by Ray Dick

The fallout from a decade of stretching the Canadian Forces to the limit to meet a growing number of peacekeeping and other commitments around the world has become increasingly evident as former and serving members of the military seek help from national peacekeeping associations across the country.

The greatest need of these returning soldiers, many of them stressed out from what they have been through in several rotations, is help in dealing with their trauma and re-establishing themselves in society, says Harold Leduc, president of the Canadian Peacekeeping Veterans Association with headquarters in Victoria.

The CPVA, set up in 1991, is one of three main peacekeeping veterans associations that have sprung up across the country since the early 1990s, in the same time range as the government began cutting Department of National Defence budgets and personnel in a fight against growing federal deficits. The other major peacekeeping veterans associations are the Blue Helmets Inc., set up in 1997 with headquarters at Canadian Forces Base Gagetown in New Brunswick, and the Canadian Association of Veterans in United Nations Peacekeeping, incorporated in 1991 and based in Ottawa. All are led by former peacekeepers, and all have commented on the changed atmosphere since their service that began in the 1960s.

“It was different then,” said Fred Leblanc of Fredericton, president of the Blue Helmets, an association with 113 members across Canada “and one in Australia.” He did his peacekeeping service in 1962 in the Congo. “You did your job, returned, and that was it.” Today it was a different story.

Paul Greensides of Gloucester, Ont., agrees. He is the national secretary of the Canadian Association of Veterans in United Nations Peacekeeping, an association officially sanctioned in 1991 that now has 648 members “from Vancouver Island to Newfoundland.” There “was nothing in place for us” when he returned from peacekeeping duty in Cyprus in 1966.

While all three associations are involved in varying degrees with initiatives and projects to help the returning peacekeepers and those still serving, all agree that peer counselling is a valuable tool in helping the veterans to overcome stress and trauma while they are still serving or to facilitate their reintroduction to civilian society.

Leduc, who leads the largest peacekeeping veterans association with some 800 members, says “the military and Veterans Affairs Canada has improved its care-of-the-injured policies and programs.” Among those improvements, adopted by VAC after suggestions from Leduc’s group, is a program where former Canadian Forces members and their families can call a toll-free line and get free professional counselling in or near their own communities through a 24-hour-a-day assessment and referral service.

This counselling includes such areas as work-related issues, health concerns, family problems, psychological difficulties, substance abuse, gambling and financial problems.

Leduc’s group is also involved in several other projects to aid returning peacekeepers, one in co-operation with the University of British Columbia and financial support from British Columbia/Yukon Command of The Royal Canadian Legion. It is a 15-week, 45-hour counselling program conducted by psychology professor Dr. Marvin Westwood and involves peacekeepers talking to fellow peacekeepers and acting out past traumas in group sessions.

“We now have a peer support network set up in Ontario, Quebec and the Atlantic region,” said Leduc, a member of the Legion’s Prince Edward Branch in Victoria.

Leduc also says the CPVA was the driving force in the government establishment of a Canadian Peacekeeping Service Medal over five years of effort and through five private members bills in Parliament. The first medals were awarded in an Ottawa ceremony Sept. 6, 2000, and the program is continuing.

Both the Blue Helmets and the CAVUNP have taken a special interest in the peacekeeping medal. “We want to ensure that as many people as possible get the medal,” said Leblanc, a member and service officer with the Legion’s Marysville Branch in Fredericton.

Leblanc said his group started in 1997 when a group of 11 former peacekeepers got together and decided to form a support group. It has since grown to 113 retired and serving members from across Canada, operating from a home base at CFB Gagetown.

Although officially incorporated in 1991, a group of Canadian United Nations veterans got together in Toronto and started organizing CAVUNP in January 1986 to remember those who fell in the service of peace, to improve the care of those wounded in body or spirit, co-operate with other organizations with similar objectives, support charitable organizations of benefit to veterans and to educate the public on peacekeeping and peacekeepers. Chapters were formed from Victoria to Corner Brook, Nfld., and members include serving and retired Canadian military, Royal Canadian Mounted Police and civilian veterans of United Nations peacekeeping missions. The association takes part in various national observances, and a CAVUNP member is a representative on the National Defence and Veterans Affairs Centre for the Support of Injured and Retired Members and their Families.

“But it’s comradeship as much as anything else,” says Greensides, who served 36 years in the military, including his stint in Cyprus with the Black Watch. “Members can discuss problems more easily and readily with someone who has been through the same experiences.”

The CPVU can be reached at Box 48197, Victoria, BC V8Z 7H6. CAVUNP is at 614-915 Elmsmere Rd., Gloucester, ON K1J 8H8. And the Blue Helmets are at 17 DeWitt Acres, Fredericton, NB E3A 6S3.