CREDIT: Wayne Cuddington, The Ottawa Citizen Outgoing U.S. Ambassador to Canada Paul Cellucci is making a final appeal to beef up Canada's armed forces before he leaves his post. He said the military should build an elite, rapid-reaction strike force -- and buy heavy-lift aircraft to transport the soldiers to trouble spots.

Canada can "punch above its weight" on the global stage, but it must pour money into intelligence gathering, create a rapid-reaction strike force and buy heavy-lift aircraft to transport elite soldiers to world trouble spots, says outgoing U.S. Ambassador Paul Cellucci.

With a boost in defence spending expected in the federal budget, Mr. Cellucci said Canada's 55,000-member military needs to be reshaped to battle terrorist threats, confront ethic cleansing and help out in national disasters.

The U.S. would like Canada to beef up its elite JTF2 special forces and establish a Canadian strike force that could deploy anywhere in the world on short notice.

"A Level 2 special forces would give Canada the ability to have troops that could be quickly deployed to trouble spots -- whether it is Haiti or whether it is the tsunami where people needed help right away," Mr. Cellucci said in a wide-ranging interview.

Mr. Cellucci did not say how many soldiers the U.S. would like to see in a strike force.

But experts have said Canada should be able to commit a self-contained brigade-size unit of about 4,000 soldiers to any rapid-reaction force.

In fact, the Liberal government has committed to recruiting an additional 5,000 full-time troops, and the Defence Department is in the process of doubling the size of the Joint Task Force 2 ranks to an estimated 600 troops from 300 counter-terrorism commandos.

Mr. Cellucci said Canada also needs to purchase strategic airlift for a rapid-reaction force so it does not have to hitch rides with the U.S. air force, or rent Ukraine-built Antonov cargo planes from Russia as the military had to do during the recent tsunami crisis.

"Obviously, this would require an increase in defence spending, but I don't think it would be overwhelming. I think it is something that is achievable in the fairly near term," he said. "It would mean that Canada would punch above its weight and contribute substantially to international security where Canadians have a great reputation."

Unlike Canada, which couldn't immediately deploy its Disaster Assistance Response Team to Sri Lanka because it didn't have heavy airlift, Mr. Cellucci said U.S. forces were able to get to Southeast Asia quickly to save lives.

"In the early days of the tsunami, it was U.S. helicopters which got there quickly because we have the capacity to deliver choppers and the soldiers where they were needed, and they were providing water and food to people who would have died without it," he said.

"That's a good thing, and I see no reason why Canada should not have some of that capability as well, but to have that capability you have to have lift."

Mr. Cellucci said the U.S. would also like Canada's security agencies, such as the ultra-secret Communications Security Establishment, to help collect and interpret intelligence for its allies.

The U.S. respects Canadian expertise in the intelligence field, and Mr. Cellucci said the country could play an even more important role in analysing "satellite imagery, whether it's on the battlefield or in a situation that could be developing somewhere around the world."

"This is a mission that can be done without sending Canadian forces overseas," he said.

Mr. Cellucci also had high praise for Canadian troops in Afghanistan, saying they were instrumental in helping bring democratic freedoms to a country that had once been ruled by the Islamic hardline Taliban.

On missile defence, Mr. Cellucci said he hoped Canada would sign on before he leaves as ambassador on March 18 after a four-year stint in Ottawa.

But he said the U.S. has no deadline for Canada to say yes or no because it understands the political pressures Prime Minister Paul Martin is facing in a minority Parliament and with growing dissension within Liberal ranks.

But Mr. Cellucci also left little doubt Washington expects Canada will ultimately join the missile program since it's already given its approval for Norad to act as an early warning system.

"A vote has been promised and a vote will take place and before the vote, a case will be made (for missile defence) that this is in Canada's interest," he said. "We hope Canada will make a positive decision and go forward with us, but we are going forward anyway."

In other news yesterday, Mr. Cellucci says Washington wants quick action on approving a new border crossing between Windsor and Detroit and suggested the U.S. is prepared to split the cost.

He noted Canada and the U.S. have worked out a 50/50 cost-sharing formula to pay for a new bridge currently being built between New Brunswick and Maine, saying this could be the model for the new crossing currently under study by both Windsor and Detroit to relieve the logjams that plague the two country's busiest border crossing.

U.S. Envoy's Parting Advice: Beef Up the Military