The essential Gen. Rick Hillier, Canada's outgoing chief of defence staff of the Canadian Forces, in brief: His personal life, military career and some of the more notable quotes from a very public military figure.

Personal life

• Born in 1955 in Campbellton, N.L.
• Graduated from Memorial University in 1975 with a bachelor of science degree.
• Has had two sons with wife Joyce; they have one grandson.
• Cheers for the Toronto Maple Leafs
• Hillier's official biography states: "Enjoys most recreational pursuits but, in particular, runs slowly, plays hockey poorly and golfs not well at all."

Military career

• Has been in the Canadian Forces for 36 years
• Enrolled in the Regular Officer Training Program (ROTP) in 1973 
• After completing armoured officer training, he joined the 8th Canadian Hussars (Princess Louise's) based at CFB Petawawa, Ontario
• He would later serve with the Royal Canadian Dragoons in Canada and Germany, and would ultimately command the regiment
• Had several staff officer jobs, ranging from the army in Montreal to the strategic level at National Defence headquarters in Ottawa
• 1998: Appointed as the first Canadian Deputy Commanding General of III Corps, U.S. Army in Fort Hood, Tex.
• 2000: Took command of NATO's Stabilization Force's (SFOR) Multinational Division (Southwest) in Bosnia-Herzegovina.
• May 2003: Appointed commander of the Army
• October 2003: Selected as the Commander of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Kabul, Afghanistan.
• Feb. 4, 2005: Assumed duties as the Chief of the Defence Staff (Prime Minister Paul Martin approved the appointment), making him the country's top military leader

Quotes

• "I just wanted to be a soldier." -- his response to being asked whether he always harboured ambitions to be a general.
  
  
• "... Is it too much to ask that our Parliament ... show their support for the men and women who will execute the (Afghanistan) mission by voting overwhelmingly to support them in the danger and risks they will encounter." -- Hillier, speaking on Feb. 24, 2008, while Parliament was considering whether or not to extend the mission.
  
  
• "Governor Asadullah has been doing some phenomenal work in Kandahar province ... Obviously we have worked with him because he is the governor there, and we have seen some incredible changes in the province and if there's an issue of any kind of impropriety whatsoever, that's an issue for the Afghanistan government." -- Hillier on Feb. 1, 2008; Foreign Affairs Minister Maxime Bernier would tell Afghanistan's President Hamid Karzai slightly more than two months later that Asadullah Khalid should be replaced.
  
  
• "I was on the beach in the Dominican Republic. I had a little break, and I heard about that and -- can I say this without everybody beating up on me across Canada? -- I was on my third rum and Coke, and I really didn't give a damn" -- Hillier on Feb. 1, 2008, talking to reporters about PMO communications director Sandra Buckler's statement that the military did not inform the government that transfers of Afghan prisoners had been suspended. She retracted the statement the next day, saying she "misspoke."
  
  
• "The Taliban provided that sort of fertile garden in which al Qaeda could do a whole bunch of things that it would not have otherwise been able to do or would have had more difficulty doing." -- Hillier telling The Canadian Press in a December 2007 interview on why it was important to have pushed the Taliban from power in Afghanistan.
  
  
• "The Taliban are not 10-foot-tall warriors, but at the same time they are not to be dismissed lightly." -- Hillier in another December 2007 interview with CP.
  
  
• "I will be the public champion of those brave men and women. They are Canada's sons and daughters, ladies and gentlemen. If we can't market Canada's sons and daughters back to Canada's moms and dads, we need to find somebody to replace us to do the job. Because that's what needs to be done." -- Hillier on Nov. 6, 2007, in response to suggestions he'd been muzzled.
  
  
• "We're on exactly the same sheet of paper." -- Hillier in an appearance on CTV's Mike Duffy Live on Oct. 26, 2007; he was speaking about the situation where he appeared to contradict Prime Minister Stephen Harper on the length of the military mission in Afghanistan.
  
  
• "Let me just come out very frankly here: I met a variety of soldiers who are pissed off. They're angry that these allegations have detracted from the overall mission here." -- Hillier speaking to reporters in Kandahar on May 2, 2007 on allegations that Canadian troops turned over detainees to Afghan authorities knowing they would be tortured.
  
  
• "Those actions, dollar deprived, have now led to some deep wounds in ... the Canadian Forces over this past, what I would call, a decade of darkness." -- Hillier in a Feb. 16, 2007 speech to a defence group, referring to budget cuts made in the 1990s.
  
  
• "We're doing the security operations not because we want to do them, but because they are absolutely essential to do." -- Hillier in a December 2006 interview with CP
  
  
• "I think Canadians believe in this mission. I think they believe that we have a responsibility as the rich and luxurious and caring nation that we are to help in other places around the world where the populations don't have any of those benefits or advantages or rights." -- Hillier told reporters in Kandahar, Afghanistan on Oct. 1, 2006
  
  
• "I don't think tough quite describes it." -- Hillier on Aug. 16, 2006 after a period in which seven Canadian soldiers died in a short period
  
  
• "I'm not ashamed to say we need money." -- Hillier in an April 12, 2006 speech to a Toronto business audience about the Forces' budgetary needs
  
  
• "These are detestable murderers and scumbags. They detest our freedoms, they detest our society, they detest our liberties." -- Hillier on July 14, 2005, on Osama bin Laden and Islamist terrorists in general. He added: "We're not the public service of Canada. We're not just another department. We are the Canadian Forces, and our job is to be able to kill people. "
  
  
• "As a responsible citizen of the world we have been involved in the campaign against terrorism, and, of course, we try to bring stability to places that are unstable and therefore have acted as hotbeds for supporting terrorism. All that, I think, does make us a target." -- Hillier speaking to CTV's Question Period on July 10, 2005, days after a terror attack on London's subway system
  
  
• "In this country, we could probably not give enough resources to the men and women to do all the things that we ask them to do. But we can give them too little, and that is what we are now doing. Remember them in your budgets." -- Hillier in his first speech as CDS on Feb. 4, 2005

Sources: Dept. of National Defence, CTV.ca archives, The Canadian Press