Ensuring the warfighter is prepared for the battlefield and can successfully fight against today’s threats and adversaries of the future, is a challenge that is felt by military leaders across the globe and will likely be at the core of conversations and educational sessions next month at the Land Forces Training conference.

Major General Stephen Cadden is the Commander of the Canadian Army Doctrine and Training Centre and will deliver the keynote presentation next month at the conference kick-off. The Canadian Army Doctrine and Training Centre is a training institution that is the Canadian military’s Center of Excellence for land operations training. Maj. Gen. Cadden recently shared his insights with DefenceIQ on modernization and the importance of working with industry to develop the right training solutions.  Here is what he had to say in his interview:

Major General Stephen Cadden, Commander of the Canadian Army Doctrine and Training Centre

As we know, the operating environment and threats are constantly evolving. How do you ensure that the capabilities will be relevant and effective for future environments?

Canada is neither the largest nor the smallest military, which means we are very much focused on ensuring that we develop solid ties with allies and partners.

The two key formats for that are through our Five Eyes Alliance and its ABCANZ program, and our NATO partnership. We try to get a first assessment baseline with all of our allies about what future threats will be, agreeing that they will be broad and very expensive to tackle, and then we ensure that any new capabilities we wish to invest in and develop are part of that allied program. That way, we will not necessarily invest in niche capabilities only, but we will ensure that whatever we’re doing is complementary to the armed forces of the countries that we expect to have to fight with on future battlefields to ensure that we have a credible collective defense.

Can you describe the role and importance of industry in the design and delivery of the new capability?

None of us have really cracked the code on what will allow us to quickly and efficiently procure the exact solutions that we need, but our bigger successes stem from when we get together with industry. They’re able to understand our needs and propose solutions that go above and beyond the minimum requirements that we articulate.

As a side note, Canada has an integrated defense department, which includes significant uniformed and civilian components, and we have a specific element devoted to research and development. We have made a significant investment for the future in ensuring that the field force can identify current and future challenges.

We’ve set aside a specific amount of money with a streamlined process, to allow industry to get involved, to help tackle that program, and provide us with solutions that we can review and decide whether we wish to invest in or not.

Read the full interview here. Maj. Gen. Cadden will be a featured speaker at Land Forces Training.  Click here to register for the event.

Modern Military Training is a proud media partner for this year’s Land Forces Training event. We look forward to hearing what experts like Maj. Gen. Cadden and others have to share about improvements being made in the arena of military training.