The chain of command is an authority and accountability system linking the office of the Chief of the Defence Staff to the lowest level of the Canadian Forces and back again to the office of the CDS. It is also a hierarchy of individual commanders who make decisions within their connected functional formations and units. The chain of command is intended to be a pre-emptive instrument of command - allowing commanders actively to seek information, give direction, and oversee operations. It is a fundamental aspect of the structure and operation of the Canadian military, and ensuring its soundness is therefore a paramount responsibility of command.

Before and during the deployment of Canadian Joint Force Somalia, the Canadian Forces chain of command was, in our view, severely wanting. The Inquiry was faced again and again with blatant evidence of a seriously malfunctioning chain of command within the Canadian military. It failed as a communications system and broke down under minimal stress. Commanders testified before us on several occasions that they did not know about important matters because they had not been advised. They also testified that important matters and policy did not reach subordinate commanders and the troops or, when they did, the information was often distorted. Multiple illustrations of these problems are provided in Chapter 17.

As one example, the failure of the chain of command at senior levels was striking with regard to how commanders came to understand the state of the Canadian Airborne Regiment in 1992. Many senior officers in the chain of command, from MGen MacKenzie to Gen de Chastelain, testified that they were ignorant of the state of fitness and discipline of the CAR.

Yet they maintained even during the Inquiry that they had faith in the appropriateness of the CAR to undertake a mission because they assumed that it was at a high state of discipline and unit cohesion.

Throughout the period from early 1992 until the deployment of the CAR to Somalia in December 1992, several serious disciplinary problems - one, at least, of a criminal nature - had occurred in the CAR. These incidents, among other matters, were so significant that they led to the dismissal of the Commanding Officer of the CAR, itself a unique and remarkable event in a peacetime army. Yet we were told that few officers in the chain of command were even aware of these problems.

We were asked to believe that the scores of staff officers responsible for managing information from units for senior officers and commanders in Special Service Force headquarters, Land Force Central Area headquarters, Land Force Command headquarters, and NDHQ never informed them of these serious incidents. Indeed, we must assume that the specialized and dedicated Military Police reporting system, composed of qualified non-commissioned members and officers who routinely file police reports and investigations specifically for the use of commanders, failed to penetrate the chain of command. In other words, we must believe that the commanders did not know what was happening in their commands and therefore that the chain of command failed. But the matter is worse, for the evidence is that the chain of command provided enough information that commanders ought to have been prompted to inquire into the situation and to act.

We were told without further explanation and supporting evidence that "the Forces had an administrative concept of organization and command control.. and still do." However, in our view, the confusion of responsibilities in NDHQ and the lack of precise definitions of command authority in the CF and in NDHQ are such that they raise worrisome questions about the reliability, or even the existence, of a sound concept of command in the Canadian Forces generally.

It is not as though problems in the structure for the command and control of the CF on operations in Canada and overseas was a new issue for CF leaders. Studies ordered by the Chief of the Defence Staff as early as 1985, to inquire into the continuing confusion in NDHQ concerning operational planning, confirmed this issue. One of these warned the CDS and the Deputy Minister that NDHQ could not be relied upon to produce effective operational plans or to be an effective base for the command and control of the Canadian Forces in operations. In 1988 the weaknesses in plans for CF operations in Haiti prompted yet another study into authority and planning responsibilities in NDHQ. This report found no agreed concept for the operation of the CF in wartime; that NDHQ was inappropriately organized for command functions; that the responsibilities of the CDS and DM were blurred; and that "the most complex issue dealt with" was the relationship between the Deputy Chief of the Defence Staff (DCDS) and the commanders outside Ottawa. None of these problems was resolved satisfactorily.

A report prepared for the CDS and the DM in September 1992 confirmed that these problems had not been properly addressed. Among other things, the evaluators found "undue complexity in the command structure. . .and too much room for misinterpretation." Further, "the evaluation showed that there is a critical need for a simplified command and control structure, one which will bring to an end the current ad hoc approach." Thus, from their own studies and experiences, senior CF officers should have been well aware that the existing structure for the command of the CF was, at least, suspect and required their careful attention.

In short, there is compelling evidence that the chain of command, during both the pre-deployment and the in-theatre period, failed as a device for passing and seeking information and as a command structure. There is also considerable evidence that the actions and skills of junior leaders and soldiers overcame many of the defects in the chain of command, allowing the operation to proceed. This was especially true during the period when Operation Cordon (Canada's contribution to the original United Nations peacekeeping mission) was cancelled and Operation Deliverance (Canada's contribution to the U.S.-led peace enforcement mission) was authorized and soldiers deployed.