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Canadian Defence Policy1
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 07 November 2014
Extract
The brief period since 1935 has produced in the attitude of the Canadian Government and people towards national armaments and defence policy a change so sudden and striking as to merit the name of revolution. Observers who in the quite recent past had remarked the obstinate refusal of Ministry, Parliament, and public to pay the slightest attention to the apparatus of defence, have been astonished during the past three years by the energy with which the present Government (headed by a statesman who in three previous terms in office had shown no special interest in this phase of the national life) has attacked the problems of military policy, and by the vigour with which the Canadian electorate has fallen to discussing them.
Students of the past, of course, are aware that Canada is merely running true to form. Her history is marked by an alternation of long periods when the national defences are utterly neglected with short violent interludes, arising out of sudden foreign complications, when the country awakes to the inadequacy of those defences and tries to make up for earlier inactivity by measures taken in the teeth of the crisis. In the light of this record, it is not surprising that a desperately perilous international situation has now forced the Dominion into one more military stock-taking. Nevertheless, the episode is arresting; and its possible ultimate implications for all Canadians are of such necessary interest that it may be worth while to record here the things that have been done, and to assess, in however imperfect and conjectural a fashion, the ideas that lie behind the new departures and the policies which they are designed to serve.
- Type
- Articles
- Information
- Canadian Journal of Economics and Political Science/Revue canadienne de economiques et science politique , Volume 4 , Issue 4 , November 1938 , pp. 490 - 504
- Copyright
- Copyright © Canadian Political Science Association 1938
Footnotes
1
This paper is a somewhat abbreviated and considerably revised version of that entitled “New Trends in Canadian Defence Policy”, which was prepared by the writer at the request of the Research Committee of the Canadian Institute of International Affairs and published in the series of Canadian Supplementary Papers presented to the recent British Commonwealth Relations Conference at Sydney, Australia. The writer wishes to acknowledge the kindness of Major-General L. R. LaFleche, D.S.O., the Deputy Minister of National Defence, in supplying him with factual information. Any opinions here expressed or implied represent only the author's personal views; no responsibility for them attaches either to the Department of National Defence or the Canadian Institute of International Affairs.
References
2 For statistics, see Canada Year Book, 1914, pp. 645-9, and Report of the Department of National Defence for Fiscal Year ending March 31, 1937, p. 60.
3 See the table of expenditure in Report of the Department of National Defence for Fiscal Year ending March 31, 1937, pp. 13-14.
4 In an address in Toronto on Dec. 13, 1937. Text kindly furnished by Department of National Defence.
5 It must be remarked that Mr. Bennett, as leader of the Opposition, encouraged rather than opposed the Government's rearmament programme. It appears that the two leading parties are now as much at one in improving Canada's fighting forces as they formerly were in neglecting them.
6 The final total of the 1937-8 estimates was $36,034,371. Supplementary estimates raise the 1938-9 total to $35,966,524 (including a small item for civil air operations). Of these supplementaries, $1,525,460 consisted of revotes.
7 New York World-Telegram, June 13, 1936.
8 Information from Department of National Defence.
9 Two of the destroyers were built for Canada in England in 1930. The other four were built for the Royal Navy in 1932.
10 For a cogent discussion of these matters, see Sandwell, B. K., “Our Defence Is in the Air” (Saturday Night, Toronto, 09 17, 1938).Google Scholar
10a One consequence of the war crisis of September, 1938, is that from now on more attention will probably be paid to the Atlantic coast. It seems quite probable that in the Empire's next war it will be engaged against European and Asiatic powers simultaneously, and although, as explained below, Canada's Pacific front is the more exposed, she cannot count upon concentrating all her mobile means of defence there. The only safe policy would seem to be preparation to deal with minor emergencies, at least, on both coasts simultaneously.
11 Statement of Mr. Mackenzie in House of Commons, Feb. 15, 1937. On May 16, 1938, he told the House that 768 firms had been surveyed.
12 Statement of Mr. Mackenzie in House of Commons, Feb. 23, 1937. See New York Times, April 15, 1938. Grant, J. Fergus, in “Canada's Aircraft Industry” (Canadian Geographical Journal, 08, 1938)Google Scholar, describes the types of aircraft now being built for the Royal Canadian Air Force.
13 Statement of Mr. King in House of Commons, Feb. 19, 1937.
14 Attention should be directed to the authoritative and lucid article by “Canuck”, entitled “The Problems of Canadian Defence” (Canadian Defence Quarterly, April, 1938).
15 SirCorbett, Julian, History of the Great War based on Official Documents … Naval Operations, vol. I (London, 1920), pp. 148–53, 290, 318, map 14.Google Scholar Cf. Churchill, Winston, The World Crisis (one-vol. ed., 1931), book I, chaps. xii and xv, and Canadian Annual Review, 1914.Google Scholar Duguid, Colonel A. Fortescue, in Official History of the Canadian Forces in the Great War, 1914-1919, general series vol. I (Ottawa, 1938), pp. 12–15, and appendix 30Google Scholar, takes a rather optimistic view of the value of the two submarines.
16 Brebner, J. B., “Canada, the Anglo-Japanese Alliance and the Washington Conference” (Political Science Quarterly, 03, 1935).Google Scholar
17 Montreal Gazette, May 2, 1935.
18 At Woodbridge, Ont., on Aug. 21.
19 In this connection attention may be directed to the project, lately advanced in the United States with great assurance, of a military road to be constructed by the American Government through British Columbia to Alaska. There are indications that we are on the eve of a great drive in Washington for this scheme. It is obvious that its execution would render Canadian neutrality in any American war utterly impossible; and as Mr. King's Government has based its defence programme largely on the need for defending neutrality, it is likewise obvious that it cannot agree to the scheme. It will be a great deal easier to maintain the integrity of Canada's sovereignty against this and similar well-meant proposals if Canada can demonstrate that she is ready to defend herself; and this is an additional reason for anticipating (and welcoming) a considerable increase in the defence estimates at the next session of Parliament.