The key to understanding "transformation" in the Canadian sense is that it was never intended to produce increased combat power or readiness. It was designed to kick out ad hoc battle groups for scheduled missions along the lines of SFOR in Bosnia while at the least maintaining the size and rank structure of the regular officer corps. For example the notion of having fewer full strength infantry battalions capable of rapid deployment was rejected in favour of maintaining skeletal units in order to retain the original number of command slots. The result being large scale augmentation of task forces going overseas by people plucked from other units and HQs, all of whom have to start training from scratch.

Inter-service, regimental and language group politics exacerbate the problems of organizing the CF and attempts by the Hillier, the CDS, to mimic US military organizations, with their much greater economies of scale, have only made things worse.