Canada’s defence readiness has deteriorated significantly in recent years amid ongoing crises and challenges in military procurement and funding, according to senior military leadership. General Wayne Eyre, former acting chief of the Defence Staff, has described a persistent decline in the Canadian Armed Forces’ (CAF) state of preparedness, exacerbated by aging equipment, insufficient budgets, and delayed policy reforms.
Throughout 2022 and 2023, efforts to update Canada’s defence policy and address critical capability gaps moved slowly despite broad consensus among military and government officials on the need for urgent action. Eyre highlighted that investing in capabilities suited to modern warfare—including submarines, long-range strike capacity, and autonomous systems across air, land, and sea domains—is essential, alongside digital transformation for command-and-control and artificial intelligence integration.
Key challenges cited by Eyre include decades of underfunded maintenance budgets leading to deteriorating infrastructure and critically low ammunition stockpiles, concerns amplified by ongoing conflicts such as in Ukraine. He emphasized that fixing the foundation of the CAF required not only resources but also a fundamental overhaul of the procurement system, which remains fragmented and burdened by excessive bureaucratic processes with no single point of accountability.
The loss of procurement expertise following public sector cuts in the early 2010s further diminished capacity to execute defence priorities effectively. While attempts to streamline processes and build implementation capacity were underway, Eyre noted resistance within government, including from the Finance Department, which maintained a traditional view of defence spending as discretionary, impeding timely increases in military funding.
Eyre met with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in October 2022 to present a comprehensive briefing on the military’s readiness, revealing equipment serviceability rates hovering around 50 percent and the risk of depleting ammunition within days under wartime conditions. Despite acknowledgment of these issues at the highest levels, delays continued. A public policy update mandated by Budget 2022 was repeatedly deferred, facing continued scrutiny and slow decision-making that extended into 2023.
In a politically sensitive environment, the government implemented nearly $1 billion in cuts to the defence budget as part of a broader spending refocus, while insisting these reductions would not harm the CAF. Eyre described this as untenable, warning that the cuts directly impacted operations, maintenance, modernization efforts, and personnel morale. Commanders were forced to consider retiring some equipment due to lack of funding for upkeep, raising concerns about Canada’s international standing and operational effectiveness.
The formation of a national-security council chaired by the Prime Minister in late 2023 marked a notable development, providing a forum for strategic discussions including a military approach to Arctic sovereignty. This culminated in the April 2024 release of “Our North Strong and Free,” Canada’s updated defence policy framework, which prioritized Arctic infrastructure and regional deterrence. The policy secured more funding than anticipated but deferred many financial commitments to the long term and removed previous plans for adding 14,500 regular force members, with promises to revisit expansion once current recruitment targets are met.
Despite the incremental progress, Eyre characterized the preceding years as a lost opportunity, noting that the prolonged indecision came at a critical juncture amid a shifting global security environment. He underscored that while past decades centered on a relatively stable and unipolar world, the current era demands renewed focus on national defence as a core responsibility of government. The military’s readiness may now be on a path to recovery, but the challenges of rebuilding capability and morale remain substantial.