Canadian General to Command coalition team in Iraqi

By: Mathew Fisher, National Post 

Canadian Brigadier-General David Anderson is to command a coalition team — including as many as 12 other Canadians — that is to work with Iraq’s security ministries in Baghdad as they prepare battle plans for the long-anticipated offensive to drive the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant out of Mosul and northwestern Iraq.

Lt.-Gen. Steve Bowes — who commands all Canadian troops on operations at home and abroad — revealed the key appointment, during an interview with the National Post, in which he discussed details of what Canada’s new mission in Iraq and the region will look like when it becomes operational in July.

Anderson’s name was later confirmed to the Post by Commander Nathalie Garcia.

Anderson served with the infantry in Afghanistan before commanding an army brigade in western Canada. He is to be responsible for ensuring that “the lines of communication and the intents and actions fire both ways,” said Bowes, who runs Canadian Joint Operations Command.


Four RCAF Griffon helicopters being sent to Iraq are to be deployed exclusively with elite Canadian Special Forces Operations Command troops who are advising and mentoring Kurdish peshmerga forces, Bowes said.

Canada was conducting “a ground-air threat assessment” so the helicopters would be able to react to whatever ISIL might try to do to them, said the three-star general, who served two tours in Afghanistan. “They will certainly go with a defence suite.”

Griffons that Canada deployed to Afghanistan were armoured and equipped with lethal Gatling guns manned by door gunners.

Matthew Fisher/Postmedia NewsLt.-Gen Steve Bowes

Bowes confirmed that, as has been the case since the Harper government first sent military advisers to Iraq in late 2014, only elite and secretive Canadian special forces commandos — rather than conventional forces — would assist the Peshmerga, whose front-line troops are dug in on a strategically important ridge that looks down on Mosul and the Tigris River Valley.

Although the Trudeau government withdrew the RCAF’s Kuwait-based CF-18s from combat operations over Iraq and Syria last month, the number of Canadians helping Iraq fight ISIL is to grow to 830 from about 600. The exact locations and jobs of those Canadians who are to be based in Iraq and neighbouring countries was discussed recently at a conference with U.S. Central Command and partner nations.

“A lot of positions were vacant within the coalition structure. We are picking up some of them,” Bowes said.

“At the moment, in what they call the building partner capacity sites, they are oversubscribed in trainers and undersubscribed in troops to train, but the mission will evolve. So, in a year’s time, who really knows.”

The Canadian Forces were aware of reports ISIL has been using chemical weapons but his troops had excellent equipment and training to deal with such threats, the general said.

“The enemy, ISIL, Daesh (its acronym in Arabic), has shown an ability to metastasize and change tactics and we try to keep abreast of them,” he said.

“For example, how they have been converting dump trucks, putting armour plates on them and creating vehicle-borne improvised explosive devices. That shows the degree to which they are capable of taking anything and changing it into a weapon.”

Brig.-Gen. Shane Brennan, who led a Canadian team that mentored Afghan security forces in Kandahar, is to be the next public lead of Joint Task Force-Iraq. Like the previous three JTF-I commanders, who were from the RCAF, Brennan, who is an army officer, is to be based at an airfield in Kuwait that serves as the joint coalition headquarters.

Some of the Canadians being sent to the Middle East are to join another Canadian Afghan vet, Brig.-Gen. Greg Smith, on the staff of a U.S. army major-general in Baghdad. Others are to be part of an expanded Canadian intelligence capability or tasked with supporting troops in Iraq by expanding the logistics footprint in Kuwait.

Sgt Donald Clark, Army NewsFour RCAF Griffon helicopters being sent to Iraq are to be deployed exclusively with elite Canadian Special Forces Operations Command troops who are advising and mentoring Kurdish peshmerga forces, Bowes said

“The mission is complex, as you can imagine, with people all over the place,” Bowes said. “What we have to go through is a very human process of identifying the people and matching them to the positions and then giving themselves sufficient time to prepare themselves professionally with pre-deployment training.”

As well as weapons and other specific military training, those troops selected for what the defence department calls Operation Impact would undergo cultural training specific to their assignments with the Iraqi Kurds or Iraqi Arabs.

“Be mindful that ours is a small mission,” that should not be compared with the much larger combat operation that Canada undertook in Kandahar, Bowes said, adding that not only the military was involved in Iraq but there were “significant whole-of-government initiatives underway in Ottawa to support the mission.”

Bowes was upbeat about the somewhat expanded ground duties that Canada was taking on in Iraq.

“No fears and nothing that keeps me awake,” Bowes said. “What I think about a lot is whether I am doing everything I can to enable the chief (Gen. Jon Vance) and other leaders to ensure that our (political) leadership in this country understands the environment in which we have deployed personnel.”

The general’s mornings began early, reading reports from international news organizations such as Al-Jazeera before attending classified briefings with his staff who monitor everything from volcanoes to terrorist attacks and conflicts and potential conflicts worldwide, especially in eastern Europe and the Middle East.

“You can’t just look at northern Iraq, or Baghdad or Kuwait in isolation,” he said. “You have to be able to look at the region. You have to be able to monitor what is going on around it and understand how things can shift. On the political level this is an extraordinarily complex part of the world.”

Canada in Iraq: Government to Vote on New ISIS Mission, March 8

By TIM NAUMETZ | The Hill Times 
Published: Friday, 02/26/2016 1

A House of Commons vote on the Liberal government’s decision to pull Canadian fighter planes out of air strikes against Islamic State fighters in Iraq and Syria while tripling the number of Canadian soldiers near front lines with Iraqi security forces is set to be held on Tuesday, March 8, according to a schedule all sides agreed to this week.

A motion from Prime Minister Justin Trudeau (Papineau, Que.) calling on the Commons to support the government’s renewed Iraq mission is bound to pass with the Liberal majority.

The decision to withdraw Canada’s six CF-18 fighter planes from U.S.-lead coalition air strikes against ISIL fighting positions and other targets while beefing other military components, including helicopter transport support for Canadian special forces soldiers advising Kurdish Peshmerga troops, dominated most of the opposition arguments in the extended debate.

NDP Leader Tom Mulcair (Outremont, Que.) declared at the outset on Wednesday, Feb. 17, that his MPs would vote against the motion on grounds Canadian soldiers are taking part in ground combat by serving close to frontlines with the Peshmerga soldiers and having exchanged fire with ISIL soldiers, targeted air strikes against ISIL targets along front lines of battle and taken part in defending a Peshmerga compound against a major ISIL assault last December.

A Canadian CF-18 fighter jet, along with two French warplanes, helped to repel the attack.

Conservative Leader Rona Ambrose (Sturgeon River-Parkland, Alta.) has made it clear the Conservative party is likely to oppose Mr. Trudeau’s motion, after she moved an amendment on the first day of the debate calling on the Commons instead to urge the government to “re-establish Canada’s influence within the international decision-making process in the fight against terrorism and rebuild the trust Canada has lost with its allies by reversing its decision to withdraw, which essentially removes Canada from any combat role.”

Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan (Vancouver South, B.C.), however, told the Senate this week the government plan will maintain the close relationship between Canadian special operation troops and Peshmerga security forces they are currently with, including to the point Iraqi security forces begin a ground offensive to re-capture the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, overrun by ISIL fighters after they began attacks against Iraqi government and military positions in 2014.

“As the Iraqi security forces take cities, the U.S. was already there for a significant amount of time. We need to be able to train the Iraqi security forces, because if you realize how the problem happened in the first place, they weren't able to hold ground, and Daesh [ISIL] was able to take over,” Mr. Sajjan told Senators on Wednesday when he appeared for a special Question Period.

“As we re-take those cities, keep in mind we need to leave troops on the ground in the cities as you go to the next one. You need to train a significant number of troops to be able to have an eventual defeat,” Mr. Sajjan said in response to questions. “You cannot defeat an enemy like this from the air, so we have adjusted our mission to be more suited towards defeat of Daesh alongside our coalition partners, making sure a critical piece in the north, where we're at, remains stable, and that we have trained the right security force, not just external, but internal as well.”

He added: “As the Iraqi security forces make their way up, coming up to Mosul, we will be very close to that line. It's part of a wider plan to make sure of the eventual defeat of ISIL. I am not talking about our CF-18s or air strikes or dropping bombs. I am talking about the defeat of the enemy, which is Daesh. The only way we can do this is by making sure that we train the Iraqi security forces to be able to hold their ground, and, more importantly, to keep the ground and the gains after the defeat is complete. When they can maintain the stability in that nation, then we can work on the political piece as well to keep the entire region stable.”

Mr. Sajjan said Thursday the reference to Canadian soldiers being close to the front line when Iraqi security forces eventually attack ISIL troops holding Mosul is consistent with the existing “advise and assist” role for the Canadians. “The training mission as it stands, as it always ways, does not change,” Mr. Sajjan said in response to a question about his statement in the Senate. “Our troops are providing the Peshmerga the advise and assist function, making sure that they are able plan their defences and making sure that they can adjust to the needs of the threat, but we also do a lot of work for the internal security as well, so there’s a lot of moving parts, but the advise and assist mission, from as it was, does not change.”

Conservative MP James Bezan (Selkirk-Interlake-Eastman, Man.) told The Hill Times he believes the debate in the House on the motion was worthwhile, even though the result of the vote has been known from the start. “We knew what the outcome was going to be, but at least everybody has had a chance to voice their opinion. I’m satisfied that we’ve had enough time to have that debate and that our position was put out there clearly, that the CF-18s need to be in the fight,” Mr. Bezan said.

Mr. Trudeau made a point of noting, when he announced the renewed Canadian mission, which includes more than $1-billion of humanitarian and civil society development in the war-torn region, and confirmed the plan would go to a motion and debate in the Commons, that Cabinet has the authority to make decisions over international treaties and combat operations without the consent of Parliament.

tnaumetz@hilltimes.com
The Hill Times

Current Liberal Advisory on Iraq Criticized Tories on "Non-Combat"

Written by: LEE BERTHIAUME Ottawa Citizen

The Current Liberal Foreign Affairs Advisory also backed airstrikes against the Islamic State.

Less than a year before becoming Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s foreign policy guru, Roland Paris blasted the Conservative government for not being upfront about the fact that Canadian troops in northern Iraq were indeed engaged in combat.

The comments were made in a January 2015 blog post written for the University of Ottawa’s Centre for International Policy Studies, where Paris was director. They came after the Tories revealed that Canadian soldiers had been operating on the front lines with the Kurdish forces they were advising and assisting.

The Conservatives as well as senior military officers maintained the mission was non-combat, even though Canadian troops were calling in airstrikes and had engaged in firefights with Islamic State fighters. But Paris accused the government of “redefining” combat, and said Canadians deserved the truth.

“Our national government — regardless of the political party in power — must be forthright with Canadians about something as serious as putting Canadian soldiers into combat situations,” Paris wrote.

“Wars, especially long wars (as this one is likely to be), must be rooted in public trust. A lack of forthrightness erodes that trust.”

The Trudeau government is now presiding over the exact same type of mission. And like the Conservatives before them, they insist Canadians are not engaged in combat.

The fact the Liberals have followed the Conservatives in also using the term non-combat, even though Canadian soldiers are doing the same thing as before, has emerged as a political headache for the government after it promised during the election to end combat operations.

In his blog post, Paris raised and then answered nine questions about the Iraq mission. The first: “Is Canada engaged in ground combat?” His answer: “Yes.” Paris went on to accuse prime minister Stephen Harper and defence chief Gen. Tom Lawson of “walking a tightrope” in trying to explain why it isn’t combat.

Paris, who was appointed Trudeau’s foreign policy adviser in November, wrote that the Iraq mission had become a victim of “mission creep,” in which a small military operation slowly drags a country deeper into war.

“It became clear last week that the terms of Canada’s operation had changed,” Paris said. “Canada’s new front-line role — as well as our leaders’ redefinition of what counts as combat — unquestionably represent mission creep.”

As part of its new mission in Iraq and Syria, the Liberal government has ended Canadian airstrikes against Islamic State. But it has also tripled the number of soldiers assigned to work with Kurdish forces to 200, and will deploy helicopters to help move the troops and ferry equipment and supplies.

Gen. Jonathan Vance, the chief of defence staff, has said there will be no change to what Canadian troops are doing there. This includes accompanying Kurdish forces to the front lines, calling in airstrikes and fighting Islamic State forces when necessary.

But the government and Vance insist the mission is non-combat. Vance rejected suggestions Friday that he was tailoring the definition of combat to suit the Liberal government’s needs, saying he was the “expert on what is combat,” and telling those who don’t like his definition: “Too bad.”

In his blog post, Paris said Canada was the first country to “tinker with the definition of ‘ combat’ and move ‘advisers’ into a front-line role.” And he said having Canadian soldiers on the front lines with the Kurdish forces they are “advising and assisting” was unnecessary.

“In the final years of the Canadian mission in Afghanistan, for instance, our troops trained Afghan forces in military facilities behind the wire and did not accompany Afghan forces on tactical operations,” he wrote.

“Indeed, the U.S. military indicated last week that American troops currently in Iraq are not being deployed with Iraqi units to front-line positions. Rather, they are training Iraqis behind the wire at four major military bases.

“The assertion that deploying Canadian troops to the front lines is an inevitable element of advising and assisting is, therefore, misleading.”

Paris did support expanding Canada’s mission in northern Iraq, noting that Australia had about 200 soldiers on the ground. But he said such an increase in the number of Canadian trainers should be done “while simultaneously clarifying and tightening guidelines on the deployment of these forces to front-line positions.”

He also called for a redoubling of non-military assistance to address the root causes of instability in the Middle East and North Africa, and offered qualified support for Canada continuing to bomb Islamic State in Iraq.

“As long as Canada’s CF18s can play a useful role,” he wrote, “it is reasonable to continue this deployment, provided we remain convinced that the overall mission is achievable, and that there are not more compelling demands for the CF-18s when we have to make this decision.”

Canadian warplanes conducted their last airstrikes in Iraq and Syria last week.

Canada in Iraq: U.S. Applauds Canada’s Revamped Mission

Written by: Lee Berthiaume,  

Published in the Monday, February 9, 2016 Ottawa Citizen - NP Section 

Mission meets coalition’s needs, U.S. envoy says

"IF YOU THINK CANADA IS A FREE RIDER BECAUSE WE ARE NOT PARTICIPATING ANYMORE TO THE AIRSTRIKES, THEN GERMANY IS A FREE RIDER. AND ITALY. AND ABOUT 50 MEMBERS OF THE COALITION. THIS IS NOT THE CASE." — FOREIGN AFFAIRS MINISTER STÉPHANE DION

The U.S. has headed off a potential controversy by giving the Liberal government a thumbs-up over its plan to stop bombing ISIL in Iraq and Syria, and instead concentrate on military training, diplomacy and aid.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau unveiled the new mission Monday, as Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan prepared to travel to a NATO defence ministers meeting in Brussels. The plan includes tripling the number of troops training Kurdish forces in northern Iraq to 200, while ending the bombing campaign by Feb. 22.

There had been fears the U.S. and other allies would react negatively to the plan to withdraw Canadian fighter jets from the region, particularly at a time when other countries such as the Netherlands and Australia are expanding their participation in the bombing campaign.

But speaking in Washington, the Pentagon’s chief spokesman, Peter Cook, praised the new mission, describing it as the kind of response U.S. Defence Secretary Ashton Carter has been looking for from anti-ISIL coalition members.

“The secretary sees these as significant contributions,” Cook told reporters, “and he appreciates the decision by the Trudeau government to step up Canada’s role in the campaign at this critical time.”

In a separate statement, U.S. Ambassador to Canada Bruce Heyman said Canada’s “significant contributions” are “in line with the coalition’s current needs.” That includes trainers, as well as more than $1 billion in humanitarian and longer-term aid. Canada is also beefing up its diplomatic presence in the region.

But Heyman left the door open to more contributions in the future.

“Canada remains an essential partner in the counter-Daesh mission,” he said, using another name for ISIL, “and we will continue to discuss with all coalition partners additional ways to intensify efforts.”

Foreign Affairs Minister Stéphane Dion said in an interview he had spoken to French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius and was scheduled to talk with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry.

“It’s not for me to put words in their mouth, but I’m very confident that both of them will be very positive,” he said.

Carter said two weeks ago there should be “no free riders” in the U.S.-led coalition fighting ISIL. While his comments were largely aimed at Turkey and some Arab states, critics of the Liberal government suggested the comment could apply equally well to Canada.

“If you think Canada is a free rider because we are not participating anymore to the airstrikes, then Germany is a free rider. And Italy. And about 50 members of the coalition,” Dion said. “This is not the case.

“In fact, in order to be more effective, we needed to deploy a larger panoply of our expertise, and to do it in a very integrated way with what our allies are doing. We are not alone in this fight. We are part of a coalition, and we looked at the best way for us to be optimally effective within the coalition.”

Experts on both sides of the border said the Americans’ biggest fear was the Liberal government would withdraw the fighter jets as soon as it was elected to power in October. The fact Canada is keeping its surveillance and refuelling planes in Iraq and Syria also helps.

Chris Sands, director of Canadian studies at Johns Hopkins University in Washington, said the expanded training mission is important because many allies don’t want to put troops on the front lines with the Kurds.

Still, there was skepticism over Washington’s overwhelming praise.

“I’m not sure this will be greeted with a great deal of hand clapping down in Washington,” said former Canadian diplomat Colin Robertson, now vicepresident of the Canadian Global Affairs Institute. “There’ ll be disappointment because they thought maybe they could change the Liberal government’s mind.”

Added Sands: “I think people here will say ‘OK, fine. At least they’re not walking away.’ ”

Den Tandt: Canada is Stepping Back to War with ISIS Mission Update

Published by Michael Den Tandt, National Post 

February 9, 2016 

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s revamped military mission in Iraq — because he wears it now, for good or ill — is neither cowardly appeasement, as the Conservatives allege, or a perilous escalation, as New Democrats would have you believe. But of the two themes, the second is closer to the mark.

As is the custom with Canadian military ventures, clarity and directness vanished or were non-existent from the start. The Conservatives’ soon-to-be-former combat mission, fronted by six Royal Canadian Air Force CF-18 fighter-bombers, was never as robust or aggressive as they or their critics let on. The effort unveiled Monday, with its tripling of the special forces contingent from 69 to 207, will be far more combative — that is to say, risky for those who will carry it out — than the PM’s swords-into-ploughshares rhetoric suggests.

This isn’t to say the new mission is wrong-headed. On the contrary: It appears to be robust internationalism, backed up with lethal force, of a kind Canada hasn’t engaged in since the final pullout from Afghanistan in 2014.

The irony is that politics prevents any of the warring tribes in the House of Commons from saying so.

This is, more than anything else, a replay of 2005, when then-prime minister Paul Martin and then-defence chief Rick Hillier conceived of a multi-pronged military and humanitarian project for Canada in Afghanistan that would clear away any cobwebs left by this country’s non-participation in president George W. Bush’s catastrophic invasion of Iraq in 2003.

That wasn’t the Kandahar mission’s tactical purpose, obviously, but it provided the context. We didn’t do that for you (thank God), the Martin government was saying to Washington, but we can do this for you, and this is both better, and more difficult.

The crack to be papered over in the current case, of course, is the withdrawal of Canada’s CF-18s from the air war in Iraq and Syria, which happens in two weeks, despite the Liberal government still not having managed to articulate why. In their disquisitions about this the PM and his ministers have tied themselves in one rhetorical knot after another, apparently out of a desire to avoid saying the wrong thing, or embarrassing their Obama administration allies. In the process they’ve sustained far more damage than they would have had they been more blunt from the get-go.

If there is a rationale for withdrawing the fighters (beyond that this was a campaign promise), as near as I can figure it, it is as follows: First, the carnage in northern Iraq and Syria, the emergence of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant itself, are primarily an American responsibility. ISIL, formerly al-Qaida in Iraq, formerly members of Saddam Hussein’s Sunni praetorian guard, would not now exist had the Iraqi dictator been left to rot. “If you break it, you own it,” General Colin Powell told his commander-in-chief before the invasion. That was true. Therefore, the American military should be at the sharp end in wiping out ISIL.

The second reason, now coming to the fore with details on the new mission: If Ottawa is tripling the special forces component, boosting overall troops deployed from 650 to 830, and spending a total of $1.6 billion in the region over three years, the cost has to come from somewhere. The PM alluded to this Monday in French, in answer to a question from reporters: “In any mission, there are choices to make. We can’t do everything.” Like Reason #1, this is laced with political pitfalls, which may be why Trudeau mentioned it only in passing. Is the government placing nickels and dimes above preserving human life? The direct answer is that resources are finite and no political party in Ottawa is calling for increased defence spending (though they should).

Finally to a third reason, related to the first two: The Trudeau government is keen to put its own stamp on foreign policy. It wishes to brand itself, domestically and internationally, as a government more interested in helping the needy than obliterating the wicked, to put it simply. Therefore it symbolically sets down Thor’s hammer, the CF-18s, and extends more helping hands, earning it kudos from agencies such as UNICEF and CARE Canada, while also throwing enough new ground muscle into the fight to appease the Pentagon.

This makes a certain kind of sense, from a Liberal political perspective, as it puts them squarely in the centre of the spectrum, taking shots from both left and right.

The wrinkle and the great risk in this, for Trudeau and his government, is precisely that it is so symbolic. For all the Harper government’s vaunted bellicosity, six CF-18s formed a relatively small hammer, in the context of the broader war, and their pilots were not routinely at risk of being shot at or blown up. This changes now. The risk of casualties has at least tripled. Aid requires transport and protection, all of it vulnerable to attack. That is the news here, not the CF-18s. In a modest but deliberate way, Canada is stepping back to war.

Canada & the Middle East: Jordan and Lebanon will be Part of ISIS Focus

This news is a few days old, but I had not gotten around to sharing it yet. Enjoy. 

Written by the Canadian Press: 

QUEBEC -- Canada's new role in the fight against the Islamic State will involve ensuring Jordan and Lebanon remain stable, Foreign Affairs Minister Stephane Dion said Friday after a meeting with his U.S. and Mexican counterparts.

Dion promised that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau will soon announce details of Canada's new deployment within the American-led coalition. The Liberals promised during the election campaign to end Canada's role in the bombing mission over Iraq and Syria.

Canada's role won't focus solely on Iraq, said Dion, adding "we will see what to do about Syria."

Dion added that U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry offered suggestions about how Canada "can be more effective" in the coalition, whose members also include Britain, France and Australia."The two other countries we need to help to make sure they are stable, because they are so key for the region and are affected by the civil war in Syria and the situation in Iraq, and I am speaking of Jordan and Lebanon. These considerations will be in our plan."

"The goal of Canada is to redeploy our efforts in a way that is optimal," Dion said.

Trudeau has been panned at home by the Conservatives and other critics for his plan to end Canada's bombing mission, particularly after six Canadians were killed mid-January by a terror group linked to al-Qaida.

Kerry said he is "absolutely confident" Trudeau will ensure Canada continues to make a "significant contribution that will make a difference."

"While they (Canada) have made a choice with respect to one particular component of that effort (the fight against ISIS), that does not reflect on the overall commitment or capacity to contribute significantly to the road ahead," he said.

Kerry, Dion and Mexico's Claudia Ruiz Massieu also discussed other topics, including the economy, human-trafficking and climate change.

Friday's meeting in Quebec City sets the stage for a summit later this year featuring Trudeau, U.S. President Barack Obama and Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto.

The so-called Three Amigos were supposed to meet in Canada last year, but former prime minister Stephen Harper cancelled the summit.

Speaking in Spanish, Dion confirmed to reporters that Canada will eliminate the visa requirement for Mexican citizens imposed by the Conservative government, but gave no timetable.

Kerry noted that every day more than $3.5 billion worth of goods cross between the United States, Canada and Mexico.

"We have to continue to do more," he said, "to increase investment, reduce costs for trade, business, travel and make tourism easier without jeopardizing safety."

Canada in Iraq: CDS Vance to Provide Trudeau with Options

David Pugliese had  a good piece today in the Ottawa Citizen, discussing Canada's possible future role in Iraq against the Islamic State (ISIS). The new Liberal government plans to end Canada's bombing campaign, but no end date has been determined yet. 

General (Then Lt. Gen) Jonathan Vance (former Commander of Canadian Joint Operations Command) holds a technical briefing on combat strikes against ISIS at NDHQ in Ottawa in the fall of 2014.

Article Written by David Pugliese, Ottawa Citizen, October 22, 2015 (page A13)

Military planners are working to come up with scenarios for the new Liberal government on how Canada can contribute troops to train Iraqi forces battling the Islamic State, even as Canada winds down the bombing campaign.

Prime Minister-designate Justin Trudeau this week reaffirmed his intention to have Canada pull out of the bombing against ISIL in Iraq and Syria, and instead focus on troops to train Iraqi soldiers.

Canada already has 69 special forces soldiers training Kurds in northern Iraq. It is unclear at this point whether an expanded training role would mean boosting the size of that special forces contingent or whether it would see regular troops helping improve Iraqi skills.

There have been initial discussions among planners at Department of National Defence headquarters but little can be done until a Trudeau government takes power. The cabinet will be sworn in Nov. 4.

“We would engage Canada’s military in something we’ve demonstrated tremendous ability at in Afghanistan and elsewhere: training up local troops doing the fighting on the ground,” Trudeau said during the election campaign.

The U.S. is conducting a training mission in Iraq and has more than 3,500 troops there. Troops from Italy, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Germany, Norway and Finland all have been involved in training Kurdish forces.

Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper committed Canada to the Iraq war a year ago. Six CF-18 fighter jets, surveillance and refuelling aircraft, as well as 600 personnel are involved in the bombing mission.

It will be up to Chief of the Defence Staff Gen. Jon Vance to present the options to Trudeau’s government.

Just 10 months ago, Vance — then a lieutenant general and in charge of the Iraq operation — was asked by journalists what would happen if the Canadian bombing mission ended early.

Vance answered that the coalition would adapt. “They have the capacity to react if a partner in the coalition leaves the mission,” Vance said in January. “It is possible to set priorities but we are very important at the present time in the mission, very important in the coalition, but they can change their method, their targeting and the priority of targets if one partner or another leaves the mission.”

Defence analyst Martin Shadwick said the impact of Trudeau’s decision to leave the bombing campaign will be blunted by Canada’s decision to commit more training troops.

“If it had been a complete pullout from the mission, then our allies would not have been happy,” said Shadwick, who teaches strategic studies at York University.

There have been concerns in the U.S. that the bombing campaign has had a limited impact. ISIL has retreated from about 25 per cent of the territory it seized in Iraq but it still continues to hold large areas of the country.

In late August, Harper acknowledged the effect had been less than envisioned. “The intervention has had the effect of largely stopping the advance of (the Islamic State), particularly in the north of Iraq and to some degree in other parts of Iraq and Syria – not maybe as much we’d like,” he said.

The Conservatives also committed the RCAF to expanding the bombing mission to Syria starting in April. At the time, Defence Minister Jason Kenney incorrectly claimed Canada was needed because it was one of the few nations in the coalition that had smart bombs.

Canada has only conducted a small number of bombing missions in Syria because it doesn’t have enough information about targets on the ground.