Operation Preamble

On the afternoon of Thursday January 14,1999, while he was in meeting in downtown Toronto, Roberts was called on his cellphone and asked if was available for a callout for Op Preamble. Naturally he said yes. Even be before he got to his car, and while he was standing knee deep in snow, in the parking lot he got a second call. This time it was Susan Ho of Maclean's Magazine asking about the deployment of Army Reserve soldiers to support the City of Toronto. Roberts told her he was on his way home to get his uniform and kit, and then was going to 32 Canadian Brigade Group Headquarters for a briefing. He told Ms.Ho that he would be more than happy to talk to her once he had some hard information.

At 32 CBGHQ, Roberts was told he would be co-ordinating the public affairs for a Company sized group of soldiers to be prepositioned at Fort York Armoury in downtown Toronto. Another armoury in Toronto, Moss Park Armoury, was being turned into a shelter for the homeless.

Media coverage on Friday morning was very extensive, CTV's Canada AM, CBC Morning, and City-TV Breakfast Television provided live coverage of soldiers from CFB Petawawa who had been brought into the area and prepositioned at CFB Toronto, in north Toronto. The Reserve troops at Fort York Armoury were issued shovels deployed to clear bus shelters and routes through snow banks for pedestrians in the downtown area. Two teams of soldiers moved along King Street and Queen Street digging out street car stops. People would stop them, and thank them or to give them gifts. Resturant owners offerred free coffee. At the intersection of King Street West and Bay Street, on three of the four corners television cameras crews from Global TV, CFTO-TV, and CITY-TV conducted interviews with soldiers as they dug out street car and bus stops and routes through snowbanks from the sidewalk to the road. At another interesction, two photographers from The National Post bumped into each other as they took photographs of the soldliers. Afterwards they asked each other what they were doing there. They both told each other that they had been tasked to cover this part of Toronto.

CTV Canada AM	Global TV	CBLT-TV

CFMT-TV

The snow kept on falling, and within 24 hours, Friday evening, additional Reserve soldiers were called in and the organization was upgraded to Battalion strength. Dubbed The Toronto Battle Group, it was commanded by Lieutenant-Colonel Julian Chapman, Commanding Officer of The Toronto Scottish Regiment. Soldiers who were supposed to deploy on planned winter warfare exercises were redirected to Fort York Armoury. During the night approximately 320 troops finished up sleeping on the concrete armoury floor on air mattresses.

The next morning, and armed with credit cards QM staff headed to hardware stores to purchase additional snowshovels. Catering for the addition soldiers had to be arranged. Lessons learnt the day before, showed that military radios were useless in the downtown area because of the high-rise buildings. So over 20 cellphones were rented and issued to people in command positions. After a briefing, troops deployed from Fort York Armoury to the Toronto Works Yard on King Street West to be assigned tasks.

On the street interview with CFMT-TV

After returning to the armoury that evening troops lined up to read the newspaper clippings taped to the wall and to see if there were in any photographs. A number of them were less than amused to see that Mayor Lastman had visited troops temporally based at ASU Toronto. These soldiers had been brought in from CFB Petawawa as a precaution, should additional resources might be needed. The fact that these troops had armoured personnel carriers, and that the mayor rode around in them for a photo opportunity resulted in some observations.

The next morning Roberts called a friend who had a contact in the mayor's officer. In a follow up discussion with the mayor's office, Roberts had to explain that the 320 troops at Fort York Armoury were from Toronto, and were the mayor's constituents. He also mentioned that they would be wrapping up operations that afternoon and that there would be a final parade. The mayor's office said he would be there.

CITY-TV broadcast a scenes of Mayor Mel Lastman, accompanied by LCol Julian Chapman and CWO Kenvin Junor inspecting the soldiers of the Toronto Battle Group who were staged out of Fort York Armoury.

After the Inspection Mayor Mel Lastman poses on the parade square with the troops.

Letter to the editor of Maclean's Magazine In response to an article in the January 25 issue Roberts wrote this letter. Maclean's published it, unedited in their February 15 issue.

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