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Provision of Battle Honours for Peacekeeping Missions

geo

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Small question on a related topic...
It is great that these two Squadrons were granted battle honours for their fine work BUT while I think that the Commander-in-Chief Unit Commendations presented to 2PPCLI and 1R22R is all fine and good, shouldn't their contribution in the FRY have merited a battle honour as well?
 
geo said:
Small question on a related topic...
It is great that these two Squadrons were granted battle honours for their fine work BUT while I think that the Commander-in-Chief Unit Commendations presented to 2PPCLI and 1R22R is all fine and good, shouldn't their contribution in the FRY have merited a battle honour as well?

Battle Honours are not traditionally given out for peacekeeping.  Conduct a search as this has been discussed extensively on army.ca.
 
geo said:
Small question on a related topic...
It is great that these two Squadrons were granted battle honours for their fine work BUT while I think that the Commander-in-Chief Unit Commendations presented to 2PPCLI and 1R22R is all fine and good, shouldn't their contribution in the FRY have merited a battle honour as well?

Land elements in theatre when Canada was still at war with Serbia were not enough of their formed body to be awarded a battle honour.  Not all elements involved in Kosovo were there as "peacekeepers."
 
ʞɔoɹɯɐɥs said:
Land elements in theatre when Canada was still at war with Serbia were not enough of their formed body to be awarded a battle honour.  Not all elements involved in Kosovo were there as "peacekeepers."

Buddy, you do not know what you are talking about or you are confusing what geo asked.  2 PPCLI and 1 Vandoo never served in Kosovo.  The LdSH (RC) Recce Sqn and 1 PPCLI arrived after "hostilities" had ended with Serbia.  The only "land elements" in the theatre of operations may have been CANSOF, which we won't be discussing.
 
geo said:
Small question on a related topic...
It is great that these two Squadrons were granted battle honours for their fine work BUT while I think that the Commander-in-Chief Unit Commendations presented to 2PPCLI and 1R22R is all fine and good, shouldn't their contribution in the FRY have merited a battle honour as well?

Don't worry, they weren't the only ones to have been left out of the equation.

429 and 436 Sqns spent the campaign actually descending down into the WEZ and conducting repeated, multiple landings and offloads within the theatre of operation, actually landing in Pristina and a coupole of other airfields in southern Kosovo.  Most of us were deployed and on the "triple operation" for three months - Op Kinetic, Op Echo and Op Mikado.

None of the transporters got anything, not a mention, not a single word, nothing.
But we're used to that.
2 PPCLI and 1 Vandoo shouldn't feel like they're the only ones left out.

 
Gunner,
I am fully aware of what you say.... that peacekeeping does not warrant battle honours.
But actions in Medak & Sarajevo were not really peacekeeping..... were they?

I will "buy" that the the size of the detachments involved in these operations were too small to warrant a unit honour - and the Commander in Chief's commendation addresses the situation.... with all due respect: I don't buy the cavalier way you brushed off the topic.
 
geo said:
Gunner,
I am fully aware of what you say.... that peacekeeping does not warrant battle honours.
but actions in Medak & Sarajevo were not really peacekeeping..... were they?

Yes, yes they were.  No declaration of war by Canada, a chapter 6 UN mandate, no defined enemy, etc, etc, etc.  Were elements of 2 PPCLI in combat during Medak, yep, definitely, but they weren't at war.  Personally, I would be very disappointed if Canada decided to provide battle honours for peacekeeping.

I will "buy" that the the size of the detachments involved in these operations were too small to warrant a unit honour - and the Commander in Chief's commendation addresses the situation.... with all due respect: I don't buy the cavalier way you brushed off the topic.

Not cavalier at all.  Use the search feature as battle honours have been discussed at length over the last 10 years.

429 and 436 Sqns spent the campaign actually descending down into the WEZ and conducting repeated, multiple landings and offloads within the theatre of operation, actually landing in Pristina and a coupole of other airfields in southern Kosovo.  Most of us were deployed and on the "triple operation" for three months - Op Kinetic, Op Echo and Op Mikado.

Globesmasher -I suspect this was due to the number of personnel drawn from the two tpt squadrons not forming enough of a critical mass.

 
Gunner said:
Yes, yes they were.  No declaration of war by Canada, a chapter 6 UN mandate, no defined enemy, etc, etc, etc.  Were elements of 2 PPCLI in combat during Medak, yep, definitely, but they weren't at war.  Personally, I would be very disappointed if Canada decided to provide battle honours for peacekeeping.
As far as I know, Canada didn't declare war on Serbia during Kossovo... yet two Canadian airforce squadrons have been honoured with KOSSOVO battle honours

NATO's objectives in relation to the conflict in Kosovo were set out in the Statement issued at the Extraordinary Meeting of the North Atlantic Council held at NATO on 12 April 1999 and were reaffirmed by Heads of State and Government in Washington on 23 April 1999:

a verifiable stop to all military action and the immediate ending of violence and repression;
the withdrawal from Kosovo of the military, police and paramilitary forces;
the stationing in Kosovo of an international military presence;
the unconditional and safe return of all refugees and displaced persons and unhindered access to them by humanitarian aid organisations;
the establishment of a political framework agreement for Kosovo on the basis of the Rambouillet Accords, in conformity with international law and the Charter of the United Nations.
The Yugoslav Government claimed that it was protecting the minority Serbian population of Kosovo against attacks by the Kosovo Liberation Army.


Given that this CANFORGEN only got posted recently - clearly honouring a formation with a battle honour for action in a region of the FRY, I figured that it was a reasonnable place to bring up the subject again.
 
geo said:
As far as I know, Canada didn't declare war on Serbia during Kossovo... yet two Canadian airforce squadrons have been honoured with KOSSOVO battle honours


Given that this CANFORGEN only got posted recently - clearly honouring a formation with a battle honour for action in a region of the FRY, I figured that it was a reasonnable place to bring up the subject again.

Another interesting can of worms to open on this topic would be to suggest that those reserve units who provided augmentees to 2 PP should be eligible for some kind of recognition as well...
 
D&B...
Not at all... troops who were with 1R22R and 2VP received clasps for the CinCs unit commendation.
As individual augmentees to the 1R22R & 2VP, they were de facto members of these fine REG units... parent units aren't in line for anything... they would require to have fielded sub or sub-sub units to enter the fray...
 
GEO- We didn't get clasps, we got little gold pocket pins (out of a dirty old plastic bread basket I might add) en masse, underneath the bleachers of the Winnipeg Arena. They weren't even presented individually! Oh yeah and it was 9 years too late!

It was a knee jerk pathetic attempt to clear the air. What was kick ass, was getting to see the guys you served with and finally get to sit around and have a beer and just shoot the S*&t.

Noneck
 
Noneck... sorry to hear that those people running the show made the delivery in such a crappy manner.

The 1R22R presentation was a little better done.

WRT it being 9 year too late....yeah, yeah... we know, we know.  A country afraid of tarnishing it's peacekeeping reputation - so they very quickly turned the page on that little bit of history.

Then again.... Korea was recognized as a "police action" for something like 40 years.....
 
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