is also an opportunity to meet in person your videos. The new acquisitions have been executive committee members and to let posted and are available in the library. them know what you want for the The practice of sending duplicate 2008/2009 season, if you missed the AGM books to HMC Ships and Carleton Ottawa on May 5th. and exchanging books with the Friends of We look forward to seeing everyone: the Canadian War Museum, which helps us acquire titles not otherwise available and at the same time lets us dispose of duplications 1700 to 1930 and military books of lesser interest to our Monday, June 2nd 2008 readers, will continue until further notice. HMCS Bytown Soundings May 2008 3 ______ ___________________________________________________________________________________________________ The New NATO By Cdr Larry Trim Strategic Communications, Chief Maritime Staff The purpose of this article is to security problems by utilizing an effective explore the “new NATO” and in particular Western European Union (WEU). In the early explain how Canada participates from a days after the Cold War, there were two naval perspective. I will begin with what is camps: those on the one hand who thought the new NATO and also what is “NATO that NATO should remain a collective defense transformation”. Once we fully understand organization; and those on the other who why and how NATO is becoming “new”, we sought to expand NATO into an organization will then discuss the naval players and how that could take on a larger role within the they contribute to NATO missions. This will entire European security domain. 1 With the be followed by recent examples of Canadian total disintegration of the Balkans, the participation, so as to fully understand the Europeans quickly realized that they were revised command structure within NATO. woefully under-prepared to deal with the The end of the Cold War was degraded security situation, either by an ad postulated by critics as the start of the hoc arrangement or via the WEU. NATO demise for the Alliance. With the Warsaw moved decisively, and over the next eight Pact dismantled, NATO was seen as irrelevant, and some thought that the 1 The New NATO and the Evolution of Peacekeeping: European nations could deal with any Implication for Canada. Http://www.parl.gc.ca/36/2/parbus , accessed 5 March 2008. 4 Soundings May 2008 _________________________________________________________________________________________________________ years the character of NATO began to operational concepts 4. Finally, ACT change, from providing collective defense for “implements by persuading nations the membership to providing general security individually and collectively to acquire the to member countries and their neighbours. capability, and provides the education and This was the genesis of the Partnership for training, and enabling concepts to be Peace activities, and the general expansion of implemented by NATO forces”. The NATO NATO to include countries that were, only a Response Force is one example of an ACT few years before, considered the enemy. In transformation initiative. fact in 1999, Poland, Hungary and the Czech The NATO nations have significantly Republic became members. 2 Since then increased their scope of military operations seven other eastern European nations since the early 1990s. NATO has maintained (Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, a presence in the Balkans and continued to Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia) have joined. work with Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, And at the recent Bucharest summit, Albania and Montenegro under the umbrella of and Croatia were invited to start accession Partnership for Peace Programmes. The talks. largest operations currently underway In the post-9/11 situation NATO include leading the International Security quickly realized that the transformation Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan, process that it had been diligently following establishing a training mission in Iraq, and needed to become more synchronized with providing logistic support to the African the Global War on Terror.