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Ethnic infighting erupts in Canadian military amid influx of non-citizen recruits

Ethnic infighting has erupted at Canadian military basic training amid a massive recent influx of non-citizen recruits, according to a damning leaked internal report.

The Canadian Armed Forces first allowed permanent residents to join in 2022, and then relaxed vetting rules in October 2024, resulting in dramatic rise in foreign recruits. Aptitude tests have also been removed, and candidates can enrol with a set list of approved medical issues, including mental health problems.

But the Canadian Forces Leadership and Recruit School report obtained by Juno News, titled “Initial Observations – Impact of Changes to Canadian Armed Forces Recruiting Policies at Basic Training Over 2025”, found the changes had a devastating effect on basic officer training at the Quebec centre.

The document, written by school Commandant and Lieutenant Colonel M.R. Kieley in January, stated that a cohort of more than 1,000 permanent residents arriving at the beginning of 2025 was a “challenging demographic to train”, and noted there were also a large number of recently naturalised Canadian citizens.

The influx of non-citizen candidates resulted in a French-language Basic Military Officer Qualification (BMOQ) platoon that was made up of 83% permanent residents, while English-language platoons were typically in the 30% range.

“These initial platoons were also made up of candidates with as little as three months residency in Canada, leading to a significant culture shock as candidates had not yet acclimatised to Canadian society, let alone military culture,” the report stated.

“[The Francophone] platoon was plagued by allegations of racism (from candidates against staff but equally candidates against other candidates) and constant infighting between cultural blocs within the platoon (ie. Cameroonian candidates against those from Cote D’Ivorie).

The gap between US and European living standards has been noticeable for some time, and some European countries aren’t even keeping up with the poorest states in the United States. That is, when we look at measures of income, states like West Virginia and Mississippi compare favorably against European countries like France, Italy, and the United Kingdom.

This has led to what some observers of international macroeconomics call the “Mississippi Question.” The question goes something like this: “is my country poorer than the poorest state in the United States?” The poorest state is presumably Mississippi, and if your country is worse off than Mississippi, that’s evidence that your country has nothing to brag about in terms of its standard of living.

Whether deserved or not, the Mississippi economy has been deemed by some as a benchmark for what not to be, and the comparison has become more popular over the past decade. About ten years ago, British journalist Fraser Nelson suggested that when we compare foreign GDP per capita between European countries and US states, we find that the United Kingdom is poorer than Mississippi. This idea has never set well with British policymakers, of course, and the matter has been debated for years with pundits and researchers suggesting different measures that help give us insight into whether or not Country X is indeed poorer than Mississippi. The Financial Times in 2023 asked the question, and concluded that the UK is still richer than Mississippi, but barely.