OTTAWA – Canada’s top military officer temporarily stepped down as chief of the defense team after the military police opened an investigation into unspecified charges against him.
The top military officer, Admiral Art McDonald, stepped down on Wednesday amid a separate investigation into the former chief of defense staff, Jonathan Vance, a retired Army general. Reports have surfaced this month that Mr. Vance behaved inappropriately with two subordinates.
Citing the police investigation, Defense Minister Harjit Sajjan declined to offer any details about Admiral McDonald’s decision to withdraw. The Department of National Defense also gave no details, and Admiral McDonald did not publicly comment on the accusations.
“I take all allegations of misconduct seriously and continue to take strong action against any allegations of misconduct that are made,” said Mr. Sajjan in a released statement Wednesday night on Twitter. “It doesn’t matter the classification, it doesn’t matter the position.”
The Canadian military has long struggled with accusations of sexual misconduct and sexism.
In 2019, the government set aside $ 690 million to resolve claims of sexual harassment and misconduct within its military, which were brought in five collective lawsuits.
The deal was made after an external review by a retired Supreme Court judge who concluded that the military had “a hostile environment for women and LGTBQ members, and is conducive to more serious incidents of sexual harassment and assault”.
During his tenure, Mr. Vance, who served as head of defense from 2015 until his retirement last month, launched a widely publicized program to “ensure that sexual misconduct is never minimized, ignored or excused”.
When Admiral McDonald was appointed head of the defense team, he talked about the need to change culture within the armed forces and apologized to his members “who have experienced racism, discriminatory behavior and / or hateful conduct”. He told reporters that, throughout his career, he had inadvertently perpetuated some of the problems he now planned to solve.
But, less than a month into his new job, Admiral McDonald faced criticism after posting a tweet promoting diversity and cultural change accompanied by a photograph of eight white senior military commanders around a table with a single woman in civilian clothes and a ninth man appearing on a video screen behind them.
Lieutenant-General Wayne D. Eyre, commander of the army, will serve temporarily as the superior officer of the army.
Last week, Sajjan – a former army lieutenant colonel who served in Bosnia and Afghanistan – refused to tell the House of Commons national defense committee when he learned of the charges against Vance, only saying he was “shocked” When first aired publicly on Global News, a Canadian broadcaster, earlier this month.
Vance, who twice led the Canadian Forces based in Kandahar, Afghanistan, was appointed by the previous conservative government.
On Sunday, Global News broadcast an interview with Kellie Brennan, a former army major, who said she had had a sexual relationship with Vance for several years, including periods when she was in charge in Toronto and Ottawa.
When asked whether it was consensual, Ms. Brennan said: “On a personal level, does ‘consensual’ mean that I was participating in this? Yea.”
But she added: “Can I say no to him? No. The reason I say this is because if he called me or texted me, I was forced to go back to him. “
She said her attempts to raise the issue within the military have gone nowhere.
“It was a hot potato that nobody knew what to do with,” she said.
Mr. Vance denied having sex with Mrs. Brennan while she was under his command, but said they had dated in 2001.
Cases involving inappropriate sexual intercourse usually go to a military court martial.
Michel W. Drapeau, a retired Army colonel who is now a lawyer specializing in military law, said that under the military justice system, officers can be prosecuted for having intimate relations with anyone under his command.
Vance’s retirement, added Drapeau, does not prevent him from facing charges for misconduct while on active duty.
But Drapeau said the court-martial system requires the cases to be authorized by a high-ranking official, making it “almost impossible to pursue the charges” against Admiral McDonald if the investigation reveals any misconduct.
Earlier this week, the Conference of Defense Associations Institute, a Canadian policy group led largely by former military officers, issued a statement raising concerns about the effect that allegations of sexual misconduct are having on the military.
“Claims of this nature erode public confidence in the Canadian Armed Forces and, ultimately, negatively affect morale and hamper efforts to recruit our nation’s future protectors,” the group said.