Canadian participation in World War II

As a long-standing dominion of the British Commonwealth, Canada joined England in declaring war against Germany in September, 1939. Canada’s contributions helped turn the tide in major military campaigns.

Until the actual onset of World War II, the Canadian government was reluctant to commit funds to reequip and modernize its army, particularly costly armored tank units. The air force was also ill equipped to meet the needs that arose once war was declared against the Axis. Beginning with very few ships capable of meeting the demands of transoceanic deployment, the Canadian navy grew to more than four hundred vessels by the end of World War II.

Prewar Military Strength and Buildup

Canada’s state of military preparedness held little promise for early major participation in the Allied war effort. Canada’s only standing military force in 1939 (the Permanent Active Militia) contained slightly more than 4,000 men, including officers. Although a force of about 51,000 reservists (the Non-Permanent Active Militia) existed prior to the war, it lacked significant equipment and advanced training for combat.

For several years after the beginning of the war, Canada was able to field only a single division (usually numbering between 15,000 and 30,000 soldiers) for service in Europe. These numbers reached the strength of the corps level (combined forces of two or more divisions) by 1943, when First Corps (I Canadian Corps) forces were deployed for the first time in a major European campaign during the Allied invasion of Italy. Mobilization efforts through 1944 eventually brought enlistments to about 1.1 million, nearly three-quarters of whom joined the army. The air force reached 260,000 members, and 115,000 joined the Canadian navy.

During the early years of the war, most of the Canadian forces remained on home soil; they joined major campaigns in 1943 and 1944 with the aim of dislodging Nazi Germany from Western Europe. Canadians joined the buildup of Allied forces needed to meet that task, amassing a total of five divisions stationed in England just prior to the D-day invasion of France in 1944.

Early Battle Participation

The first involvement of Canadian forces in the European theater of war ended unsuccessfully. Operation Jubilee (better known as the ill-fated Dieppe raid) in August of 1942 involved landing several thousand soldiers from the Second Canadian Division, together with 1,000 British commando forces, on the coast of France near the key port city of Dieppe. Even though the landing troops had substantial support from both the air and the sea, German defenses were able to repel the raid, killing more than 1,000 soldiers and capturing more than 2,300.

The Dieppe raid, however, provided important intelligence information regarding the nature of German coastal defenses, information that was later used to plan the 1944 D-day invasion. The initial setback at Dieppe stood out in contrast to the impressive accomplishments of Canadian forces in two later stages of the European conflict, first during the Allied invasion of Sicily (Operation Husky) in July, 1943, followed by operations on the Italian mainland, and then during and following the D-day landings in France in 1944.

The troops that fought in Italy included forces from the First Canadian Division, tanks from the Fifth Canadian Armored Division, and an additional armored brigade. Canadians fought alongside other Allied forces in several key battles during the Italian campaign, notably in the Moro River campaign, the battle to take the coastal zone around Ortona (Chieti Province) and, in May, 1944, the important advance that broke the so-called “Hitler Line” of defense in central Italy between the coast and the Aurunci Mountains. This campaign, which was a joint operation involving the British Eighth Army, the First Canadian Infantry Division, the Fifth Canadian Armored Division, and Polish forces, played a key role in the advance toward the liberation of Rome in June, 1944.

D-day Operations

The Third Canadian Division, technically still under the command of the British First Army Corps, participated in the June 6, 1944, Allied invasion of Normandy on D Day. The Canadians landed on Juno Beach, situated between the main British landing points at Sword Beach and Gold Beach (all code names assigned by the Allies). In the first stages of combat, the Canadians suffered important casualties, about 1,000 killed or injured.

Once their assigned beachhead was secured, the Canadian forces moved inland with the goal of linking up with British forces advancing from the Sword Beach landing site. Their progress inland on D Day outpaced all other Allied forces, bringing them to the main road connecting Bayeux to the provincial capital of Caen. That city had been identified by British field marshal Bernard Law Montgomery as key to the overall success of the Normandy invasion. Even though the Canadian push was reinforced by other troops (notably by American forces that had landed at Omaha and Utah Beaches), fierce German resistance meant that the city would not fall for another month.

Operations After D Day

Once Allied forces succeeded in liberating most of France, an enormous task still lay ahead: pushing the Germans back past the Rhine River and defeating Adolf Hitler on his own ground. Canadian responsibilities during these later stages of the war were critical and were carried out mostly independently, without the joint command structure that had characterized earlier operations.

A key example of this was the famous Battle of the Scheldt, which was part of the drive to liberate Belgium and the Netherlands in the last months of 1944. Although British forces captured the major Belgian port of Antwerp on the Rhine, the strategic river delta separating Antwerp from the North Sea (the Scheldt) remained in German hands. The job of occupying the Scheldt fell to the First Canadian Army, whose forces attacked several key German strongholds, particularly at the Leopold Canal on the Scheldt’s southern zone, and in the zone of the Beveland Canal. By the time German forces lost control of the Scheldt (on November 8, 1944), it was clear that one key to the success of Canadian troops was the work of engineers, especially those who built bridges that enabled infantry forces (principally the Sixth Canadian Infantry Brigade) to advance where amphibious attacks had tried, but failed, to break German defense lines. The cost of this offensive was great: By the time the ports were cleared on November 8, after five weeks of fighting, nearly thirteen thousand Allied forces were killed, wounded, or missing, about half of them Canadian.

During what would be called the Rhineland campaign in the first months of 1945, Canadian forces were responsible for a battle line of about 360 kilometers (about 220 miles) running from the Maas River (called the Meuse in France, where it has its origins before joining the Rhine) to Dunkirk near the French-Belgian Flemish border. In an initial stage of the Rhineland campaign (starting February 8), Allied forces, including nine British divisions (plus Belgian, Polish, Dutch, and U.S. units) were under the command of General H. D. G. Crerar of the First Canadian Army. Moving toward the strategic German defense zone of the Reichswald forest (much of which had been flooded when the Germans destroyed an entire network of dikes), these forces had to rely heavily on amphibious operations headed by the Canadian Third Division (known as the Water Rats).

The Rhineland campaign depended on the capture of major fortifications in the Hochwald forest, an operation (dubbed Blockbuster) that was carried out by the Second Canadian Corps between February 27 and March 3. The Canadians captured Xanten (just east of the Hochwald forest) on March 10, opening the way for the American Ninth Army to move into the area from the south. As the Germans retreated across the Rhine, the two main Allied forces, including major Canadian units, joined and were able to cross the Rhine. Germany’s defeat in Western Europe became imminent.

Impact

Canadian military forces expanded quickly from prewar levels to participate as a major part of the Allied war effort. By the D-day offensive of June, 1944, they were able to make significant contributions, and they continued to play large roles in major campaigns that brought down the German war effort.

Bibliography

Bryce, Robert B., and Matthew Bellamy. Canada and the Cost of World War II: The International Operations of Canada’s Department of Finance, 1939-1947. Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2005. A detailed study of the use of eight years of appropriations earmarked for expanding Canada’s military capacities, which initially were quite limited.

Halford, Robert G. The Unknown Navy. Saint Catharines, Ont.: Vanwell, 1994. The story of Canada’s merchant marine fleet and its role in shipping vital wartime supplies across the Atlantic to Europe.

Nicholson, G. W. L. The Canadians in Italy, 1943-1945. Vol. 2 in Official History of the Canadian Army in the Second World War. Ottawa: Edmond Cloutier, Queen’s Press, 1956. Detailed documentation of Canadian participation in the Italian campaign.

Stacey, C. P. Arms, Men, and Governments: The War Policies of Canada, 1939-1945. Ottawa: Queen’s Printers, 1970. Concise overview of Canadian defense policy through World War II.

‗‗‗‗‗‗‗. Official History of the Canadian Army in the Second World War. 3 vols. Ottawa: Edmond Cloutier, Queen’s Printer, 1955-1960. Definitive work on the Canadian army’s operations through World War II.

Wilmot, Laurence F. Through the Hitler Line. Waterloo, Ont.: Wilfred Laurier University Press, 2003. Memoir of a Canadian participant in the important Italian campaign in May and June, 1944, that helped open the way to the liberation of Rome.