Joining British-led rapid response force could help with drones, Arctic training, Canada’s top soldier says

Canada’s chief of the defence staff Jennie Carignan says joining a British-led rapid response force would help the Canadian Armed Forces put their new equipment and organizational structures to the test, while one expert cautions Ottawa may be stretching itself and its military too thin through a flurry of commitments.

The Joint Expeditionary Force, currently made up of 10 NATO countries to respond quickly to emerging threats, would give Canada’s Armed Forces a “menu of options” in terms of opportunities to test new capabilities that the country is acquiring, General Carignan told The Globe and Mail. This includes drones and counter-drone technologies.

“As we are onboarding new capabilities, there are opportunities to build exercise scenarios to integrate those new capabilities, and that is the advantage that participating in the JEF brings,” she said.

The JEF was originally launched in 2014 by seven NATO members as a flexible, rapidly deployable force that could be used by participating countries to respond to crises as they see fit, saving them from having to put together a new unit every time.

Its members currently include Britain, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Norway and Sweden. Given the geopolitics of its member countries, the force and its exercises have a heavy regional focus on Baltic and northern security.

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Prime Minister Mark Carney announced Canada’s formal application to join the force on Sept. 16, after a meeting with British Prime Minister Andy Burnham in Liverpool. Mr. Carney said Ottawa’s interest in joining the British-led force is part of an effort to reinforce Canada’s “military interoperability” and “collective security.”

Canada’s submission to join the JEF comes after its previous involvement in the force’s activities, including Exercise TARASSIS in the fall of 2025. There, the Royal Canadian Air Force practised operating in contested, degraded and limited environments, for instance, by landing CF-18 fighter aircraft on a highway in Estonia.

As well, Mr. Carney participated in a virtual meeting of the JEF in March to discuss the security of the Canadian Arctic, Northern Europe and the Baltic region.

By nature, the JEF is meant to be a flexible organization that operates on an opt-in basis, said Robbie Boyd, a former senior military officer within Britain’s Ministry of Defence, who led the creation of the JEF in 2014.

“It’s a strategic co-operation forum for defence development, for supporting each other, for discussion, and then it has that operational edge as well,” he told The Globe.

For example, Mr. Boyd described the JEF’s first operation shortly after it was created to respond to an outbreak of the Ebola virus. Led by Britain, the country worked alongside its JEF partners Denmark and the Netherlands to deploy aid overseas. “Suddenly, we had this instant response of capabilities that we were able to build into the Ebola crisis.”

The voluntary nature of the JEF appeals to Gen. Carignan, who said Canada would participate in exercises and missions based upon what it deems beneficial to its own Forces and their development.

“The way this works is [JEF] planners get together, they figure out the schedule of events over the next cycle of exercises, and then nations make a decision on what force package they could have participate,” she said.

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Training with new drones that the Forces are acquiring, as well as participating in winter warfare exercises, are two specific goals Gen. Carignan highlighted for Canada if it joins the JEF. She added that Canada has lots to offer other JEF countries as well, such as training areas at Forces bases in Alberta and Newfoundland.

But Canada’s contribution to any new force or strategic partnership will be limited by its own military capacity, said David Perry, president of the Canadian Global Affairs Institute, a think tank focused on international relations.

Take the Royal Canadian Air Force, for example, which doesn’t have enough pilots to staff the 88 fighter jets that Ottawa is considering purchasing, he said. Or the navy, which is searching for submariners to staff its expanding submarine fleet.

The federal government has signed a dozen or so memorandums of understanding and partnership agreements in the past year and a bit, Mr. Perry said. At some point, it’s going to have to be more selective and assess what’s actually going to stick.

“Otherwise, I worry that we’re going to get distracted and spread way too thin,” he said.

However, that doesn’t necessarily mean the federal government is wrong to think ahead. As military training and procurement chugs along, Mr. Perry said planning for the future is still the right call.

“Otherwise, you wait too long and arrangements get solidified, and Canada will be on the outside looking in.”