A Long-Overdue Thank You for Warrant Officer (ret’d) Brent McNair

Westmount, Quebec – 02 January 2026: Levée Day 2026 was intended, as always, to start the year with fellowship. Approximately 60 members of the regimental family gathered at the Armoury, welcomed by Lieutenant-Colonel Kevin Langlois, Commanding Officer, and Chief Warrant Officer Jim Quesnel, Regimental Sergeant-Major, who continued the tradition by personally serving breakfast before raising a glass to the year ahead.

This year, the Levée also carried a special purpose. Eight and a half years after his retirement, the Regiment finally had the chance to formally close the loop for Warrant Officer (ret’d) Brent McNair. In a brief, sincere presentation, Lieutenant-Colonel Langlois and Chief Warrant Officer Quesnel presented Warrant Officer (ret’d) McNair with his certificate of service, an overdue acknowledgement of a soldier whose fingerprints remain on the unit’s culture.

According to the RMR’s latest history book, Glory Never Dies, published in 2025:

Brent McNair, then an earnest and eloquent RMR corporal from rural Ontario, served in Afghanistan with the Van Doos, and later with the Provincial Reconstruction Team. “I got along well with the Afghan people, they are strong willed, hard-working people,” he says. “But I was not prepared for how tribal the country is. It is like walking on eggshells.”

McNair, who later served with a Psychological Operations (PSYOPS) team, said while he was prepared for action he didn’t expect “all the non-combat stuff” he was assigned to do: “Our core business as soldiers is to do the fighting, but there is so much to do outside the fighting. A soldier has to be versatile and has to do things that are outside the core business. We do the best we can.”

A review of Warrant Officer (retired) McNair’s many appearances on the Regiment’s website reads like a catalogue of “quiet professionalism,” the kind that rarely asks for attention but consistently raises standards. As a Company Sergeant-Major of “A” Company in 2015, he documented the controlled chaos of deploying for weekend training to Canadian Forces Base Valcartier, where the combined Brigade company fielded 124 soldiers on strength, including 58 from the RMR, and then drove home a lesson every leader learns the hard way: timings slip fast at company level, and recovery is never automatic.

He also invested in tradition and people. In 2016, as President of the Mess Committee, Warrant Officer McNair welcomed guests alongside Regimental Sergeant-Major Chief Warrant Officer David Cochrane at the Warrant Officers’ and Sergeants’ Mess for the 100th annual Ypres Mess Dinner. That same year, he captured the warmth of the regimental family in writing, describing the Children’s Christmas Party hosted by all three messes and The Royal Montreal Regiment Association (Branch 14).

Beyond the Armoury, he represented the Regiment on the world stage and in Canada’s harshest terrain. In New Zealand in 2017 for the 100th anniversary of the Battle of Vimy Ridge, he led the commemoration and spoke to the Regiment’s actions and cost at Vimy Ridge.  In the high arctic on Operation NUNALIVUT 2017, he served as Company Sergeant-Major alongside Major Pat Paulin.

If a medal can be a milestone, Warrant Officer (retired) McNair reached one in 2019 when Lieutenant-Colonel John Shone presented him with the Canadian Forces Decoration medal, also a bit delayed as Warrant Officer (ret’d) McNair had already retired from the CAF and was living abroad.

Yes, the expression may be hackneyed but in this instance it deserves its due: Warrant Officer (ret’d) Brent McNair, thank you for your service!