For more than 5 years I have been in touch with various members of the Forces about this, both officially and otherwise. I've also had "more than one" serving armour officer (serving regimental CO's in fact) contact me asking various opinions on this topic.
The situation is thus (distilled to save bandwidth....):
-wheeled AFV's have become the "flavour of the month", in many countries mostly due to lower initial cost, easier maintainablity, air transport, training and wear and tear.
Plus they look cool. Don't laugh. They don't look nasty like tanks do, so we aren't seen as being "aggressive".
-the Leo C2 nearly did not come about at all. There was talk some years back that the Leos would not upgraded at all, and the LAV fleet expanded and the Leos sold off (hey, I need a dozer tank!). If the Leo C2 (all but useless really when it comes to Canada....when would we EVER deploy them, and if so, HOW? Can't rent ALL the Antonovs after all!). The idea was that we would not be engaging in high intensity conflicts anyway as a result of national political policy, so why invest in the Leo upgrade--a result of the misguided optimism of the non-existent "peace dividend".
-it is HIGHLY unlikely that we will buy tanks again in the near future (barring earth shaking international developments of course). With the succession of Liberal governments (not likely to change due to lack of an effective alternative party or leader) likely to remain unbroken for the forseeable future, this is almost a certainty anyway.
-the concept of light brigade concept is also not new, and has been experimented with before in this country. (good God, that traitorous, neo-Marxist, sandal clad, bike riding, tree hugging commie pinko flower child Trudeau had his bureaucrats investigating the idea that Scorpions and Scimitars were effective replacements for the Centurion in the 70's!! That must have been a holdover from PET's many turns at the hookah.....)
-as a result of this change of doctrine, it is as well also likely that our armour guys may even see MORE deployments (worrisome to say the least to serving individuals), as WAFV's don't look like tanks, and therefore not as "war like" on the 6 o'clcock news, and they can be moved much easier, and more often, for fewer dollars. And seeing as though most liberals want to be the next UN GS, this is just good PR. We'd be sending "light" vehicles, not those nasty tanks. It's all about appearance. We have to be seen as saving the world you know......
-I have had "more than one" armour officer (and God knows how many troopers ) tell me they think this idea is essentially whacked, but in the end they know it IS inevitable for the forseeable future. They are taking it in stride, as they have to. And for the time being, they will retain their tanks and the training, albeit limited, that goes with it.
Now to reiterate the obvious, YES we all know that tanks are NOT dead, they have NOT been shoved from the battlefield as I had one idiot friend suggest to me the other day (don't worry, he's since been disposed of in an especially brutal manner).
We here on MLU also know full well that they are still, and will be for the forseeable future, a viable and superior battlefield weapons delivery system, but the current reality is such that WAFV will be prevalent in most small to mid size countries. And we are NOT a large country by any stretch, except in terms of square miles of unpopulated nothingness and vacuous voters.
It is a done deal. The Armoured Corps is lucky they still have tanks at all (and they know it). I speak not from conjecture on this. It was a very near thing that Leos would be gone entirely if it weren't for the fact that we just recently spent millions upgrading them.
This is pretty much the only way the Forces can buy time till the political climate changes, and in the interim, still keep our tracked tank capability and "corporate knowledge" of them.
And finally remember a few points:
-Liberals will be there for at least the next 4 years. And unless Paul Martin suddenly shifts to the right due to a blow to the head, his defence policy won't be much different from what it is now.
-the only thing that would conceivably change the attitude of apathetic, dumbass Canadian voters, who will always vote for the status quo, is if someone directly attacks Canada. Unlikely maybe, but that's also what the Liberals are doing--not pissing anyone off because we're so nice and don't support our friends and Allies like we should.
Don