Article content

CFB SUFFIELD, Alta. — It’s fair to say that there is enough British firepower here to invade a good chunk of Western Canada before we could have any chance of stopping them.

Twenty-two battle tanks. About 350 armoured vehicles. More than 1,000 support vehicles. And during this particular exercise, about 1,250 British troops armed with everything from submachine guns to anti-aircraft missiles.

We apologize, but this video has failed to load.

tap here to see other videos from our team. Try refreshing your browser, or Alberta’s British invasion: Massive military base allows troops from U.K. to replicate war Back to video

But the British remain our friends, of course, and this just happens to be the British Army’s quadrennial mission of sending a battle group to invade a remote chunk of Alberta.

“Very complex, very dangerous … it’s the closest we think we can come to the replication of war,” says Col. Marcus Evans, commander of British Army Training Unit Suffield.

Evans stands amidst a landscape of British tanks, armour and infantry stretching as far as the eye can see. He is commanding the largest single gathering of British military ground strength outside the U.K. And like a futuristic Napoleon, he can keep tabs on the direction and speed of every single unit from a tablet computer.