By every principle of war, every shred of military logic, logistics
support to Canada's Task Force Orion in Afghanistan should have
collapsed in July 2006. There are few countries that offer a greater
challenge to logistics than Afghanistan, and yet Canadian soldiers lived
through an enormous test on this deadly international stage - a
monumental accomplishment. Canadian combat operations were widespread
across southern Afghanistan in 2006, and logistics soldiers worked in
quiet desperation to keep the battle group moving. Only now is it
appreciated how precarious the logistics operations of Task Force Orion
in Kandahar really were.
What the Thunder Said is an honest, raw recollection of incidents and
impressions of Canadian warfighting from a logistics perspective. It
offers solid insight into the history of military logistics in Canada
and explores in some detail the dramatic erosion of a once-proud corner
of the army from the perspective of a battalion commander.