Studies in Canadian Military History – Serie

The Halifax Explosion of 1917 is a defining event in the Canadian consciousness, yet it has never been the subject of a sustained analytical history. Astonishingly, until now no one has consulted the large federal government archives that contain first-hand accounts of the disaster and the response of national authorities.Canada's recently established navy was at the epicentre of the crisis. Armstrong reveals the navy's compelling, and little-known, story by carefully retracing the events preceding the disaster and the role of the military in its aftermath. He catches the pulse of disaster response in official Ottawa and provides a compelling analysis of the legal manoeuvres, rhetoric, blunders, public controversy, and crisis management that ensued. His disturbing conclusion is that federal officials knew of potential dangers in the harbour before the explosion, took no corrective action, and kept the information from the public. As a result, a Halifax naval officer was made a scapegoat and the navy received lasting, and mostly undeserved, vilification.This is a provocative read not only for military and naval devotees but for anyone who wants to understand one of the events that shaped Canada in the twentieth century.

The extended peace the world anticipated following the decisive Allied victory in the Second World War was abruptly shattered in June 1950 by the invasion of South Korea by communist North Korea. Responding to a United Nations' call to assist the South Korean regime, Canada deployed an 8000-man brigade to the peninsula to fight as part of an American-led UN force. This comprehensive account of the Canadian campaign in Korea provides the first detailed study of the training, leadership, operations, and tactics of the brigade under each of its three wartime commanders as well as its relationship with American and Commonwealth allies. An impeccably researched analytical history, the book examines the uneven performance of the various Canadian units and argues that the soldiers of the "Special Force" initially sent to Korea were more thorough and professional in their operations than were the army's regular battalions that eventually replaced them at the front.

Our slogan has always been 'Fight or Pay.' We call upon the people to enlist or help others enlist. We sometimes say: 'If you cannot put the "I" into fight, put the "pay" into patriotism,' and that serves as a slogan on any platform.– Sir Herbert Ames, founder of the Canadian Patriotic FundUnlike the Second World War, the Great War exists in the collective memory of Canadians as a tragic war. Characterized by the brutality of trench warfare, the First World War is remembered largely for the immense sacrifice in life and limb of Canadian soldiers. In Fight or Pay, reknowned historian Desmond Morton turns his eye to the stories of those who paid in lieu of fighting – the wives, mothers, and families left behind when soldiers went to war. Aware that the recruiting effort would fail if men were forced to choose between their families and the front, the Canadian government and its wealthy backers introduced the Canadian Patriotic Fund, known in its day as "the Patriotic." Charged with support of soldiers' loved ones, the Patriotic and its volunteers set out to take over their lives and transform them into a middle-class model of frugal self-denial. Meanwhile, the Militia Department took on the task of deciding which dependants a soldier could support. Suddenly, the State and private philanthropists were managing family decisions that had never been their business before.A pan-Canadian story, Fight or Pay brings to light the lives of thousands of valiant women whose sacrifices have been overlooked in previous histories of the Great War. It is also an incisive and honest look at the beginnings of a social welfare system that Canadians have come to think of as intrinsic to citizenship. Social and military historians, scholars of gender studies, descendants of First World War families, and anyone with an interest in popular history will find Morton's tale a rich addition to the landscape of Canadian history.

Self-doubt so plagued him that he suffered a nervous breakdown even before fighting his first combat action. But, by the end of the Second World War, Bert Hoffmeister had exorcised his anxieties, risen from Captain to Major-General, and won more awards than any Canadian officer in the war. Fighting from the invasion of Sicily in July 1943 to the final victory in Europe in May 1945, this native Vancouverite earned a reputation as a fearless commander on the battlefield – one who led from the front, one well loved by those he led. How did he do it?The Soldiers' General explains, in eloquent and accessible prose, how Hoffmeister conducted his business as a military commander. With an astute analytical eye, Delaney carefully dissects Hoffmeister's numerous battles to reveal how he managed and how he led, how he directed and how he inspired. An exemplary leader, Hoffmeister stood out among his contemporaries, not so much for his technical ability to move the chess pieces well; there were plenty who could do that. Rather, Bert Hoffmeister was exceptional for his ability to get the chess pieces to move themselves.

Commander A.F.C. Layard, RN, wrote almost daily in his diary, in bold, neat script, from the time he entered the Royal Navy as a cadet in 1913 until his retirement in 1947. The pivotal 1943-45 years of this edited volume offer an extraordinarily full and honest chronicle, revealing Layard's preoccupations, both with the daily details and with the strain and responsibility of wartime command at sea.Enhanced by Michael Whitby's explanatory essays, the diary sheds light on the inshore anti-submarine campaign in British waters; discusses pivotal events such as the invasions of North Africa and Normandy and convoys to Russia; describes encounters with important personalities; and records the final surrender of German U-boats. It is a highly personal piece of history that greatly enhances our understanding of the Canadian naval experience and the Atlantic war as a whole.A consummately well-researched work, Commanding Canadians will appeal to both naval scholars, as well as to general readers interested in military history.

In the middle of the most destructive conflict in human history, almost 40,000 Germans civilians and prisoners of war were detained in internment and work camps across Canada. Five internment camps were located on the southern shores of the St. Lawrence River in the province of Quebec: at Farnham, Grande Ligne, Île-aux-Noix, Sherbrooke, and Sorel.Prisoners of the Home Front details the organization and day-to-day affairs of these internment camps and reveals the experience of their inmates. Martin Auger shows how internment imposed psychological and physical strain in the form of restricted mobility, sexual deprivation, social alienation, and lack of physical comfort. In response, Canadian authorities introduced labour projects and education programs to uphold morale, thwart internal turmoil, and prevent escapes. These initiatives were also intended to expose prisoners to the values of a democratic society and prepare them for postwar reintegration.Auger concludes that Canada abided by the Geneva Convention; its treatment of German prisoners was humane. Prisoners of the Home Front sheds light on life behind barbed wire, filling an important void in our knowledge of the Canadian home front during the Second World War.

In the middle of the most destructive conflict in human history, almost 40,000 Germans civilians and prisoners of war were detained in internment and work camps across Canada. Five internment camps were located on the southern shores of the St. Lawrence River in the province of Quebec: at Farnham, Grande Ligne, Île-aux-Noix, Sherbrooke, and Sorel.Prisoners of the Home Front details the organization and day-to-day affairs of these internment camps and reveals the experience of their inmates. Martin Auger shows how internment imposed psychological and physical strain in the form of restricted mobility, sexual deprivation, social alienation, and lack of physical comfort. In response, Canadian authorities introduced labour projects and education programs to uphold morale, thwart internal turmoil, and prevent escapes. These initiatives were also intended to expose prisoners to the values of a democratic society and prepare them for postwar reintegration.Auger concludes that Canada abided by the Geneva Convention; its treatment of German prisoners was humane. Prisoners of the Home Front sheds light on life behind barbed wire, filling an important void in our knowledge of the Canadian home front during the Second World War.

In Verdun, English and French speakers lived side by side. Through their home-front activities as much as through enlistment, they proved themselves partners in the prosecution of Canada's war. Shared experiences and class similarities shaped responses based first and foremost in a sense of local identity.Fighting from Home paints a comprehensive, at times intimate, portrait of Verdun and Verdunites at war. Durflinger offers an innovative interpretive approach to wartime Canadian and Quebec social and cultural dynamics. It will appeal to anyone interested in the history of the Canadian home front during the Second World War.

In January 1944, Vice Admiral Percy Walker Nelles was fired from his position as head of the Royal Canadian Navy. Betrayed reveals the true story behind the dismissal: a divisive power struggle between two elite groups within the RCN pitted the navy's regular officers against a small group of self-appointed spokesmen for the voluntary naval reserve. Threats of public scandal, mass insurrection, and political intimidation caused one of the worst breakdowns in Canadian civil-military relations, revealing complex aspects of military professionalism and leadership.This fascinating investigation into the machinations of a divided navy tackles important questions of military professionalism, leadership, and identity. Betrayed will appeal to readers interested in military history and security studies, political science, and sociology.

In January 1944, Vice Admiral Percy Walker Nelles was fired from his position as head of the Royal Canadian Navy. Betrayed reveals the true story behind the dismissal: a divisive power struggle between two elite groups within the RCN pitted the navy's regular officers against a small group of self-appointed spokesmen for the voluntary naval reserve. Threats of public scandal, mass insurrection, and political intimidation caused one of the worst breakdowns in Canadian civil-military relations, revealing complex aspects of military professionalism and leadership.This fascinating investigation into the machinations of a divided navy tackles important questions of military professionalism, leadership, and identity. Betrayed will appeal to readers interested in military history and security studies, political science, and sociology.

Renegades: Canadians in the Spanish Civil War, by veteran journalist Michael Petrou, tells the story of the 1,681 Canadians who, between 1936 and 1939, defied Canadian law to fight fascism in the Spanish Civil war. The war pitted a left leaning, democratically elected Spanish government against a military uprising led by Francisco Franco and supported, with weapons and tens of thousands of troops, by Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany. By the time it was over, fascism had triumphed in Spain, and more than 400 Canadians were dead.Until now, little was known about these men and women, and about those who survived. Petrou has changed this. He has drawn on recently declassified material, interviewed veterans, and visited the battlefields of Spain to write the definitive history of Canadians in the war. Jack Granatstein, one of Canada's leading military historians, concludes: "Based on massive research, this is the best and most complete account of Canadians in the Spanish Civil War we are ever likely to get."Renegades reveals that Spanish Civil War veterans were pressured to become police informers, with the cooperation of the federal government; that a 1970 application by a veterans' group for non-profit status was opposed by the federal government out of fear that approving the application might offend Spain's fascist dictator, Francisco Franco; and that the RCMP spied on Canadian veterans at least until 1980, when one police report noted that the veterans' "political motivations are more in keeping with the NDP philosophies." Other highlights include:Detailed and vivid descriptions of the battles the Canadians fought, and their lives in Spain between action. The stories of Canadian prisoners of war are also told – as are accounts of Canadians who were imprisoned and otherwise punished, sometimes severely, by their own commanders.New and sensational information about Dr. Norman Bethune, whom Spanish authorities accused of espionage and of having a secretly fascist lover.The story of a young University Toronto student who was jailed as a suspected spy and was lucky to leave Spain alive. After reading recently declassified documents from Soviet archives about this man, Petrou tracked him down and interviewed him at the age of 90.

During the Second World War, more than 4,000 civilian nurses enlisted as Nursing Sisters, a specially created all-female officers' rank of the Canadian Armed Forces. They served in all three armed force branches and all the major theatres of war, yet nursing as a form of war work has long been under-explored. An Officer and a Lady fills that gap. Cynthia Toman analyzes how gender, war, and medical technology intersected to create a legitimate role for women in the masculine environment of the military and explores the incongruous expectations placed on military nurses as "officers and ladies."

During the Second World War, more than 4,000 civilian nurses enlisted as Nursing Sisters, a specially created all-female officers' rank of the Canadian Armed Forces. They served in all three armed force branches and all the major theatres of war, yet nursing as a form of war work has long been under-explored. An Officer and a Lady fills that gap. Cynthia Toman analyzes how gender, war, and medical technology intersected to create a legitimate role for women in the masculine environment of the military and explores the incongruous expectations placed on military nurses as "officers and ladies."

The First World War's appalling death toll and the need for a sense of equality of sacrifice on the home front led to Canada's first experience of overseas conscription. While historians have focused on resistance to enforced military service in Quebec, this has obscured the important role of those who saw military service as incompatible with their religious or ethical beliefs. Crisis of Conscience is the first and only book about the Canadian pacifists who refused to fight in the Great War. The experience of these conscientious objectors offers insight into evolving attitudes about the rights and responsibilities of citizenship during a key period of Canadian nation building.

The First World War's appalling death toll and the need for a sense of equality of sacrifice on the home front led to Canada's first experience of overseas conscription. While historians have focused on resistance to enforced military service in Quebec, this has obscured the important role of those who saw military service as incompatible with their religious or ethical beliefs. Crisis of Conscience is the first and only book about the Canadian pacifists who refused to fight in the Great War. The experience of these conscientious objectors offers insight into evolving attitudes about the rights and responsibilities of citizenship during a key period of Canadian nation building.

Since the mid-1950s, successive Canadian governments have grappled with the issue of Canada's role in US ballistic missile defence programs. Until Paul Martin's government finally said no, policy-makers responded to US initiatives with fear and uncertainty as they endlessly debated the implications – at home and abroad – of participation. However, whether this is the end of the story remains to be seen.Drawing on previously classified government documents and interviews with senior officials, James Fergusson examines Canada's policy deliberations during five major US initiatives. He reveals that a combination of factors such as weak leadership and a tendency to place uncertain and ill-defined notions of international peace and security before national defence resulted in indecision on what role Canada would play in ballistic missile defence. In effect, policy-makers have failed to transform debates about the issue into an opportunity to define Canada's strategic interests at home and on the world stage. Canada and Ballistic Missile Defense is the first comprehensive account of Canada's response and indecision regarding US ballistic missile defence initiatives, and the implications of this inaction.

The citizen soldier is a central figure in Canada's social memory of the First World War. But is the ideal of being a citizen first and a soldier only by necessity an unchanging feature of the Canadian identity?This compelling history traces the evolution of the Canadian amateur military tradition in the turbulent years from 1896 to 1921. Before the Great War, Canada's military culture was in transition as Canada navigated an uncertain relationship with the United States and fought an imperial war in South Africa. Gradually, the untrained civilian replaced the long-serving volunteer militiaman as the archetypal amateur soldier, setting the country down a path leading directly to the battlefields of Flanders and northern France.Militia Myths reveals the history of a military culture that consistently employed the citizen soldier as its foremost symbol, but was otherwise in a state of profound change.

As the last guns sounded on the Western Front, 4,200 Canadian soldiers, some of them conscripts, travelled from Victoria to Vladivostok to open a new theatre of war in Siberia. Part of the Allied intervention in Russia's civil war, the force sought to defeat Bolshevism, but grim conditions, conflict among the Allies, and local opposition eventually forced Canada to evacuate the troops.This groundbreaking book brings to a life a forgotten chapter in the history of Canada and Russia. Combining military and labour history with the social history of British Columbia, Québec, and Russia, Benjamin Isitt examines how the Siberian Expedition exacerbated tensions within Canadian society at a time when a radicalized working class, many French-Canadians, and even the soldiers themselves objected to Canada's military adventure designed to alter the outcome of the Russian Revolution. The result is a highly readable and provocative work that challenges public memory of the First World War while illuminating tensions – both in Canada and worldwide – that shaped the course of twentieth-century history.

History has told us something about our war dead but very little about our war wounded. Veterans with a Vision provides a vibrant, poignant, and very human history of Canada's war-blinded veterans, whose courage and the organization they created reshaped the way Canadians and successive governments perceived war disability and, in particular, blindness. Serge Durflinger illuminates the lives of the war blinded by detailing the veterans' process of civil re-establishment, physical and psychological rehabilitation, and social and personal coping. He describes how, in 1922, a group of veterans formed the Sir Arthur Pearson Association of War Blinded (SAPA), closely linked to the Canadian National Institute for the Blind (CNIB). This organization effectively advocated for government pension entitlements, job retraining, and other social programs that allowed veterans to regain a strong measure of independence.Veterans with a Vision captures the spirit of perseverance that permeated the veterans' community and highlights the impacts made by the war blinded as advocates for all Canadian veterans and all blind citizens.

History has told us something about our war dead but very little about our war wounded. Veterans with a Vision provides a vibrant, poignant, and very human history of Canada's war-blinded veterans, whose courage and the organization they created reshaped the way Canadians and successive governments perceived war disability and, in particular, blindness. Serge Durflinger illuminates the lives of the war blinded by detailing the veterans' process of civil re-establishment, physical and psychological rehabilitation, and social and personal coping. He describes how, in 1922, a group of veterans formed the Sir Arthur Pearson Association of War Blinded (SAPA), closely linked to the Canadian National Institute for the Blind (CNIB). This organization effectively advocated for government pension entitlements, job retraining, and other social programs that allowed veterans to regain a strong measure of independence.Veterans with a Vision captures the spirit of perseverance that permeated the veterans' community and highlights the impacts made by the war blinded as advocates for all Canadian veterans and all blind citizens.

In wartime, it is not only success on the battlefield that determines victory. Winning hearts and minds is a vital part of military strategy and relies in large part on the effective management of how and what information is reported from the front.This illuminating study explores how the Canadian military developed and relied on public relations units to manage news during the Second World War. The soldiers assigned to these units, mainly former journalists, were responsible for censoring information, supervising and assisting war correspondents, coordinating policy with the Allies, and ensuring the steady flow of news to Canada.Using public relations case studies from Dieppe, the Sicilian campaign, and Normandy that reveal clashes among individual commanders and politicians, the press, the military, the government, and the Canadian public, The Information Front offers a balanced and intelligent discussion of how the military used censorship and propaganda to rally support for the war effort.

In wartime, it is not only success on the battlefield that determines victory. Winning hearts and minds is a vital part of military strategy and relies in large part on the effective management of how and what information is reported from the front.This illuminating study explores how the Canadian military developed and relied on public relations units to manage news during the Second World War. The soldiers assigned to these units, mainly former journalists, were responsible for censoring information, supervising and assisting war correspondents, coordinating policy with the Allies, and ensuring the steady flow of news to Canada.Using public relations case studies from Dieppe, the Sicilian campaign, and Normandy that reveal clashes among individual commanders and politicians, the press, the military, the government, and the Canadian public, The Information Front offers a balanced and intelligent discussion of how the military used censorship and propaganda to rally support for the war effort.

The five British and Canadian generals depicted in Corps Commanders were a surprisingly eclectic lot – one a consummate actor, one a quiet gentleman, one a master bureaucrat, one a brainy sort with little will, and the last a brain with will to spare. And yet they all fit readily into British Commonwealth armies and fought their corps in similar fashion. All three Canadians controlled British formations and served under British army commanders, and the two Britons worked for and led Canadians as well. Such inter-army adjustments were relatively simple because they all spoke the same "language" – a common method for solving military problems and communicating solutions. Like all senior commanders in the British Commonwealth, they learned the language of the staff colleges at Camberley and Quetta, and so did the staff officers that served them. This allowed a gunner from Montreal to understand a guardsman from London with ease – no small advantage when coordinating coalition battles involving tens of thousands of troops.In probing how these corps commanders fought, Douglas E. Delaney has produced an invaluable study for anyone interested in coalition warfare, interoperability, or how men managed large formations in war.

An intriguing account of Canada's role as a Pacific power during the crisis that led to war with Japan.

The cancellation of the CF-105 Arrow in 1959 holds such a grip on the imagination of Canadians that earlier developments in defence procurement remain in the shadows.Randall Wakelam corrects this oversight – and offers fresh insight into the AVRO saga and contemporary procurement issues – by detailing the complexities Canada's air force faced in buying fighter aircraft and by showing how the RCAF grew by leaps and bounds. Wakelam shows that cabinet members, chiefs of staff, and air marshals were forced to negotiate competing pressures to arm the air force, please allies, and save money. Their decisions resulted in the CF-100 Canuck and the F-86 Sabre, Canada's front-line defensive aircraft in the coldest years of the Cold War. Although historians assume that the Arrow arrived on the heels of these successes, Wakelam reveals that neither the air force nor the government believed AVRO could manufacture even the CF-100 on budget.

During the Second World War, the Congress of Industrial Organizations in Canada grew from a handful of members to more than a quarter-million and from political insignificance to a position of influence in the emergence of the welfare state. What was it about the "good war" that brought about this phenomenal growth?Labour Goes to War analyzes the organizing strategies of the CIO during the war to show that both cultural and economic forces were at work. Labour shortages gave workers greater power in the workplace and increased their militancy. But workers' patriotism, their ties to those on active service, and allegiance to the "people's war" also contributed to the CIO's growth – and to what it claimed for workers. Drawing on a wealth of archival material, Wendy Cuthbertson illuminates this complex wartime context. She also shows how the complex, often contradictory, motives of workers during this period left the Canadian labour movement with an ambivalent progressive/conservative legacy.

During the Second World War, the Congress of Industrial Organizations in Canada grew from a handful of members to more than a quarter-million and from political insignificance to a position of influence in the emergence of the welfare state. What was it about the "good war" that brought about this phenomenal growth?Labour Goes to War analyzes the organizing strategies of the CIO during the war to show that both cultural and economic forces were at work. Labour shortages gave workers greater power in the workplace and increased their militancy. But workers' patriotism, their ties to those on active service, and allegiance to the "people's war" also contributed to the CIO's growth – and to what it claimed for workers. Drawing on a wealth of archival material, Wendy Cuthbertson illuminates this complex wartime context. She also shows how the complex, often contradictory, motives of workers during this period left the Canadian labour movement with an ambivalent progressive/conservative legacy.

We often picture life on the Canadian home front as a time of austerity, as a time when women went to work and men went to war. A Small Price to Pay, the first full-length study of consumer culture in wartime Canada, explodes this myth of home front sacrifice by bringing to light the contradictions of consumer society during the Second World War.Wartime governments pressured Depression-weary citizens to save for the sake of the nation, but Canadians had money in their pockets after years of want, and the fantasy realm of advertisements promised them fresh groceries, glamorous movies, and new cars and appliances. Graham Broad reveals that our "greatest generation" was not impervious to temptation but rather embarked on one of the biggest spending booms in our nation's history.Cutting through the fog of patriotic enthusiasm, this richly illustrated book reveals that the consumer-spending boom of the 1950s and 1960s was not a "postwar" phenomenon after all.

In 1951, Canada sent troops to western Europe to support its NATO allies. The brigade helped Canada establish its international status. In private, however, Canadian officials and military leaders expressed grave doubts about NATO's strategies and operational plans. Despite these reservations, they sent military families overseas and implemented personnel policies that permanently changed the distribution of the defence budget and the character of the Canadian Army.By exposing the hidden agendas that pushed NATO's members in different directions even as they presented a united front, this original account of the evolution of the Canadian Army – from a small training cadre to a truly national force – offers a new perspective on military policy and diplomacy in the Cold War era.