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Canada and WWII
1939-1945
Into the Fire Again
WWII Begins
Canada declared war against Germany on
Sept. 10th 1939 after Germany invaded Poland
on Sept. 1st, 1939.
Unlike WWI, Canada declared war after a vote
in Parliament…not because we were part of
the British Empire.
 Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie
King was determined to not split Canada over
conscription as had happened during WWI.
“Not necessarily conscription,
but conscription if necessary”
Having suffered from nearly twenty years of
neglect, Canada's armed forces were small,
poorly equipped, and for the most part
unprepared for war in 1939.
Tens of thousands of volunteers signed up
immediately.
Unlike WWI, everybody knew this war would
not end quickly…or, without sacrifice.
The War Measures Act was voted in again…
Canada saw Nazi Germany as a threat to
Canada.
Laws are passed by PM & Cabinet…not
Parliament.
Civil rights are suspended.
British Commonwealth
Air Training Program
One PM King wanted to contribute to the war
effort ( and keep Canadian soldiers from dying
in battle) was to start a program to train pilots
from all over the Commonwealth.
The prairies were chosen as an ideal location
for pilot training as the skies were clear and
population centres were small…in case of
acidents!
Canada agreed to accept most of the plan's costs but
insisted that the British consent to a public
pronouncement that air training would take precedence
over all other aspects of the Canadian war effort.
The Canadian government paid more than $1.6 billion,
three-quarters of the total cost. Graduates totalled 131
553 pilots, navigators, bomb aimers, wireless
operators, air gunners and flight engineers from the 4
founding partners, other parts of the
COMMONWEALTH, the US and countries of
occupied Europe.
Home Front
Women played a vital role in working in
factories to replace men serving overseas.
Victory bonds were sold to pay for war.
Supplies like gas, food were rationed.
Metal, wood, fat recycled for war use.
The government controlled the economy.
Ordered factories to produce war material.
Also controlled prices to keep inflation down.
The Allied Powers
Britain
Canada
Australia
New Zealand
Other Commonwealth nations
Free French resistance fighters
USA (After Dec. 7, 1941)
The Axis Powers
Germany
Italy
Japan
Hitler’s March Through Europe
Hitler’s blitzkrieg style of fighting marched
through most of Europe quickly.
France falls in weeks…
Netherlands, Belgium, Norway, Poland all are
invaded.
Battle of Britain
Hitler wanted to crush Britain…it was the
only country in Europe not invaded by Nazis.
Hitler called it “Operation Sea Lion”
Operation Sea Lion was an air war…
Bomb London into submission.
British pilots fought back valiantly.
Always outnumbered by German bombers.
Britain did have one advantage…radar!
Spitfire airplanes flew out to meet German
bombers and shot them down before they
could drop bombs on London.
British Prime Minister Winston Churchill had
this to say about the brave pilots that pushed
back the Nazi bombers:
August 20, 1940 - On the Battle of Britain
"Never in the field of human
conflict was so much owed by so
many to so few."
June 4, 1940
"We shall not flag or fail. We shall go on to
the end. We shall fight in France, we shall
fight on the seas and oceans, we shall fight
with growing confidence and growing
strength in the air, we shall defend our
island, whatever the cost may be. We shall
fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the
landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields
and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills;
we shall never surrender."
Hitler’s invasion of Britain failed…
Now England became a base to begin
fighting back against the Germans.
This was a huge victory for the allies.
Evacuation of Dunkirk
On 10 May 1940 Hitler’s armies struck
westwards across Europe. Within three weeks
Holland and Belgium had surrendered and
German Panzer (tank) divisions had split the
British and French armies.
The British Expeditionary Force (BEF) and a
substantial number of French troops were
trapped in a diminishing pocket of land centred
on the port of Dunkirk.
The German army was hoping to trap the
335,000 soldiers along the coast and capture
them.
Hundreds of boats…fishing boats, ferries,
anything that could float sailed across the
English Channel to pull the soldiers off the
beach,
Most of the soldiers were rescued.
The “Miracle of at Dunkirk”
Battle of the Atlantic
After Hitler’s failure to invade Britain, he
wanted to starve off the island nation by using
his U-boats to torpedo any supply ship heading
to Britain.
The Allies countered by forming convoys.
Hundreds of supply ships would be protected
by warships on the outer edge.
Safety in numbers!
Operation Barbarossa June, 1941
Hitler’s first big mistake was to stab the Soviet
Union in the back, break a treaty of nonaggression and try to invade Moscow.
Now Hitler had to fight on two fronts…west
and now east.
Hitler was also unprepared for a Russian
winter.
The War in the Pacific
Canada’s major contribution to WWII was
focused in Europe….
Canadian soldiers were engaged in some
Pacific battles however.
The Attack of Pearl Harbor
On Dec. 7, 1941, the Japanese government
launched a surprise attack on the US Naval
Base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.
Two attack waves, totalling 350 aircraft, were
launched from six IJN aircraft carriers which
destroyed two U.S. Navy battleships, one
minelayer, two destroyers and 188 aircraft.
Personnel losses were 2,333 killed and 1,139
wounded. Damaged warships included three
cruisers, a destroyer, and six battleships.
The intent of the strike was to protect
Imperial Japan's advance into Malaya and the
Dutch East Indies – for their natural resources
such as oil and rubber – by neutralizing the
U.S. Pacific Fleet
The attack was one of the most important
engagements of World War II. Occurring
before a formal declaration of war, it shocked
the American public out of isolationism.
Roosevelt called December 7, 1941 "… a
date which will live in infamy."
On Dec.8, 1941, the USA declared war
against Japan and any of Japan’s allies.
So, now the USA was also at war with
Germany and Italy too.
Canada and the other allies also declared war
against Japan.
Hong Kong Falls
Japan also timed other attacks as the same
time as Pearl Harbor.
Hong Kong was an English colony in Asia.
Japan attacked Hong Kong on Dec.7 as well.
Hong Kong was defended by a small unit of
British military.
Canada also had soldiers there to help England
defend Hong Kong.
The Japanese military easily conquered the
small army.
Thousands were captured and put into the
infamous Japanese prison camps.
The Battle of Dieppe
The Allied Dieppe Raid, codenamed
Operation Jubilee, began at dawn on August
19, 1942.
The objective was to briefly invade the
German-occupied port of Dieppe, France,
destroy predetermined targets and return to
England as quickly as possible.
The Dieppe Raid of August 19, 1942 was one
of the worst disasters of the Second World
War.
Nine-hundred-and-seven Canadian lives were
lost on that day and 1,946 other Canadians
were captured and forced to spend the
remainder of the war as prisoners.
Success depended on surprise and darkness,
neither of which prevailed.
In the main attacks that took take place across
the pebble beach in front of Dieppe, the
enemy swept the beach with machine gun fire.
Mis-communication caused the reserve
battalion to be pinned down as well.
Bad timing, inadequate equipment and miscommunication caused the entire mission to
be plagued by disaster.
On almost every front, the enemy was ready
for the Canadians and was able to defeat them
quickly.
Some claim it was a useless slaughter, others
maintain that it was necessary to the success
of D-Day two years later.
Invasion of Italy
Canadian troops played a vital role in the 20-month
Mediterranean campaign which led to the liberation
of Italy during the Second World War.
In this campaign, which was fought in Sicily from
July 10 to August 6, 1943, and in mainland Italy
from September 3, 1943, to February 25, 1945, the
fighting was particularly bitter.
The Germans, taking full advantage of
mountain peaks and swiftly running rivers,
made Allied advance very difficult and costly.
There were 25,264 Canadian casualties in the
fighting, including more than 5,900 who were
killed.
In the end, the invasion was not enough to
pressure the Germans from retreating…
another European invasion would be
necessary!
July, 1943, Italy Surrenders
American, British and Canadian forces
accepted the surrender of the Italian
government…
The beginning of the end of the Axis powers.
D-Day
 A European invasion was necessary to face
Hitler head-on and begin an invasion of
Germany.
The target would be in northern France…in
Normandy.
It would be the largest invasion force ever!
Thousands of soldiers, ships, planes gathered
at the staging area in England.
Everything had to be top secret
Americans, British and Canadians would
divide the beach landing areas.
After a stormy journey across the English
Channel, the soldiers would rush to the beach
in landing craft.
The front ramp would drop and soldiers would
run up the beach to the cliffs.
On top of the cliffs were German defense
sites.
Despite huge losses, the Allies held onto the
beach and began to push the Nazis back to
Germany.
Paris is liberated on Aug. 25, 1944.
Canadians Liberate the Netherlands
Quickly after D-day, the Allies have the
Germans on the run….
Canada was given a major role in liberating
the Netherlands.
Bombing Germany
The Allies began to bomb German cities to
crush the Nazi economy and punish civilians
into submission.
US planes bombed by day and British and
Canadian bombers flew at night.
Dresden/Hamburg Firestorms
The Allies created a new bombing technique
where incendiary bombs would ignite a city in
to a huge firestorm.
Fire would burn into a huge tornado killing
hundreds of thousands of civilians.
Fire-storming these 2 German cities killed as
many as the atom bombs in Japan.
V-E Day ( Victory in Europe)
On May 8th, 1945, Germany had officially
surrendered.
Hitler had committed suicide in a Berlin
bunker.
The Allies had defeated the fascist dictators of
Europe!
Hitler’s Bunker
The story of Hitler's death is one of a man who
knew the end was near and was determined to
not be captured alive. Supposedly while he was
in his bunker, on April 30, 1945, realizing the
Russians were almost upon him, he put a
automatic pistol to his head and pulled the
trigger while reclining on a couch. The body
was then taken outside, put in a pit and set on
fire to destroy the evidence.
The War In The Pacific
Canada had a limited role in the war in the
Pacific.
Because of the attack on Pearl Harbor,
Hawaii, this will be a war the USA is
focused on.
The Nuremburg War Trials
The Allies created a new court to hear the trials
of captured Nazi officials and death camp
operators.
The new crimes were:
- crimes against humanity
- war crimes
One important legal concept that came out of
the Nuremburg trials:
“I was only following orders.”
is not a valid excuse for committing
war crimes.
Of the original twenty-four defendants, twelve
(including Martin Bormann, tried in absentia)
were sentenced to death by hanging.
Many Nazi officials escaped and have never
been caught.
Some Nazi scientists were given amnesty and
came to the USA or Canada to work on the
space program.
Convicted Nazi prison guard loses appeal
to retain Canadian citizenship
On Nov. 24, 2000, Seifert was convicted
in absentia by an Italian court on charges
that he raped, tortured and murdered
nine Jews at a German concentration
camp in Italy during the Second World
War.
Death of Mussolini
Mussolini was caught in July, 1945 trying to
escape in a disguise with his mistress.
They were hung upside down on a lamp-post
and pelted with stones and mutilated.
Japan is Next!
With V-E Day over, all energy is now focused
to invade Japan.
The Japanese culture says it is shameful to
surrender.
This will be a tough nation to invade.
The US and Japan were playing a game of
“cat and mouse with their aircraft carriers
( a new weapon).
 By 1943, Japan was retreating.
The US strategy was to “island hop” across the
Pacific and cut off the Japanese military.
Kamikaze Attacks
The closer the US forces got to Japan, the
more desperate the Japanese forces fought
back.
Kamikaze pilots would fly their planes into an
American warship in a suicide mission.
If they died in battle, their souls went to
heaven.
The Manhattan Project
The US government set up a secret lab in the
New Mexico desert.
The purpose of this lab was to create a new
type of bomb…
An atom bomb! A chain reaction that had the
power of a ton of dynamite!
The secret weapon was detonated sucessfully
in 1944.
There was enough uranium to make 2 bombs.
One was called “Little Boy” and the other,
“Fat Man”
US President Harry S. Truman had a tough
decision to make:
1) invade Japan and risk many US deaths
2) use this new bomb to force a Japanese
surrender
* Truman chose #2
The Bombing of Hiroshima
On the early morning of Aug. 6, 1945, a B-52
Superfortress bomber called the Enola Gay
took off from Tinian Island to Japan.
On board was the atom bomb “Little Boy”.
100,000 people die from the explosion and the
firestorm after.
Another 100,000 die from radiation fall-out
A new horrible weapon is invented and used
in a hostile manner!
Nagasaki
The Japanese government did not surrender
after the bombing of Hiroshima…
Some say the government officials in Tokyo
did not believe that such a weapon could
exist.
On Aug. 9, 1945, the US dropped the 2nd and
only bomb left on the city of Nagasaki.
V-J Day ( Victory in Japan)
On Aug. 11, 1945, the Japanese government
officially surrendered.
WWII was over!
The total estimated human loss of life
caused by World War II was roughly
72 million people. The civilian toll was
around 47 million, including 20 million
deaths due to war related famine and
disease. The military toll was about 25
million, including the deaths of about 5
million prisoners of war in captivity.
The Allies lost about 61 million people,
and the Axis lost 11 million.
Canadian deaths = 45,300
Germany = 7,503, 000
USSR = 23,600,000
Japan = 2,680,000
USA = 418,000
Was the Atom Bomb Necessary?
“I had been conscious of a feeling of depression
and so I voiced to him my grave misgivings,
first on the basis of my belief that Japan was
already defeated and that dropping the bomb
was completely unnecessary, and secondly
because I thought that our country should
avoid shocking world opinion by the use of a
weapon whose employment was, I thought, no
longer mandatory as a measure to save
American lives.”
Dwight D. Eisenhower
US general & future president
"The Japanese had, in fact, already
sued for peace. The atomic bomb
played no decisive part, from a
purely military point of view, in
the defeat of Japan."
Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz, Commander in Chief of the U.S. Pacific Fleet
"The use of [the atomic bombs] at
Hiroshima and Nagasaki was of
no material assistance in our
war against Japan. The
Japanese were already defeated
and ready to surrender."
Admiral William D. Leahy,
Chief of Staff to President Truman.
“Japan would have surrendered
even if the atomic bombs had not
been dropped, even if Russia had
not entered the war, and even if no
invasion had been planned or
contemplated.”
The United States Strategic Bombing Survey, after interviewing hundreds of
Japanese civilian and military leaders after Japan surrendered
Japanese-Canadian
Internment Camps
After the bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1941, the
entire west coast was paranoid that they would
be attacked next.
Canada’s government used the War Measures
Act to label any Japanese-Canadian a potential
enemy.
The law forced all Japanese-Canadians to
leave the coast and move to “internment
camps” in the Rocky Mountains or the
Prairies.
The government sold their houses and fishing
boats or farms and kept the money.
"We saw all these people behind the fence,
looking out, hanging onto the wire, and
looking out because they were anxious to
know who was coming in. But I will never
forget the shocking feeling that human beings
were behind this fence like animals [crying].
And we were going to also lose our freedom
and walk inside of that gate and find ourselves
. . . cooped up there . . . when the gates were
shut, we knew that we had lost something that
was very precious; that we were no longer
free."
Mary Tsukamoto
“When we got to our tar-paper barracks, we
found sand coming in through the walls,
around the windows, up through the floor.
The camp was surrounded by barbed wire.
Guards with machine guns were posted at
watchtowers, with orders to shoot anyone
who tried to escape. Our own government
put a yoke of disloyalty around our
shoulders. But throughout our ordeal, we
cooperated with the government because
we felt that in the long run, we could prove
our citizenship.’