Name: Canadas military proposes mobilizing a citizens army of 300,000
Uploaded: 2025-12-11T02:19:38.576Z
Duration: 3 min 8 s
Description: Canada’s Department of National Defence plans to mobilize 300,000 citizen reservists, following commitments made at a NATO summit in Washington, D.C., in 2024 to strengthen military readiness. The proposal, obtained by CBC News, will be presented to the federal government in the coming months.

Canada’s Department of National Defence plans to mobilize 300,000 citizen reservists, following commitments made at a NATO summit in Washington, D.C., in 2024 to strengthen military readiness. The proposal, obtained by CBC News, will be presented to the federal government in the coming months.

Ottawa

Internal documents obtained by CBC News show that Canada's Department of National Defence is working on a proposal to mobilize up to 300,000 citizen soldiers as a supplemental reserve. This plan, described as a work in progress, is a response to NATO's 2024 call for member states to prepare for potential conventional conflicts.

The proposal would require significant resources, including uniforms, weapons, and equipment, at a time when the Canadian military is already facing recruiting challenges and strained supply chains. The plan is expected to be presented to the federal government in the coming months, with further details anticipated in the spring.

Canada's military proposes mobilizing a citizens' army of 300,000

Internal documents obtained by CBC News reveal a proposal for a massive new mobilization by Canada's military. They show the Department of National Defence is making preparations to take on hundreds of thousands of reservists and citizen soldiers. The country's top soldier describes the proposal as a work in progress and one that will potentially be presented to the federal government in the coming months. The CBC's defence correspondent, Murray Brewster, is on the story for us and he joins us now from Ottawa. So Murray, where is this proposal coming from and it certainly sounds very ambitious. Well, it is an ambitious proposal, Andrew. It comes out of the NATO Summit of 2024 where NATO was basically telling all of its members to be ready in one capacity or another to fight some kind of conventional conflict if that ever happens. And it has been decades since Canada had a mobilization plan. When I say decades, we could perhaps even go back to as far as the Cold War because during the Cold War it was felt that because the conflict might potentially go nuclear very quickly, there was no need to have mobilization plans. So in many respects, the Department of National Defence is starting almost from square one in terms of being able to draw up these plans to mobilize the country in the event of a major emergency or a major catastrophe. And Murray, what more can you tell us about what's in these documents? Well, these documents were from last summer and they were basically the beginnings of the planning for bringing in these reservists. Now, we have to break this down because we have a regular force in the Canadian military of roughly 68,000, which the military would like to see eventually get to 85,000. We also have 30,000 reservists, which the military would like to see to get to 100,000. But what we're focusing on in these documents is the 300,000 supplemental reserve that the military would like to create. So these are lightly trained citizen soldiers for want of a better description. And what these documents do is they paint a picture of how difficult the task is going to be. I spoke with one expert who said, this is basically the tallest order the Canadian military has received since the end of the Cold War because they are looking to buy uniforms. They're looking to buy weapons. They're looking to buy equipment. And where's all of this going to come from when you have supply chains that are already strained and the Canadian military is having trouble doing recruiting and getting people into just the regular and the permanent reserve forces. So it's a very tall matter. The chief of the defense staff spoke with us. You'll see the story a little bit later. But what she said was that this is very much a work in progress and that the federal government will see some kind of proposal in the spring. That'll be interesting to watch for. I know you'll be watching closely too, Murray. Thank you. The CBC's Murray Brewster live in Ottawa.

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