CFB Gagetown 5th Canadian Division Support Base ( 5 CDSB ) Gagetown , referred to as CFB Gagetown , is a large Canadian Forces Base located in southwestern New Brunswick . Construction of the base . At the beginning of the Cold War , Canadian defence planners recognized the need for providing the Canadian Army with a suitable training facility where brigade and division - sized armoured , infantry , and artillery units could exercise in preparation for their role in defending western Europe under Canada ' s obligations to the North Atlantic Treaty . The facility would need to be located relatively close to an all - season Atlantic port and have suitable railway connections . Existing training facilities dating from the First and Second World War s in eastern Canada were relatively small ( Camp Debert , Camp Aldershot , Sussex Military Camp , Camp Valcartier , Camp Petawawa , Camp Utopia ) , thus a new facility was considered . At the same time , regional economic development planners saw an opportunity for a military base to benefit the economy of southwestern New Brunswick . The area under consideration was an expansive plateau west of the St . John River between the cities of Saint John and Fredericton , measuring approximately in length and in width ; more accurately it runs between Oromocto in the north to Welsford in the south , and between the St . John River in the east and the South Branch of the Oromocto River in the west . Over 900 families inhabited the area primarily engaged in agriculture and forestry industries . The terrain was variable , providing mixed Acadian forest , swamp and marshland , as well as open farming areas similar to the North European Plain . The influence of the " St . Croix Highlands " , part of the Appalachian Mountain range , creates hilly terrain and valleys in the southern and western part of the region close to the Nerepis and Oromocto Rivers . The expropriation of lands began in the early 1950s , much to the surprise of local residents who had been kept in the dark about the expropriation until the last minute . The base was surveyed so as to not affect some of the historic communities along the western bank of the St . John River such as Gagetown , Hampstead , and Browns Flat ; the expropriation began several kilometres west of the river and eliminated the communities of Petersville , Hibernia , New Jerusalem and others . This remains the largest single land expropriation in the history of New Brunswick . The base headquarters were chosen for the northern part of the base adjacent to the , then , small village of Oromocto . In preparation for the influx of service personnel , Oromocto was redesigned as a " planned " town , with buried electrical utilities and residential and commercial clustering typical of larger planned towns such as Richmond Hill , Ontario . Construction of the base facilities in Oromocto benefitted from convenient railway connections provided by Canadian National and Canadian Pacific Railways . A new alignment of the Trans - Canada Highway was built on the eastern bank of the St . John River , opposite from Oromocto in the early 1960s ( see Route 2 ) and a new highway bridge across the St . John River connected the Trans - Canada Highway to the village of Burton , just south of Oromocto and near the east gate for the base . The Gagetown Military Camp ( or Camp Gagetown ) opened in 1956 and was named after the village of Gagetown , although the base was located west of this historic village and was headquartered to its north in Oromocto . The base ' s territory measured and included numerous live - fire ranges for infantry , armoured , and artillery units , as well as aerial weapons ranges . At the time of its opening in 1956 , until the opening of CFB Suffield in 1971 , Camp Gagetown was the largest military training facility in Canada and the British Commonwealth of Nations . By comparison , Suffield has with usable by the military , and designated as the Suffield National Wildlife Area . The training area has been heavily " landscaped " over the years by military foresters and many woodlines have been sculpted to form shapes recognizable from the air , including : Operations . Initially , Camp Gagetown was the home base for many army regiments , including The Black Watch and The Royal Canadian Regiment , however defence cutbacks in the 1960s saw a gradual reduction , and the demise of their parent formation , 3 Brigade Group . On February 1 , 1968 , the Canadian Army , the Royal Canadian Air Force , and the Royal Canadian Navy were merged to form the unified Canadian Forces . Following this unification , Camp Gagetown was renamed Canadian Forces Base Gagetown ( CFB Gagetown ) . In the post - unification armed forces , CFB Gagetown functioned as the primary combat training centre for Force Mobile Command ( renamed Land Force Command in the 1990s ) . In the early 1970s Combat Training Centre Gagetown ( CTC Gagetown ) was established as a unit at CFB Gagetown comprising armour , artillery , and infantry training schools . In the 1990s the Canadian Forces School of Military Engineering was relocated to CFB Gagetown from CFB Chilliwack . The base is still widely referred to as Camp Gagetown . Increased defence spending in the 1980s saw numerous new training facilities built and ranges modernized , and this continued into the 1990s as the Canadian Forces closed smaller bases in response to further defence budget cuts . A large training building housing much of CTC was opened in late 1992 . CFB Gagetown continues to function as the army ' s primary training facility , although due to risk of forest fires in recent years , live - fire training has been pushed primarily to the fall - winter - spring seasons . CFB Gagetown hosts ACSTC Argonaut , the only Royal Canadian Army Cadets summer training centre in the Atlantic Provinces . Defoliant testing . Portions of the training area were subject to testing of the defoliant s Agent Orange and Agent Purple during the 1960s , which has led to an inquiry as to its long term effects upon the soldiers and civilian base personnel who were exposed to it . The affected areas had soil tests that measured dioxin levels at 143 times the Canadian Council of Ministers of the Environment guidelines for maximum exposure . In 2009 , a New York production company is releasing a feature length documentary looking into the herbicide sprayings that took place at the base from 1956 - 1984 . It has been said that over 3 . 2 million liters and kilograms of chemical defoliants were sprayed during that time . That number would make the concentration per acre stronger than American sprayings in Vietnam .