Great leaders don't always come from the top

Christie Blatchford
The Globe and Mail, 18 August 2009

What the Conference of Defence Associations Institute may not know about Warrant Officer Willy MacDonald, the 2009 recipient of their prestigious Vimy Award, is that he learned at least some of his astonishing leadership skills at the knee of his mother, Sandra, a provincial civil servant, union activist, feminist and veteran protester in Regina.

“It was probably all the marches we went on to protest,” she chortled in a recent telephone interview. “Me and my radical friends.

“I'd tell the kids, ‘Okay, we're going for a walk' and off we'd go, with Emma, the dog,” often to one of Saskatchewan's anti-Fair Share marches, Fair Share being the then-Conservative government's unpopular plan to dismantle government departments.

Full disclosure: WO MacDonald, now 36, is a friend. We first met in Kandahar in 2006 and he, along with his captain, Jon Hamilton, and their commanding officer, Lieutenant-Colonel Ian Hope, were the three leading figures in my book, Fifteen Days , which told the story of the 1st Battalion, Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry, and their six-month tour in southern Afghanistan.

WO MacDonald is also the recipient of the Star of Military Valour, for what the award's citation described this way: “On August 3, 2006, amidst chaos and under sustained and intense enemy fire in Afghanistan, Warrant Officer MacDonald, then sergeant, selflessly and repeatedly exposed himself to great peril in order to assist his wounded comrades.”

That is necessarily a sterile version of what actually happened that terrible day, when in the Panjwaii district, trying to take what was known as the White School, 14 soldiers found themselves seriously outnumbered, pinned down and under attack by a large group of Taliban.

At the nadir of the battle, with four Canadians already injured and one dead – Corporal Chris Reid, mortally wounded in a bomb blast – the soldiers were trapped in the school's outbuildings when a lone rocket-propelled grenade tore into one of them, killing Corporal Bryce Keller, Private Kevin Dallaire and Sergeant Vaughan Ingram, and wounding four others, including Capt. Hamilton.

He got on the radio and his message was dire: “If you don't get LAVs [light armoured vehicles] in here now, we're all gonna die!”

With machine-gun fire and RPGs raining down on him, WO MacDonald made a run for it. “As I came around the corner,” he said later, “I was assaulted by what I saw. Three soldiers appeared dead, and several more were writhing in agony from their multiple injuries. Those that were not hit by enemy fire were either hysterical or unable to do anything but stare at me in disbelief and shock.” Only Capt. Hamilton, his right foot pouring blood, was in control.

WO MacDonald apologized, of course, for not getting there sooner; Capt. Hamilton looked him in the eyes and said, “Don't worry about it, Will. I knew you'd come for me.”

And it was for that conduct – courage while under withering fire, not to mention the utter steadfastness that allowed Capt. Hamilton to know Willy would not let him down – that WO MacDonald was awarded his Star of Military Valour and in part why he received the latest honour, the Vimy Award.

The Vimy, inaugurated in 1991, is awarded every year to “one Canadian who has made a significant and outstanding contribution to the defence and security of our nation and the preservation of our democratic values.” Past distinguished winners include a number of generals, including former chief of defence staff Rick Hillier, Major-General Lewis MacKenzie and former air commodore Len Birchall.

But never before has an NCO, a non-commissioned officer, won the Vimy, and that WO MacDonald did is further recognition that the greatest leaders aren't necessarily officers (though many are), and might just as often come from the ranks.

Just as WO MacDonald aced just about every course he took as a soldier before Afghanistan, so has he continued to distinguish himself since getting back to Canada, speaking about his experiences at high schools and military gatherings. His personnel file is replete with letters of appreciation.

He first joined the military as a teenager. Where his friends, looking for part-time jobs, worked at fast food joints, WO MacDonald and a soccer mate joined the Royal Regina Rifles, a reserve regiment, instead. “Willy never looked back,” his mother said.

An air-force brat herself, Ms. MacDonald and her three brothers avoided the military in their own careers. When Willy joined up, and her daughter, Melody, married a soldier, she thought to herself, “What is going on here?” But she is rightly very proud of her son. “He's a charming little devil,” she said.

It was from her that WO MacDonald learned about the value of standing up for your principles (as a child, he once picketed outside a Mac's Milk store because it drove the local independent out of business, telling his mom that he knew it wouldn't do any good, but that he felt obliged to make his voice heard) and the importance of being able to communicate. “You need to command the English language” was her mantra to her children. “You have to be persuasive.”

She was “petrified” when he went to Kandahar. “My blood pressure soared.” She said it's a good thing Willy came back safe and sound, because otherwise, “I'd have to go and protest on Parliament for the next 10 years,” she said.

When he returned from Afghanistan, it was to a fierce welcome from his family and neighbours in Regina. That night, he, his mom and her partner, Wendy, “had a big group cry” on the couch as he told them about Aug. 3, and how Capt. Hamilton had whispered, “I knew you'd come for me.”

And that's the thing about Willy MacDonald: All his friends know he would come for them, whatever it took.

After a stint in Wainwright, Alta., WO MacDonald is now back in Edmonton, with the 3rd Battalion of the PPCLI. Jon Hamilton is on his way there himself, so the two great friends will be reunited. Capt. Hamilton has a new baby girl to his family, and WO MacDonald has a fiancée, Danielle Cariou.

He will receive his award in Ottawa on Nov. 20.