Conversations on Strategy Podcast – Ep 57 – LGen Michael C. Wright – On Canada’s Army

Commander of the Canadian Army Lieutenant General Michael C. Wright discusses the Canadian Army, modernization, Ukraine, technology, and more. Listen in for insights about the Canadian Army, its mission, its future, and how America’s neighbor to the north partners with the United States. 

Keywords: Canada, Arctic, Canadian Army, technology, modernization

Stephanie Crider (Host)

You are listening to Conversations on Strategy. The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the guests and are not necessarily those of the Department of the Army, the US Army War College, or any other agency of the US government.

Lieutenant General Michael C. Wright, commander of the Canadian Army, is joining me remotely today. Wright enrolled in the Canadian Armed Forces in 1990 as an infantry officer. He has commanded from platoon to brigade and Joint task force levels. He served in Bosnia, Afghanistan, and the Middle East, as well as in Canada. On promotion to Lieutenant General in July 2024, he was appointed as the commander of the Canadian Army.

Welcome to Conversations on Strategy, sir. Thank you for joining me.

Lieutenant General Michael C. Wright

Stephanie, thanks very much for the invitation. [I am] really looking forward to this.

Host

I'd like to open our discussion with land warfare and modernization. Looking at the last three years of fighting in Ukraine, what are your most important takeaways regarding the evolution of land warfare, and how is the Canadian Army modernizing to meet this moment?

Wright

Thanks, Stephanie.

The Canadian Army, like all of our close allies, are paying very close attention to what’s happening on the battlefield in Ukraine. I think I’ll start with three key takeaways and then how it’s shaping what the Canadian Army is doing.

The first one is that it has proven that Landpower absolutely matters. Landpower in terms of the conventional large-scale combat operations capability absolutely matters, which is really driving the modernization effort that we’re doing within the Canadian Army. Not only for the capabilities that we’re trying to bring in, but also for the wholesome review of our force structure that we’ve engaged in.

The second one—and this is one that I actually spend a lot of time thinking about and, frankly, worrying about—is how rapidly technology is evolving on the battlefield. Just looking at drones, for example, the multiple iterations of drones, how they are used—how they’re use for reconnaissance, how they’re used for strike—has changed so many times over the past three plus years, and knowing the challenges that we have in many of our militaries in keeping up with innovation and procuring the equipment that we need in the right time frame.

The third key take away is following on from that rapidly evolving technology, we certainly see the importance of precision, but I always like to remind people that it is not a binary decision between precision or mass. We actually need precision and mass because—I’ll go back to the first part—Landpower matters. And in fact, I think one of the major reasons why we’re seeing this conflict, this war, go on over three years is because that decisive Landpower has not been—certainly in the past year to year and a half—has not been able to be applied at the level that’s required to see a decisive victory by either side.

Host

These are big enough challenges in the present, and I know you’re working a lot on modernization and looking into the future. Can you talk a little bit about your vision for the Canadian Army?

Wright

My vision of the Canadian Army is really building upon the great work that was done by my predecessors. Immediately before coming into command of the Canadian Army, the focus of my predecessor, Lieutenant General Joe Paul, was very understandably on making the transition from our primary force-generation mission, the multinational brigade in Latvia, setting the conditions to move from the battle group level up to the brigade level. What I’m trying to do is the great work that was done there to ensure that all those capabilities that are being put in place in our mission in Latvia are actually going to be able to be scaled across the Canadian Army.

The vision that I’ve laid out is that we need to make sure that we are a credible, interoperable, digitally transformed, modern Army that's capable of offering the government of Canada with agile and scalable options for employment in competition, in crisis, or in conflict. The way that I’ve divided that up in terms of priorities are modernization, reconstitution, and readiness, and it’s a deliberate ordering of those priorities because we need to modernize, and we need to reconstitute our forces both in terms of people and equipment before we can augment our level as readiness.

If you want, I can talk a little bit about the modernization effort that we’ve embarked upon.

Host

I’d love to hear a little bit about that, please.

Wright

Absolutely. Certainly, part of our modernization effort is a wholesale modernization of the capabilities we have in the Canadian Army. We are actually going through the largest modernization since the turn of the century, and that modernization that we did at the turn of the century really set the conditions for the decade plus that we spent in the counterinsurgency fight in Afghanistan, and then, certainly, the operations we were involved with in the Middle East. We have 47 major capital projects, but we all know, and you don’t have to learn this at War College, you can’t go around saying, “I have 47 priorities.” So, the way I describe it are there are four plus one, which are incredibly important for the future of the army. Those four are long-range precision strike; this is a capability that Canada has never had. It’s a capability that will, first of all, be incredibly important as part of that NATO mission in Latvia. But, it’s also a capability that has a continental and Canadian Defense nexus to it.

The second one is ground-based air defense [GBAD]. This is actually a capability that Canada had, but then we divested earlier this century, and certainly lessons learned from Ukraine show the incredible importance of ground-based air defense. Luckily, there we’re already seeing the fielding of some dismounted systems in Latvia, but we’re moving aggressively to bring both dismounted and mounted systems into Latvia, but then also to field them across the Canadian Army and again including GBAD, being a perfect example of where that has a role in the defense of Canada.

The third one is modernization of our indirect fire. So, that’s everything from our mortars up to what is going to be the eventual replacement for our M777 [howitzer 155mm artillery]. I think it’s going to be a self-propelled howitzer. Certainly, as we look at whether it’s the US Army or our closest allies around NATO, they’re all going the self-propelled howitzer route. So, I think that’s where we’ll end up going.

The fourth one is actually directly tied to our defense policy update that our government put out last April, Our North, Strong and Free, which really emphasize the importance of the continent, but then [it includes] Canada and the Arctic for our national defense. And so, that’s domestic and Arctic mobility and enhancement, which is basically having the vehicles that allow us to be mobile and survivable in the Arctic.

Now, I said “plus one,” and that plus one is making sure—it’s one thing to get all of those capabilities in, but we need to make sure that we have the command, control, and communication systems to allow us to integrate them across the Canadian Army, across our Canadian Armed Forces, and probably most importantly with our allies, whether that’s in a NORAD [North American Aerospace Defense Command], a NATO, or another partnership perspective.

Host

I’m really glad that you brought up the Arctic. My next question is about America and Canada. We have shared interests in the Arctic, including security and economic development. Tell me a little bit more about the collaborative efforts between our two countries and maybe share your thoughts on them.

Wright

Absolutely. And, it’s interesting because I was on a panel earlier today where I was side by side with the commander of the Royal Canadian Air Force. If he was here, he would talk to you about the importance of our binational relationship, really a unique binational relationship that we have with the United States through NORAD. Traditionally, from the Canadian Armed Forces perspective, we’ve looked more at the Air Force, and then, over the past decade, the Navy as well, because it’s not only that aerospace, but also maritime approaches [that we need in the Arctic]. But I think it’s important for me to be able to express to our government the role that the Canadian Army can play in continental defense.

I spoke a little bit about some of the capabilities that we’re pursuing and how that will involve the Army more in terms of that homeland defense. It’s also for the Canadian Army right now, we represent the only permanent posture, or the only permanent presence, in the Canadian Arctic with our Rangers [a component of the Canadian Armed Forces Reserve]. Now, our Rangers are not like American [US Army ] Rangers or even [the Swedish Army Rangers]. I had the opportunity to visit Sweden last month and saw their Ranger regiment. What our Rangers are a force of 5,000 people who are located in over 200 isolated and coastal communities in the north and the Arctic. And, in fact, 1,800 of them are actually north of the Arctic Circle.

What they do provide for us is presence [and] sovereignty. We’re ensuring that we are tying them closer into reporting so we’re able to plug into that domain awareness that we have in the Arctic. But, they’re also incredibly important for us, not only in terms of the relationships they have with the communities in the north and in the Arctic, but also as we send up members of both our regular force and reserve forces to train, we rely a lot on the Canadian Rangers for their knowledge of the land, of the customs, and for how we can not only be able to fight, but to survive in a harsh climate like that.

Host

You mentioned a few minutes ago continental defense. How do the United States and Canada work together to defend the continent?

Wright

The simplest answer to that is we work together through NORAD, a long existing binational relationship. Again, the Army has not traditionally played a large part in that when you look at the over 300, I believe it is, Canadians who are serving in NORAD. [It is] much more heavily weighted on the Air Force and on the Navy side—particularly the Air Force. But, it’s absolutely an area that as we look at the future of making investments, and I’ll note we’re recording this podcast on the 19th of March, yesterday, in only his fourth full day on the job, our new prime minister, Mark Carney, along with the minister of national defence, and our chief of the defence staff, were up in the Arctic talking about not only investments that are being made in terms of the modernization of the over-the-horizon radar systems, but also giving more opportunities for training that’s being done in the Arctic. That’s where, again, I return to the role of the Canadian Rangers, but also, with us sending up our Arctic response company groups, sending up members of the regular conventional Army to do training up North, and in fact, just over the last month we’ve had two large-scale exercises in the Arctic: Operation NANOOK, which is controlled by our Canadian Joint Operations Command and then NOREX [Northern Exercise], which is an opportunity we have for one of our divisions to exercise their Arctic response company group. Both of those exercises took place with American forces. In one case, the USAF [US Air Force] National Guard and some Navy divers. And, in the other case, the US Army working side by side.

We also benefit from a great relationship we have with [11th] Airborne Division in Alaska. We actually have [a] deputy commanding general in the division, who’s a Canadian. And regularly, now, we are sending Canadian elements through JPMRC [Joint Pacific Multinational Readiness Center] in Alaska, which gives us not only a fantastic training opportunity, but the absolute importance of ensuring that we are well connected and interoperable with our closest ally.

Host

In a perfect world, do you see a place where we could do better working together, America and Canada?

Wright

Of course, there’s always ways that we can improve. I think the area that I’m really looking forward to working [on] with the United States Army is I spoke about the modernization that we’re going through and, particularly when we’re talking about those command, control, communication systems, we want to work hand in hand with the United States Army. Just last week, I was out in Fort Irwin, California, for Project Convergence Capstone 5 [PCC5]. I was excited about going there last week. I can tell you I’m even more excited about [Project Convergence Capstone] PCC6 happening next year because I have a clear vision as to what the areas [are] that I’d like the Canadian Army to bring innovation and experimentation [to] next summer.

I spoke a little bit earlier about our force structure review. We do not, in Canada right now, have what, certainly, our American listeners would consider to be a division. We do have four divisions within the Canadian Army, but they’re very much administrative and regionally based and with capabilities such as long-range precision strike. Those are capabilities that are very much going to rest at the division level. So, we are actively going through a holistic review of our structure, with a view to knowing that we need to be able to generate a war-fighting division headquarters. So, my focus for PCC6 is going to be what do we need to do within the Canadian Army to make sure that not only we have the proper technology, the proper procedures to field that division headquarters, but also to make sure it is able to integrate with our allies?

Host

We just covered, very broadly, some really big topics. We have a little extra time if there’s anything you'd like to revisit or expand on.

Wright

Yeah. Stephanie, maybe if there’s just a thought I could end off with: It’s great to be down here in Washington [DC]. This is an annual event we have where we celebrate the long-standing partnership and the close relationship that we have with all elements of the United States military and the Department of Defense. I don’t think it’s ever been as important as it is now. Certainly, when we look at the trajectory of the war in Ukraine, when we look at the potential impacts that could have on our mission—Canada’s largest NATO deployment with the forward land forces in Latvia—and that overall collective defense and deterrence on NATO’s eastern flank, it’s incredibly important to maintain the strong military-to-military relationships that we’ve enjoyed for decades. Geography will not change. We remain neighbors and we will remain incredibly close allies between the Canadian Army and the United States Army.

Host

What a great thought to end on. Thank you so much for making time to speak with me today.

Wright

Hey, thank you, Stephanie. It’s been a real pleasure.

Host

Listeners, for more Army War College podcasts, check out Decisive Point, SSI Live, CLSC Dialogues, and a Better Peace.