[Fast paced music plays]

Lieutenant Jacques Pecora: We are making a difference here. Our techniques do work, and they are being used on the battlefield.

Capt Orton: Hi! I’m Captain Adam Orton, and this is the Canadian Army Podcast. Since 2015, the Canadian military has been training Ukrainian soldiers as part of Operation UNIFIER. Now, with the Russian invasion underway, acquiring soldier skills is more important than ever. The Canadian Army currently has several combat engineers deployed in Poland to continue that mission to help our Ukrainian allies. Joining me from Poland is Lieutenant Jacques Pecora who is a troop commander with the Engineer Training Element. Welcome to the podcast.

Lt Pecora: Thanks, sir.

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Capt Orton: So you get on the ground. What’s your first impression of the training area, all the people around you, as you get started with the training of the Ukrainian soldiers?

Lt Pecora: When we first arrived, it was pretty obvious that the training was put together quickly. And the situation necessitated that. Ukraine approached Poland and asked them to train five-hundred combat engineers, Poland immediately said: “Yes!” And then they went to their allies like Canada and asked for support in that mission. So as Canadians, we were the first ones to sign on. And we got on ground, there was a lot of work to do, coordinating with our Polish counterparts to figure out how our troops could fit into the training and how best we could increase the capacity of Ukrainian students and ultimately contribute to the mission of saving Ukrainian lives.

Capt Orton: And when you first met these people that you’re going to train with, when you looked at their faces, what did you see? Like, what was your impression of the people that had shown up?

Lt Pecora: The impression was that they were excited for what was ahead of them on the course.

Capt Orton: Okay.

Lt Pecora: Yeah, we have a wide range of Ukrainian students that are coming to us. And most of them are coming from frontline units. But the demographic is all across the board, all ages, all backgrounds, all trades, even—all come in here, eager to learn combat engineer skills to take back with them to the battlefield.

Capt Orton: Other than their enthusiasm, did anything else stand out to you?

Lt Pecora: I’d say, as I mentioned there, the experience levels between them. So the whole design of the course is oriented around transitioning a soldier from whether it’s basic training or another occupation training into a combat engineer. So we have some students that have infantry backgrounds, logistics support backgrounds, or others. And the different levels of experience that they have adds a certain challenge for us that we have to adapt and overcome to get everybody on that even playing field, all conducting the same skills by the time they leave.

Capt Orton: So what is Canada teaching these people or these soldiers as they’re basically getting in the fight for their lives in their country?

Lt Pecora: Yeah. So, alongside our Polish allies and a couple other nations, we’re teaching the soldiers how to be combat engineers. And the course revolves around three main topics that are fundamental to the skills of a combat engineer. First is explosives and demolitions, which is taught by the Polish armed forces. The second is mines and obstacles, taught by the Canadians—and again, explosive ordnance disposal and military search that’s also taught by the Canadians. These three fundamental skills are critical for combat engineers in any environment, and our students will graduate the course with these skills in hand, ready to pass those on and employ those on the battlefield in Ukraine.

Capt Orton: Why is the training divided between Canadian and Polish troops?

Lt Pecora: The main reason why Canada’s only teaching the two specific topics is because the Polish are better prepared to teach demolitions and explosive’s piece. So Canada uses C-4 as a primary explosive. It’s a plastic explosive, meaning it’s malleable. On the other hand, both Poland and Ukraine use TNT—which typically comes in rigid blocks. So the employment of these different kinds of explosives means that you have to have different considerations. And for that reason, Poland is better prepared to teach explosives and demolitions.

Capt Orton: I understand that you’re a troop commander. How big is your troop?

Lt Pecora: Yes, we have about forty combat engineers. For operational security reasons, I’m not going to give the exact number. But in addition to our combat engineers, we have some supply personnel that essentially support our deployment out here as we are the only Canadian Army Forces personnel in our specific geographical location.

Capt Orton: How long do you have the troops for and what does the training cycle look like?

Lt Pecora: What we’re looking at is about a month long for each course. And each course has roughly one hundred twenty Ukrainian students per course. So, by the end of 2023, if the zeros continue as they are now, it’s projected that Canada alone will have trained about over one thousand Ukrainian combat engineers. And with the additional combat engineers trained by Poland before Canada’s participation, there’ll be about twelve hundred fifty.

Capt Orton: So tell me a little bit about the training like. Can you go into a little bit more detail about it?

Lt Pecora: Yeah, so I’ll speak specifically to the two main topics that Canada is responsible for. So again, that’s the mines and obstacles portion and the explosive ordnance disposal and military search portion. So in the mines and obstacles portion—the mindset that we’re really trying to impart on the students is how do we enable the armoured and infantry assets to move on the battlefield in a combined arms fashion. So, as Ukraine seeks to go on the offensive to retake their sovereign territory, we’re training these combat engineers to breach obstacles, conduct engineer reconnaissance of enemy barrier plants in order to enable the offensive arms being the armoured and infantry to retake that ground. On the other hand, when we talk about explosive ordnance disposal and military search, the main emphasis is on searching and clearing an area that can be used in the future by either Rear Echelon Forces or civilians as they move back into the area. So that’s disposing of duds that land in the area—disposing of booby traps that are reminiscent of the war, or IEDs that are in the area too. It’s important to note that skills on both topics can be used to both the offensive and defensive in different situations. So we cover a wide range of abilities that ultimately enable the combat engineers to be kind of like the Swiss Army tool for the Army.

Capt Orton: So I know that like, I think there’s even a joke about this in the commander’s podcast is, you know—I know the Canadian Armed Forces use a lot of PowerPoint, and sometimes that can be a lot of classroom time. Are you guys doing a lot of that? And how is this program been changed to kind of meet the needs of soldiers who are literally heading into the fight shortly after this training?

Lt Pecora: We have a very limited amount of time with Ukrainian students. And it was clear right off the get go that we had to minimize the amount of theoretical time we spend with them and maximize the practical hands-on. And what really enables that is our ability to deploy a troop from one combat engineer regiment out here and empower the sappers and corporals to be the instructors for the Ukrainians. It offers a high instructor to student ratio, so that we can enable as much hands-on as possible by the students because that’s how they learn. They learn by doing their job properly. They also learn by making mistakes and being corrected. And it’s—it’s really a testament to the professionalism of our staffers and corporals, our most junior ranks, are able to instruct with as much confidence as they have been here.

To your point about how the training has evolved as we’ve been here, the demand signals that we initially received from Ukraine, when we first got on ground, was full emphasis on countering the explosive threat on the battlefield. So that’s taking care of and neutralizing anti personnel mines, booby traps, and improvised explosive devices. And so we tackled all three of those skills. And they’re captured in our explosive ordnance disposal and military search topic. But as Ukraine started to go on the counter offensive and retake their territory, the demand signals from Ukraine transitioned into enabling the combined arms manoeuvre elements to go on the offensive. So now, we’ve transitioned the mindset of the course a little bit in order to enable, as I mentioned, the armoured and infantry assets to make a breach through enemy obstacles in order to take back their ground.

Capt Orton: Is there anything else that’s interesting to talk about that relates to the training you’re doing, what kind of gear you’re using and how it’s being sourced and all that?

Lt Pecora: Yeah, so a big emphasis of the training we’re doing is realizing that the Ukrainian students will not have the same equipment or assets that we have as Canadians. So we gear the training around that reality. So, how we do that is for example, when conducting a military search, you suspect that anything can be booby-trapped, whether it’s the front door to a building, or a weapon left in a trench line. So to neutralize that threat in the safest manner possible. We use what’s called The hook and line kit. And it’s quite basically just a rope with a carabiner, or a grappling hook on the end, and you will attach that grappling hook or carabiner to the object suspected of being booby-trapped, you will then follow the rope to a safe distance away and ideally undercover. And you conduct what we call a pull. So you pull on the rope to move the item suspected of being booby-trapped, whether that’s the door or a weapon that’s been left in a defensive position. And in doing so you create a standoff between the potential explosive threat and the combat engineer so that the combat engineer won’t be harmed by it.

So, in Canada, combat engineer elements are outfitted with fairly sophisticated hook and line kits that are capable of a lot of things. But we know that Ukrainian combat engineers will not have these kits in Ukraine. So what we’ve done instead is made improvised kits from hardware stores. So that’s one example of how we’ve overcome a difference in the equipment available. And it’s an example of how we’ve adapted the training specifically to the needs of the Ukrainian students.

Capt Orton: That really leads into the classic train how you fight, which is, you might not have all the gear that maybe what we’re used to having at home in our training schools or whatever, but then neither will they. And so being able to use that adaptability in the training environment means that you’re training under those realistic conditions that you’ll have to use on the battlefield anyways?

Lt Pecora: One hundred percent. And we know that it works. We know it’s saving lives. We’ve received feedback through the Ukrainian chain of command, that what we’re teaching the students is effective, and it’s helping them accomplish their tasks. One specific example that’s related to this is we receive feedback that one of our graduates of a previous course was sent back to his unit in Ukraine and was put in charge of a section responsible for searching a farmhouse. And this farmhouse was suspected of being booby-trapped by Russian forces as they withdrew from the area. Our student that graduated our course, while employing this team, used all the tactics, techniques and procedures that we taught on our course, in order to clear this farm house in the safest manner possible. And using an improvised hook and line kit as I described, they conducted multiple pulls on different items in the house. And doing so caused two explosions. But because the team employed our techniques with the hook and line kit, they didn't suffer any casualties. So that was a pretty rewarding moment for us when we received that feedback from Ukraine—and really emphasized that we are making a difference here, that our techniques do work, and that they are being used on the battlefield.

Capt Orton: Wow. I mean, that’s a really good story. And I would imagine that there’s an amount of uncertainty when you take your students and fire them back out into the world, that you know, communication methods don’t always allow for you to find out how that has gone. I guess it’s kind of a big deal to be able to hear back about that and know that it’s actually working.

Lt Pecora: Yeah, absolutely. Deployments are long. It’s a lot of time spent away from family and friends. But it’s feedback like that, it's the moments where the Ukrainians are returning to their units, and their sincere thank you that keep us motivated here for what we’re doing, and the difference we’re having.

Capt Orton: Man, I’m glad you’re having that experience. Like that seems really legitimate, that's kind of what we’re here to do. So it’s amazing that it’s happening.

Lt Pecora: It’s rewarding across the board, working with our Polish allies, our Latvian and British allies, too. We are all on the same page. We’re all motivated in the same camp together for the same purpose. We collaborate on a daily basis for the ultimate goal of helping save Ukrainian lives. We know that while the Ukraine students are likely to suffer hardship or be casualties when they return. And it has a toll on us as instructors having that uncertainty, as you mentioned— but it’s part of the job.

Capt Orton: Yeah. I mean, it really is.

Lt Pecora: Yeah.

Capt Orton: You know, this is an unusual environment in the sense that you’re attached to a group that’s not Canadian controlled or anything like that. And you’re working with people that aren’t Canadian soldiers, and I’m sure there’s a lot of interesting dynamics that come up in that space. What kind of other challenges have you encountered as part of this training mission?

Lt Pecora: Say our foremost challenge is the language barrier, obviously—because we’re working very closely with our Polish host nation, but we’re also instructing Ukrainian students. So there’s three languages right there that have to be overcome. We’re lucky enough that we deployed with a number of Canadian Army Forces members that are fluent in both Ukrainian and English, that enable our training, without whom we wouldn’t be able to impart any knowledge or skills on the Ukraine students. So we’re fortunate on that front. And very fortunate also that we have civilian contractors augmenting our linguist ability, so that we can break down the Ukrainian students into the smallest groups possible in order to maximize their hands-on practical training. So get a metal detector in as many hands as possible, get a tripwire feeler in as many hands as possible, or hook and line kit as many hands as possible. And it’s in those practical lessons that the Ukrainians learned the most, not necessarily in the theoretical essence.

Capt Orton: Obviously, you’re talking to these people, and they’re giving you good feedback, you know, good old mentor trainee dynamic. What are you hearing from them? What are they talking about, as you’re going through this process together?

Lt Pecora: They’re talking about what they’re seeing at the front line, a lot of the time. They’re very eager to share with us some of the threats that they’ve encountered, or the threats that they know their fellow soldiers have encountered also. And we take this feedback, and we use it to, one, feed the intelligence assets of the Canadian Army Forces and, two, adapt our training to those threats that we know the Ukrainians are seeing on the front line, so that we can better prepare them for when our students go back.

Capt Orton: Have you received a lot of soldiers talking about their perspective on what’s happening in their country?

Lt Pecora: We have, obviously—there’s hardship across the country, both with the soldiers and with the civilians, and the sentiment amongst the soldiers is an anger and aggression towards the aggression shown by the Russian Federation. And it’s pretty profound on the camp. But it’s necessary in a way to have that fighting spirit. And to enable Ukraine to fight and defend their land. It starts to become a challenge for us when we instruct on the law of armed conflict, which we believe is very necessary for any professional soldier and very necessary, especially considering most of our training audience, the Ukrainian students are newly mobilized people that are relatively fresh to the profession of arms and haven’t necessarily received training on the law of armed conflict. So we provide that and we get mixed emotions in return. On one hand, as you can imagine, the hardship caused by the Russian Federation deters soldiers from showing mercy in return. But on the other hand, we have a lot of soldiers that are thankful that we provide this training because they hadn’t received anything similar in the past. So, them knowing what is and is not allowed, and the reasons why ensures that they will go back to the battlefield as a professional soldier, and they can share that knowledge with their fellow soldiers on the frontline.

Capt Orton: Yeah, I mean, the law of armed conflict is always a subject with, with which you see a lot of personal passions exposed, because you have basically your legal obligations as a soldier, but also when people that you know, are dying, or things are happening around you in the heat of the moment, it can be difficult to fight through the cloud of emotion that you’re experiencing, to make sure that you’re doing the right thing at every moment. And it must be particularly challenging when you’re in a defensive position, and maybe some of the things that have been happening have been happening to make the legally correct decision at that time.

Lt Pecora: You’re absolutely right. It’s the emotional piece that is the biggest challenge. Typically, people know what is right and what is wrong. And such things do not need to be explained or described. But it’s in the heat of the moment when the emotions are high that someone doesn’t think rationally and thinks impulsively—and does something that they will either regret later, or that they will be held accountable for. And it’s understanding that, that it’s the emotional piece, and also understanding what is right and what is wrong that will prevent violations of the law of armed conflict.

Capt Orton: Man who would have guessed that we would head in the direction of emotional intelligence is important for soldiers on a combat engineer podcast, right, of currently being deployed to Poland, but you’re right. That’s literally what it’s about. So based on what you just said about some of the emotional and technical challenges that the soldiers are about to head into, what gives you hope about the future of this conflict, and particularly the soldiers that you’re training?

Lt Pecora: Yeah, so I’m confident that the combat engineers leaving our course will go back with the skills and knowledge they need to accomplish their tasks on the battlefield. A lot of these students, when they leave our course, will go back to the units and be the sole combat engineer representatives for the unit, responsible for leading teams of other soldiers in executing engineer tasks. So we’re confident that our students will have everything they need to impart the knowledge on those team members that they will lead to conduct the tasks and share that knowledge and do so in as safe a manner as possible.

It’s even more critical when we consider that long after the war, unexploded ordnance will have littered eastern Ukraine, and will have to be remediated. So by training combat engineers skills that are capable of finding and neutralizing or disposing of explosive threats, the Ukraine Armed Forces will be able to make the war torn area usable again for when civilians eventually move back in.

Capt Orton: Well, it sounds like you’re really getting the full experience of an operational training deployment. I’m glad you’re having that experience. And that seems like it’s been a good one.

Lt Pecora: Thanks. It absolutely has. It’s incredibly rewarding. We know that we’re making a difference here. We’re proud of it. We receive feedback from Ukraine saying that the capabilities and the quality of students coming out of our course is enabling the units at the frontline to sustain the fight and take the fight to the enemy.

Capt Orton: Well, thanks so much for coming on the podcast and sharing your stories and giving us these insights. It’s really something special. I hope you stay safe out there and your troops stay safe as well.

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Lt Pecora: Thanks, sir.

Capt Orton: That was Lieutenant Jacques Pecora from 1 Combat Engineer Regiment based out of Edmonton, dialling in from Poland. Thanks for listening. Orton out.

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