Nothing unusual. Different job. Different mandate. What it does show is that she takes her jobs seriously, and doesn't blindly follow orders from cabinet.
Honestly, I wish she had stayed for the cuts. Because she's about the only person I trust to execute cuts competently. But unfortunately we got stuck with Blair as MND. And I have zero confidence that he won't challenge the generals on their preferences for cuts and push a real first principles test. Good ministers exercise the challenge function well and gain respect when they do it competently.
As for where we stand, I don't think there's anybody actually cutting. Lots have dialed back ambitions as interest rates have risen. Honestly, bad as a $1B cut is, I think it would be more manageable if there weren't other political decisions imposed on the CAF.
I'll give you an example of how bad the above gets. To improve our ability to deploy and standup rapidly, the RCAF decided to create an air expeditionary wing. The job of the AEW is to develop, manage and employ expeditionary capabilities to help the RCAF rapidly stand up a small detachment anywhere in the world. Not a bad goal. So what did the government do with this brilliant idea? They built the Wing in Bagottville to create jobs there. The airfield engineering unit that can build up shelters and clear an emergency airfield is in Cold Lake. The deployable air traffic control unit and the main transport fleet for the whole wing is in Trenton. Oh and the main joint operations group that stands up a new theatre is an army unit based in Kingston. Basically, if the RCAF wants to deploy a few helicopters to Haiti with a small camp, a Herc must be sent to Bagottville and then Cold Lake, then everybody including the army personnel from Kingston have to assemble in Trenton before leaving. Imagine the waste created by not co-locating in Trenton. And there's so many examples of poor planning and political interference like this across the CAF.
