Book reveals JTF-2's secret operations

Bruce Garvey

Ottawa Citizen

OTTAWA - Joint Task Force Two, Canada's top-secret anti-terrorist commando unit now on the ground in Afghanistan, has been deployed on at least a dozen foreign operations -- some of them high-risk, front-line missions -- since the force's formation in 1993.

Contrary to previous official military claims that JTF-2 has only operated in limited "benign, observer-type" missions, the unit has served on front lines in Bosnia, Haiti, Rwanda, the former Zaire, Peru and Kosovo. Operations have ranged from hunting snipers and training controversial local military forces to protecting VIPs such as Governor-General Adrienne Clarkson and Jean ChrŽtien, the Prime Minister.

Details of the missions are revealed in the new book, Canada's Secret Commandos: The Unauthorized Story of Joint Task Force Two, by Ottawa Citizen military affairs writer David Pugliese.

Mr. Pugliese reveals for the first time how Canadian counter-terrorist specialists were sent to Nepal in 1996 to train soldiers there to deal with Communist guerrillas threatening to topple the government.

Also detailed are JTF-2 missions within Canada, such as those conducted against militant aboriginal groups in Quebec, Ontario and British Columbia.

JTF-2 was a key component of a planned military operation to invade and take over three Indian reserves in 1994 to clamp down on cigarette smuggling, according to the book.

The book represents the most information ever released about the elite Canadian counter-terrorism force. To produce Canada's Secret Commandos, Mr. Pugliese relied on JTF-2 reports and other information provided by the Department of National Defence, as well as interviews he conducted with military personnel while visiting overseas operations in the mid- to late-1990s.

The book notes that parliamentarians and the Canadian public have been kept in the dark about the extent of JTF-2 operations over the years.

Based in Dwyer Hill, southwest of Ottawa, JTF-2 took over the lead role against terrorism from the RCMP unit formed after an attack on the Turkish embassy in Ottawa in 1985. It is modeled on Britain's Special Air Service regiment and its elite soldiers are the best the Canadian army has to offer.

JTF-2 operations in Afghanistan have been at the centre of a storm of political controversy after it emerged that Art Eggleton, the Minister of National Defence, failed to inform Mr. ChrŽtien and Parliament that the unit had taken prisoners and handed them over to the United States until several days after it happened. Mr. ChrŽtien had claimed the issue of what to do with such prisoners was hypothetical, since none had been captured by Canadian troops.

Opposition politicians have called for Mr. Eggleton's resignation, suggesting he misled Parliament.

But Mr. Pugliese's book reveals there have been other controversial matters regarding the commando team's overseas missions, and "through no fault of the JTF-2 operators, the unit has engaged in missions, particularly in the area of training foreign security forces, that have the potential to seriously damage Canada's reputation abroad."

In 1996, JTF-2 soldiers trained the Haitian police SWAT team in tactics that were supposed to be used against former army officers who were threatening to overthrow that country's fledgling democratic government.

"Two years after JTF-2 left Haiti, its proteges in the Haitian SWAT unit were being used not for the police work the unit originally trained them for, but to intimidate and threaten the government's political opponents and their families," Mr. Pugliese writes.

There are also questions about the extent of the "counter-terrorism" training that Canada has provided to the Nepalese army. According to Department of National Defence documents cited in Canada's Secret Commandos, Canada sent a "special forces team" to advise the Nepalese army. The heavily censored reports show JTF-2 and other counter-terrorism specialists at National Defence Headquarters in Ottawa were involved, but many of the details of that mission are still being withheld for security reasons.

At the time, the Royal Nepalese Army (RNA) was facing the prospect of a fully fledged civil war against Communist guerrillas and turned to Canada for help.

The 47,000-strong army operated on a paltry budget of US$52- million and had no experience with internal security duties.

The Canadian training team went to work advising the RNA on tactics and the best deployment of its forces against the guerrilla force. In addition, RNA officers were sent to Canada for advanced training.

The training mission -- which went unreported in the media -- left the government in Nepal "extremely well disposed to Canada and the Canadian Forces," according to John Bremner, the Canadian Forces advisor in New Delhi.

The Nepalese army has since been accused of extensive human rights violations, such as randomly opening fire on civilians.

Over the years the Department of National Defence has slowly built up its role in overseas missions, dubbed "green operations," to include intelligence-gathering and sniping at enemy forces. At the same time, it has continued its anti-terrorist duties, known as "black operations."

In 1994, at the height of cigarette smuggling through Indian reserves on the Canadian border with New York, JTF-2 was a key component in a planned military operation that would have seen an invasion and takeover of three reserves -- Akwesasne, Kanesatake and Kahnawake.

The plan was for a force of 800 RCMP officers to move in, backed by JTF-2 and several thousand soldiers.

Military units across the country were put on alert after CSIS and military intelligence reports warned that militant Mohawks might attempt to close Highway 401 and seize and sabotage a water treatment plant at Deseronto.

"In the end," Mr. Pugliese writes, "cooler heads prevailed and Prime Minister Jean ChrŽtien's Liberal government backed off the assault plan."

Ottawa opted to reduce cigarette taxes in an attempt to recoup some of the estimated $1- billion a year being lost to the black market trade in smuggled cigarettes.

JTF-2, however, was used in a campaign of increased surveillance on the Akwesasne reserve. "The commando team's soldiers became familiar with the trails and backroads on the native reserves as they spent days hidden in forests, observing smugglers at work and relaying the information to the RCMP and other civilian police forces."

Mr. Pugliese says he believes that while JTF-2 plays an essential role for Canada, there must be more accountability and parliamentary oversight of its activities.

The government announced in early October that JTF-2 was joining the war in Afghanistan, but it wasn't until December that 40 soldiers from the unit headed overseas. Days later, the government announced the strength of the commando force would be doubled from approximately 300 to 600 men, with $119-million earmarked for the expansion.

In his book, Mr. Pugliese raises what he calls the fundamental question -- "where would the extra elite soldiers come from?"

"The Canadian Forces was already in the middle of a recruiting crisis and the regular force units were under-strength themselves," he writes. "JTF-2 had already experienced recruiting problems in 1996 and 1997 when the Canadian Forces were 70,000 strong. How would it find the qualified troops for this latest expansion with the military ranks hovering at around 58,000?

"The main concern is that the government's proposal to transform JTF-2 into a 600-member formation will put the unit on the road to becoming similar to the U.S. Army Rangers -- a tough and well-trained rapid deployment combat force, but certainly not one on the same level as the SAS, Delta Force, or a host of other special forces teams around the world. And one could certainly argue that if the government wanted a version of the Rangers it should never have disbanded the Canadian Airborne Regiment."

Already, there have been concerns both that JTF-2 standards had been lowered in order to fill the ranks at the current strength of 300, and that other units of the Canadian Forces were suffering as their best men were picked by the commando unit, according to the book.

Canada's Secret Commandos also contains details about the rigorous training JTF-2 soldiers must endure, the official honours its troopers have been awarded and what the unit will need in the future.

Mr. Pugliese said he decided to write the book because the Canadian public should know that its military personnel are "more than just the peacekeepers" the government continually portrays them as, and that JTF-2 should be recognized for the work it has been doing.

"In the U.S. in particular, the American special forces community has realized the need for a controlled and limited amount of publicity, not only to send a message to the enemy about what they may face on the battlefield, but also to build a strong public support for such elite formations," Mr. Pugliese writes. "While a certain degree of secrecy is obviously needed, the total clampdown on all information regarding JTF-2 has arguably backfired on the Canadian Forces.

"Another serious implication of JTF-2's secrecy is a total lack of oversight and accountability regarding the unit ... a breakdown of the unit's budget still remains 'black,' and parliamentarians and the public don't have a clue as to how the money is being spent. Any wrongdoing within the unit is also not made public because of the convenient and all-encompassing excuse of operational security."