CANADIAN FOREIGN POLICY

VIS-A-VIS

GREAT BRITAIN, THE UNITED STATES

AND THE FAR EAST, 1937 - 1941

by

GREGORY ALLAN JOHNSON

B.A., The University of British Columbia, 1979

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E-6 (3/81) Abstract

The central theme of this study is the plight of the small power entrapped in a power struggle between large powers. In this case it is

Canada enmeshed in a three way struggle that included Britain and the

United States on the one hand and Japan on the other. The aim is to demonstrate that Far Eastern events played a significant role in the formulation and conduct of Canadian diplomacy between 1937-1941.

An attempt is made to approach the subject by utilizing a contextual analysis instead of the traditional textual 'centralist' approach. The study prinicpally focuses on two important issues that have so far not been fully explained by Canadian historians. The first is the Canadian government's decision to give the West Coast of Canada defence priority status over all other areas from 1937-1939. The second is the matter of Prime Minister

Mackenzie King's growing suspicion of the United States and its intentions in

Canada.

Canadian historians generally explain the government's decision to grant the Pacific Coast defence priority status in one of two ways. First, historians take the view that since no Japanese attack upon Canada ever occurred the government's decision was made as a result of political pressure and war hysteria from the West. The second argument usually shows that the government was entirely justified in providing for the contingency of such an attack, even if it never materialized.

This study attempts to demonstrate that many leading government officials, including the Prime Minister, feared that such an attack was possible and that in the period after 1939 there is some evidence to show that their fears may have been founded. Nevertheless, it would appear that the overriding concern was not whether Japan would attack, but what the United

ii States would do in the event of an all-out Pacific war. It would seem that the government believed the United States might use the threat of a Japanese attack on North America as a pretext to justify its expansionist aims in

Canada and especially in Northwest Canada. This is precisely what did happen in the aftermath to Pearl Harbour and the government sought to offset the growing American presence in the Canadian Northwest by stationing still more troops on the West Coast.

Mackenzie King's concern over the question of Pacific Coast defence is

intimately tied to his growing suspicion of American intentions in Canada.

Canadian historians have tended to brush aside the Prime Minister's fears as examples of 'irrational paranoia'. This study attempts to show that these fears were far more than examples of paranoia. United States policy in the

Far East was expansionist, imperialistic and directed towards the establishment of a Pax Americana in the Far East. This massive growth in

American power took place against a background of a rapidly declining

Britain. Moreover, Washington's failure to define the purposes for which that power was to be used soon led Mackenzie King to believe that the aim of

American foreign policy was to hasten the decline of Britain and to take over

Canada.

This study is not an attempt to 'defend' Mackenzie King and his government; rather, it is an attempt to cast new light on a critical period in

Canadian history from a different perspective.

iii Table of Contents

Abstract ii

Table of Contents iv

Acknowledgments v

Introduction

The Far East as a Factor in Canadian Foreign

Policy, 1937 - 1941 1

Chapter One

The Setting, Canada, Britain, the United States and the Far East to 1937 18 Chapter Two

The 'Atlantic Triangle' and the Opening of the 'undeclared' Sino-Japanese War, 1937 - 1939 38

Chapter Three

Canada and the Road to Pearl Harbour: 'Waiting for F.D.R.', 1939 - 1941 69

Chapter Four

Aftermath and, Conclusion. Mackenzie King's Pacific Dilemma 97

Notes to Introduction 114

Notes to Chapter One 118

Notes to Chapter Two 124

Notes to Chapter Three 132

Notes to Chapter Four 138

Bibliography 142

iv Acknowledgments

I would first like to express my deepest gratitude to Professor J.S.

Conway. He gave generously of his time, expressed a great deal of interest in the development of this study and, I might add, extended his patience on more than one occasion. I am also grateful to him for having introduced me to the work of Christopher Thorne and for suggesting the research topic at a time when I was swimming in uncharted seas. His cordial friendship and invaluable guidance over the years will always be treasured.

To Professor John Foster and Dr. Dianne Newell I am also indebted.

They too gave freely of their valuable time, offered a great deal of criticism and support in the early stages of the project.

I would like to express sincere thanks to Dr. George Oshiro and Mr.

Alan Mason. Dr. Oshiro spent many hours discussing and criticizing my views. His insight into Far Eastern affairs saved me from considerable embarrassment. Mr. Mason provided me with a copy of his own research paper and he directed my attention to several important documents that I would otherwise have missed.

A special thanks goes to Mrs. Beverley Ersoy for typing the final draft.

Without her assistance the work might not have been completed.

Finally, to you Gayle - for being the most understanding companion, for putting up with the late nights, the long hours of solitude and especially for your encouragement when it was needed most.

All of the views expressed here, of course, are my own and any errors that remain are my own responsibility.

v Introduction: The Far East as a Factor

in Canadian Foreign Policy, 1937 - 1941

History, it seems, reserves one of its harshest lessons for small powers

that become trapped in power struggles between large powers. In the

ensuing catastrophe the small power, tragically enmeshed in circumstances

over which it has little control, has to wage a clever diplomatic battle to

protect its very existence as a nation or suffer drastic consequences.

This is a study of one such small power, Canada, and its foreign policy

vis-a-vis Britain, the United States and Japan. The period is from the

opening of the 'undeclared' Sino-Japanese war in July 1937 to the Japanese

attack on Pearl Harbour in December 1941. The focus will be primarily on

the Canadian response to the Far Eastern policies of Britain and the United

States.

The Far East is a greatly neglected factor in- pre-World War Two

Canadian diplomatic history. Canadian historians have devoted so much time

to the study of the impact of European events upon Canadian diplomacy that

the influence of Far Eastern events has been largely overlooked. The aim

here is to demonstrate that Far Eastern events, and especially the tension

that occurred in Anglo-American relations regarding that part of the world,

played a significant role in the formulation and conduct of Canadian foreign

policy. Similarly, it is to the Far East and the interaction of British and

American policies and aims there as a whole that we have to look in order to gain a broader understanding of what Canadian policy makers were trying to accomplish. Canadian statesmen were confronted with the problem of sustaining Canadian independence in a rapidly changing international order marked by the decline of Britain as a world power and the rise of the United

States as a superpower. Much of this study attempts to explain how a small

1 group of men sought to defend Canadian national interest against the military

and economic encroachment of foreign powers.

Historians traditionally view these years as Canada's attempt to assert

her growing nationalism by pursuing a foreign policy that would promote

Canadian independence in world affairs without upsetting the inward search

for national unity.1 In other words, the domestic scene largely dictated the 2

shape that foreign policy took. All major foreign policy decisions were

governed by one key consideration: the French-Canadian factor.

The French-Canadians made up one-third of the population of Canada

during the 1930's and 1940's. Their international outlook was decidedly

isolationist. They held a fear and a disdain for American republicanism and a

deep-rooted suspicion of Britain. The Americans were viewed as

assimilationists who would destroy the French-Canadian culture while the

British were perceived as imperialistic war-mongers who would gladly sacrifice

French-Canadian blood for the greater glory of the British Empire. Politically

they leaned towards the Liberals and the Liberal party, in turn, depended

upon their support. The Liberals, led throughout this period by Prime

Minister Mackenzie King, recognized that French-Canada was an important

component and a critical factor in the maintenance of national unity. Without 3

the full support of French-Canada there would be no national unity.

Given this French-Canadian factor, argues the dominant school of

historiography, Canadian statesmen were, until September 1939, adverse to a

policy that could draw Canada into the growing world crisis for fear of what

it would do to national unity. Mackenzie King, after all, warned the House of

Commons in March 1939 that 'A strong and dominant national feeling is not a

luxury in Canada, it is a necessity. Without it this country could not exist1. There was undoubtedly a great deal of truth behind this statement, but the continued existence of Canada was also dependent upon the strong link with Britain. 'The fact of Canada'2, writes A. P. Thornton, denied the facts of North American geography, denied the fact of what many in the nineteenth century held to be the manifest destiny of the growing United States: to become territorial sovereign of the whole continent. It was the link with the British Empire that prevented this from happening and both the British in Canada and the French-Canadians saw this clearly. It was therefore in Canada's own interest to remain a member of the British Empire, because it was the power of that Empire alone wh'^ch saved her from absorption from her powerful southern neighbour.

Canadian statesmen were well aware of the value of this important connection.

Canada's dependence on the Empire link, however, often proved to be a cloak and dagger affair. For just as Canadian policy makers did not want to get dragged into European events {especially through the League of Nations), so they were even more adverse to getting dragged into Imperial commitments on the coat tails of Britain. The risk of dividing Canada into two hostile camps was simply too great. Canadians remembered only too vividly the crisis that took place in 1917 over the question of conscription of men for overseas service. The mere thought of another occurrence no doubt sent shivers down the spines of many Liberal politicians.^ This was most aptly demonstrated by

Mackenzie King's blank refusal to support Britain during the Chanak Crisis in

1921.^ He would later display a similar attitude at the 1937 Imperial

Conference.

So goes the main trend in the historiography that covers this period.

The twin themes of national unity and the importance of the link with the

British Empire have formed the fundamental framework around which the history of Canadian foreign policy has been written. The critics of Mackenzie

King's government generally argue that too much attention was paid to national unity and not enough to the Empire. The defenders usually attempt to show that too much attention was given to the Empire and the critics have not shown enough appreciation of Mackenzie King's efforts to maintain national unity. Both sides, nevertheless, agree that the Empire link was somehow important.**

3 Indeed it was. But could Canada continue to rely on Britain for

protection at a time when the British Empire was in a state of decline? It is

now known that this decline can be traced back to the 1870's; it became acute after the Great War; found expression in the 1930's through Britain's desire to maintain a peaceful international status quo by pursuing a policy commonly

referred to as appeasement; it reached crisis proportions after the fall of

France in June 1940; and became steadily worse after the United States entered into what then became the Second World War in December 1941 when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbour. All of this, moreover, was taking place against a background of increasing Anglo-American rivalry; a rivalry that extended back to the end of the Great War and continued throughout the

1920's - an era that Captain Roskill has entitled 'the period of Anglo-American antagonism1 - into the 1930's when the United States decided to reach naval 9 parity with Britain. The situation was further compounded by the fact that

Britain and the United States often pursued divergent policies with respect to the Far East.

This left Canada in a precarious position. She could ill afford, as previous history had shown, to become entangled in a rift between the United

States and Britain. The lesson was often learned at Canada's expense because Britain lacked the resources to press an issue. The outcome of the

1903 Alaskan boundary dispute is a case in point. Yet for Canada to deny the Imperial link would have been tantamount to committing diplomatic or perhaps even national suicide because the United States, despite its growing power, would not challenge British 'prestige' in Canada to the point of war.

'Prestige' here means the facade of power, for while Britain was still very much the Emperor in the context of international diplomacy during the 1930's, she was definitely without the clothes.

Canadian policy makers faced a dilemma, one that assumes menacing proportions when viewed in the context of Far Eastern developments. For it 4 was in the Far East that Britain's weakness was to be fully demonstrated and the manifestation of American power fully revealed. As the European war and

later the Pacific war progressed it became clear that the United States would assume the position that Britain previously held as the chief western colonial 10 power. This shift of power in favour of the United States forced Mackenzie

King to begin thinking of the new battle he would have to fight, this time with the United States. It would, moreover, be a far more difficult battle than the one he fought with Britain given the geographical proximity of the

United States and the fact that Canada could no longer rely on Britain to

function as a counterweight to the United States.

The realization of the dilemma caused near panic among many Canadian statesmen and the attempt to resolve it resulted in much confusion and political 'double-talk'. The problem Mackenzie King and his advisors grappled with was essentially a gigantic paradox. On the one hand there was a desire to see Canada play a greater role in world affairs apart from Britain. This would demonstrate that Canada was an independent nation with its own foreign policy. It was also a safeguard against being drawn into Imperial wars.11 On the other hand, Canadian policy makers, despite their distrust of Britain, did not wish to sever the Imperial tie for fear of being dominated by the United States. The desire to retain the link with Britain, however, carried the risk of Canada being drawn into Imperial commitments and this posed a great domestic threat.

Until September 1939 Candian statesmen attempted to resolve the problem by pursuing a dual policy. The formal (public) policy was one of 'no commitments'. This policy incorporated Mackenzie King's famous formula: Met 12 Parliament decide'. It was a sufficiently evasive policy that kept Britain at 13 arm's length while Canada decided just what Parliament was to decide.

Canada enjoyed a considerable amount of success with this policy in that

Mackenzie King forced the British to 5thin k twice about expecting automatic commitments on Canada's part to Imperial defence and foreign policy schemes.

The actual policy (pursued privately) was one that would bring together, in

harmony, the 'two great democracies', Britain and the United States. This 14

policy has been commonly referred to as the 'linch-pin role1. Mackenzie

King tried to promote good Anglo-American relations by acting as an

intermediary between Britain and the United States. The belief was that so

long as Anglo-American relations remained cordial Canada would be spared the

plight of the small power trapped between two hostile great powers. The

Canadian Prime Minister was moderately successful with this policy between

1937 and 1941 ("Perhaps1, in the words of one historian, 'he was too successful1).15 But this was only the case where Europe was concerned.

Where the Far East was concerned this policy was not so successful.

Mackenzie King's efforts to promote some sort of Anglo-American understanding were made largely in vain. It was, in fact, mostly as a result of tension and mistrust in British-American Far Eastern relations that

Mackenzie King shed much of his anti-British feeling and began to push for the Commonwealth of Nations in an effort to offset what he perceived to be the growing domination of the United States over Canada.

One of the first decisions Canadian policy makers faced during the period leading to the Second World War was whose policy to back: Britain's or the United States'. This was not a critical decision as long as the question was confined to Europe because the Canadian attitude towards

European affairs was transmitted through London. It was also made easier by the fact that Britain and the United States were generally in accord with respect to Europe. President Roosevelt sympathized with British Prime 1 6

Minister Neville Chamberlain's European policy of appeasement. But with respect to the Far East the situation was not the same. Roosevelt made it known that the United States would view any British attempt to appease Japan with 'extreme disfavor1.1^ This differenc6 e in the American attitude towards Europe and the Far East caused the British a great deal of trouble but it had even more significance for Canada. As one contemporary student of international affairs wrote in 1941, Canada's 'geographical position on the

North American continent demands that the nature of her relations with Japan 1 g should not seriously conflict with policies of the United States'. Thus with respect to the Far East, the question of who to back was indeed a critical one which required careful consideration. If Mackenzie King wished to achieve even a modicum of success with his linch-pin policy he would have to proceed cautiously because his desire to support Britain would be at the risk of alienating the United States. At the same time, however, his desire to remain in step with the United States meant pursuing a policy that could provoke

Japan into a war with Britain that would ultimately destroy the British

Empire.

Under these circumstances Canada was forced to play a dangerous game as the Royal Commission's 1940 Report on Dominion-Provincial Relations made clear: Canada's position (vis-a-vis Britain and the United States) is similar to that of a small man sitting in a big poker game. He must play for the full stakes, but with only a fraction of the capital resources of his two substantial opponents: if he wins, his profits in relation tOghis capital are very large, and if he loses, he may be cleaned out.

The stakes were indeed high and it can only be surmised that Mackenzie King knew it (a factor that may go a long way in explaining his cautious approach to foreign policy). Ever since the abrogation of the Anglo-Japanese alliance in 1921, and especially after the 1931-33 Manchurian Crisis, there was the nagging question of what would happen in the event of a Far Eastern war involving the West. Would Canada be involved in an Anglo-Japanese war with

American abstention? A similar possibility was an American-Japanese war with

British abstention. Which ever way it might go raised a host of problems for

Canadian policy makers. Would, or could Canada remain neutral if such a

7 war took place? Would the United States or Britain try to line up Canada in

support of their respective policies in an attempt to force each others hand?

If Britain went to war with Japan should Canada shed her British alliance and

move towards the United States? Similary, if the United States went to war with Japan, would Canadian participation be sought in Pacific defence

schemes? Or would the United States military simply move in and violate

Canadian sovereignty? In addition to this was the possibility that Canada

herself might be attacked by Japan in an all out Pacific war. This raised the question of Pacific defence and the means to carry it out.

The Canadian government's decision to give Pacific Coast defence

priority status over other areas from 1937 until the outbreak of the European war has never been fully explained by Canadian historians. CP. Stacey, in his magisterial study of Canadian policy, suggests that the government capitulated to political pressure and 'war hysteria1 from the Western

Provinces. 'As a result of these measures of exaggerated precaution1, writes

Stacey, '...large numbers of men and great quantities of equipment were 20 accumulated uselessly on the Pacific Coast'. James Eayrs gave the matter some attention in his remarkable study, but his fixation on European events led him to overlook the importance of the Far East. He consequently failed to 21 explain the government's decision. T. Murray Hunter, in his article, felt 22 that every contingency had to be covered. But these writers implicitly 23 assumed - what Nicholas Mansergh assumed also - that Canada could have left Pacific Coast defence to the United States without fear of American designs upon Canada.

The concern the Canadian government demonstrated over the question of

Pacific defence can only be understood if the fear of growing American interest in the Canadian North West is fully appreciated. Whether or not the

United States wanted to 'take over1 Canada or merely ensure that Canada was not a strategic weakpoint was not clea8r then and it is not clear now. The later assumption that Canada's move into the American sphere of influence was inevitable or that Mackenzie King led Canada into the arms of the United

States because Britain was in a state of decline is a post hoc development.

When the situation is placed in a wider context it can be seen that the government's decision to arm and defend the West Coast of Canada was not only made to fight off a possible Japanese attack but ostensibly to counter a probable American move to do it for Canada. Mackenzie King had no intention of letting the United States defend Canada. Moreover, from 1936 onwards Canadian officials and the Chiefs of Staff were worried that the

United States might use an American - Japanese war as a pretext to move arms and men into Canada. It was not clear at the time that American influence would be beneficent. This fear of American intrusion grew enormously during the early stages of the European war when Britain was locked in a life and death struggle with Germany. At the same time Japan, egged on by Germany, appeared to be making threatening gestures towards

Britain's Far Eastern colonies. Meanwhile the United States continued to adhere to its policy of isolation and would not, until the very last moment, give Britain a guarantee of armed assistance if Japan attacked her Far 24

Eastern possessions.

The United States refusal to give Britain a guarantee of military support in the Far East was viewed with considerable alarm in Canada. Until

September 1939 it was felt that any British involvement in a war with Japan would induce either Germany or Italy (or both) to strike in Europe. After the European war began Mackenzie King continually warned the British not to pursue any policy that could provoke a war with Japan unless American support was promised in advance. The Prime Minister, it seems, feared that

Britain would become involved in a war with Japan while the United States stood aside.

9 British policy makers were well aware of the situation. By the summer of 1941, after numerous approaches to the United States had failed to secure an American commitment, Britain turned to the Dominions for support in an effort to stage a show of Empire solidarity in order to deter Japanese aggression. Mackenzie King rose to the occasion and complied with a British

request, made in September 1941, to send Canadian troops to Hong Kong in order to strengthen the British garrison. This decision is particularly significant in view of the fact that Hong Kong was to be defended only for reasons of Imperial prestige. Mackenzie King's motives at this juncture are confusing. It seems to be clear that the decision to send troops to Hong

Kong was a last ditch effort to shore up Britain's flagging position in the Far

East. Yet only three months before this British request he had been furious over a similar suggestion, made by his own Cabinet, to have Canadian troops 25 sent to the Middle East. It was a request that he promptly refused. It may be, however, that Mackenzie King was influenced by British and

American notions that the Japanese were somehow racially inferior beings who were unable to wage a first class war - notions that would bear bitter fruits 2 6 in late 1941 and early 1942. But, as we shall see, the Prime Minister was one of the first to believe that the Japanese were capable of launching an attack upon Canada. Whatever the curious blend of motives were, this decision, nevertheless, represented a complete reversal of a policy Mackenzie

King had advocated for twenty years, that is, not to be drawn into Imperial commitments. It is also worth noting that Canadian historians have seldom dealt with this issue and where they have it has usually been in a critical 27 manner.

The question of Pacific defence and the decision to send Canadian troops to Hong Kong, though only part of a much larger problem Canada faced in a rapidly changing world, still serves to illustrate a side of Mackenzie King which to this day puzzles historians,1 0 namely, his growing suspicion and mistrust of the United States. On the one hand we see Mackenzie King telling Norman Armour, the American Minister to Canada, in 1935 that 'there were two roads open to Canada, but that he wanted to choose "the American 28

road'". On the other hand, by 1943 this attitude had changed. The increasing American activity in the Canadian North West and the demonstration of United States power in the Pacific led the Prime Minister to worry that 'efforts would be made by the Americans to control developments in our country after the war, and to bring Canada out of the 29 orbit of the British Commonwealth of Nations into their own orbit'.

Although the United States eventually succeeded in virtually assuming strategic control of the Canadian North West, they did not do so at the open invitation of the Canadian government. Indeed, Mackenzie King fought the

American intrusion into Canada, particularly over the Alaskan highway issue, through a process of non-committal stall tactics. He gave way only when, in the aftermath of Pearl Harbour, Washington simply brushed aside previous

Canadian objections. The Alaskan highway issue is also instructive on the question of the effectiveness of polictical pressure from the West. CP. 30

Stacey attempts to argue that Mackenzie King bowed to such pressure. Yet when the Premier of British Columbia, T.D. Pattullo, tried to bring pressure on the federal government to build a highway and actually sent a letter to

President Roosevelt expressing the value of such a project, Mackenzie King turned a deaf ear.31

The shift in Mackenzie King's attitude towards the United States occurred as a direct result of the American involvement in the Pacific war. A second and less obvious shift took place towards Britain. Though he harboured a suspicious attitude towards Britain and many British statesmen, he was imbued with a curious, but powerful sentiment for the Empire.

Indeed, as the British became less dangerous Mackenzie King became more 11 favourable to them. 'I think Churchill is one of (the) most dangerous men I have ever known1, he recorded in 1939. Yet by the end of 1947 he would

feel that 'perhaps in more respects than one, he (Churchill) was the greatest 32

man of our times'. While Mackenzie King's sentiment for the British Empire

can be gauged from a discussion he had with the Prime Minister of Burma, U

Saw, in late November 1941 (U Saw was pressing for Dominion status.

Mackenzie King urged him to hold off until after the war because Britain was

fighting for her life. U Saw did not heed Mackenzie King's advice and was later jailed by the British), his suspicion towards Britain could easily be 33

aroused. In Janaury 1944, Lord Halifax, the former British Foreign

Secretary, now the British Ambassador to Washington, delivered a speech in

Toronto calling for greater Empire collaboration. Though the speech

contained nothing new or startling, Mackenzie King's old fears reemerged. 'It 34

seemed', he wrote, '...like a conspiracy on the part of the Imperialists'.

Observing and recording these shifts and whims is much easier than

understanding them. It is perhaps for this reason that in the area of foreign

affairs Mackenzie King is portrayed either as the architect of Canadian

autonomy or as the man who broke the British connection (some say the 35

Empire itself) and led Canada straight into the arms of the United States.

But neither of these views take into consideration the fact that after having

fought so hard for Canadian autonomy and a separate voice for Canada in

world affairs, Mackenzie King was, by the middle of the Second World War,

alarmed at the prospect of United States' domination. His perception of

Canada's national interest has not been fully appreciated by historians. The

best explanation we have of Mackenzie King's growing suspicion towards the

United States is the 'paranoid streak' thesis offered by CP. Stacey, who writes, in his usual critical manner, that ...it is surely hard to take quite seriously King's belief at the end of his life that it was an object of United States foreign policy to bring about the annexation of Canada (Can this have been an echo from his Victorian youth?) He1 2 must have forgotten ...how excruciatingly uninterested in Canada Americans are. In any list of the goals of American policy, the acquisition of Canada would surely stand very low indeed.

Stacey's argument is, of course, predicated on the grounds that Canada had nothing to fear from the 'good neighbour' to the south. In fact, and this study will attempt to demonstrate it, Mackenzie King was by no means the only one to cast a wary eye at the United States. High officials in the

Department of External Affairs were, by the middle of the war, also beginning to question American intentions in Canada. In Britain, too, there existed a growing uneasiness about American motives to the point, in fact, where leading British statesmen began to discern a vague desire on the part 37 of the United States to dismantle the Empire itself.

These fears of the United States were surely more than examples of

'irrational paranoia'. They were widespread and held with conviction.

Nevertheless, historians have chosen to ignore these beliefs and have instead promoted the more popular 'hands-across-the-border1 (or in the case of

Britain and the United States, the 'hands-across-the-sea') version of wartime relations.

For too long, however, the writing of the history of Canadian foreign policy has been dominated by the 'centralist' tradition in Canadian historiography that stems back to the appearance of Donald Creighton's The 38

Empire of the St. Lawrence in 1936. Carried on over a period of more than three decades, this tradition has viewed Canada in terms of its link with

Europe. It is certainly a valid approach, but the result of its application to

Canadian diplomatic history has been a neglect of the Far East as a factor in

Canadian foreign policy; a neglect, moreover, that has led to a failure to fully appreciate the fact that Canadian policy makers faced a far more complex situation than has generally been portrayed by historians.

Where this study is concerned, Canadian policy can be broken down into four periods. The first chapter covers the period from the formation of the 13 Anglo-Japanese Alliance in 1902 to the opening of the undeclared

Sino-Japanese war in July 1937. The purpose here is simply to outline the setting and some of the problems Canada faced with respect to the Far East.

The second chapter opens with the beginning of full scale war in China and runs to the opening of the European war in September 1939. The

Canadian government initially attempted to assume a low profile. When it became clear that the war would continue, an official policy of strict neutrality was adopted. At the same time fears began to grow about Canada's position in the event of a Pacific war involving the West. The government responded to the growing Far Eastern crisis by giving Pacific defence priority status over other areas. Meanwhile, Canadian concerns began to focus on

Europe and the possibility of war there. By the summer of 1939 Canada faced the distinct possibility of fighting a two front war alongside Britain.

Hitler's designs on Poland put Britain in a delicate position while in the Far

East the Tientsin crisis brought Britain and Japan to the brink of war. The

Tientsin crisis was resolved, but not without ill-feelings between Britain and the United States. The United States, for the duration of this crisis, stood aside and, though full of moral support, did not offer Britain any guarantee of armed assistance.

The third chapter begins with Canada's entry into the European war and continues down to Pearl Harbour. The immediate concern was with the

European war, particularly after the fall of France, and Canada's Far Eastern concerns must be seen within that context. But even then the possibility of an Anglo-Japanese war loomed large. It would seem that Mackenzie King's greatest fear was that the United States might attempt to provoke Japan into a war and then leave Britain in the lurch. This fear became rather pronounced during the Burma Road crisis in June 1940. Mackenzie King wanted to avoid taking any action that would provoke Japan and he attempted to promote a situation which ensured that Britain would not go to war without

14 the full support of the United States. The growing crisis in the Far East once again raised the question of Pacific defence and especially the Alaskan highway issue. At this critical juncture, when it seemed as if even Britain herself might fall, there was a great desire to look towards the United States for security. Indeed, it would be surprising if this had not been the case.

But Mackenzie King was not willing to cast Canada's lot in with the United

States and he continued to express reservations over the Alaskan highway project. He eventually gave way, but it was not entirely as a result of political pressure from the West. Rather, it seems, Mackenzie King bowed to

American pressure to have the highway built.

• The fourth chapter covers the aftermath of Pearl Harbour. With the

American entry into the war Canada was reduced from Britain's number one ally to a mere appendage. As the United States began to take a commanding lead in the execution of the war, and as Britain's position declined, Mackenzie

King became more and more suspicious of American intentions in Canada and especially in the Canadian North West. Although there is no evidence to

'prove' that the United States wanted to 'take over' Canada, an attempt will be made to show that Mackenzie King's fears, and those of other leading statesmen, were indeed substantial and possibly justified. The massive increase in American power in the Pacific, coupled with a hint of megalomania in Roosevelt's attitude, roused suspicions on both sides of the Atlantic. The

United States would not clarify the purposes for which its growing power was to be used and it began to appear that the Americans were leaning to a more expansionist and imperialistic outlook as the war progressed.

This study attempts to fulfil three aims. First, it seeks to explain why the Canadian government gave Pacific defence priority status at a time when

Germany appeared to present the greater threat. Second, it attempts to understand why Mackenzie King grew increasingly more suspicious of the

United States as the war progressed. Finally, it is an effort to put into

15 broader context the study of Canadian foreign policy during this period by abandoning the traditional 'centralist' approach in favour of a more delineated contextual approach.

A word or two might be useful in outlining the sources. In Canada there is a lack of secondary source material. The most useful work has been

Alan Mason's 'Canada and the Far East, 1930-1941', an unpublished University of Toronto research paper (1973). I have therefore relied heavily on the published Documents on Canadian External Relations, volumes six through nine. The large section on the Far Eastern crisis in volume eight proved to be the most useful source of information. The Mackenzie King Diary has also been used extensively. For the 1939-1941 period I have drawn upon the

Mackenzie King Record, an edited version of the Diary compiled by J.W.

Pickersgill. The Diary and the Record have been used interchangeably.

The British and American side has been drawn from the small, but growing, amount of secondary literature now appearing. Christopher

Thome's remarkable study. Allies of a Kind, which first appeared in 1978, has been especially helpful. The published Documents on British Foreign

Policy, particularly volumes VIII and IX of series three, contain a great deal of material. Unfortunately they cover only the period to September 1939.

Also valuable for the pre-European war period are the published Foreign

Relations of the United States.

One final note. Mackenzie King's presence will dominate any study of

Canadian foreign policy during these years. The reason for this is quite simple and particularly important. Until Louis St. Laurent became Prime

Minister in 1948, the Prime Minister's Office was attached to the office of

Secretary of State for External Affairs. Mackenzie King therefore acted as his own Secretary of State for External Affairs and this gave him a great deal of influence in policy formulation. The reader should bear this in mind

16 because it gave Canada's Department of External Affairs a status that was not shared by the British Foreign Office or the American State Department.

17 Chapter One: The Setting, Canada, Britain,

the United States and the Far East to 1937

International alliances are often useful devices to help states guard their interests. Often they are welcomed because the international order is put into a balanced equilibrium, thus ensuring a peaceful co-existence between the various countries of the world. But they can also create rivalries between states that normally maintain cordial relations. When this happens the international balance can be upset and this may be detrimental to other nations.

So it was to be when Lord Lansdowne, the British Foreign Secretary, secured the first Anglo-Japanese alliance in 1902. In the short-run the alliance proved to be most beneficial for Canada. During the Great War Japan performed a valuable service in keeping Germany at bay in Pacific waters.

German raiders in the Pacific caused some concern on Canada's West Coast and the presence of Japanese warships in Vancouver harbour did much to reassure Canadians.1

In the long run, however, the Anglo-Japanese alliance proved to be a burden for Canada. Although it helped Britain cover up the fact that the

Empire was becoming over-extended, it could not be reconciled with the growing American presence in the Far East. There was mounting tension in

Japanese-American relations and this automatically affected Anglo-American 2 relations. By 1921 the situation was acute enough to force Canadians to bring the matter up at the 1921 Imperial Conference, the same year in which the alliance was due to be renewed.

The question of the renewal of the alliance caused great concern in

Canada. 'If there is one dominion to which'. Prime Minister Arthur Meighen told the House of Commons in April 1921, 'more than another, the question of the renewal (of the Anglo-Japanese alliance) is of more importance it is to the 18 Dominion of Canada ...a portion of the British Empire standing - if I may say it - between Great Britain on the one hand and the United States on the other1.

The allusion was clear: Canada had no wish to be trapped in a rift between Britain and the United States. Meighen argued that the alliance should be abrogated because the growing tension between Britain and the

United States over the Far East threatened the Empire and Canada's security.

'If we now in this state of affairs', Meighen warned the delegates at the 1921

Imperial Conference, 'renew a confidential and exclusive relationship with

Japan it is wholly impossible to argue convincingly, to my mind, that it is not going to affect detrimentally our relations with the United States...1. This concern, moreover, was greatly heightened by the attitude of various statesmen in the United States. In November 1921, for example, Elihu Root, a former American Secretary of State, told former Canadian Prime Minister

Robert Borden 'of the disastrous effect upon American public opinion of a renewal of the Alliance ...the alliance at present was regarded by the people as an alliance between Great Britain and Japan against the United States'.

It was therefore with a sense of urgency that Canada brought pressure to bear upon Britain. The Anglo-Japanese alliance was subsequently abrogated and replaced by the five-power naval treaty and the nine-power treaty (concerning China) drafted at the Washington Conference in 1921-22.

Meighen was aware of what poor Anglo-American relations meant for Canada, but his concern went much deeper. There was the realization that the world was altering and that the Pacific would one day become an important focal point in international affairs.

The issue that worried Candian statesmen was what would happen in the event of an American-Japanese war. Even though the 1911 renewal of the

Anglo-Japanese alliance had been framed so that Britain could not be implicated in an American-Japanese war, Canadian fears were not assailed. In

19 the words of J.B. Brebner, 'Canada's fear of her own territorial implication in any American-Japanese conflict added urgent force to the basic principle of her foreign policy, that is, maintenance of the best possible relations between

Great Britain and the United States'. Meighen felt that it was better to gamble on American support in the Far East than to risk getting caught between Britain and the United States. The abrogation of the alliance and the Washington Conference demonstrated that if Britain, too, was forced to choose between Japan and the United States, she would move towards the latter.7

This American factor did not augur well with many in Britain and this g had an immediate effect upon Canada. It led Britain to make new demands on Canada. In June 1925, April 1926 and again at the 1926 Imperial

Conference Britain made it clear that she wanted Canada to avoid provoking

Japan by pursuing any policy 'which offends their national pride and hurts 9 them in a point in which they are very sensitive...'.

These types of demands angered many in Canada as well as Canadians abroad. P.C. Larkin, for example, the Salada Tea tycoon who served as

Canada's High Commissioner to London in the 1920's, wrote to Mackenzie King

(who became Prime Minister in 1921) in May 1922 that the British 'have the 10 same feeling towards me that they would have towards a child'. And again in 1924: If you were living over here as I have been for the past two years, you would fall, as I have, from the clouds. ...One of the great deal of waving of flags and talk of Imperial sentiment and all the rest of it, but when it comes down to business the sentiment, if any existed, vanishes quickly. ...Any courtesies or concessions made to Canada by Ministers and others will have to be drawn from them by forceps. ... Such were the origins of what James Eayrs has referred to as 'prickly 1 2 irritability' in Anglo-Canadian relations. It was not so much the 'Imperial sentiment' that raised many Canadian hackles as it was the demand for a single Imperial foreign policy, directe2d0 from London, in which Canada was expected to contribute without consultation. Thus Meighen's famous utterance in 1 922 over the British request for support during the Chanak incident -

"When Britain's message came then Canada should have said: "Ready, aye 13 ready; we stand by you1" - actually found little support among the more wary Canadian officials. Indeed, Canada was beginning to experience growing pains of its own and the first symptom was expressed in the insistence on greater representation abroad.

Canada established Legations at Washington, Paris and then, in 1929, in

Tokyo. Canada's first Minister there was Sir Herbert Marler, a former

Liberal member of Parliament and Cabinet Minister. He was given a very able staff which was headed by Hugh Keenleyside, the First Secretary and Charge d'Affaires. Shortly after Marler arrived in Japan he received a message from

Mackenzie King outlining Canada's objectives: First: Of keeping friendly the relations between Canada and Japan. Second: Of promoting the trade of this country. Third: Cooperation within the British Empire. Fourth: Making apparent to the other parts of the British Empire and to the world that we in Canada had just as good material^nd brains for the Foreign Service as any other part of the Empire.

In addition to these somewhat modest goals (though the third would prove difficult) was a far greater purpose. Mackenzie King felt that

1 ...with our New World point of view, we could be of immense service in furthering ideals and policies which some of the older countries were slow to grasp as being best for the maintenance of friendly relations between 15 nations'. Although Mackenzie King never defined the 'New World' point of view, implicit in his thought was the idea (or ideal) of Canada as an independent nation whose foreign policy would be an expression of federal-provincial relations. Embodied in this idea were several immediate aims, among them national unity, economic development, and the role Canada should play in the British Empire, the League of Nations and on the North 16 American continent. Mackenzie King, moreover, tended to view Japan as

21 the stepping stone for the commercial penetration of the Chinese mainland and its vast market. The Far East held the key to future development.

Therefore a diplomatic superstructure had to be erected, for, in the words of one historian, Mackenzie King saw 'Canada as centrally placed between the

Pacific and Atlantic Oceans and between Europe and Asia ...at the podium of a great diplomatic amphitheatre or arc, which represented the international system'.17 The basic framework was in place with the opening of the

Legation in Tokyo in May 1929. It was barely established two years before

Canada would face the first of many crises during the 1930's.

The Manchurian crisis of 1931-33 and the separate but related Shanghai 18 crisis in 1932 .were monumental events. Together they represented the first major challenge to the League of Nations; they marked the real beginning of the Japanese attempt to dominate East Asia; and they brought an element of exacerbation into Anglo-American relations that never disappeared.

The Far Eastern crisis of 1931-33 progressed through several stages.

The first stage began with the clash between Japanese and Chinese troops in

Manchuria in late September 1931. China appealed to the League of Nations and the League set up the Lytton Commission to look into the incident. With the outbreak at Shanghai in January 1932 the crisis entered another phase which brought American involvement. Henry Stimson, the American Secretary of State, wanted Britain to invoke the nine-power treaty of 1921 and to adopt a policy of non-recognition. The final stage began with the presentation of the Lytton Commission's findings and the so-called 'Cahan incident', in which

CH. Cahan, Canada's Secretary of State, made a speech openly supporting

Britain's Sir John Simon, the Foreign Secretary, in acknowledging Japan's

'civilizing mission' in China.

The initial response to the Far Eastern crisis was largely two-fold. On the one hand there were those of an 'internationalist' persuasion, like Hugh

Keenleyside and especially Lord Cecil and Gilbert Murray of the British based 22 League of Nations Union, who wished to see the League take speedy action and impose economic sanctions on Japan. In their view Japan was clearly the

'aggressor1 nation and therefore had to be forced to withdraw from

Manchuria. There were those, however, who felt that sanctions could not be

levied without the risk of war. This feeling was particularly apparent in

Canada. O.D. Skelton, the influential Under-Secretary of State for External

Affairs, wrote in March 1932:

I am frankly prejudiced against their (sanctions) use. In general I doubt the possibility of fighting the devil with fire, or of ending war by going to war - for an economic boycott could with difficulty stop short of war; in particular I doubt whether France and the other European countries which are always demanding sanctions against European 'aggressors' (i.e., disturber^ of the status quo) would lift a finger in a non-European dispute.

This stance was supported by R.B. Bennett, the Prime Minister at the time.

Both men, though they generally deplored Japan's actions, felt that the proper course was to support a policy of conciliation.^

On the other hand, there were those, particularly in Britain, who did not perceive Japan's attack upon Manchuria as a great threat. British policy makers since Sir Edward Grey recognized that if Japan expanded into North

China, away from British interests, the Empire in the Pacific would not be threatened. The Japanese attack on Shanghai, however, was a completely different matter. This was the nerve centre for British interest in China and

Japanese expansion into the area caused considerable alarm in London. This latter crisis was quickly settled because Japan did not want to push Britain 21 too far until they consolidated their hold on Manchuria. Still, the Shanghai crisis had the greater impact on Britain and this held a great deal of significance for Canada. It led the British Chiefs of Staff, for example, to warn in March 1932 that 'the whole of our territory in the Far East, as well as the coastline of India and the Dominions and our vast trade and shipping 22 lies open to attack...'. They also wanted an end put to the 'assumption 23 that at any given date there will be no major war for ten years'. 23 The abolition of the ten year rule, which had been adopted after the

Great War, meant that Britain would have to begin thinking about re-arming.

This was certainly implicit in Whitehall's warnings. The government was unsympathetic, however, and explained to the Services that Britain was 24 financially unable to prepare for war. Whitehall then turned to the

Dominions for support. In July 1932 the Committee of Imperial Defence informed Canada that events in the Far East were 'ominious' and warned: 'We 25 cannot ignore the Writing on the Wall'. The subliminal message here was the call for Empire solidarity to deal with the rising threat Japan presented.

But Mackenzie King had already, in 1921 and again in 1926, set in motion an attitude that forced Britain to deal with Canada and the other Dominions cautiously. 'The settled policy of the Dominions', J.H. Thomas, the

Dominions Secretary, told the British Cabinet back in March 1932, was that

'they will not be committed beforehand, in relation either to this country or to the League, to participation in any hostilities without the approval of their 26 own Parliaments'.

Although the influence of the Dominions was slight when it came to the formulation of British policy, there can be no doubt that the apparent lack of

Empire solidarity made for uneasy reading in London. But even more disquieting was the attitude of the United States. Already, by the end of

1931, there was a growing wariness in Britain over what many considered to be the American unwillingness to assume 'an obligation or a responsibility'.

Robert Vansittart, the powerful Permanent Under-Secretary in the Foreign

Office, for example, was very critical of the Americans and their 'many facile but impractical recipes'. A year later he wrote: 'The Americans have often let us down'.27

Indeed, the Americans were far from being on good terms with the

British and this carried obvious implications for Canada. They were rankled 24 over the British refusal to adhere to the 'Stimson Doctrine1 of non-recognition of Japan's claim in China in January 1932, after which Henry Stimson returned with a proposal to invoke the nine-power treaty, only to get a 2 8 second refusal. It prompted Stimson to claim in his book. The Far Eastern Crisis in 1936, that it was Britain, and in particular John Simon, who had 'let 29

America down'. This belief in British betrayal was to become a festering sore and indeed, it may be claimed, one of the vital factors affecting

Anglo-American relations throughout the decade. In fact, we will see its reflection in Franklin Roosevelt's policy as late as 1940.

Of course the United States had no intention of backing up their policy and perceptive observers of the international scene knew as much. 'You'll get nothing out of Washington but words', Stanley Baldwin, then Lord

President of the Council in MacDonald's government, correctly observed in 30

1932, 'big words, but only words'.

It should have come as no surprise, given the atmosphere at Geneva and the American attitude, that Cahan chose to stand behind Britain. The later denunciation of him and his 8 December 1932 speech by Canadian historians is misguided and the charge that he deliberately disobeyed Ottawa's instructions 31 is now known to be wrong. Cahan had, in fact, been instructed to tell the

League Assembly to 'exhaust the possibilities of conciliatory settlement' and to avoid any 'discussion of sanctions or actions against a party unwilling to 32 accept settlement'.

What did Cahan say in his speech that set off the fireworks? It must first be remembered that Cahan was speaking in reaction to the findings of the Lytton Commission. The Commission essentially proposed that a policy of

'non-recognition' be adopted. This was not very different from the 'Stimson

Doctrine' of the previous January and when the League later accepted it

Britain's worst fears were confirmed: Japan promptly left the League and held Britain responsible for the moral condemnation of Japan's action in

Manchuria. Cahan's speech basically upheld Japan's claim to rights in China and hinted that Japan had a special mission to perform. But he stressed that although Japan had the right to act as she did under the present circumstances, she did not have the right to occupy and hold Chinese territory. Finally, he deplored the policy of sanctions and praised the idea 33 of conciliation.

The only Canadian statesman to take issue with Cahan's speech was W.D.

Herridge, Canada's Minister to Washington (and Bennett's brother-in-law).

But it was not so much in what Cahan said that irritated Herridge as it was the personal slight. Herridge told a State Department official that Cahan 'had 34 made him look like an idiot'. Others felt that the speech was good. Even

Skelton, who had been embarrassed by Cahan's action, recognized that 'with the substantial justice of this obiter dictum few people will be prepared to 35 36 quarrel'. Bennett's response was that 'Cahan made a good speech'. Herridge had good reason to be angry because he had misrepresented 37

Cahan's instructions to Stimson. He overstepped his authority (even after having been told to use 'discretion') and led Stimson to believe that Canada's policy was not any different than that of the United States. It can only be imagined what Herridge felt when Stimson told him that the United States was

'greatly concerned1 over reports that the League was going to 'lay off the 38

Manchurian affair. Herridge probably soundly denounced Cahan in an effort to straighten things out and perhaps to save his own skin. It prompted an angry Stimson to remark that Canadian representatives should 39

'adhere more closely to the letter and spirit of his instructions'.

Cahan's speech, nevertheless, forced Canada to pull back. The general desire was to let the matter blow over while attempting to 'keep the peace' between Britain and the United States. This was no doubt a wise policy.

Canada could neither afford nor risk playing for the big stakes. General

A.G.L. 'Andy1 McNaughton, the Chief of the General Staff, recommended that 26 Canada 'do nothing which will accentuate the difficulties in U.S./Japanese relations, and to do everything which will improve the political understanding 40 between Great Britain and the United States.1

But this was proving to be a difficult task because the hostility in

Anglo-American relations appeared to be growing. By the end of 1932 even

British Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald, who strove to maintain good relations with the United States, was now 'furious' over the American unwillingness to accept responsibilities. Simon, for his part, commented in late 1933 that 'America always leaves us to do the difficult work vis-a-vis 41 Japan1. At the same time there was on the American side an ever growing 42 distrust of British imperialism.

Whatever may have been behind the shortcomings of the League, the

Japanese move into Manchuria did not destroy the international system in the

Far East, it merely demonstrated that no viable system had been established.

Nor did it 'cause1 the failure of the League and the long series of crises which followed, but rather exposed the League's limitations and more 43 especially the nature of collective security as it existed in the 1930's.

The Manchurian crisis, however, had no sooner been settled when Japan took another step in East Asia. The so-called Amau Declaration in April 1934 proclaimed that 'Japan is called upon to exert the utmost effort in carrying 44 out her mission and fulfilling her special responsibilities in East Asia'. This move raised a host of fears, especially in Britain, which led to some 45 renewed calls for Anglo-American cooperation. But this was not forthcoming and by the end of May, London decided that an appeal would have to be made to the Dominions for a show of Empire solidarity in the face of Japan's (and Germany's) rising power.

On 31 May 1934 Ramsay MacDonald saw the High Commissioners of all the

Dominions and told them that 'as a result of a number of things happening in

Germany and elsewhere ...a comprehensive survey of the whole Defence

1 position should be made. He further 2promise7 d that the Dominions would be 'called into consultation'.**" Thus was born Maurice Hankey's 'Empire Tour' of

1934-1935.47

Lt. Col. Sir Maurice Hankey, later Lord Hankey the 'Man of Secrets' was probably the most influential British civil servant of his time. He was

Secretary to the Committee of Imperial Defence and the Cabinet and he embarked upon a massive tour in order 'to put the Prime Ministers of all the 48

Dominions wise as to our own defence plans'.

Word of Hankey's tour hit the Canadian Press in November where it was charged that he was coming to work out 'a detailed plan for the defences of the Empire, and that creation of a unified Empire Air Force was 49 contemplated'. This was exaggerating matters because Bennett and

Mackenzie King had actually invited Hankey to Canada. Nevertheless, his arrival in Ottawa on 21 December 1934 was not altogether a welcome one.

Hankey had been preceded by Admiral Sir Roger Keyes, who had 'beaten the naval drum' and by Lord Lothian who, in October, made a number of speeches to branches of the Canadian Institute of International Affairs in which he tried to rally support for naval cooperation.50 Thus forced to act cautiously, Hankey made only one speech in Canada on which he wryly commented: 'It was not an easy task to talk for half an hour and say nothing without boring my audience'.

Although Hankey felt his visit to Canada was a success, he had certain reservations which he outlined in a memorandum entitled 'Impressions of

Canada1.51 He noted that 'After the fervid Imperialism of Australia and New Zealand, the calculating aloofness of Ottawa strikes a chilly note in more 52 senses than one'. He warned London that 'we have to keep a very close eye on the avoidance of anything calculated to play into the hands of the numerous anti-Imperialists, aliens and "highbrows" in Canada, if we hope for 53 their aid in Imperial Defence'. 28 While in Canada Hankey saw McNaughton, who stressed the importance of

good relations with the United States and warned that any move on the part of Britain to seek better relations with Japan would be inimical to good

relations with the United States. This prompted Hankey to write that 'if we 54

estrange the United States we shall estrange many people in Canada1. Also worthy of note is Hankey's observation of growing Canadian concern about

the possibility of an American-Japanese war. 'The contingency1, he wrote,

'...is taken into account of Canada having to preserve her neutrality in a war between the United States and Japan'.55 We will see a fuller expression of this in late 1936. Hankey's tour through Canada demonstrated, if anything, that Bennett, too, despite the fact that he has been portrayed as an 'Empire Man', held certain reservations with regard to Canada's participation in Imperial 5 6 commitments. 'In the matter of naval co-operation', Hankey observed, '...I should judge Canada to be the most backward of the Dominions at the present time1.

All of this, it must be remembered, was taking place at the same time as preliminary talks for a Naval Conference were. The British wanted to avoid a naval race with the United States but were afraid that the Americans might reverse the Stimson doctrine in return for such an agreement. Meanwhile, on the American side, suspicion of British motives was still very prevalent.

Robert Craigie (later Sir Robert), the Foreign Office Naval Specialist, wrote in July 1934 that '...there is little doubt that, as a result of malicious journalistic activities, the silly State Department now believe that we are 58 deliberately trying to undermine American-Japanese relations'.

This suspicion was greatly heightened when Britain approached

Japan in November 1934 with proposals that included an 'equality of national status' clause for the signatory powers. It led the newly elected President of

29 the United States, Franklin Roosevelt, to write to his special envoy Norman

Davis, who was then in London, that if

Simon and a few other Tories must be constantly impressed with the simple fact that if Great Britain is even suspected of preferring to play with Japan to playing with us, I shall be compelled, in the interest of American security, to approach public sentiment in Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa in a definite effort to make these Dominions understand clearly that their future security is linked with us in the United States.

It is difficult to determine when the gist of this reached Canada. There is nothing in Hankey's report to suggest that it ever did. But even if the

Bennett government had caught wind, the concern probably would have been slight given that Canda was in a state of massive economic depression. In fact, the years 1933-1934 were the height of neglect in terms of defence expenditure with only $13 million allocated.60 Bennett's major concern was with economic recovery and defence matters were accorded low priority.

Meanwhile, Anglo-American relations continued to deteriorate. As one

Foreign Office official noted in early January 1935: 'The problem seems to be whether we should trust the feeble uncertain American or the predatory Jap 61

(sic) ...which horse to back ...the Jap would be the better partner'. At the same time mutual suspicion and distrust between the United States and

Britain continued to bedevil the naval talks in London while Japan, unrepentant, refused to accept anything less than naval parity with the West.

It was therefore to a rather hostile international climate that Mackenzie

King returned when he won the 1935 election. His immediate concerns were with the Abyssinian crisis, then in full swing, and economic recovery. But it was not long before the defence question and Canada's role vis-a-vis Britain and the United States began to assume greater importance.

Greater importance as opposed to great importance. When McNaughton left as Chief of the General Staff in 1935 he prepared a memorandum entitled

'The Defence of Canada' in which he set out the deficiences in Canada's defence system. Mackenzie King did not get around to reading the 28 May 30 memorandum until 25 August 1936. What he read perturbed him. 'The impression left on my mind', he recorded in his diary the next night, 'was 62 one of the complete inadequacy of everything in the way of defence'. The

Joint Staff Committee was instructed to prepare an appreciation. They produced their report - 'An appreciation of the Defence Problems Confronting

Canada, with Recommendations for the Development of the Armed Forces' - on

5 September. James Eayrs has referred to it as one of 'the key documents of

Canadian history1.^

Although the Joint Staff Committee ruled out all chance of an American attack upon Canada and felt that the European situation contained the most serious implications, keen interest was placed on the Far East, which ranked number two. 'Signs are not wanting', the report began, of a growing conflict of interest between the United States and Japan in the North Pacific. The influence of the Big Navy party, which is said to include the President, the vast sums which have recently been set aside with the object of building up the United States Navy to treaty limits and the important naval manoeuvres held last year off Pearl Harbor (sic) and the Aleutian Islands, the several requests received by the Canadian Government to fly U.S. Service aircraft over Canadian territory and territorial waters en route to Alaska, and the manifest interest in the construction of a highway through British Columbia connecting the State of Washington with Alaska, are distinct portents of the trend of events. Should war between these countries materialize, one of the following courses would be open to Canada:- (1) To throw in her lot with the United States independently of the rest of the British Empire. (2) In the event of the United Kingdom and the other Dominions deciding to act jointly with the United States, to co-operate in such action. (3) In the event of the United Kingdom and the other Dominions deciding to adopt a position of neutrality, to remain neutral herself. The first is held to be an unlikely contingency. The second and third, in the view of the Joint Staff Committee, are those which this country must now anticipate and for which preliminary defence measures whould now be undertaken, thus enabling Canada to secure its position in some measure,^either as a co-belligerent or, alternatively, as an effective neutral.

This is the first appearance of a comprehensive statement of Canadian concerns in the event of a Far Eastern war. The options needed little gloss

31 but the report went on to list Canada's military liabilities and these did have an ominous ring:

...the liability of direct attack on Canada by Japanese forces has become a matter requiring urgent consideration and action in view of the menacing situation which continues to develop in the Far East. ...The prospect of war breaking out at some not distant date between some, or all, of the Anglo-Saxon communities ...are apparent. ...There is another aspect of local defence, the maintenance of neutrality. ...Canada by its geographical position and political and commercial relations with the United States would be peculiarly susceptible to charges of non-neutrality by either of the combatants, and liable to be manoeuvred into a situation where armed supervision of its frontier would be^ the only aternative to active participation on one side or another.

Thus there was already a growing awareness that a Far Eastern war presented Canada with a number of problems. There was no denying that

Canada's geographical position could land her into serious trouble. For it was not inconceivable that the United States would use the Aleutians as a base to conduct operations against Japan and Japan might therefore attempt to seize the islands. If this were to happen then

A definitely complicating factor for Canada in a war between the United States and Japan is the American possession of Alaska. By utilizing Alaska and the Aleutians, the United States might hope to bring her superior naval and air power within striking distance of Japan and her immediate sea communications. A glance at the map will reveal that the indented and sparsely settled coast of British Columbia provides an admirable area from which Japanese submarines, and even surface craft, can develop raids against U.S. sea communications and Pacific Coast ports. ...Under the circumstances visualized, with American national feeling running high and with a large army mobilized and impatient to intervene, it is to be expected that should Canada give the United States real reason to complain of Japanese infringement of Canadian neutrality owing to the lack of adequate armed supervision by Canada of its territorial waters, territory or the air supervening, American public opinion will demand that the requisite protective measures along the Canadian seaboard be secured by what would amount to the military occupation of British Columbia by U.S. forces.

A strange prophecy for 1936, but one that, as we shall see, came very close to being fulfilled. The message here was clear: Canada had to arm and defend the Pacific Coast and then demonstrate to the United States that they need not worry about Canada's defence posture in the event of an

32 American-Japanese war. This was spelled out again by the General Staff on

14 October 1936:

...reference has already been made to the rumours and reports which are certain to be circulated in the United States concerning alleged Japanese infringements of Canadian neutrality. If adequate measures are not taken by Canadian authorities to ally United States public anxiety in this regard ...it is quite probable that United States army authorities ...will bring great pressure to bear on the Government at Washington to permit them to take action themselves to supplement alleged Canadian inadequacies. Such action might involve the occupation of important points on the Canadian coast by United States land forces, especially such points as might be of use to the powerful, and steadily growing, army air corps. As Canada is, for practical purposes, incapable of resisting such a United States invasion there would be no course open except the humiliating one of accepting the violation of her sovereign rights.

The Prime Minister took these memoranda seriously. What he did not like was the cost - estimated to be about $200 million over five years with an initial outlay of some $65 million. As he noted in his diary on 10 September

1936: 'I thought we owed it to our country to protect it in a mad world, at least to the extent of police services, both on sea and in the air, alike on the

Atlantic and Pacific Coasts. I stated it was humiliating to accept protection from Britain without sharing on the costs, or to rely on the United States 6 8 without being willing to at least protect our neutrality'. This concern, moreover, came at a time when Canada was still caught in the grip of a deep economic depression. Mackenzie King had to face that fact and he told his

Minister of National Defence, Ian Mackenzie, that the proposed rearmament program might have to be extended over a period of ten years. The sum 69 actually allocated was $36,194,839.63. The government gave coastal defence priority and the Pacific coast came before the Atlantic.

Looking back in retrospect it might seem rather surprising that

Canadians should have been even this concerned about defence. After all, was not economic recovery of paramount importance? And was not Canada's security guaranteed by Britain and the United States? Perhaps. But it would seem that the 'guarantee' of securit33 y was in itself a dangerous thing, especially with respect to the United States. Again, and this study will probably over-emphasize the point, Canadian statesmen were not quick to jump to the conclusion that Canada's security was guaranteed, and if it was, then they did not like the strings that were attached. There was nothing here that resembled an early paranoia about a possible Japanese attack upon

Canada, but rather a realistic assessment of what could happen if there was a

Pacific war.

Nevertheless, there was a certain duality in Canada's approach to the darkening international scene that reflected something of the confusion we will encounter later in this study. For example, already Mackenzie King is concerned about the 'mad world' and the necessity of defending Canada, but at the same time he rejects British offers to help Canada.70 It led Hankey to observe that 'We realise that in the present state of Canadian opinion no

Canadian Government could commit itself to active participation in a war...'.71

Later, in March 1937, Mackenzie King treated Sir Ronald Lindsay, the British

Ambassador to Washington, to 'a diatribe ...against sanctions. ...He (King) said that Canada was resolved to maintain neutrality in any war at any price, and that on no account would she be dragged into any hostilities'. This brought a sharp response from the Foreign Office. Vansittart commented that

'Mackenzie King seems to lose rather than gain in intelligence as he gets older. This is drivel, and dangerous drivel. I hope he will be sternly 72 discouraged ...from "thinking" on these lines'.

It may have been 'drivel' but it nevertheless appeared to be true.

Indeed, the senior Dominion presented the British with quite a problem. On the one hand they did not want Mackenzie King, in the words of the

Dominions Secretary, Malcolm MacDonald, 'to think that we really contemplate 73

Canada not being in a war with us'. On the other hand there was the wider problem of the defence of the Empire itself. As Admiral Sir Ernie

Chatfield, the First Sea Lord, noted in 1936, the Empire was 'disjointed, 34 disconnected and highly vulnerable. It is even open to debate whether it is 74 in reality strategically defensible1. Canada's attitude did not make the problem any easier.

The situation was put into sharp relief by the appearance of a number of defence reports in February 1937. They did not make for particularly optimistic reading, especially coming, as they did, on the eve of the 1937

Imperial Conference. The British Chiefs of Staff, in their 'Review of Imperial

Defence1, observed that

We are in a position of having threats at both ends of the Empire from strong military powers, i.e. Germany and Japan, while in the centre we have lost our traditional security owing to the rise of an aggressive spirit in Italy accompanied by an increase in her military strength. So long as that position remains unresolved

diplomatically, only very7great military and financial strength can give the Empire security.

Given these circumstances it was no surprise that the central issues of the 1937 Imperial Conference were foreign policy and defence. This was the wish of Malcolm MacDonald, Hankey, Baldwin and especially the Chiefs of 76

Staff. What is interesting is the consideration that was given to Far

Eastern questions. Where Hankey was concerned this was natural because he had long pressed for the completion of the naval base at Singapore.

Chatfield, too, was adamant with regard to the 'paramount importance1 of the

Singapore base. He felt that if the position in the Pacific was lost 'it was doubtful if it could ever be recovered'. But even Baldwin noted that the

Dominions were likely 'to feel that Europe was a very long way away1 and would therefore conclude that 'they themselves had nothing to fear1 if a war broke out in Europe. He wanted to stress to the Dominions the danger that

Japan might well attack British possessions in the Far East if Britain became involved in a European war.

Britain's plan for a show of Empire solidarity in the face of the rising threat was to be sadly disappointed. The 1937 Imperial Conference resembled a family gathering full of bickering that demonstrated, if anything, that the 35 Empire was not only 'disjointed' strategically but politically as well. Canada's attitude to Empire defence and foreign policy was summed up by the Canadian

Minister of National Defence in late May:

1. Canadian public opinion supported the present defence policy of the Government of Canada. 2. Canadian public opinion would not, under present conditions, support any larger appropriations than those voted this year by Parliament. 3. Canadian public opinion was definitely opposed to extraneous commitments but was prepared to support a National defence policy for the protection of their coasts and the focal areas of their trade routes. The most important contribution they could render at this time, when dark shadows seem to be hovering over w the world, 7 as, as far as possible, to preserve unity in their councils....

Here was the polite way Canada refused to be drawn into unconditional support of British policy. This position, moreover, was not to change for 79 some time - despite Mackenzie King's private assurances to the contrary with Hankey, for example, writing a year later that

...all our efforts at the (1937) conference failed to obtain from Canada any really satisfactory assurance that we should be able to count with certainty on obtaining supplies from her in time of war. ...It would be clearly disastrous if we laid our plans on the assumption that we could count on Canada, and then when th£g day came we found that we had been building upon false premises.

It would of course be absurd to suggest that Canada's attitude played anything more than a very minor role in the shaping of British foreign policy. Yet remarks from highly placed British officials like Hankey do suggest that London did indeed consider Dominion opinion. Nor was the attempt to stage a show of Empire solidarity at the 1937 Imperial Conference the cornerstone of British policy. But it is interesting to note that Neville

Chamberlain, who became Prime Minister while the Conference was in progress, stated that without the appearance of a great and unified Empire, 81

Britain would be reduced to 'a fourth-rate power'.

Meanwhile, with Commonwealth problems nowhere close to being resolved, events in Europe had taken a turn for the worse. The Abyssinian crisis challenged the League and the principle of collective security and 36 demonstrated that the League was once again an ineffective organ. The

Spanish civil war threatened to develop into a bloody horror that would draw in other powers. And Germany's move into the Rhineland was an ominous sign for the future of Europe.

By the summer of 1937 it was clear that the world was in troubled times.

Britain had not resolved the European problem, much less the Far Eastern one; the United States continued to adhere to a policy of non-involvement and was, if anything, even more antagonistic towards Britain; and Canada, viewing the world scene with growing trepidation, was soon to place a large question mark over its own future security and its existence as a sovereign nation. The era of the 'fire-proof house' was gone and with the opening of the undeclared Sino-Japanese war Canadians would forever regret that misleading concept.

37 Chapter Two: The 'Atlantic Triangle1 and the

Opening of the 'undeclared' Sino-Japanese War, 1937-1939

The undeclared Sino-Japanese war began on the evening of 7 July 1937 when a company of Japanese infantry from Peking stumbled into the Chinese

29th Army while on manoeuvers near the Marco Polo Bridge. It was a minor skirmish so the local authorities attempted to negotiate a cease-fire agreement.

But the Japanese tried to impose a settlement. This enraged the Chinese government and Chiang Kai-shek ordered more reinforcements to the area.

The Japanese responded by bringing in more troops from Manchukuo and

Korea. Within days fighting broke out and by August the two sides were engaged in a war that would last eight years.1

The 'China incident1, as the Japanese termed it, was one in a series of international crises in the late 1930's that culminated in the Second World

War. Like many other events it had a symbolic significance. For the

Japanese it symbolized the beginning of the 'new order' for East Asia. For the Chinese it symbolized part of a larger struggle for survival that would not end until Mao proclaimed China to be a communist state. For the British it symbolized the beginning of the end to their presence in the Far East.

For the United States it symbolized a threat to the Open Door policy of economic expansion in China that, however meager in terms of actual dollar 2 value, could still draw the United States into a conflict with Japan.

These were ominous, even if they were initially symbolic, developments for a small group of Canadian statesmen in Ottawa to ponder during the summer of 1937. There was a great desire to believe that the Sino-Japanese war was a 'quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know 3 nothing'. But there was also a realization that if the quarrel grew it would sooner or later have an impact upon Canada. As one Canadian scholar observed in 1941, the opening of the undeclare38 d Sino-Japanese war 'compelled the Canadian government ...to watch closely its position vis-a-vis Great

Britain and the United States'. The fundamental reason for this became clear almost from the beginning of the renewed Anglo-American interest in the

Far East.

The British were understandably concerned about the situation.

Alexander Cadogan, the former British Ambassador to China, now Deputy

Under-Secretary in the Foreign Office, distrusted the Japanese and feared that they might increase their attack upon China, possibly to the point where

British interests in China were directly threatened.5 Britain did not want to become heavily involved in a Far Eastern crisis because the European situation was growing worse.

With this thought in mind the Foreign Office sent a message to the

United States requesting them to join Britain in urging Japan to exercise restraint. But American cooperation was not forthcoming. Sir Ronald

Lindsay, the British Ambassador to Washington, cabled London on 15 July that the Americans were 'pessimistic' and did not want to get involved.

Sumner Welles, the American Under-Secretary of State, said that the United

States was 'rather reluctant "to get mixed up with all Europe" in the Far

East'. It was a scarcely veiled warning to Britain that the United States would pull no British chestnuts from the fire. But it was also a poor note on which to begin a healthy diplomatic relationship.

The opening of the Sino-Japanese war did not catch the Canadian government completely off guard. Robert Randolph Bruce, the Canadian

Minister to Japan, reported in late June 1937 that with the return of Hirota as Foreign Minister in the new Konoye government, Japan might attempt to expand its position in China.7 It was not the actual Japanese move into

China that worried Canadian statesmen as much as it was the effect that an aggressive Japanese policy would have upon Canada. O.D. Skelton summed up the problem Canada faced in February 1936. 'The establishment of

39 another military dictatorship (in Japan)', he wrote to Mackenzie King, 'will not only increase the danger of conflict in Canada and Russia, but will

intensify every other international difficulty. The question of our own Pacific coast defences will undoubtedly be brought up soon1. The opening of the

Sino-Japanese conflict fulfilled Skelton's prophecy and, as we shall shortly see, brought the United States to express considerable concern about

Canada's Pacific Coast defences.

Meanwhile, it was becoming clear that the hostilities in China would continue. Fighting broke out in Shanghai in early August which culminated in 'Bloody Saturday' on 14 August when some two thousand civilians were killed. Britain sent several messages to Japan warning that the Japanese would be held responsible if the war spread. But these messages only further enraged the Japanese and they continued their attack. The problem was how to bring pressure to bear on Japan in order to make her back down.

It appeared, as Sir John Pratt of the Far Eastern department of the Foreign

Office noted, that 'nothing but force will restrain Japan and neither we nor 9

America are prepared to use force'.. This was to be the British dilemma until Pearl Harbour - no military force to back a threat of intervention and little or no direct support from the United States. As Chamberlain himself noted in a letter to his sister at the end of August 1937: 'The Americans have a long way to go before they become helpful partners in world affairs.

I have tried to get them to come in in Japan and China but they were too frightened of their own people - though I believe that if they had been willing to play there was enough chance of stopping hostilities'.10 He would later write in exasperation that 'It is always best and safest to count on nothing from the Americans but words'.11

The Canadian government, perhaps sensing that the continuation of the

Sino-Japanese war might lead to another Simon-Stimson affair, tried to assume a low profile. On 12 August, however, Bruce gave an interview to the 40 Toronto Star that caused a storm of controversy. Bruce said that Japan's invasion of China was 'simply an attempt to put her neighbor country into decent shape, as she had already done for Manchuria'. He went on to observe that the Chinese 'lack a constitutional government and their rulers are just self-appointed war lords'. Then, in a statement that must have made

League supporters blood boil, the Minister asserted that Canada should not

'curb her (Japan's) markets' through the imposition of sanctions or embargos

'but to help her expand and expand with her'.

The reaction was almost immediate. The League of Nations Society wanted Mackenzie King personally to disavow Bruce. The Chinese

Consul-Ceneral approached Skelton to find out what Bruce implied. Mackenzie

King and Skelton spent some time trying to explain away Bruce's statements 13 but they did not repudiate him and refused to accept his resignation.

Although Bruce's comments ran counter to United States policy, where

Secretary of State Cordell Hull was attempting to invoke something like

Stimson's 1932 non-recognition doctrine, Mackenzie King does not seem to 14 have been overly perturbed. No mention of the episode is to be found in his diary. Still, the controversy demonstrated that many Canadians were indeed looking towards the Far East and the Canadian government had to watch its step.15

Nevertheless, Bruce's views coincided with the views expressed by certain members of the British Foreign Office. Nigel Ronald, for example, the First Secretary in the Far Eastern department, felt that Britain should 16 welcome a Japanese victory because it would rid China of corruption.

Charles Orde, Head of the Far Eastern department, agreed with Ronald and added that the Chinese were 'such inveterate wrigglers and self-deceivers that they are really best helped by braving them to face hard facts by themselves'.17 Orde, and many others in the Foreign Office, however, 41 wanted to pursue a policy that avoided 'embroilment' with Japan because Britain did not have the ability to show 'teeth' in the Far East.10 Prime

Minister Chamberlain concurred with these observations (although it is difficult to say if he felt this way about the Chinese). His uppermost fear, one that the Chiefs of Staff shared, was that Britain might become involved in a simultaneous European-Far Eastern war. Britain's primary concern, he felt, lay in Europe and if she 'became involved in the Far East the temptation to the Dictator states to take action whether in Eastern Europe or in Spain, 20 might be irresistible'.

Mackenzie King does not seem to have shared the Foreign Office view of

China. In the privacy of his diary he expressed horror at what was taking place in China. He felt that Japan was a 'brutal ag(g)ressor' attempting 'to steal a country without any justification...'. But it was not so much the bloodshed that worried him as it was the danger that Britain might be drawn into a war in the Far East. On this point he agreed with Chamberlain but for different reasons. The Canadian Prime Minister personally felt that such a war was 'not worth the lives of white men for "Business Interests'" (This is not the only time Mackenzie King made a statement that contained hints of 21 racial prejudice). It was an obvious reference to the attitude adopted by the United States back in 1932 when Henry Stimson spent a great deal of effort preaching to the British 'the moral issue at stake over Japan's attack on China1 while at the same time emphasizing 'the very real direct cash value 22 to all of us in the policy towards China'. Later, the American Secretary of the Treasury, Henry Morgenthau, would view the Far East as an international economic battleground: 'It's an international battle between Great Britain, 23 Japan and ourselves, and China is the bone in the middle, see?' It was this growing sense of rivalry that perturbed Mackenzie King and he hoped that Britain could stay out of the Far East while the United States held the 24 peace.

42 This was wishful thinking on the part of the Prime Minister. By the end of August two new developments occurred. The first came on 21 August when Chiang signed a non-aggression pact with the Soviet Union. This caused some alarm in London. The Foreign Office felt that China might be moving closer to Russia and feared that this would lead Japan to intensify her 25 attack under the guise of ridding China of the 'communist menace'. The second development was of a more serious nature. On 26 August the British

Ambassador to China, Sir Hughe Knatchbull-Hugessen, was seriously wounded when a Japanese plane attacked his car. This brought a storm of protest from Britain. Anthony Eden, the Foreign Secretary, wanted to withdraw the newly appointed Ambassador to Tokyo, Sir Robert Craigie. The Japanese made several expressions of 'deep regret' and by the end of September the issue was closed.

The Knatchbull-Hugessen affair had some unpleasant side effects in

Canada. Britain suggested that Canada, too, should withdraw her Minister to

Japan. Mackenzie King's suspicions of British motives were immediately aroused. Such a move, he felt, would be viewed as 'a united Empire front'.

He told Skelton that 'it was quite evident that the British Government is seeking to draw Canada into the existing situation in the Orient as well as in

Europe'. The Prime Minister obviously wanted to avoid entanglement in the

Far East, especially on the coattails of Britain. '"British interests" in China will not be a sufficient ground for our participation in a war in the Orient', 27 he wrote in his diary. This was no doubt a sound observation and

Mackenzie King's policy was shaped accordingly.

The reasons why Mackenzie King dreaded becoming entangled in the Far

East, in the view of historians who deal with this subject, are obvious: the basic fear of upsetting national unity, of being drawn into Imperial commitments, and of nullifying whatever independence Canada had attained in 28 world affairs. But there is another reason, which has been less 43 emphasized, why the Canadian government wished to stay out of the Far

East: the perceived danger that if the West became involved in a Far Eastern

war the United States might advance onto Canadian territory.

As shown in chapter one, Canadian authorities were sensitive to United

States encroachment and in particular to the American desire to gain access to

Alaska through British Columbia. The subject of Alaska and the Alaskan highway was by no means a new one in 1937. Ever since the United States

purchased Alaska in 1867 Americans tended to view British Columbia as the corridor to their northern possession. Indeed, so important was this tract of barren wasteland that in 1903 President Theodore Roosevelt was ready to prepare a 'Big Stick' in order to attain more of it - albeit, at Canada's expense. The Alaskan boundary dispute is too well known to need 29 summarizing here. The President got his way and Canada suffered considerable humiliation in the process.

The United States first looked at the possibility of building a highway in

1929. It met with the support of the Premier of British Columbia, T.D.

Pattullo, and in 1932 the Hoover Administration actually appointed a board of commissioners to do a feasibility study. With the onset of the depression, 30 however, the project was shelved. The United States brought the question up again in early 1936. On 30 January the American Minister to Canada,

Norman Armour, was instructed to sound out the Canadian government on proposals to construct the highway. The government sought the advice of the military. It took some time, but in a strongly worded memorandum dated 11

February 1937 the Canadian General Staff warned that The building of a north and south highway through British Columbia and the Yukon would provide a strong military inducement to the United States to ignore our netural rights in the event of a war between that country and Japan, a danger which we should do everything in our power to avoid.

This memorandum also expressed the feelings of Mackenzie King and the next day Armour was told that Canada did not feel it could bear the financial

44 burden and 'that while it may be hoped that circumstances will alter in the 32 future it would hardly be feasible to make any definite forecast'.

The Canadian government may have been sincere in its insistence that the highway was simply too expensive. But in view of the feeling expressed by the General Staff and in the House of Commons it is far more likely that this was an excuse cooked up to stall the project indefinitely. It is interesting to note that O.D. Skelton was initially in favour of the project.

He wrote to Major-General E.C. Ashton, the Chief of the General Staff, that the project seemed 'to represent a perfectly intelligible aspiration on the part of the Pacific Coast people, and if the Province should want it and it should turn out to be feasible, I should think any military objections would have to be very carefully and firmly established before they could be allowed to 33 overcome such a project1. By the end of March 1937, however, Skelton too 34 was of the conviction that Canada could not afford the highway. In all probability the Prime Minister had a private talk with his Under-Secreatry after unfavourable comments were made in the House of Commons. 'As a

Canadian", T.J. O'Neill, a Liberal M.P. from British Columbia, told the House in February 1937, 'I do not want to be riding on the coat-tails of Uncle Sam. 35

They are good and long, but I do not want to ride on them'. A similar view was expressed by a French-Canadian member: 'As regards imperialism,

I think that American imperialism is not any better, nor any brighter, nor 36 any more desirable than British Imperialism".

For a time, it seemed, the Canadian government had resisted American pressure. But with the onset of the Sino-Japanese war the United States took a renewed interest in the Alaskan highway project. In early August

1937 President Roosevelt told Cordell Hull that he wanted the Alaskan highway 37 built as soon as possible. Hull replied that the Canadians 'have 38 unfortunately shown little inclination 4eve5 n to discuss the matter'. The President pressed the issue and on 3 September Hull wrote to Armour stating that

It has long been a source of disappointment to the President that the Canadian authorities have not found it possible to cooperate with us in the initiation of this project. He has recently written to me of his eagerness to have the highway completed as soon as possilbe, ar^cj of his hope that negotiations to this end may proceed vigorously.

Roosevelt was, in fact, so interested in the project that Armour was instructed to take up the matter 'in a formal note supported by oral represenations1. It was felt that, all else failing, the United States could try to induce Canada into acceptance by proposing an 'international park'. Hull knew that it would be of 'little utility' but wanted the suggestion put forward in order 'to win the consent' of the Canadian government.

The President followed up these initiatives with a personal visit to

British Columbia at the end of September 1937. The Canadian Minister to

Washington later reported that 'the condition of our Pacific naval forces and coast defences disturbed' Roosevelt and 'as he was thinking of the United

States defences ...the British Columbia coast had to be regarded in reality as 41 a link between the United States and Alaska'. While Roosevelt was at

Victoria he saw T.D. Pattullo. Pattullo, as has been noted, expressed enthusiasm about the highway and during the Presidential visit made a number of public speeches in an attempt to bring pressure to bear on the federal government to go ahead with the project. Mackenzie King was not 42 pleased. Pattullo, he felt, 'has acted like a child'. The government was not going to take this type of pressure from Roosevelt, let alone the Premier of British Columbia, and for a time the issue was successfully evaded.

But the American approaches towards Canada could only be evaded so long as the Sino-Japanese conflict did not threaten to escalate into a major war involving the West. On 5 October 1937, however, Roosevelt delivered a speech in Chicago that implied a change in the United States attitude. 46 During the course of this famous 'Quarantine Speech', which was deliberately made 'in a large city where isolation was entrenched', Roosevelt said

When an epidemic of physical disease starts to spread, the community approves and joins in a quarantine of the patients ^iri order to protect the community against the spread of the disease.

The statement seemed to imply that the Western powers should adopt economic sanctions against Japan in order to force her out of China.

The Canadian reaction to Roosevelt's speech was twofold. On the one hand, the Canadian Legation in Washington expressed optimism. Herbert

Marler, the Canadian Minister, reported on three aspects of the speech:

...first, the vigour and directness of his language in condemning "the present reign of terror and international lawlessness"; secondly, the emphasis with which he sweeps aside the contention that the vital interests and safety of the United States are not directly endangered by "international anarchy"; and thirdly and above all, the passages in which he envisages cooperative action by the peace-loving nations in order to br^ng about the international restoration of peace, order and morality.

Marler felt that the speech 'must mean that the United States will readily agree to join the other signatories of the Nine-Power Treaty in consultation over the Far Eastern situation'. This was to be welcomed because 'as in the case of the invasion of Manchuria ...the United States has pursued a policy 45 parallel to and in step with that of the League of Nations'.

Mackenzie King and his top advisors, on the other hand, remained silent. Indeed, Armour was puzzled at the lack of response because Canada's 'obvious interest in official pronouncements tending to clarify the intentions of the United States and the United Kingdom' should have brought a quicker 46 reaction.

Several reasons may be suggested why Mackenzie King chose initially to remain silent. First, and probably most important, was the fact that

American intentions were not clearly spelled out in the speech and if they were then Mackenzie King did not like the implications, especially if Marler was right. Canada's West Coast defences were in a state of total

47 unpreparedness. The Prime Minister was therefore adverse to any action that might provoke Japan because the 'repercussions upon ourselves and others' 47 would be 'impossible to foresee'. Both Mackenzie King and O.D. Skelton rejected the idea of applying sanctions, particularly if it was in connection with the League. Mackenzie King was of the firm conviction that the League would 'make us declare sanctions against Japan with Sanctions leading to

War'. His feeling towards the League was no different: 'If ever there was an institution which has played the devil with nations, it is the League of 48

Nations'. In addition to this was the fear that, because the United States did not clearly indicate its policy, Britain and the United States might go through yet another Simon-Stimson affair.

Skelton further examined some of these concerns in a memorandum for the Prime Minister on 20 October. In it he observed that The Foreign Office, it would appear, is now determined it will not allow the United States to get the jump on it again, or to talk vaguely of "quarantine" or "pressure" without realizing just what effective pressure means - hard and fast military commitments in advance.

He went on to note that 'the key' to understanding the question of sanctions

'is contained in the memory of the Manchurian episode' and that This boils down to saying that before anyone talks of putting pressure on Japan there must be a definite undertaking from the United States Congress that it will line up in a military alliance with each and all of some dozen countries, chiefly the United Kingdon. ...It is difficult to imagine that the British Government believes that the United States Congress or Senate could be induced ...to give in advance a firm undertaking of military alliance such as is suggested. The United States might drift into war ...but it is hardly conceivable it would openly pledge itself to war in advance.

The only alternative, in the view of Mackenzie King and his chief advisors, was a policy of conciliation. This idea was put forward by Loring Christie, a

Counsellor in the Department of External Affairs and second only to Mackenzie

King and Skelton in authority, on the same day:

The Great Powers - whose Far Eastern investments and commerce are what is really at stake - should not be allowed to

48 jockey us into any part of the responsibility for protecting their interests, for enlarging the war there, or for the undoubted risk or repercussions upon their interests in Europe and Africa which might in turn call for protection. Canada's Far Eastern interests do not require us to make an enemy of Japan. Conciliation is the proper and only practical line for Small Powers, and they should resolutely stick to it.

It was an adequate expression of what Christie, who adopted Lord Salisbury's maxim, 'Never let your diplomacy outrun your resources', had been preaching 51 all along. But it was a wise policy designed to keep Canada out of another

Anglo-American rift. Historians still remain divided over the question of what Roosevelt really 52 implied in the October speech. What cannot be doubted, however, is the suspicion it engendered in London. Chamberlain felt that 'after a lot of ballyho the Americans will somehow fade out and leave us to carry all the 53 blame and the odium'. Even Eden, who was constantly arguing in favour of closer Anglo-American cooperation, asked for an 'exact interpretation' of 54 Roosevelt's 'quarantine' idea.

Nevertheless, the hint that the United States might pursue a more active policy led to a prolonged discussion in the British Cabinet on 13 October about the Far Eastern situation. Chamberlain and Eden discussed the possibility of holding a conference in an effort to find a solution to restore peace in China. The British Prime Minister was not adverse to a conference, but he was worried about the implications of putting forward sanctions as a means of action. He was, like Mackenzie King, of the conviction that sanctions could not be imposed without a risk of war. Even if they could be imposed, he warned his Cabinet, 'economic sanctions were of no use unless backed by overwhelming force'.55 Britain, unless she had the full support of the United States, lacked this kind of force. American support, moreover, despite Roosevelt's speech, was still a long way off.

What did arise from this and other discussions was an idea to hold a conference in order to find a solution to the Sino-Japanese conflict. It

49 opened at Brussels on 4 November 1937. The Brussels Conference was a

failure even before it started. Japan refused to attend, a development that

led one Canadian delegate to observe that 'the Conference resembled Hamlet with the Prince of Denmark, or perhaps more accurately Othello without 56 lago1. Norman Davis, who led the American delegation, overrode his instructions until he was told to initiate 'nothing more than platitudes'. The

State Department did not 'wish this conference at least to take any positive 57 steps'. Eden, who represented Britain, spent most of his time chasing after American cooperation, particularly on the question of applying sanctions

(Davis had, in fact, been instructed by Roosevelt to warn Eden not to 'push 58 the United States out in front at Brussels'). The British Foreign Secretary must have been astounded when the Canadian delegation boldly declared: 59

"Condemnation if you will, but no sanctions'.

The Conference was a disastrous demonstration of lack of unity. Hume

Wrong, Canada's Advisory Officer to the League, stated that the results of the Brussels Conference 'were virtually nil'. 'The nineteen countries there assembled', he wrote to Skelton, 'did not even produce a "ridiculus mus" from their labour'.*'0 Chamberlain, who had encouraged the Conference, now felt 61 that it 'had been a complete waste of time'. The only one who felt that the

Conference had accomplished anything was Eden. But his insistence that

Anglo-American cooperation had been given a great boost does not reflect 62 upon his credibility.

Despite its failure, the Brussels Conference demonstrated two things.

First, the Washington Conference treaty system no longer functioned in the

Far East. And second, short of using military force, Japan's continued drive into China would be almost impossible to check. Without the support of the

United States, Britain would have to continue to face Japan alone and this carried the risk of becoming involved in a Pacific war. The implications for 50 Canada will be discussed shortly. It is perhaps one of the tragedies of the period that the warnings of the

British Ambassador to Tokyo, Sir Robert Craigie, were not heeded. Time and again Craigie tried to impress upon the Foreign Office the danger that

Japan presented. He argued that Britain should pursue a policy of 63 conciliation towards Japan before British interests were damaged. This type of approach was rejected by London. The Foreign Office felt China could keep up the struggle thereby protecting British interests until such 64 time as Britain herself could actively intervene.

What really lay behind this rather optimistic assessment of China's ability to stave off Japan's continued attack was an air of racial superiority that distorted both Britain's and the United States' perceptions of the reality of 65 Japanese power. Charles Orde, for example, believed that Britain was 'a much greater Asiatic power than Japan... . This they must be made to 66 realise and accept". Anthony Eden felt that all Britain had to do was to

'effectively assert white-race authority in the Far East'.67 Chatfield, who

'...tried to impress on the Foreign Office the weakness of our Naval position' in December 1937, would, in February 1939 confidently declare that Britain 68 could 'trust to our superior efficiency to contain the Japanese fleet'. Even

Churchill was imbued with a latent racial superiority. He referred to the

Chinese as 'little yellow men', and in March 1939, just three months before the Tientsin crisis, wrote to Chamberlain asking him to Consider how vain is the menace that Japan will send a fleet and army to conquer Singapore. It is as far from Japan as Southampton is from New York. ...To send such a large part of their strictly limited naval forces on such a wild adventure ...will never commend itself to them until England has been decisively beaten, which will not be the case in the first year of the war. ...Do not therefore let us worry about this bugbear ...there will be no attack in any period which our foresight can measure.

Although Churchill was referring to the great naval base at Singapore, the underlying message was clear enough: the Japanese simply did not possess the white man's ability to wage war. 51 Similar beliefs were held in the United States. Henry Stimson, for

example, as Secretary of War, felt that 'Japan has historically shown that

when the United States indicates by clear language and bold actions that she

intends to carry out a clear and affirmative policy in the Far East, Japan will

yield to that policy, even though it conflicts with her own Asiatic policy and

conceived interests'.70 Roosevelt believed that Japanese 'aggression' could be

attributed to the less-developed skull pattern of the Japanese and he went so

far as to hire one Professor Hrdlicka of the Smithsonian Institute to study the

possibility of racial crossing in order to produce a more docile 'race' of 71 Japanesei .

These demonstrations of racial superiority, subtle as they often were,

led to a firm belief that the Japanese lacked the ability to inflict a crushing

defeat to the Chinese (who were also viewed as another second class race,

thereby giving rise to the notion that a first class race like the British would

have nothing to fear). It is not the purpose of this study to dwell on this

issue, nor is it being suggested that this racial factor guided the formulation

of policy. But there can be no doubt that it affected it and this would give

Mackenzie King some trouble later on.

In Canada, and particularly in British Columbia, racist feeling ran high.

But unlike the general feeling expressed in Britain and the United States, there was a great fear of Japan's subversive capabilities. Charges were made to the effect that Japanese agents were buying strategic properties, conducting surveys of the British Columbia coastline and using fishing boats to bring in saboteurs. Archdeacon F.G. Scott of Quebec City, for example, charged on 17 November 1937 that Japanese naval officers were actually living 72 in disguise in 'so-called Japanese fishing villages in British Columbia'. A week later these charges were supported by a member of the British Columbia

Legislature, Captain MacCregor Macintosh, who solemnly declared that Scott was 'telling the truth' and that 'Oriental penetration into British Columbia industry was a real fact'.'"' These accusations were not supported with a

shred of evidence and were correctly brushed aside by Ottawa. Mackenzie

King's government resisted Provincial pressure to deal with this Japanese

'threat' and demonstrated that by opposing the attempts made to have the

Japanese excluded from Canada.

Nevertheless, the government's continued efforts to resist Provincial

pressure while at the same time showing a great deal of concern towards

Pacific defence raises some interesting questions. Indeed, given the general

belief that Japan lacked the ability to wage a first class war, why did

Canadian statesmen even think about the problem of Pacific defence? And why did the government, moreover, give the West Coast defence priority

status over other areas? The answers to these and other questions are to be

found in the series of international events that occurred between late 1937 and 1939.

The West began to show even greater concern towards the Far East when

Japan launched a series of successful offensives into the heartland of China near the end of 1937. In early December Nanking, the Chinese capital and symbol of her rebirth, was captured. Then, on 12 December, Japanese shore batteries on the Yangtse river fired upon H.M.S. Ladybird and Bee and

Japanese aircraft attacked and sank the U.S.S. Panay and three Standard Oil tankers.

The United States reacted immediately and, without consulting Britain, sent a note of protest to Japan (the American Ambassador, Joseph Crew, was 74 in fact instructed to deliver the protest without waiting for Britain's note).

Despite this rebuff, Eden continued to press the United States for a show of joint Anglo-American action. Roosevelt would not go this far, but he did tell the British Ambassador to Washington on 16 December that the United States would like to hold naval conversations with Britain. Although Lindsay felt that Roosevelt's suggestion resembled 'the utterances of a hair-brained 53 statesman or of an amateur strategist', he strongly recommended that London 75

accept the offer. Eden was quick to grab the initiative and in early

January 1938 Roosevelt sent Captain Royal Ingersoll of the United States navy

for secret high-level talks with the British on the possibility of sending a

joint Anglo-American fleet to the Far East.

The Ingersoll mission caught British statesmen off guard. Chamberlain,

Admiral Chatfield and Robert Vansittart expressed scepticism. Chamberlain

and Vansittart believed that if the Fleet went to the Far East the temptation 76

for Germany and Italy to take action in Europe might be too great.

Chatfield was considering the general strategic concern. 'Imperially we are

exceedingly weak1, he wrote, 'If at the present time, and for many years to

come, we had to send a Fleet to the Far East, even in conjunction with the

United States, we should be left so weak in Europe that we should be liable

to blackmail or worse'.77 Eden was the only one who voiced optimism. The

Americans, he felt, would not 'sit by with folded hands (and) watch (the) 78

British Empire in jeopardy1. Eden's continued insistence on closer

Anglo-American cooperation at a time when most British statesmen had all but given up hope was one of the factors that led to his resignation a month

later. But in the context of late 1937, after the failure of the Brussels

Conference, the confusion over Roosevelt's 5 October speech and the separate note to Japan after the Panay incident, it is quite understandable that the

Ingersoll mission was viewed suspiciously.

Despite the pessimism, however, Ingersoll did meet with members of the

Cabinet, Foreign Office and the Admiralty. Although the mission turned out to be a failure after it was leaked to Congress by hostile elements in the United States navy department, a document entitled 'Record of Conversations' was produced and became available to scholars when the Public Records Office 79 was opened. It is an impressive document that outlines a scheme for

Anglo-American naval cooperation in the Far East. There is a detailed plan for the deployment of ships, submarines and aircraft; a discussion of codes

and signals; and provisions for the interchange of personnel and general

liaison. But under the heading of 'Strategical Policy' is a short paragraph

that, unknown to the Canadian government, contained ominous implications for

the future:

The U.S. Navy will be responsible for operations against Japanese trade throughout the West Coast of North and South America, including the Panama Canal and the passage round Cape Horn. The U.S. Navy will also assume responsibility for the general Naval defence of the West Coast of Canada.

It is difficult to say what Mackenzie King's reaction to this would have

been because there is no evidence to show that Canada was informed of the

mission. Moreover, though the visit was leaked to Congress, no mention was ever made in public of the final report. It is safe to assume that Roosevelt's

political career would have been in serious danger if the report had been

released (the British were well aware of this as Chatfield revealed in a letter to Admiral Pound: '...AU talk, however, of any action by the US is taboo and highly secret, but we won't mention it to anybody else'. Could he have 81 meant Canada as well?).

The United States administration was well aware of the implication of the

Ingersoll mission and determined to approach Canada on the subject. On 13

December, just one day after the Panay incident, Norman Armour spoke to

Colonel H.D.G. Crerar, then Director of Military Operations and Intelligence, at a social gathering. Crerar's record of the conversation is worth quoting at length:

After dinner, Mr. Armour drew me to one side saying that he would like to talk to me, personally and confidentially, about a matter which was much in the President's mind, and, naturally, in his own. This matter was the increasing seriousness of the international situation, the prospects of another great war involving both Canada and the United States, and in that connection the present desirability of somewhat closer contact between the U.S. War Department and the Dept. of National Defence. He emphasized ...that on each of his more recent conferences with the President, Mr. Roosevelt had raised these particular issues.

55 I agreed that our direct military contacts with the Departments at Washington were non-existent, and that a greater interchange of ideas on military problems of mutual importance would be to joint advantage, but I doubted whether our Government desired to create any formal or continuous liaison....

Armour went on to suggest that this should be done gradually, but he wished to speak to the Prime Minister 'at an early date1. It is interesting to note that what had started out as a project for a northern highway was now assuming far greater proportions, that is, military cooperation for the defence of Canada.

Roosevelt followed this up with a note to Mackenzie King on 21 December asking him to come to the White House for a 'chat'. 'This year has marked little progress toward the goal of peace1, Roosevelt wrote, '...and now at its close the Far East gives us mutual concern, in addition to the threats of 83 armed banditry in Europe'. The next day Roosevelt issued a 'definite direction' to Hull 'suggesting that Canada might well send an army and a 84 naval officer ...for off-the-record conversations'. This suggestion was put to Mackenzie King on 7 January 1938 (at about the same time Ingersoll, unknown to the Canadians, was in London). On 18 January Major-General

E.C. Ashton, Chief of the General Staff and Commodore P.W. Nelles, Chief of

Naval Staff, after having journeyed to Washington separately and incognito, met with their American counterparts for the first of two meetings.

The conversations were by no means as comprehensive as those being undertaken in London. Ashton and Nelles were, in fact, instructed to make

'no commitments'. But the presence of Major-General Malin Craig, Chief of

Staff of the United States Army at both meetings and Admiral William Leahy,

Chief of Staff of the United States Navy at the second meeting does indicate the high-level nature of the talks. The Americans kept no record of these conversations and only three copies of the Canadian officers' reports were made. Of these Ashton's report is the most interesting: General Craig ...asked me what subjects we wished to discuss.

56 I informed him that we had come at the request of the U.S. Government and were not informed as to what subjects would be covered, but that I was authorized to give and receive information, but to make no commitments. He stated that he had very limited instructions, but was prepared to talk as "soldier to soldier" on defence questions with particular reference to the Pacific Coast. He outlined their coastal armaments and their air defence arrangements with particular reference to Juan de Fuca Strait and Puget Sound. He asked for details of our defence arrangements in that neighbourhood, land, sea and air, and the probable size of the forces, particularly naval and air, which could be assembled. I gave him this information in general terms and informed him that I could provide him with any details that he required. He stated that the information given was sufficient. He then stated that the United States Army would be prepared to extend their defensive operations to cover the Pacific Coast from the United States-Canadian border to the Canadian-Alaskan border line, and asked for information as to the landing fields that could be provided on the Canadian coast line for their planes, with which they were well supplied, their bombers being highly efficient. At this point I informed him that Canada was in a different situation from the United States, in considering a question of this kind, in that the United States had only themselves to think about, but that Canada, while looking after her own defences to the best of her ability and means, was an integral part of the British Empire and also a member of the League of Nations, and these facts must not be lost sight of. He agreed. I then informed him that we were considering defence questions, particularly on the Pacific Coast, under three conditions- fa) Canada, with the other Nations of the British Empire, at war with Japan - the United States neutral. (b) The United States at war with Japan - Canada with the other Nations of the British Empire neutral. (c) The British Empire and the United States allied against Japan. He immediately stated that we could "wash out" the first two; that in his opinion it was inconceivable that in a war with Japan both nations would not be engaged at the same time, and therefore, we need only consider situation (c). 1 stated that while we had considered that that situation would be a probable one, we must remember the others, in order to avoid any overt act which might affect Canadian neutrality and thereby react on other portions of the British Empire. ...Scales of Attack. I inquired as to the scales of attack which they were considering, and found them very parallel to our own. Raids were to be expected. Possibly one or two small cruisers or armed merchant vessels for bombardment purposes, and motor torpedo boats. He stated that the Japanese had some very powerful boats all along the coast. The U.S. authorities were going to force them out; had already taken action at San Diego. Aeroplane attack in considerable force probably from carriers or improvised carriers protected by destroyers. These might be very heavy. They accepted the principle that they could not intercept or prevent attacks but their 'planes would follow the

57 enemy 'planes to sea, trace them to their parent ship or base and inevitably destroy them - none would escape. I asked if they had considered the possibility of any raids on a large scale by enemy fleet, or larger-scale landing parties to secure a base. He stated that he did not consider that any such proposition was likely to be attempted at such a great distance from Japan, but that if it were attempted, while great damage would be done, the fleet engaged would be intercepted and inevitably destroyed before it could return to Japan. I told him that we had not considered heavy naval attacks feasible. At this point I informed him that I had with me a General Staff memorandum on the "Fixed Defences of Juan de Fuca Strait" which covered our own layout and what we presumed to be theirs. This had not been prepared to be given to them, but that if he would like to see it, I should be glad to hand it to him. He would find therein, as far as our armament was concerned, our existing, interim and proposed arrangements. I spoke of the gaps which existed between the areas covered by our coastal defences and theirs. He stated that those gaps would be covered effectively by their air forces, and in places, by mobile guns. I handed the memorandum to him at his request. He expressed the view of the danger of imminent rupture with Japan and stated that the Philippines would be taken by Japan within 48 hours. ...He impressed the necessity of immediately interning all Japanese on an emergency arising, and said they had them all listed and located....

The most significant thing about these staff talks was the relative degree of importance attached to Pacific Coast defence. But the essence of what would later become a dilemma for Canada - the threat of a Far Eastern war with American abstention - is casually cast aside here by Craig. This must have puzzled the Canadians, especially given the current state of

Anglo-American relations vis-a-vis the Far East. Also interesting is the scale of attack envisaged, particularly on the part of the Americans. This factor will come up shortly when Mackenzie King's views on this are examined. The question of the United States assuming the defence of the West Coast of

Canada is another interesting feature. The Canadians refuse to commit themselves (note Ashton's insistence that all three conditions be kept in mind). Little did the Canadians know that the United States had already assumed that it would take care, at least in naval terms, of Canada's West

Coast defence problem.

58 The growing crisis in the Far East, the American approaches to Canada

regarding Pacific defence and the increasing pressure in the House of

Commons were beginning to concern Mackenzie King. On 11 January 1938 his

Cabinet met and discussed the general situation. Later that night the Prime

Minister recorded in his diary that the Cabinet

...took up the question of considering an additional two destroyers to the Pacific Coast defence. I pointed out that we might be faced with a world situation at any time. ...Japan was very dangerous. Referred particularly to the attitude of the ex-Admiral now in the Home Office in Tokyo, defying the British. I pointed out where Australia, New Zealand and even Africa were all doing something to assist in their defence, and strengthening the Empire as a whole. For us to do nothing was not playing the game. ...Also that with the United States materially increasing its large war equipment, that for us to do nothing in meeting our own defence was to become increasingly dependent upon the United States with possible serious consequences; ...I pointed out beside that on the Pacific Coast with the Islands, etc., there, a few destroyers could be of real service. We had to face possibilities of conflict in which gwe might be neutral, or a conflict in which the Empire was involved.

Mackenzie King's Cabinet thus faced a dilemma. On the one hand there was

the problem of the unpredictable nature of Japan's behaviour. On the other

hand there was the equally disconcerting question of what the United States would or would not do in the event of a Pacific war. As Ian Mackenzie, the

Minister of National Defence, pointed out in a speech in early 1938:

If we do not drive off those who seek to use our bays and inlets for un-neutral purposes - as bases for attacks on another friendly Power - somebody else will glo it for us and we shall lose the sovereignty of our own territory.

That 'somebody else' was the United States. But the government was caught between financial stringency and the desire to protect Canada from American encroachment. Indeed, it was this rather than the actual danger of attack from Japan that seems to have been the preoccupation of the Prime Minister.

Mackenzie King sometimes believed that the United States over-stressed the possibility of a Japanese attack upon North America. 'The United States view on this', he wrote, 'is that of its War Office, and has been a view held for 88 twenty years without much ground'. It would therefore appear that

59 Mackenzie King felt the United States might attempt to use the threat of a

Japanese attack in order to justify its expansionist aims in the Canadian

Northwest. This he was determined to resist. 'Grounds of public policy', he wrote, 'would not permit using the funds of a foreign Government to construct public works in Canada. It would be, as Lapointe phrased it, a 89 matter of financial invasion, or, as I termed it, financial penetration'.

The growing fear that the Far East could explode into war any minute

led the Prime Minister to declare in the House of Commons that 'our decision 90

is to be strictly neutral' with regard to the Sino-Japanese war. This was to be the official policy. At the same time, howe_ver, the Minister of National

Defence stated that 'the government was disposed to give priority to 91 considerations affecting our problems on the Pacific'. It was a double-edged policy that was intended to show that Canada would do nothing to provoke a war in the Far East while demonstrating to the United States that Canada could, and would take care of its own defence.

Meanwhile, in an effort to escape the dilemma, the Prime Minister attempted to reassure the people of Canada. 'At present (the) danger of attack upon Canada', he told the House of Commons, 'is minor in degree and secondhand in origin. It is against chance shots that we need immediately to 92 defend ourselves'. Privately, however, Mackenzie King expressed a great fear that Canada might not be so immune to attack after all. On 22 July 1938 he confided in his diary that I believe that we must look ahead; we cannot live in (the) present day world, and expect to be immune from attack in any great conflict. If newspapers can reach Canada in one day from London, who will say what can be done by aircraft destroyers and the like coming from any country - any part of the world. We must begin to face that appalling situation in our own interests. ...While I do not wish to see Canada drawn into any Conflict, I do not believe we will be more likely to be drawn but rather less likely if we have strong defence equipment of our own here. It will mean running counter to prejudice but I think the way will have to be prepared, but it should be done in a way that will not unduly alarm. We are in a new era in th6e0 world's history - an era of air control, and of close relationship of all the parts. The key words here were 'in our own interests'. Those interests did not necessarily parallel the interests of the United States. Thus when President

Roosevelt declared in a speech at Kingston, Ontario in August 1938 that 'the

United States will not stand idly by if domination of Canadian soil is threatened by any other empire', Mackenze King and others were of two minds. On the one hand there was a sense of relief. Roosevelt appeared to give the promise that the United States would accept new international obligations. In return Mackenzie King spoke of Canada's 'obligations as a good friendly neighbour ...and that, should the occasion ever arise, enemy forces should not be able to pursue their way either by land, sea or air, to 94 the United States across Canadian territory'. Another senior member of the

Department of External Affairs felt that 'it seems better to take President

Roosevelt's words simply as they stand and in the light of today's existing 95 context of international affairs'.

On the other hand, Mackenzie King was not at all sure that this show of

American support was beneficial. 'I do not like to be dependent on the

U.S.', he wrote in his diary a few months later, 'change of leaders there might lead to a vassalage so far as our Dominion was concerned. There was more real freedom in the British Commonwealth of Nations, and a richer 96 inheritance. This I truly believe1. The author of a rather humorous unsigned memorandum was of much the same view:

F.D.R. - Kingston - August 18, 1938 'The Dominion of Canada is part of the sisterhood of the British Empire. I give to you assurance that the people of the United States will not stand idly by if domination of Canada (sic) soil is threatened by any other empire.' Paraphrase

To Miss Canada: These dictators have got to be cleaned up. But don't you worry about your part of the job. I'll keep an eye on your farm till you get back.

To John Bull: Don't get me wrong. There's no seduction business here. You'll notice 1 spoke like a Dutch uncle to Little Nell as one

61 of your girls. We family men understand one another and what's good for the girls, and besides it suits me to have her stick around your fireside. The main thing is I've got to have Hitler S Co. cleaned up. Don't you worry about that either. Go to it and take Little Nell along. What! Me? Oh! no, I'm staying home; but I'll look after her farm while she's away. And I'll sell you all the stuff you want from my farm to boot. As my cousin T.R. said to Harriman: "What's the Constitution between friends?" To Steve Early: Boy, and (sic) I a trader, or am I? You Yankees may know a- thing or two about that business, but you can't beat the Dutch.

Implicit in this parody was the notion that 'Little Nell1 did not want Uncle Sam

to watch the farm. The feeling was that Roosevelt's willingness to extend the

American security blanket over Canada did not reduce Canada's responsibility

towards defence but rather increased it. Mackenzie King was well aware of this as he revealed in his diary two days after Roosevelt's Kingston speech:

'Roosevelt's assurance only added to our responsibilities', he began, 'that we would have to see that our coasts were so defended that no enemy forces 98 could operate from Canadian territory against the United States'.

This line of reasoning seems to have been predicated on the assumption that Canada was liable to attack from a foreign power and in particular from

Japan. It is perhaps in retrospect amazing that Canadian statesmen ever thought along these lines. But in the context of 1938, after British Prime

Minister Stanley Baldwin said in 1935 that 'The bomber will always get through', and after that was seemingly demonstrated when Guernica was destroyed in April 1937, there was a growing realization that the world was entering a'new era in warfare. Mackenzie King, as we have seen, was very much troubled by the new technology in warfare and at times it weighed 99 heavily on his mind. Historians may feel that the Canadian Prime Minister over-reacted to an implausible situation. Nevertheless, these fears of what could happen still placed a big question mark over Canada's own security.

At the same time, however, there was the realistic belief that an attack upon

Canada was a remote possibility.

62 The co-existence of these two strands of thought can be confusing. But

if viewed in the context of international relations these two distinct lines of

reasoning become part and parcel of the same dilemma: the inability of

Canadian statesmen to grapple with what had been until then the completely

unpredictable intentions of the United States. On the one hand there was the

fear that if Japan did launch an attack upon Canada then the United States would move into Canada in order to protect its own security. Thus the decision to defend the West Coast of Canada was made to offset the danger of an American possibility of moving into Canada.

On the other hand, the government seemed to consider the possibility of such an attack materializing as only a remote one. If this was the case then why did the government decide to defend the West Coast of Canada? The general explanation put forward is that the government bowed to political pressure from the West. The problem with this argument is threefold. First, it does not take into consideration the fact that members of Mackenzie King's government did fear an attack. Second, it does not view the problem in the wider context of international relations. Finally, there is little evidence in the record to suggest that the government's decision to defend the West Coast of Canada was made because of political pressure from the West.100 Rather, it seems, Mackenzie King, not being sure of American motives, felt that the

United States might even attempt to use the threat of a Japanese attack to move into Canada. If the West Coast of Canada was adequately defended, therefore, any such United States move would confirm the notion that

American motives were not entirely altruistic. It would appear, in fact, that it was on this particular issue that Mackenzie King's suspicions of American intentions were to be much enhanced. For if a Japanese attack upon North

America was a remote possibility - and Roosevelt told Mackenzie King in

August 1938 that Japan would not present a threat 'for (the) next four or 101 five years' - then why was the United States so interested in Canada's 63 Pacific defence system? This crucial question still remains unanswered.IU/ It

may be that these same two strands of thought existed in the United States

as well (although Russell Weigley points out that the United States army, like

the navy, tended to view the Japanese army as an adversary not worthy of

sustained concern).

The dominant feeling among Canadian statesmen until 1939 was,

nevertheless, that a Japanese attack upon Canada was still a possibility. As

the Far Eastern situation began to deteriorate, moreover, the probability of a

war there involving either Britain or the United States and possibly Canada

was becoming a pressing reality over-shadowing or at least as significant as

the European situation. The government responded by installing additional

defences on the Pacific Coast, particularly in the form of artillery. Four of

Canada's six destroyers were also stationed on the West Coast. This

rearmament was a modest contribution which did not add a great deal. But 104 the desire was still there even if the money to rearm was not.

Japan continued its offensive in China throughout 1938. Canton fell on

21 October and Hankow, which served as the temporary capital, was taken shortly afterwards. The capture of these two cities brought the Japanese dangerously close to important British trading centres. In November Premier

Prince Konoye made his celebrated 'new order' speech, another ominous warning to the West. At the same time the situation in Europe was growing worse. Germany annexed Austria in March and the crisis over Czechoslovakia brought Europe to the brink of war in September. The two theatres, Europe and the Far East, exploded during the summer of 1939. As Germany continued its pressure on Poland (over the Danzig Corridor) the Japanese blockaded the British Concession at Tientsin - developments that forced

Canada to face the very real prospect of a two-front war on the heels of

Britain. The state of Anglo-American relations, moreover, had deteriorated as a result of Britain's agreement with Italy in April 1938. Sumner Welles, 64 speaking for Roosevelt, said that the Anglo-Italian agreement 'would revive

and multiply all fear of pulling the (British) chestnuts out of the fire; and it

would be represented as a corrupt bargain completed in Europe at the

expense of interests in the Far East'in which the United States are intimately 105 concerned'.

Meanwhile, Japan's continued aggression led even Sir Robert Craigie to advocate a show of British naval force in Far Eastern waters. The British

Ambassador felt that it would require 'three or four capital ships' to present to the Japanese 'a far more convincing argument than any number of

protests'.

The Foreign Office liked the idea and responded with enthusiasm. On 13

February 1939 C.C. Fitzmaurice of the Foreign Office, after making an intensive study of the problem, sent a letter to the Admiralty outlining a plan to have ships sent to the Far East. Fitzmaurice's letter and the subsequent reply from the Admiralty reveal very clearly the dilemma Britain faced and the curious nature of the reasoning employed to resolve it. More important, however, is the way this dilemma would later affect Canadian statesmen and especially Mackenzie King.

'Are we to wait until aggression takes place in the Far East', began the

Foreign Office letter, '...and then send out a force, or are we to station that force there in time of peace?' Fitzmaurice felt that ships could indeed be sent to the Far East, in particular, the old 'Royal Sovereigns' that were due to be scrapped in 1942-44. They were, he noted,

...in any case ...too old to be of real fighting value ...in Europe, but is it necessarily true of the Far East seeing that the bulk of the Japanese Fleet consists now, and will still consist for some considerable time of just such vessels some of them even older? While, therefore, the decision to scrap these vessels may be correct, there must at least be a query about it when, on the one hand, it is said that we have not enough ships to station in the Far East and when, on the other hand, it is proposed in three years or so to scrap ships which, though old, are still formidable, and WCJUJ^I retain a large proportion of their fighting value in the Far East.

65 Here again is that strange element of thought that lay behind British and

American perceptions of Japanese power. In other words, there was an acute

awareness of the threat Japan posed, but this was offset by the belief that

Japan did not possess the power to deal a crushing blow in the Far East.

The Admiralty returned with its recommendation on 29 March. It was

not optimistic:

Neither as it exists now, nor as it will be when the present contemplated (naval) expansion is completed, can the British Fleet be regarded as adequate to meet with success, alone and simultaneously, the navies of Germany, Italy and Japan... .My Lords fully appreciate the political arguments which have been advanced for the stationing of capital ships in the Far East: but it will be appreciated from the foregoing that at the moment, with our restricted number of capital ships and with heavy commitments in the Mediterranean, it is impossible to do so.

The Admiralty went on to point out that if all went well 'by 1942 we shall be 1 Qg able to station a capital ship in the Far East.'

A more comprehensive statement of the real nature of Britain's inability to meet its world wide commitments is difficult to find. It led Chatfield, for example, to exclaim that 'I have no doubt that sooner or later it will be our 109 turn to face the music'. And face the music they did. The Tientsin crisis during the summer of 1939 was to demonstrate just how precarious

Britain's world wide position was and this had obvious implications for

Canada.

The long and tangled train of events that led to the Tientsin crisis is too complicated to unfold here.110 In mid-June 1939 the Japanese blockaded the British Concession at the treaty port of Tientsin after charging that the

Concession was being used as a base for Chinese guerrillas who carried out anti-Japanese activities. They were also angered at the lack of cooperation

Concession authorities showed in suppressing the circulation of North Chinese currency and by the refusal of the British to hand over Chinese silver reserves sealed in Concession vaults (to the tune of about fourteen million dollars). 66 The crisis had alarming implications for other parts of the world. It was

feared that any concession made to Japan would encourage Germany to demand

more in Danzig. On the other hand, staunch resistance might lead to warlike

complications and as Neville Chamberlain said, 'it was impossible to believe 111 that ...Germany would not take advantage of the situation'. In addition to this was the attitude in Washington. Lindsay cautioned London in late June

against taking any action 'that could be construed as a return to (a) policy 11 2 of appeasement1. He warned that if concessions were made to Japan it would be at the risk of alienating the United States. Yet the United States

was not even willing to cooperate with Britain let alone give a guarantee of 113

armed support.

Meanwhile, in Canada, there were signs of growing uneasiness. On 9

June the First Secretary in the High Commission in Britain, Lester B.

Pearson, cabled Ottawa that there was a possibility that Japan was attempting

'to drive a wedge' between Britain and the United States. Pearson felt that

this was an important development, especially in view of the recent Japanese approach to the United States regarding the possibility of finding a solution 114

to ease the tension in Europe. Canadian statesmen were indeed worried

because if such a thing did happen then Britain might be drawn into a war

with Japan without American support. Mackenzie King had already resigned 115

himself to the fact that Canada would follow Britain into a European war.

But Canadian involvement in a Far Eastern war was not viewed favourably.

O.D. Skelton, for example, was not alone in feeling that Canada had no business becoming 'engaged in (an) economic or military conflict in defence of 116 concessions established after the Opium Wars'.

By the end of July 1939 the negotiations that had been taking place between Britain and Japan had reached a deadlock. The Foreign Office would not compromise over what it held to b67e essential principles. The Japanese were equally adamant and towards the end of August it seemed to be certain

that Britain would go to war with Japan.

The situation was saved, most ironically, by the Germans. The

announcement of the Nazi-Soviet non-aggression pact on 22 August threw

Japanese diplomacy into a complete state of confusion. The Japanese Premier

resigned on 25 August and his Cabinet fell a few days later (on the grounds

that the Emperor had been given false advice).

The Nazi-Soviet pact made war in Europe a certainty, but it also made

certain that there would be no war in the Far East. Hitler invaded Poland on

1 September and Britain declared war on Germany on 3 September. On 5

September Craigie was handed an aide-memoire by the new Japanese

Vice-Minister which stated: 'Now that a war has broken out in Europe, (the)

Japanese Government intend not to be involved therein but to concentrate

their efforts on the settlement of the China affair'.117

Meanwhile, and probably to the surprise of few, the United States

declared its intention to remain neutral. 'I give you assurance and

reassurance', Roosevelt promised the American people, that his government

would do everything to prevent a 'black-out of peace in the United

States'.118

To the north the feeling was much different. Mackenzie King was not

pleased about the American attitude towards the European war. After

listening to Roosevelt's 3 September radio broadcast he wrote in his diary

that 'I came away from the radio feeling an almost profound disgust. It was all words, words, words. America keeping out of this great issue, which affects the destiny of mankind. And professing to do so in the name of 119 peace ...I was really ashamed of the attitude of the U.S.1. Little did the

Canadian Prime Minister know what problems that attitude would cause over the next two years.

68 Chapter Three: Canada and the Road to Pearl

Harbour: 'Waiting for F.D.R.1, 1939-1941

In September 1939, for the second time in a span of just over two

decades, Canada entered a war 'at Britain's side'. There had never really

been a serious doubt that Canada would follow Britain. English-Canadian

sentiment towards Britain would have been far too powerful to overcome. But

it was not at all a case of Canada's eager desire to join Britain. 'The first

casualty in this war1, declared O.D. Skelton, 'has been Canada's claim to

independent control of her own destinies'.1 Mackenzie King, though he now

publicly spoke of the danger of attack upon Canada once Britain was at war,

privately criticized the 'blundering there has been in England's foreign policy 2

all along the way'. The Prime Minister, moreover, could become even more

rankled over what he considered to be British selfishness. 'How desperately

stupid some Englishmen are in appreciating any attitude other than their own', was his comment when Lord Maugham, the Lord Chancellor, wished to

make a speech in late August 1939 welcoming Canada's entry into a probable 3 war at Britain's side.

Despite these outbursts, however, Canada was committed to help defeat

Germany and to restore international peace. Mackenzie King's greatest concern, as has often been supposed, was with the domestic question of national unity. 'The concern for national unity', writes Professor

Granatstein, 'that had been demonstrated by Canada's separate declaration of war on September 10, 1939 would continue to dominate Canadian policy'.

This was perhaps true, but there was also the question of Canada's own defence. 'The defence of Canada', Skelton wrote in late August 1939, 'should be put in the foreground ...'. Of particular interest here is the fact that

Canadian eyes were not riveted on Europe. Indeed, Skelton wanted it to 'be emphasized ...that we cannot in this wa69r ignore the Pacific as we did in the last ...'."' Although the Far Eastern situation had calmed down somewhat as a result of the Nazi-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact, with the Canadian Chiefs of

Staff reporting on 5 September that '...the British position appears, temporarily at least, to have been improved by the pact since Japan's

relations with Germany have certainly received a setback and tension between

Japan and Great Britain has already eased somewhat'.6 Nevertheless,

Mackenzie King did not even share this cautious optimism. 'What may the

Japanese not do in the Orient!', he wrote in his diary on 6 September,

'There are raiders and submarines on both the Atlantic and the Pacific coasts, and pocket cruisers. I have no doubt that we shall have some bombing of our coast and possibly some inland bombing as well'.7

The Prime Minister was not the only one to correctly discern the possibility of war in the Pacific as a matter of urgent concern. Hugh

Keenleyside, for example, himself a former First Secretary and Charge d'Affaires in the Canadian Legation at Tokyo, now First Secretary in the

Department of External Affairs, observed in late August 1939 that although the Nazi-Soviet Pact 'must result in a serious re-examination of ...Japanese foreign policy' by Tokyo, he could foresee no change in Japan's 'major objectives', particularly the aggressive course of her overseas expansion. In the event of a European war Keenleyside felt that Japan would probably

'choose the side that is likely to win and to sell their services at the highest price that can be extracted'. The British, he went on to note, 'will concentrate every available influence in their efforts to win Japanese support'. 'The one great factor that may keep the Japanese from betting too heavily upon the German cause and against the British', he concluded, 'is the possibility that the U.S.A. may help the democracies'. Keenleyside followed up these observations with a memorandum on 3 September in which he recommended that Canada should make a 'small but definite contribution to the

70 efforts that will be put forth by representatives of the other powers to bring 9

Japan into the conflict on the allied side1.

Keenleyside's analysis with respect to Britain and Japan was basically a sound one. But it was the question of what the United States would or would not do that continued to baffle "Canadian statesmen and handcuff the government's desire to carry out Keenleyside's recommendation until the very eve of Pearl Harbour. On the one hand there was a great fear that Britain would somehow get dragged into a war with Japan while the United States stood aside. Much of this chapter deals with how the Canadian government attempted to resolve the problem of trying to ensure that the United States would go to war in support of Britain without at the same time alienating the

Americans by pressing too hard. For Canada and Britain the solution to the problem was simple, yet far more complex than it appeared: when would the

United States accept a full commitment to the war? 'The theme', in the words of one historian, 'might be succinctly defined as 'Waiting for F.D.R.".10

On the other hand, there was a growing concern about what would happen if and when the United States did enter the war, especially a possible war in the Pacific. The West Coast of Canada had been denuded of what few ships were there to serve in the Atlantic. Once the Far East threatened to draw major powers into a war, as it did during the summer of 1940, the problem of Canada's Pacific Coast defence, and particularly the Alaskan highway project, became matters requiring urgent consideration. But even then Mackenzie King was not willing to throw Canada's lot in with the United

States. Indeed, he continued, to express an uneasy feeling towards the

Alaskan highway project. Moreover, when the pressure of wartime developments forced Canada to seek a defence arrangement with the United

States Mackenzie King made it clear that he would never allow Canada to shed its link with Britain in order to pursue a North American outlook.

71 Mackenzie King was therefore torn between his desire to see the United

States enter the war and bail Britain out and his fear of the disastrous implications for Canada should the United States emerge from the war occupying the position Britain previously held as the world's leading power.

The Prime Minister's primary concern, it would appear, was with the maintenance of Canada's freedom of action and this essentially meant promoting good Anglo-American relations. In May 1940, for example,

Mackenzie King impressed upon Winston Churchill, who had just become Prime

Minister of Britain, the absolute necessity of avoiding any suggestion of a

Commonwealth line-up against the United States in order to force the

Americans to go to war. 'The situation in the Orient1, he wrote to Churchill,

'and its possibilities, potential developments in connection with the Atlantic coast and islands in the North American Ocean are instances of the kinds of questions which require constant attention. ...It is, I think, also of the utmost importance to the interests of the Commonwealth as a whole, that

...the position of Canada vis-a-vis the United States should be fully appreciated'.

Mackenzie King's warning was clear enough: if Britain so much as hinted that she was attempting to draw the United States into the war there would be a backlash in which Canada would inevitably suffer. As long as

Britain was willing to recognize this situation and the Canadian desire to maintain its own freedom of action the Prime Minister was happy with a looser 12 form of Commonwealth consultation. But if Britain did not toe the line when dealing with Canada he could become very upset. 'This is not our war', he declared in October 1939 when discussions with the British over air training took place. The statement was subsequently cabled to London by

Gerald Campbell, the High Commissioner. Campbell then foolishly told

Mackenzie King that it had been sent. The Prime Minister was so furious 13 that he requested the Governor General to reprove the High Commissioner.

72 Campbell, for his part, later wrote that '...I had mighty little idea, when I

arrived (in Canada), of what it means to a Dominion to be independent of all

control from the country it once called Mother'. The incident was soon

forgotten, but it serves to illustrate that Canada, at least in the eyes of the

Prime Minister, was not to be taken advantage of. Earlier, in 1938, Norman

Robertson, as First Secretary in the Department of External Affairs, had

expressed similar feelings:

I was the last Imperialist in the Dept. - and now I've gone too. You may never have had the 'language difficulty' but I can get on with the Americans a damm sight more easily than with the English and Australians ...Our direct negotiations with the U.S. are the least of our worries right now. We can cope with them but not with God's Englishmen and the inescapable moral ascendancy over us lesser breeds.

Many of these attitudes would continue throughout the war. The war,

moreover, brought out more clearly than ever underlying tensions that

threatened the very existence of the Commonwealth itself. Indeed, under the

pressure of military developments relations between Britain and the Dominions could not help but undergo a change. As a result the Dominions were beginning to look more and more to the United States to act as their ultimate saviour and protector, especially where the Far East was concerned. Yet in

Canada Mackenzie King held a very qualified view of just how far Canada's

relationship with the United States should extend. Of all the Dominion Prime

Ministers Mackenzie King was one of the first to recognize the value of the connection with Britain and the danger of United States penetration. His attitude towards Britain and the United States was a mixture of pragmatic political and strategic concerns coupled with a powerful nostalgia for the

Mother country.

Nevertheless, the growing recognition that the Empire was in deep trouble along with the fear that Japan's continued aggression in the Far East might trigger another war led to a general belief that without American

73 support Britain could be doomed. It was not long, however, before Canada

found out how hard it would be to secure American support.

On 3 April 1940 Cordon Conant, the Attorney-General of Ontario,

publicly urged the Canadian government to bring pressure to bear on the

United States in order to bring about greater American participation in the

war.16 The speech brought forth a wave of American indignation. Cordell

Hull was deeply offended and sternly remarked that 'no nondescript

utterances of minor officials or individuals abroad ...have anything remotely to do with the policy of this Government at home or in its international

relations'.17 Loring Christie, who was now the Canadian Minister to

Washington, told Skelton that Conant's speech had the effect of strengthening the hand of the isolationists in the United States Congress. Mackenzie King was aghast at the speech and tried to patch up the damage. He moved quickly to squash a similar proposal made a few months later by a former 18 Canadian Minister to Washington, W.D. Herridge.

A similar situation had developed over the question of Greenland during

April 1940. Britain and Canada were worried that the Germans might try to attack Greenland in order to cut off the supply of cryolite, an essential ingredient in aluminium production. The Canadian government thought of occupying Greenland so that the flow of this vital, commodity could continue unmolested. The United States immediately perceived this as a threat to the

Monroe Doctrine and feared that if Canada intervened the Japanese would use it as a pretext to move into South-East Asia. London felt that the American concern was foolish and suggested that Canada should proceed with the occupation. The Canadian government was once again placed in its classic predicament. The United States wanted it to do one thing, the British 1 9 another. A long series of negotiations took place and Canada decided to send a token force which included two uniformed R.C.M.P constables, four

R.C.M.P. personnel and one artillery officer in civilian dress {all landed by a 74 Hudson's Bay Company supply ship).iU The State Department took exception

to Canada's action and warned Ottawa that 'this type of 1890 imperialism' was 21

frowned upon, '...the days of Cecil Rhodes had passed.'

Thus even before the end of the 'phoney war' Canada's wartime dilemma

was taking shape. But it was not until the German victories in the Spring of

1940 brought into question the fate of the British fleet that Mackenzie King

found out how deep the dilemma would be.

President Roosevelt wanted Churchill's assurance that the British fleet

would be transferred to the United States should Britain be defeated by

Germany. Churchill would not even consider this and the issue soon became

one that threatened to upset the already rocky Anglo-American relationship.

Canada's entry into this debate was really an innocent one. On 19 May 1940

Hugh Keenleyside was sent to Washington to discuss with Roosevelt the

possibility of securing more aircraft for the British Commonwealth Air

Training Plan. The President, however, did not really wish to discuss the aircraft issue at all. Instead he wanted Keenleyside to mention the words 22

'British Fleet' to Mackenzie King.

Roosevelt did not clarify matters at this meeting, but he certainly did at a subsequent meeting. The United States, it appeared, was not pleased with

Britain's attitude regarding the Fleet. The great danger in the opinion of

Roosevelt, reported Keenleyside, was that the Germans and the Japanese have a definite understanding by which the latter will have a free hand in the Netherlands Indies, Australia and New Zealand and the United States cannot prevent this if the Germans get the British Fleet. Germany and Italy will take over all the other British and French possessions except those in the Americas. The United States itself will probably become totalitarianized as a result of the necessity of arming and organizing on a colossal scale against the imminent dangers on both the Atlantic and the Pacific.

The President told Keenleyside, after meeting with him again a few days

later, at the end of May 1940, that Britain's present stance 'implied - in fact, almost an explicit threat' which 'might be expressed in these terms: "If you 75 don't help us at once we will let the Germans have the Fleet and you can go

to Hell'". Roosevelt, moreover, went on to add that 'Not only the average

American, but the educated and informed American, had no faith whatever in

the Government which, until a few weeks ago, ruled the United Kingdom. If

a single person could be said to be responsible for the slowness and

hesitation of the United States in this crisis that person is Sir John Simon'.

Mackenzie King was stunned when he received this news. M felt

something of a sinking feeling', he wrote in his diary, 'as the President's

message was narrated'. But this was not all. Keenleyside told Mackenzie

King that Roosevelt wanted him to bring pressure to bear upon Britain,

Australia, New Zealand and South Africa 'not to yield to the making of a soft

peace'. The Prime Minister was now horrified: 'When Keenleyside had concluded his talk with the suggestion that 1 should ...bring pressure on the

British Government to turn their fleet over to the United States, for a moment it seemed to me that the United States was seeking to save itself at the expense of Britain. ...I instinctively revolted against such a thought'.

Then, in a rather rare emotional outburst, he wrote: 'My reaction was that I would rather die than do aught to save ourselves or any part of this 25 continent at the expense of Britain'.

The Prime Minister agonized over what action to take. His desire to cooperate with the United States was offset by an equal desire not to antagonize Britain. In addition to this was the fear he had of being accused of harbouring pro-American sentiments and of a readiness to sacrifice Britain 2 6 for a new orientation in world power. Finally he telephoned Cordell Hull for advice. Hull told him that 'when the time came1 the Dominions

(presumably led by Canada) were to 'tell Britain to stand firm and not part with her fleet or make a soft peace'. Keenleyside was immediately summoned in order to explain himself. He stood fast on his original impression that

Roosevelt wanted Canada to take actio76n quickly. Mackenzie King was now suspicious. 'The United States', he warned Keenleyside, 'might be using

Canada to protect themselves in urging a course that would spare them 27 immediate assistance to Britain'. A carefully worded telegram outlining Roosevelt's views, but appearing 28

to come from Mackenzie King, was sent to Churchill on 30 May. The

British Prime Minister was not pleased. 'We must be careful', he replied to

Mackenzie King on 5 June, 'not to let Americans view too complacently (the)

prospect of British collapse out of which they would get the British Fleet and guardianship of (the) British Empire minus Great Britain. ...Although the

President is our best friend, no practical help has been forthcoming from the 29

United States as yet'. Despite pressure from the United States, Churchill

refused to give in. On 24 June he sent another message to Mackenzie King which indicated that his patience was growing thin: 'If you will read again my telegram of June 5th, you will see that there is no question of trying to make a bargain with the United States about their entry into the war and our despatch of the Fleet across the Atlantic should the Mother Country be 30 defeated'. So the matter stood; the United States on the one side, Britain on the other and Canada caught in the middle.

The events of the next two years were to render this dilemma far worse.

Italy declared war on 10 June 1940. France fell on 22 June. In the Far East

Japan's aggressive moves appeared to be gathering momentum. The significance of these three events for Canada was immense. With the fall of

France Canada became Britain's number one ranked ally; not an altogether pleasant prospect for a small power. The Canadian government, moreover, had to view the possibility of a British defeat more seriously than ever now that Britain stood face to face with Germany while Italy menaced Britain's position in the Mediterranean. At the same time Japan appeared to be making a definite move to draw Britain into a three front war when she demanded 31 that Britain close the Burma Road. 77 The Burma Road crisis began in the middle of June 1940 when the

British military attache was summoned to the Japanese War Ministry and told

that Britain must close the Burma Road and the Hong Kong frontier if war

between Japan and Britain was to be avoided. This was followed by a formal

note to Craigie on 24 June. The British Ambassador initially felt that if

Britain refused the Japanese request Japan would not attack British

possessions. But he warned that Japan would probably take some sort of

action which might lead to a state of war. Craigie knew that little in the way

of support could be expected from the United States. Britain could therefore

not afford to take any risks in the Far East and should proceed to close the 32

Burma Road.

The Foreign Office disagreed with the Ambassador. It was believed that any move on Britain's part to conciliate Japan at this critical juncture in the war would alienate American support for Britain's cause. In addition to this was the strong feeling that Japan was bluffing. Halifax, for example,

stressed 'that there was a big element of bluff in (the Japanese) attitude

...and that in the long run we should lose less by standing up to Japanese 33 blackmail than by relinquishing our principles'.

The matter was taken up by the Chiefs of Staff on 1 July. The problem they discussed was a familiar one: the inadequacy of Britain's defences and the need to avoid war with Japan. The recommendation put forward was not a surprising one. Britain should close the Burma Road rather than risk war with Japan. The Foreign Office continued to argue that Japan was bluffing and the War Cabinet supported this view. The Chiefs of Staff, however, pressed their case. On 4 July they warned that 'the War Cabinet should be left in no doubt as to the apprehension which the Chiefs of Staff felt regarding the military necessity of avoiding any step which might lead to war with Japan ...particularly in the light of the possibility that we might find

78 ourselves in a state of hostilities with France'.JH The following day they

presented an even more convincing argument:

Formerly we were prepared to abandon Eastern Mediterranean and despatch a fleet to Far East relying on French fleet in Western Mediterranean to contain Italian fleet. Now if we move Mediterranean Fleet to Far East there is nothing to contain Italian Fleet which will be free to operate in Atlantic or reinforce German Fleet in home waters using bases in N(orth) W(est) France. We must therefore retain in European Waters sufficient naval forces to match both German and ItalUri Fleets and we cannot do this and send a fleet to the Far East.

These views were presented to the War Cabinet the same day. Halifax

continued to argue that the road should be left open. But Churchill was no

longer sure that this was the proper course. 'In the present state of affairs', he told the Cabinet, 'he did not think that we ought to incur 36

Japanese hostility for reasons mainly of prestige'. The Prime Minister felt that if Britain resisted the Japanese demands then the burden would fall back upon Britain instead of being '...placed where it ought to be, namely, with 37 the United States'.

But American support was, if anything, as remote a possibility as ever during the summer of 1940. Indeed, the United States not only seemed content to sit back and watch Britain shoulder the load but sniped at the

British as well. Cordell Hull, for example, angered many in Britain when after privately indicating that he 'understood' why Britain had to close the

Burma Road nevertheless felt strongly enough to deprecate the move publicly

The Canadian government, forced to steer a course between Britain and the United States, moved with extreme caution. We have seen that any attempt to exert pressure on the United States to render more assistance to the war effort would produce a strong backlash. Mackenzie King, frightfully aware of the consequences should Britain become involved in a war with

Japan, therefore turned his attention to Britain. In early July 1940 he warned London that even a Japanese 79attac k upon Canada would not make . American intervention into a Far Eastern war 'a certainty in all cases'. The

Prime Minister wanted Britain to pursue a policy of minimum provocation. But

his concern really went much deeper than this. As he noted on an earlier

occasion when, in March 1940, Britain requested Canada to stop a Soviet ship

suspected of carrying war supplies bound for Germany: 'With practically no

defence forces of our own on the Pacific Coast, the task, if attempted, might

well become the occasion of a declaration of war by Russia upon Canada, or

might lead, conceivably, to an endeavour on her part, through a combination 40

with Japan, to land forces in B.C. via Alaska'. This fear of a possible

Japanese attack with American abstention became greatly intensified during

the Burma Road crisis.

On 22 June 1940 Skelton observed that while there was 'a good deal of

bluff in the Japanese War Office threats ...there is no doubt that there is

a sufficient possibility of an outbreak (of war) to warrant all possible 41

precautions being taken in Canada'. He followed this up with a

memorandum on 2 July. The Far Eastern situation worried him, he told

Mackenzie King, because 'we cannot fight on two fronts'. The greater

danger, in Skelton's view, was the Nazi menace and for Canada 'to become

involved in a first-class war with Japan in the Pacific, however high its

motives, would almost certainly mean German victory in Europe and

elsewhere'. But there was an additional problem, the United States, and Skelton believed that While the United States is becoming more fearful of its own safety and realizes its danger if the United Kingdom is overcome, there seems no doubt that it would consider any serious threat to British Columbia as being a threat to themselves; reason for not depending on the United States is not that they would not give the aid their own interests would demand but that they could not do so effectively without co-operation on our part and we could not, as an independent ^nation, afford to allow anyone else to do all our fighting for us.

The problem was how to carry out the task. As a result of the

government's earlier decision to grant the West Coast defence priority status,

80 four of Canada's six destroyers were stationed there. The threat of war in

Europe prompted the decision to have two of them ordered to Halifax. When

the European war broke out the last two were also put into service on the 43 East Coast. The government, moreover, had enough problems financing the 44

European war let alone provide for the contingency of a Pacific war.

One man, however, was willing to provide a solution. On 17 June 1940

Hugh Keenleyside put forward a novel idea that would resolve Canada's

defence problem. 'It is no longer any secret that the Government of the

United States has been giving detailed and serious consideration to the

possibility of re-organizing the whole economic life of the Western

Hemisphere', he began, nor had much thought been given to the military necessity for a revision of our external possibilities ...that the United States in the chaotic and dynamic world that is likely to emerge from the present war, will be prepared to continue indefinitely to protect Canada without demanding a measure of active co-operation in return. It is a reasonable assumption that the United States will expect, and if necessary demand, Canadian assistance in the defence of this continent and this Hemisphere. Concrete steps such as the construction of the Alaskan highway, the defensive development of the Pacific Coasts and the Maritime Provinces, the co-ordination of Canadian and United States war material ...these are lines along which Washington is likely to require Canadian co-operation. If the United States is forced to defend the Americas against encroachments from across either Ocean, Canada will be expected to participate; thus the negotiation of a specific offensive-defensive alliance is likely to become inevitable.

Keenleyside spelled this out in another memorandum on 27 June in which he

re-emphasized the necessity of co-operation with the United States. He felt that a three point offer should be presented to Washington along the following lines:

A-immediate protective occupation of French and British possessions in the West Indies and on the continent of South America;

B-landing fields and/or naval bases in British Guiana, the British West Indies, Newfoundland, St. Pierre and Miquelon;

C-immediate construction, as a defence project, of the Alaskan Highway.

He went on to note that

81 An offer of these facilities at the present time would be accepted as a free and generous offer. It would be in line with suggestions that have been made by certain American and other officials and publicists. It would dampen the ardor of the anti-British elements in the United States who have been advocating the seizure of British bases in the Caribbean. If steps of this nature are postponed until they are forced by rapidly changing

circumstances or6 by United States pressure they will lose their good-will value.

Keenleyside's suggestion implied the reorientation of Canadian policy

towards a North American viewpoint. Mackenzie King's feeling about this was

twofold. On the one hand he welcomed Keenleyside's suggestion. In fact, as

early as 14 June 1940 the Prime Minister brought up the question of

Canadian-American staff talks in a conversation with Pierrepont Moffat, the

American Minister at Ottawa. Moffat was asked to put the proposal to

Roosevelt. The United States was initially lukewarm to this advance. On 27

June the State Department informed Ottawa that no definite reply could be given. Once the tension built up in Europe and in the Far East, however, the attitude in Washington changed and in early July Moffat told Mackenzie 47

King that Roosevelt had given the go-ahead for staff talks.

On the other hand, Mackenzie King was by no means willing to throw

Canada's lot in with the Americans. He stressed, and would continue to stress, that Canada would adhere to a British Empire view rather than a 48

North American view. What was envisaged in the Prime Minister's mind was a form of cooperation with the United States that did not involve a specific alliance. To this end the Canadians who attended the 1940 Canadian-American 49 staff talks were instructed to make no commitments. 50

These staff talks have been covered elsewhere. It is significant that at this juncture the Far East did not enter the conversations because at that moment the fate of Europe was the centre of all attention. (It may also have been that Washington felt that Canada's Pacific Coast defence problem was already solved as a result of the agreements drawn up during the 1938 82 Ingersoll mission. There is also some evidence to show that Mackenzie King felt that the 1938 Canadian-American talks were still the foundation of defence

cooperation in the event of a Pacific war).51 Nevertheless, the Far East

continued to concern Mackenzie King. Throughout the latter part of July and

early August 1940 the Cabinet discussed the issue. It was felt that even

though a Japanese attack upon Canada was unlikely, the government should

still order troops to be stationed there because of the large numbers of

Japanese living in British Columbia. In addition to this was the great fear

that Britain might be invaded by Germany; a development that would surely 52

induce Japan to attack British possessions in the Far East.

These problems put Canada into a tenuous position. On 15 August 1940

Mackenzie King met with Gerald Campbell (they were on speaking terms again)

and talked about the Far East. The discussion, which Mackenzie King

recorded in his diary, is most interesting because it clearly outlines the

larger dilemma Canada faced before Pearl Harbour and how the Prime Minister thought of attacking it: We spoke of the position of Canada vis a vis Japan, should there be a war between Britain and Japan. I said I thought we would have to avoid making any formal declaration, at least at the beginning, and to maintain an attitude of neutrality, seeing to it that no assistance was given Japan in the way of metals, trade, etc. That unless the United States came in, a declaration by Canada might greatly embarrass relations between the United States and Britain. Also we would be simply needlessly inviting attack of our Pacific coasts which, at the present time, are wholly undefended.

He went on to say that he did not wish to advise Britain unless Canada was 53

'in a position to accompany our advice by practical support1.

There are a number of points here that require some explanation.

Mackenzie King's fear of a Japanese attack upon Canada has already been dealt with, but now that the West Coast was denuded that fear seems to have become heightened. The question of Canadian neutrality is somewhat confusing. What appears to have been on the Prime Minister's mind was the notion that if Britain and Canada declared war on Japan, then Japan would attack Canada and the United States would have to fight. The danger here 83 was that the United States would accuse Britain of drawing her into the war

vis-a-vis Canada in order to protect Britain's Far Eastern interests. In

addition to this was Mackenzie King's belief, one which was to grow stronger

in early 1941, that Britain might be trying to get Canada involved in a war

with Japan so that the United States would be forced to step in ('I disliked

very much1, he wrote in his diary on 28 January 1941, after Britain

requested Canada to seize contraband cargo from Japanese ships in the

Pacific, 'this effort of some parties in the British Government to get us into

war at sea. I think that there are some who believe that this might help to 54

bring the United States into the war'). Either way Mackenzie King was not

so sure that it was wise to force the United States and his conversation with

Campbell contained, at least implicitly, a warning to Britain not to embark upon a policy that could provoke Japan.

This was the situation when Roosevelt telephoned Mackenzie King on 16

August 1940 and asked him to come to Ogdensburg for dinner. Roosevelt wanted to talk about the destroyers-for-bases deal and the matter of coastal 55 defence. What came about as a result of this historic meeting was an agreement known as the Ogdensburg Agreement. The feature of the agreement was the Canadian-American Permanent Joint Board on Defence. It was set up to discuss and develop plans for the defence of the northern half 56 of the Western Hemisphere.

The Ogdensburg Agreement, in Professor Granatstein's words, 'can be seen in different ways: as Canada seeking security under the American wing; or as nothing more than the United States formalizing its hegemony over the Canadian Dominion'.57 This may be so but Professor Granatstein is mistaken in assuming that the agreement 'was precipitated by the events in 5 8

Europe' during the spring and summer of 1940. As we have seen, events in the Far East played a significant role in the formulation of this agreement. 84 Mackenzie King, in fact, stressed that the Permanent Joint Board's 'functions 59

would include the Pacific as well as the Atlantic'.

It is true that the Canadian Prime Minister felt a great personal triumph

in securing this agreement. 'Events', he wrote in his diary, were

'vindicating my whole life's work for better international relations,

particularly between the United Kingdom and the United States'.60 And so

the feeling would continue. But Mackenzie King held a very qualified view of just how far the arrangement with the United States should go; and one had only to turn to the Far East and its impact upon Canada to see that the Prime

Minister was indeed troubled.

Although it was the prospect of a Pacific war that caused a great deal of concern in the short-run, it was ultimately the Alaskan highway project that aroused Mackenzie King's deepest suspicions regarding American intentions in

Canada. The Alaskan highway issue had surfaced for a short time in October

1939 when Charles Stewart, the Chairman of the Canadian Section of the

International Joint Commission, raised the matter with Skelton. The discussion boiled down to the question of financing the highway. Stewart felt

Canada would not object to accepting United States financial aid should the project prove feasible. Mackenzie King voiced his disapproval: 'So long as 61 Govt, of U.S. not involved that may be'. The project was effectively 62 shelved again.

It was not until July 1940 that it again emerged. By this time, of course, the Far East was in a state of acute tension and the Alaskan highway project became something of an urgent defence necessity. On 1 July Skelton wrote to Mackenzie King that The United States is becoming more apprehensive of the vulnerability of Alaska and the necessity of having access to it by land. If trouble comes on the Pacific, the United Kingdom is not in a position to assist us. We would inevitably look to the United States for help and would receive it. ...While our land and air defences on the Pacific will doubtless be increased in the next few months, 85 there is no possibility of our being able to defend ourselves without United States aid, or of goffering direct military assistance to the United States if attacked.

In other words, the writing was on the wall and Canada had better move

quickly, in Skelton's words, to 'contribute our share to the common pool in a 64

way that would appeal to United States opinion...1. It is difficult to gauge

Mackenzie King's feelings about the project at this time. But there is no

reason to believe that his attitude underwent a change. In late July Skelton

warned him that 'serious consideration should be given to including the

construction of this road as an outstanding Canadian contribution to joint 65 efforts for defence of the Pacific'. The Prime Minister turned a deaf ear.

As late as April 1941 when Cordell Hull confronted him about the project, he

stalled and attempted to argue that air service over the proposed route was 66 more important than the highway. This attitude would prevail until 1942 when the Permanent Joint Board recommended that the highway be built.

Mackenzie King and others, as we will see, were not at all happy about the decision.

Meanwhile, the Ogdensburg Agreement was being viewed somewhat suspiciously in Britain. The British War Cabinet discussed the matter on 21

August 1940 and Churchill decided to send Mackenzie King a 'cautionary' telegram: I am deeply interested in the arrangements you are making for Canada and America's mutual defence. Here again there may be two opinions on some of the points mentioned. Supposing Mr. Hitler cannot invade us and his Air Force begins to blench under the strain all these transactions will be judged in a mood (j/Lfferent to that prevailing while the issue still hangs in the balance.

Implicit in Churchill's message was the notion that Britain did not view

Canada's close association with the United States favourably. This upset

Mackenzie King because he felt that Canada was performing a great service by attempting to bring Britain and the United States closer together via the

Ogdensburg Agreement. In this sense Churchill misunderstood Mackenzie 86 King's motives and it was not until 12 September that Churchill, at the

urging of Cerald Campbell, redressed Mackenzie King's resentment with a

flattering letter.68

Nevertheless, the episode demonstrated that already, by the summer of

1940, Canada was caught between a jealous Britain on the decline and an

aggressive United States on the rise. There were those, moreover, in Britain

who sensed as much. 'I say1, one British Official was to note in 1942, 'that I

sense in certain circles, both at the F(oreign) O(ffice) and the Treasury, an

anti-American prejudice. ...It is the jealousy of the old British governing 69

class at the "passing of power'". But this was precisely what was

happening, especially with respect to the Far East. In addition to this was

the feeling that the United States did not care and Washington's constant evasion of responsibility only seemed to heighten that feeling.70 For

Mackenzie King this meant essentially that Canada would have to try filling a crucial role. What worried him most was the possibility that Canada's role would have to be greatly expanded if war came to the Pacific. This was the one thing that the Canadian Prime Minister did not want to see and throughout the winter of 1940 he attempted to find a solution to the problem.

On 4 September 1940, less than two months before the Burma Road agreement was due to expire, Britain requested Canada's view on what steps should be taken. The telegram outlined the dilemma Britain was then facing.

The Japanese had shown little inclination towards settling the war with China.

The United States could not be counted upon for support and it was not yet 71 clear what Germany might do in Europe.

The British request put the Canadian government in a bind. It now appears, in fact, that Mackenzie King's Cabinet did not wish to answer the telegram. It was not until 24 September that a draft telegram was produced. 72

London made an additional request for Canada's view on 25 September. A reply was finally sent on 30 September8.7 The document is an interesting one because it demonstrates Canada's unwillingness to become drawn into Far

Eastern affairs:

While concerned in the bearing of such issues on the relations of the United Kingdom itself and the other members of the Commonwealth with Japan, we have not considered that our interest was as direct as that of other members which would be more immediately in jeopardy in the event of Japanese aggression. We have, therefore, refrained from offering advice^but are glad to indicate our appreciation of the present situation.

Canada's unwillingness to be drawn into offering advice at this point did not

reflect a lack of concern towards the Far East. On the contrary, by the end

of September the government was more worried than ever. The Japanese had

shown no signs of easing their attack on China. In mid-September Canada felt

the effects of that attack when Japanese aircraft dropped glass training

bombs on the Canadian Pacific Liner 'Empress of Asia'. The attack caused

minor damage but so infuriated the British Ambassador to Tokyo that he

intervened on Canada's behalf. Craigie's attempt to obtain a stronger 74 Japanese expression of regret than Canada really wanted maddened Skelton. The Under-Secretary felt that 'Craigie wishes that if a break should occur

with Japan, it should be over a Canadian and not a United Kingdom 75 incident". Mackenzie King, of course, wanted to avoid such a thing. He already felt 'a very deep concern regarding Japan' and thought it 'truly

appalling how excepting the U.S., Britain is pretty well taking on the 76 world'. There was no way he would advise the British on what action to take against this background of mounting tension.

By early October 1940, however, Mackenzie King was becoming

increasingly alarmed. Japan had signed the Tripartite Pact on 27 September, a move that was made in an effort to deter the United States from intervening in Far Eastern affairs. London felt that the signing of the Pact would stiffen the American attitude and wanted to know what the Dominion reaction was.

On 8 October Britain informed Canada of its intention to stand by the United

States if she became involved in a war with Japan and wanted to know 88 Canada's attitude." The question was brought up at a War Cabinet

Committee meeting the same day. Mackenzie King minuted that the British

request was: 'Carefully considered. Draft reply outlined. Agreement to 78

stand by Crt. Br. S U.S.'. The question was indeed carefully considered

but agreement was not so easily reached. The various discussions that

centred around this decision reveal the confusion surrounding Canadian

policy. Mackenzie King recorded the Cabinet meeting in his diary later that

night. It is worth quoting at length because it shows that the government

may have been heading for a possible split: Power advocated our replying we would go to war with Japan because of our obligations of joint defence with United States. Skelton also favoured this view. I took strong exception to it, and majority of others present were with me, particularly Ralston and Lapointe and Crerar. I contended such a statement would be construed as a North American policy rather than a British Empire policy, this at a moment when the United Kingdom was doing everything and the United States assisting only to the extent for which it was being paid. I thought our position would be that we would stand by the side of Britain. What I suggested was that the Cerman-ltalian-Japanese alliance should be made the basis of our action, declaring war on Japan if she attacked Britain or attacked the United States because of assistance to Britain ...our attitude towards Japan (was) the most important of all the matters to be considered since war itself began. Just where Canada is going to find herself with Britain's hand as full as she is certain to be, and America watching primarily her own interests, once war with Japan begins, is somethjgg that ought to give every one of us the deepest possible concern.

The Prime Minister's sentiment was expressed more forcefully in a War Cabinet

Minute:

To base our declaration solely upon North American considerations would create a major political division in Canada and the government would be criticized for^throwing in our lot with our new friends and foreswearing our old.

This, in essence, was the fundamental problem - one that the government attached great importance to having resolved, especially when viewed against the belief that the United States would not allow itself to become involved in a Far Eastern war. Mackenzie King did not want to have

Canada manoeuvered into a position where she could be held responsible for

89 creating an incident that would draw Britain into a Pacific war. 'It might even suit the slate of the U.S.', he later wrote in his diary, 'if a break with the Orient came between Great Britain and Japan rather than the U.S. and

Japan' (yet another hint that Mackenzie King was growing more and more

81 suspicious of American intentions). Thus the Prime Minister once again tried to impress upon Britain the dangers involved in pursuing a forward policy with respect to Japan. This represented a change in his earlier desire not to advise Britain. But now that Japan was directly linked with the

European dictators his fear of seeing the United States leave Britain in the lurch became more pronounced. His concern over this crucial issue was demonstrated in a reply to a draft telegram Skelton wrote on 9 October.

Skelton's draft took an optimistic view of American support: We hope that Japan will not carry her threats and bluffing into action. War in the Pacific at the present juncture would compel diversion of essential forces from the European struggle. ...If the United States is now drawn into conflict with Japan, it will unquestionably be because of its support of the Commonwealth cause. The German-ltalian-Japanese alliance is openly and avowedly designed to deter the United States from affording us effective aid, and hostile action by Japan would therefore be directed against us as much as against the United States. We assume that under the recent alliance Germany and Italy would join Japan in military action and that the United States would therefore be at war with all three countries. It is inconceivable that in such circumstances we should take any other course than to joingqur new ally in its conflict with the new as well as the old enemies.

'Not necessarily so', was Mackenzie King's first comment. He then went on to warn his Under-Secretary that

...great care must be taken to link up Canada's position in the closest possible way with what arises out of United States action to assist the United Kingdom and other parts of the British Commonwealth in the present conflict against Germany and Italy, and to avoid so wording the despatch that it could be construed as a commitment on the part of Canada to go to war against Japan simply because of war between the United States and Japan regardless of the circumstances which might occasion it. For example, the United States, of its own initiative, might begin war with Japan over some incident wholly apart from anything arising out of the German-Italian-Japanese alliance. That is hardly probable but it might be so alleged by Japan. We have to be careful I think not to have it assumed that because there are joint plans for defence between the United States

90 and Canada we are thereby committed in advance to active participation in every war in which the United States may be concerned, any more than we can be regarded as committed to participate in any war in which Britain may be involved,gjnerely because we are part of the British Commonwealth of Nations.

The final telegram did not reflect the difference of opinion, but Skelton's

assurance of American support was toned down. Canada did, however, state 84

its intention to stand by Britain and the United States.

Mackenzie King's fear of American abstention led him to put out feelers

towards the United States in an attempt to form a solid Anglo-American front.

In early October 1940 he told Moffat that Canada wished to see the United

States assume control of the British naval base at Singapore. Washington did

not react to this bit of news enthusiastically. Sumner Welles, who was

already suspicious of Britain, felt that this was a British ploy to get the

United States involved. He told Moffat to warn the Canadians not to engage 85

in 'wishful thinking' about American involvement in the Far Eastern crisis.

This American attitude was confirmed the following April when Mackenzie King

saw Hull. The conversation, wrote Mackenzie King, 'confirmed in my view 8 6 that the U.S. did not want to go to war if they can possibly keep out'. So it would continue until July 1941 when Japan, partly as a result of 87 decisions made at the 2 July Imperial Conference, began a southward drive.

By the middle of July she had seized key points in Southern Indochina - moves that threatened to cut off British and American supplies of rubber and tin (in July 1941 the Foreign Office estimated that Britain had seven months stocks of rubber and only two months reserves of tin while the United States 88 received over 90% of its supplies of these resources from the same area).

On 21 July Japan concluded a treaty with Vichy France that allowed Japanese forces to occupy Indochina.

These moves enraged the United States and the State Department drew up an order to freeze Japanese assets in the United States. The imposition 91 of a total embargo of this kind initially alarmed Ottawa and London. London felt that such a move would either force a complete reversal of Japanese policy or provoke a further southward advance that would lead to war.

British officials therefore had to decide whether Britain should act with the

United States and risk war or attempt to restrain the United States and be accused of advocating a policy of appeasement. London decided that rather than risk a break with the United States Britain would 'on no account discourage1 American action and would attempt to match any move Washington wished to take. Ottawa was informed that this would involve a 'plain risk of war with Japan1 but the necessity of securing American cooperation was . 89 paramount.

Ottawa's primary concern was with the possibility of a breach between

Britain and the United States. Mackenzie King agreed that Britain should cooperate with the United States but he warned London of 'the absolute importance of securing the clearest possible indication that the active armed support of the United States will be immediately available if the Japanese 90 force the issue to the point of war'. But he also warned Churchill that it would 'be very rash for us to attempt action in order to force American ... . . , 91 public opinion'. ,

Britain's reply to Canada's call for a clear indication of United States cooperation is interesting because London viewed American support as a certainty:

In our view the United States Government will in fact be compelled to support us if need arises. It is clear that if the Japanese are provoked to extreme measures it will be as a result of the drastic effect of action taken by the United States, and not of our cooperation therein. Both by reason of general war policy of the United States towards us and their special interest in the Far East, we do not believe they would find it possible not to give us their full support.

With this feeling of optimism Britain and the rest of the Commonwealth proceeded to freeze Japanese assets and shortly afterwards Canada followed

Britain in denouncing the Anglo-Japanese Commercial Treaty of 1911.

92 Nevertheless, Mackenzie King continued to view the episode suspiciously, especially when it appeared that the United States might rescind its freezing 93 order. During his visit to Britain in August 1941 he told the British War

Cabinet that While the American public were supporting a policy of aid, "short of war", they were not yet willing to fight. The U.K. government should appreciate g^this fully in deciding upon their policy in relation to Japan. ...

It was advice not to be taken lightly. But by this time Britain was doing all that it possibly could to get the United States into the war. 'I suppose1, wrote an Assistant Under-Secreatry at the Foreign Office in August 1941,

'that the chief objective at the present moment in our foreign policy is to get 95

America fully into the war1.

This meant, of course, that certain risks had to be run. British fears of facing Japan alone, however, were matched by an equal complacency regarding the possibility of a Japanese attack. Churchill, for example, overrode his advisers on the need to strengthen Singapore. The Japanese, he said in November 1939, would never embark on the 'mad enterprise' of trying to capture it. In August 1940 he told the Prime Ministers of Australia and New Zealand that 'unless Germany can make a successful invasion of 96 Britain' Japan would not dare risk an affront with Britain. In July 1941 he felt that 'As for a Japanese attack on Singapore, he did not believe anything 97 of the sort was contemplated'. To a worried Mackenzie King he said: 'I 98 don't believe the Japanese will fight the U.S. and Great Britain'.

Mackenzie King did not share Churchill's view and when in August 1941 the latter told him that 'if Japan attacks the U.S. she will have to fight Britain' he recorded that I felt a little concern about this remark. ...I continued to tell Churchill and mentioned it again to Mrs. Churchill that while the President, Stimson, Knox, and Hull were all ready and anxious for the U.S. to go into the war, not to believe that that was' the wish of the American people. That they were wishing to keep out. That, as regards Japan, I felt they would wish to stay out there as

93 well gg.that Britain would have to do a lot of fighting herself first.

This was the situation when Britain, in an attempt to stage a show of

Empire solidarity, asked Canada on 19 September 1941 to provide troops for the defence of Hong Kong. The request was significant, not least because it reflected a certain amount of that British complacency towards Japan that we have seen:

Our defences in Malaya have been improved and there have been signs of a certain weakening in Japanese attitude towards us and the United States. In these circumstances it is thought that a small reinforcement of garrison at Hong Kong, e.g. by one or two more battalions, would be very fully justified. It would increase strength of garrison out of all proportion to actual numbers involved, and it would provide a strong stimulus to garrison and Colony; it would further have a very great moral effect in the whole of the Far East and would reassur^Chiang Kai-shek as to reality of our intention to hold the island.

The War Committee approved this request on 2 October 1941 and on 27

October nearly 2,000 Canadian soldiers sailed for Hong Kong. They landed on 16 November and met with a grisly fate less than one month later.

The government's decision to send troops to Hong Kong raises some important questions, not the least of which is: why did they comply with the request? There is no evidence to show that Mackenzie King opposed it. One

Minister later said that 'It struck me as being the only thing to do...'.101

Certainly there was a belief that Japan would not attack Hong Kong. The

British War Office told Ottawa on 26 October that 'consensus opinion (is) that 102 war in Far East unlikely at present'. The Far East Combined Intelligence Bureau felt that the airbase at Kowloon Bay was safe from attack because

Japanese pilots had bad eyesight and were unable to conduct low-level 103 bombing missions. This attitude existed amongst the soldiers themselves.

One Canadian soldier, for example, after stepping off the ship when it arrived at Hong Kong, said: 'When do we get to grips with the Coddamed 104 little yellow bastards'.

94 But Mackenzie King does not appear to have shared these views. In fact, what is more striking is that he held a very realistic view of the

Japanese ability to wage war. Yet he was willing to allow troops to be sent to Hong Kong, which was to be defended only for reasons of 'prestige1, while he had adamantly refused not three months earlier to see Canadian troops 105 sent to Egypt (for what he termed 'spectacular purposes'). The Prime

Minister was obviously motivated by deeper feelings - feelings that ran completely counter to a policy he had held to for twenty years, that is, not to be drawn into Imperial commitments. But now it was different. Britain stood alone in Europe and was facing the prospect of standing alone in the

Far East. In Mackenzie King's mind the call of Empire was too strong to overcome. Thus it appears that this was one of those rare moments when he allowed his emotions to overcome his political acumen and allowed Canada to stand at Britain's side.

It was a moment that Mackenzie King lived to regret. The Hong Kong tragedy brought a great deal of criticism upon the government. But even if viewed in retrospect the decision to stand by Britain and stage a show of

Empire solidarity was better than doing nothing at all. As late as 30

November it was not clear what the United States would do. Although he continued to warn Britain to stay out or 'they will be risking the Empire', he was angered at the American attitude. 'The U.S.', he wrote, 'have been scrupulously careful to make no commitments. I have said all along that they would be prepared to let Britain begin hostilities but Heaven knows when

Congress, if at all, would consent to the U.S. going into the war'.106

Churchill, too, was beginning to have doubts about the United States. He felt uneasy enough to warn his Cabinet, the Chiefs of Staff and senior

Australian officials on 1 December 1941 that 'he did not share the view of the

Australian Government that the outbreak of Anglo-Japanese hostilities would precipitate the American entry into the war'.107

95 It was on that same day, however, that the moment Mackenzie King both wished for and dreaded arrived when Roosevelt 'threw in an aside' and told

Halifax, now the British Ambassador to Washington, 'that in the case of direct attack on ourselves or the Dutch, we should obviously all be together'.

'Waiting for F.D.R.' was now at an end. The Japanese made sure of that on 7 December 1941. The attack upon Pearl Harbour did solve a number of difficult problems at the right time; Mackenzie King's, however, were just about to begin.

96 Chapter Four: Aftermath and Conclusion

Mackenzie King's Pacific Dilemma

The Aftermath

The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour transformed the European war into a global conflict. With the American entry into the war Canada was almost overnight reduced from Britain's number one ranked ally to a mere appendage; and almost overnight the United States began to show signs of doing what Canadian officials had feared since 1936: using the threat of a

Japanese attack upon North America as a pretext to move arms and men into

Canada in order to protect its own security.

These developments were both welcomed and dreaded by Mackenzie King and his closest advisors. On the one hand Mackenzie King was much relieved that the United States had finally entered the war. American military power was now committed to help the allies win the war. This would reduce

Canada's responsibility - which was fast approaching a state that the government could not hope to meet - and it might bury for good the question of conscription of men for overseas service. Men were now needed for local defence, particularly for the defence of the West Coast and Canada could not provide enough troops to meet both contingencies at once.1 In addition to this was the immense relief that the British Empire would be saved.

On the other hand, Mackenzie King and others viewed with considerable alarm the implications of an American entry into the war and especially a

Pacific war. Fears of American penetration of Canada became greatly heightened in the aftermath of Pearl Harbour. The influx of American capital, American military personnel, and later American arrogance against the background of a rapidly declining Britain gave vent to a strong belief that the aim of American foreign policy was to destroy the British Empire and

97 assume control of Canada. This belief, moreover, was only strengthened by

Roosevelt's own curious approach to foreign policy and by his failure to make

American motives and American intentions in Canada clear. Mackenzie King's actions were made difficult by his inability to gauge what the United States would ultimately do.

The Canadian government was by no means the only one to express these beliefs. Similar feelings were beginning to issue forth from the British

Embassy in Washington even before Pearl Harbour. Sir Ronald Campbell, for example. Minister in the Washington Embassy, observed in August 1941 that

'the British Commonwealth will be much exhausted by the war and deeply indebted to the United States, who are likely to be at the height of their mobilised strength'. Campbell noted that American awareness of this was leading to 'a continuing, though vague, desire (or assumption of destiny) to inherit the influence and power of Great Britain and the Commonwealth'.

Although he did not think that the United States government wished to pursue such a policy, he felt that British 'vigilance must be unceasing to 2 forestall the emergence of any such desire'. The Canadian government, too, sought to defend against this trend; first by stationing troops on the West

Coast and later by appointing a Special Commissioner for defence projects in the Northwest to oversee American activity.

It is very important to bear in mind that during the initial stages of the

American entry into the war it was not clear where the United States would deploy its yet to be developed military power. Even after Germany and Italy declared war on the United States on 11 December (thus saving Roosevelt from the embarrassing task of trying to convince Congress to declare war upon Germany and Italy first) Roosevelt still had to contend with the powerful 'Pacific First' group. This group, which found an able spokesperson in Pearl S. Buck, wanted American might to be put into the

Pacific theatre in order to redress the humiliation suffered at Pearl Harbour. 98 It was therefore not inconceivable that the United States might go with

an all-out effort in the Pacific and this was bound, it seemed, to sooner or

later, bring some form of Japanese retaliation upon North America. Canada

was particularly affected by this because she presented an easy target.

Mackenzie King was well aware of the American attitude and the implication it

held for Canada. On 10 December 1941 he recorded in his diary, after the

Cabinet discussed the question of Canada's defence, that

...Ralston sticks to the idea that men are not needed for local defence. I cannot see that, in the light of what may happen on either coast. ...It is conceivable that if Germany, as she may, gains an increasing control of the sea, now that America will be using the fleet to meet her own situation, that the source of convoys ...will become the target of Nazi attacks. Jhe Japs (sic), too, will, I believe, make some landing on our coast.

Of course such an attack never materialized, except when a Japanese

submarine shelled the lighthouse at Estevan point on the west coast of

Vancouver Island on 20 June 1942 and the ill-fated attempt to burn down

British Columbia's forests by sending over balloons loaded with fire bombs.

Nevertheless, there is some evidence to suggest that the Japanese were

expressing a great deal of interest in Canada's West Coast even before Pearl

Harbour. Vincent Massey, Canada's High Commissioner in London, who had

constantly downplayed the threat Japan presented, cabled Mackenzie King on

28 February 1941 that 'Reliable information of a very secret character

indicates that in official Japanese circles considerable interest is being taken

in the position of western coast of Canada'. Massey also noted that his

source made reference 'to large number of Japanese settled in British

Columbia and on western coast of United States, who are all said to have 5

their duties'. It is difficult to say where Massey obtained this information.

There is the possibility that the United States may have passed on to London a 'Magic' telegram that was intercepted on 15 February 1941 (although there

is no evidence to show that the Canadian government was privy to the actual existence of 'Magic') and London may have given Massey a hint about its 99 contents. The telegram, which originated with the Japanese Foreign Minister, instructed the Japanese Counsul at Vancouver to pay particular attention to

'paragraph 10' of a general directive for intelligence gathering. The general directive is interesting and worth quoting at length:

From: Tokyo (Matsuoka) February 15, 1941 To: Washington (Koshi)

The information we particularly desire with regard to intelligence involving U.S. and Canada, are the following: 1. Strengthening or supplementing of military preparations on the Pacific Coast and the Hawaii area; amount and type of stores and supplies; alterations to air ports (also carefully note the clipper traffic). 2. Ship and plane movements (particularly of the large bombers and sea planes). 3. Whether or not merchant vessels are being requisitioned by the government (also note any deviations from regular schedules), and whether any remodelling is being done to them. 4. Calling up of army and navy personnel, their training, (outlook on maneuvers) and movements. 5. Words and acts of minor army and navy personnel. 6. Outlook of drafting men from the view-point of race. Particularly, whether Negroes are being drafted, and if so, under what conditions. 7. Personnel being graduated and enrolled in the army and navy and aviation service schools. 8. Whether or not any troops are being dispatched to the South Pacific by transports; if there are such instances, give description. 9. Outlook of the developments in the expansion of arms and the production set-up; the capacity of airplane production; increase in the ranks of labor. 10. General outlooks on Alaska and the Aleutian Islands, with particular stress on items involving plane movements and shipment of military supplies to those localities. 11. Outlook on U.S. defence set-ups. 12. Contacts (including plane connections) with Central and South America and the South Pacific area. Also outlook on shipment of military supplies to those areas. Please forward copies of this message as a "Minister's Instruction" to New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle, Portland, (Chicago or New Orleans?) Vancouver, Ottawa, and Honolulu. Also to Mexico City and Panama as reference material.

In addition to this Tokyo wanted to stress that 'We have decided to de-emphasize our propaganda work and strengthen our intelligence work in g the U.S.'. All of this suggested that Japan may have been planning to conduct raids along the North American coastline.

100 It was probably the evidence contained in these 'Magic' telegrams that prompted the United States War Department to send a 'Triple Priority1 message to the American Minister in Canada on 9 December 1941 instructing him to request permission to install aeroplane detector equipment on the 9

British Columbia Coast. The swiftness and high-priority status of the request caught the government off guard. Norman Robertson, who replaced the deceased O.D. Skelton as Under-Secretary of State for External Affairs, immediately penned a memorandum to Mackenzie King recommending that

Canada accede to the request but to make certain that Canada retained ownership of the facilities.10 Hugh Keenleyside, now Assistant

Under-Secretary of State for External Affairs, was not altogether pleased with the way the United States made the approach. 'With regard to the point that the Americans had merely asked "informally" for an immediate approval "in principle", and did not expect an official reply with conditions attached', he wrote to Robertson, '...was contrary to the established basis of cooperation 11 between the armed forces of the two countries'.

So it was. Robertson's and Keenleyside's early apprehensions, moreover, were only to grow. Towards the end of December the already increasing American activity and change in attitude towards Canada led both officials to express a great deal of concern. 'In recent years Canadians have tended to take it for granted', Robertson wrote to Mackenzie King on 22

December 1941, 'that the United States will continue to follow a friendly, cooperative and unassuming policy toward Canada'. Robertson felt that there was nothing wrong with this assumption but he noted that Canadian-American relations were in a state of transition which 'has been rather abrupt and not too tactfully handled'. Indeed, Robertson observed that there was in the

United States a 'new awareness of the implications of its position as a great world power' and he could

101 ...see the United States turning everywhere to more direct and forceful! methods of exerting its influence. The men charged with the conduct of America's foreign policies took over from the other democratic countries the handling of all negotiations with Japan. They are now assuming a parallel responsibility for our collective relations with Vichy. ...These facts are bringing home to Americans a new appreciation of the enormous strategic importance and strength of the United States. They are showing a new sense of their "manifest destiny" and a corresponding disposition to take decisions and accept responsibilities. This change of attitude is very encouraging from the standpoint of the world in general, but it does imply quite an important modification of the special relationship in which Canada has hitherto stood with regard to the United States.

Robertson wanted Canada to have stronger representation in Washington by having the Legation elevated to the status of an Embassy. In addition to this he wished to see the (future) Canadian Ambassador in Washington be made a 1 3 member of the British Cabinet War Committee.

Even more disturbing rumblings were coming from Hugh Keenleyside. In a memorandum dated 27 December 1941 he listed eleven different instances that did not spell a bright future for Canada. Topping the list was a

Fortune poll that stated '71% of Americans "in all groups, all classes, all districts" today display an "unblushingly imperialist attitude" in regard to the objectives of United States foreign policy'. He was disturbed about the attitude Americans were displaying towards Canadian officials who visited

Washington. 'They were ready for Canadian "cooperation"', wrote

Keenleyside, 'so long as that meant that Canada would follow the American lead and subordinate the policies of Ottawa to those of Washington'. In addition to this was the 'coldness' with which United States officials turned the proposed establishment of a Canadian military mission in Washington aside; the attempts 'to take advantage of the popular apprehension for the purpose of forcing Canada to agree to the extension of American command over

Canadian forces'; and Washington's unwillingness 'to consult us or even 14 inform us in advance on matters of mutual concern'. Keenleyside saw in all of this a 102 ...tendency to ignore us - which is in startling contrast to our punctilious care to keep the United States informed ...(and) may have very great and damaging results for us if it is extended into those new fields of political and strategic cooperation and consultation which are now to ^e developed following the entry of the United States into the war.

Thus, even before the United States had been at war for a month,

Canadian fears held since 1936 now had an element of awesome reality attached.

Imagine, then, what Canadian officials thought when the United States approached Canada on 2 January 1942 with a plan to put Canadian ground and air forces in the western theatre under the command of an American 1 g

General. It is interesting to note that the request made no mention of the navy (in fact, one Canadian official minuted: 'why no navy1).17 It would appear that the decision made during the 1938 Ingersoll mission still stood.

The Canadian General Staff vehemently objected to the idea. On 16

January Maurice Pope, the Vice-Chief of the General Staff, wrote to his

Chief, Kenneth Stuart that the request for a unified Pacific command was 'not 1 g logical' and could not be admitted by the Canadian Services. What puzzled

Pope, however, was the fact that although the United States was quite specific in stating what it wished Canada to agree to, Washington was 'extremely vague in stating the premise on which ...(the) demand is 1 9 based'. Pope felt that the Japanese would conduct no more than

'hit-and-run' raids on the West Coast and even if a landing was attempted

Canada was in a position to handle this. Therefore, until the United States made its position clear, Canada would maintain control of its own defence 20 system.

This 'request' was no sooner turned down when the War Cabinet learned on 12 February that the United States was about to make yet another request for permission to have United States Army engineers begin a survey for the 21 purpose of constructing the Alaskan highway103 . The general reaction to this request was mixed. The Chiefs of Staff continued to argue that the Alaskan highway should not be constructed. CD. Howe, the Minister of Munitions and Supply, on the other hand, favoured agreeing to the request on the grounds that a survey would not commit Canada to actual construction.

This was wishful thinking on Howe's part because Roosevelt had already, on 11 February, allocated $10 million to the survey. The President, in fact, considered the construction of the highway a foregone conclusion - and he 23 was to get his way. But it was not to be without some second thoughts on

Canada's part. Hugh Keenleyside, for example, who previously advocated that the highway be built, was by early March expressing a different view.

'I do not like the idea of Canada', he wrote to Robertson, 'allowing the

United States to construct a highway on Canadian territory (thereby acquiring a moral if not a legal right to its continued use, at will, in peace or war)'.

Keenleyside was not far off the mark. At the twenty-sixth meeting of the Permanent Joint Board of Defence on 25 and 26 February 1942 the United

States presented the following conditions to Canada should the Alaska highway be built: (A) To acquire rights-of-way for the road in Canada, the title to remain in the Crown; in the right of Canada or of the Province of British Columbia as appears most convenient; (B) To waive import duties, transit or similar charges on shipments originating in the United States and transported over the highway to Alaska, or originating in Alaska and transported over the highway to the United States; (C) To waive import duties, sales taxes, license fees or other similar charges on all equipment and supplies to be used in the construction or maintenance of the road and on personal effects of the construction personnel; (D) To take the necessary steps to facilitate the admission into Canada of such United States citizens as may be employed in the construction or maintenance of the highway, it being understood that the United States will assume the expense of repatriating any such persons if the contractors fail to do so.

These demands were perhaps to be expected. After all, the United

States was taking on a project that would cost some $80 million.

104 Nevertheless, the conditions did imply a measure of United States control over a piece of Canadian territory and Mackenzie King did not view complacently the consequences that could arise. In late March 1942, after the War Cabinet 2 6 had approved the highway , Mackenzie King told Malcolm MacDonald, the

High Commissioner, that the Alaskan highway 'was less intended for protection against the Japanese than as one of the fingers of the hand which 27

America is placing more or less over the whole of the Western hemisphere'.

To his diary he confided that 'it was not without some concern that ...I viewed the Alaska Highway and some other things growing out of the war

...( it) was clear to my mind that America has had as her policy, a western hemisphere control which would mean hemispheric immunity ...from future 28 wars but increasing political control by U.S.'.

Mackenzie King's fears were further substantiated when Hume Wrong, now Canada's Minister in Washington, informed Ottawa about a point Roosevelt raised at the first meeting of the Pacific Council on 1 April 1942. Wrong reported that Roosevelt was not happy about Canada's present contribution on 29 the Pacific Coast and felt that more should be done. The President's

'request' may have been an innocent one, but it nevertheless implied a threat, namely, that if Canada did not pull its weight the United States would do it for her (in addition to this Roosevelt wanted Canada to contribute troops for the defence of Alaska - under whose authority the present writer does not know).

The matter was taken up by Robertson. On 6 April he wrote to

Mackenzie King that ...there is, I think, a great deal to be said for having some Canadian troops somewhere assuming a direct and public responsibility for the defence of some portion of United States territory. It is probably true, as General Pope reports, that the United States War Department would not be very happy about the despatch of Canadian troops to Alaska, but with United States troops now stationed at the Canadian Soo, northern British Columbia and the Yukon, it would help to balance things a little if

105 we were taking a direct and visabje share in the defence of some portion of United States territory.

This memorandum seems to suggest that the government's decision to station

more troops on Canada's West Coast was made partly as a result of American

pressure and partly because of a desire to offset the growing American

presence in that theatre. It does not appear, as CP. Stacey contends, that the government bowed to political pressure and war hysteria from the 31 Province of British Columbia.

Nevertheless, the government's actions did not produce the desired effect. By 1943 the United States had some 33,000 army and civilian personnel in the Canadian Northwest. Moreover, access to parts of the 32 territory was in fact forbidden to Canadians. Mackenzie King's attention was brought to this dismal state of affairs by the British High Commissioner,

Malcolm MacDonald, in late March 1943.

MacDonald had visited the Canadian Northwest on two occasions (what prompted him to go there is a mystery to the present writer). It is, however, interesting to note that Mackenzie King did not view this as an example of British intrusion. In fact, he invited MacDonald to speak to the

War Cabinet on 31 March - an example of the Prime Minister's growing friendliness towards the British. What MacDonald told the War Cabinet greatly disturbed Mackenzie King. 'The extensive nature of the programme of development being carried on by Americans', said MacDonald, "...could not be appreciated without actual experience. It was quite evident that these vast undertakings were being planned and carried out with a view to the post-war 33 situation". MacDonald went on to spell this out in a lengthy personal memorandum to Mackenzie King on 6 April:

...In theory the Canadian and American Governments are co-operating as equal partners in the work. But in practice the American authorities have gained increasing control of what is done, how it is done and where it is done, whilst the Canadian authorities' influence on events is comparatively small.

106 ...It is perhaps easy to overstate the danger of so much initiative and decision belonging to our American allies. Admittedly it is highly important from the point of view of the vigorous prosecution of the war that these roads and air routes should be built forthwith, and they will in any case be of immense value to Canada after the war. But it is surely unfortunate that the Canadian authorities have little real say as to, for example, the exact placing of these airfields and the exact route of these roads on Canadian soil. The Americans decide these things according to what they consider American interests. They pay no particular heed to this or that Canadian national or local interest. This aspect of the matter assumes even greater importance when one realises fully the considerations which the American Army, and the other American interests working with them, have in mind in all their efforts in the North-West. Responsible American officers will tell you frankly in confidence that in addition to building works to be of value in this war, they are designing those works also to be of particular value for (a) commercial aviation and transport after the war and (b) waging war against the Russians in the next world crisis.

MacDonald went on to note that because the Americans had spent an enormous amount of money in the Northwest, he could easily 'imagine some of these people stirring up quite an unpleasant agitation in Congress circles to force the hands of the Administration' to retain some control after the war. All of this contained ominous implications, especially

...the political effect in Western Canada. ...Wherever you travel north of Edmonton there are large numbers of American military officers, troops and airmen and civilian workmen and representatives of American business and finance. Everywhere these Americans are talking eagerly about the development of the North-West, and their words are being translated into deeds. The American Army calls itself "the Army of Occupation".

This was disturbing enough, but the High Commissioner warned that there was a growing realization on the part of Western Canadians that it was the

Americans who were opening up the Canadian Northwest. 'This state of affairs', MacDonald felt, 'tends to play into the hands of those Western

Canadians who are inclined to assert that the West receives little sympathy and help from Eastern Canada, and that its destiny lies in incorporation with 34 the United States of America'.

Mackenzie King was greatly perturbed by MacDonald's report on the situation in the Northwest. It further confirmed the notion he held with

107 growing conviction since December 1942, namely, that 'efforts ...would be made by the Americans to control developments in our country after the war, and to bring Canada out of the orbit of the British Commonwealth of Nations 35 into their own orbit. I am strongly opposed to anything of the kind1. The

War Cabinet was therefore quick to adopt MacDonald's recommendation that a

Special Commissioner be appointed to oversee American activity in the 36 Canadian Northwest. On 6 May 1943 an Order in Council was brought down appointing Brigadier W.W. Foster as Special Commissioner for Defence Projects 37 in Northwest Canada. Foster, who was shortly promoted to the rank of

Major General, was chosen for several reasons. He was a soldier of distinguished record, a former Deputy Minister of Public Works of British

Columbia and a construction engineer. Mackenzie King felt that he was 'well 38 qualified to handle the various problems that may arise'.

Foster was indeed a good man for the job, but his appointment came too late to reverse the tide of American activity. Indeed, by the end of 1943 the situation had grown acute enough to force Hugh Keenleyside to write that Until comparatively recently the United States authorities have been careful in every case to indicate that they were interested in these facilities (the Alaska highway, etc.) only from the point of view of their wartime value. They made no claims to any post-war title in or usufruct from the construction for which they were paying except that, as in the case of Canol, they hoped to recover the then commercial value when the facility was disposed of after the war. There was no indication of any desire to obtain any continuing right or any special favour or concession.

But, continued Keenleyside, as a result of the general military situation swinging in favour of the Allies, the United States 'have begun to think in terms of post-war advantage'. He could clearly discern 'a popular feeling in the United States that the Administration will be failing in its duty if it does not provide now for the acquisition of post-war profit from wartime expenditure in foreign countries'. In fact, wrote a worried Keenleyside: 'So strong has this feeling become that efforts are now being initiated to arrange

108 for the renegotiation of certain international agreements relating to the 39 post-war disposition of such defence projects'.

Keenleyside had little to offer in the way of policy recommendation other than to have Canada somehow reduce the importance of the defence facilities.

But this was akin to making candy look unattractive to a child - and there was certainly a tone expressed in Keenleyside's observations that suggested that Canada was really at the mercy of Washington.

By this time, of course, the United States was beginning to take a commanding lead in the prosecution of the war. More alarming yet was the way in which Roosevelt appeared to be handling the situation. The United

States was more and more displaying an expansionist attitude that, coupled with a hint of megalomania in Roosevelt's own manner, both worried and offended Canadians and British alike. To cite but two examples. Hugh

Dalton, as President of the Board of Trade, wrote in his diary, in May 1942: ...They (the Americans) are treating us like a poor dependency. Lyttelton has gone to Washington because F.D.R. summoned him. He is now sending for Leathers and Bevin. It is as though we were all his servants. The P.M. has always gone in for appeasing the Americans, letting them have whatever they like. S(tafford) C(ripps) thinks tb^at he ought to go over to Washington and say, "This must stop".

None of this was lost on Mackenzie King. When Roosevelt arrived in Canada for the Second Quebec Conference his attitude was so cavalier that Mackenzie

King noted in his diary: 'It seemed to me that the President was rather 41 assuming that he was in his own country'. Even more alarming was the deteriorating state of the British Empire and

Anglo-American relations. Anglo-American relations, in fact, were so low at one point nearing the end of the war that Roosevelt regarded Britain as a greater menace than the Soviet Union. Churchill, especially, was viewed as a clever schemer trying to divert American attention away from Germany 42 towards Russia. There is also some evidence to suggest that Roosevelt may indeed have been attempting to hasten Britain's decline and particularly in 109 relation to the Far East where he continually opposed British Commonwealth

strategic moves which seemed designed solely to resurrect the former glory of 43 the British Empire. Moreover, as the Pacific war progressed it only became more apparent that Britain and the United States could not and were not

likely to agree on a common policy for the post-war era. Britain's desire to

cobble together the remnants of her nearly vanished Empire ran counter to

American suspicions (and denunciation) of Britain's Imperial role in the 44

post-war world.

Given these circumstances - a rising United States pursuing a more

aggressive and expansionist policy, a declining Britain on its way to second

or even third rate status against a background of mounting tension in

Anglo-American relations - it is no wonder that Mackenzie King feared for

Canada's future. 'With the United States so powerful', he told his Cabinet in

February 1944, 'and her investments becoming greater in Canada we will have 45

a great difficulty to hold our own against pressure from the United States'.

Later he began to feel that 'It might be inevitable for us to have to submit to

it (annexation) - being so few in numbers and no longer able to look to 46 British power for protection'.

This, then, was Mackenzie King's dilemma. But the events of the Pacific war and the vast expansion of United States power and influence even into the heartland of Asia and China and the vastly increased American presence

in the Canadian Northwest introduced a new and heightened threat to

Canadian sovereignty. It was, moreover, very much a Pacific dilemma, as opposed to a European dilemma, because Canada was caught in the grip of a great power struggle for the control of an area that many, especially in the

United States, regarded as the key to future development. Pearl Buck spoke for a great many Americans when she said in 1942 that 'if the American way 47 of life is to prevail in the world it must prevail in Asia'.

110 The establishment of a Pax Americana in the Pacific was therefore a

critical factor in Canadian foreign policy. Whether or not the Canadian government could have done more than it did to offset the growing American

presence in the Canadian Northwest is certainly a debatable point. But here too Canada's freedom of action was limited - indeed defined - by the

parameters set by the United States itself.

Conclusion

The central theme of this study has been the plight of the small power entrapped in a power struggle between large powers. In this case it has been Canada enmeshed in a three way struggle that included Britain and the

United States on the one hand and Japan on the other. An attempt has been made to approach the subject by utilizing, in so far as it has been possible, a contextual analysis. In other words, the present author contends that outside influences and circumstances affected the formulation of Canadian foreign policy as much as the domestic scene did. This implies, of course, that in addition to the concern for national unity and the link with Britain

(which form the fundamental framework for the textual approach) there were other concerns and that if one looks to the Far East they begin to assert themselves.

What this means, and this study has attempted to demonstrate it, is that when the influence of the Far East is brought into the general study of

Canadian foreign policy during the years 1937-1941 certain assumptions that have long been held incontrovertible would seem to require modification. This study has concentrated on basically two of those assumptions: the first being the decision to arm the West Coast of Canada and the second focusing on

Mackenzie King's growing fear of United States penetration into Canada.

111 As we saw in the introduction, the Canadian government's decision to give the West Coast defence priority status from 1937-1939 and the decision to station more troops there after Pearl Harbour has generally been explained in one of two ways. In the first way, historians take the view that since no

Japanese attack upon Canada ever occurred, the government's decision was made as a result of political pressure and war hysteria from the West. The second argument generally attempts to show that the government was entirely justified in providing for the contingency of such an attack, even if it never materialized.

This study has attempted to demonstrate that many leading government officials, including the Prime Minister, feared that such an attack was possible and that in the period after 1939 there was some evidence to show that their fears may have been justified - what could have happened if the battle of Midway had gone the other way is a matter of pure speculation of course, but Japan may have attempted an attack on the mainland of Alaska if not on the West Coast of Canada. Nevertheless, it would appear that the overriding concern was not whether Japan would attack, but what the United

States would do in the event of an all-out Pacific war. It would seem that the government believed the United States would move into Canada in order to protect its own security - which, of course, is precisely what did happen in the aftermath to Pearl Harbour and the government sought to offset the

American presence by stationing still more troops in the West.

Mackenzie King's concern over the question of Pacific Coast defence is intimately tied to his growing suspicion of American intentions in Canada.

Indeed, it is almost impossible to separate the two issues. But it was in the aftermath of Pearl Harbour, as this study has attempted to show, that his earlier suspicions developed to an extent that historians have found hard to believe. Again, however, when viewed in the context of the war with Japan

Mackenzie King's fears are not to be simply brushed aside as examples of

112 'irrational paranoia'. United States policy in the Far East was, as

Christopher Thorne has so rightly pointed out, expansionist, imperialistic and

Empire 'hungry', albeit all suitably clothed in terms of international good-will.

Moreover, as the post-war years were to show, the erection of an American

Empire and strategic consequences of relations with China, Korea and Vietnam

were to pose political and moral dilemmas for Canadian policy makers which

would enormously complicate their attitude to their much more powerful and

aggressive southern neighbour.

The rise of the United States took place against a background of a

rapidly declining Britain. All of the rhetoric about Britain's 'Finest Hour'

and Churchill's insistence that if the United States gave Britain the tools she

would finish the job could not hide the fact that Britain's day was done.

In Mackenzie King's mind, as this study has attempted to demonstrate,

this state of affairs carried two very ominous implications. First, Canada

could no longer rely on Britain to function as a counterweight to the United

States. And second, as a result of this, Canada would be unable to

effectively check the growing American penetration into Canada. This

American presence, moreover, although initially economic in character, would,

in the Prime Minister's view, soon result in social and even political dominance over the northern Dominion.

All in all it must have been a melancholy experience for a man to have

fought so hard for Canadian autonomy and a separate voice for Canada in world affairs to see it ebbed away in a post-war international order that was

largely shaped without his influence. But then that is another story. All that has been attempted here is a better understanding of a period in

Canadian history from a perspective which has so far been overlooked and

perhaps even misunderstood.

113 Notes to Introduction

See especially Nicholas Mansergh, Survey of British Commonwealth Affairs:

Problems of External Policy, 1931-1939 (London, 1952); and H. Blair Neatby,

'Mackenzie King and National Unity1, in H.L. Dyck and H.S. Krosby, eds..

Empire and Nations (Toronto, 1969), pp. 54-70. 2 This theme is developed more fully in CP. Stacey, Canada and the Age of

Conflict, Volume 2: 1921-1948, the Mackenzie King Era (Toronto, 1981). 3 See H. Blair Neatby, William Lyon Mackenzie King, Volume 3: The Prism of

Unity, 1932-1939 (Toronto, 1976). H

Canada, House of Commons Debates, 1939, vol. 3, p. 2419.

5 A.P. Thornton, The Imperial Idea and its Enemies (London, 1959), p. 253.

See J.L. Granatstein, Broken Promises: A History of Conscription in

Canada (Toronto, 1977). 7 See James Eayrs, In Defence of Canada, Volume 1: From the Great War to

The Great Depression (Toronto, 1964); and CP. Glazebrook, A History of

Canadian External Relations, vol. 2 (Toronto, 1966; hereafter, Glazebrook). g

The critics include H. Ferns and B. Ostry, The Age of Mackenzie King

(Toronto, 1976); Donald Creighton, Canada's First Century (Toronto, 1970) and his The Forked Road: Canada, 1939-1957 (Toronto, 1976). For examples of defence see Bruce Hutchison, The Incredible Canadian: A Candid Portrait of Mackenzie King (Toronto, 1952); F.H. Underhill, In Search of Canadian Liberalism (Toronto, 1960); and Neatby, The Prism of Unity, g

Quoted in Christopher Thorne, Allies of a Kind: The United States,

Britain, and the War against Japan, 1941-1945 (London, 1978; hereafter,

Thorne, Allies), p. 20; and see also S.W. Roskill, Naval Policy Between the

Wars, Volume 1 (London, 1968).

10 That the United States was a colonial power is, in the view of this writer, effectively demonstrated by William Appleman Williams, The Tragedy of 114 American Diplomacy (New York, 1972) and his Empire as a Way of Life

(London, 1980) and by Thorne, Allies, see esp. chapter one. 11

See Documents on Canadian External Relations, vol. 6, 1936-1939 (Ottawa,

1972; hereafter cited as DCER: 6), esp. chapter one for the sometimes

amusing but usually agonizing battle Canada fought in order to secure independent councils. 1 2

James Eayrs, In Defence of Canada, Volume 2: Appeasement and

Rearmament (Toronto, 1965; hereafter, Eayrs, Defence), p. 4; CP. Stacey,

Arms, Men and Governments: The War Policies of Canada, 1939-1945 (Ottawa,

1970; hereafter, Stacey, Arms), p. 2; and F.H. Soward, et. al., Canada in

World Affairs, Volume 1: The Pre-War Years (Toronto, 1941), pp. 21, 28, 30. 13

For a.scathing attack on this policy see K.W. McNaught, 'Canadian Foreign

Policy and the Whig Interpretation: 1936-1939', Canadian Historical

Association Report (1957), pp. 43-54. McNaught did not have access to

Mackenzie King's private papers or to other important documents now available to scholars. He therefore failed to see that this policy was only one side of Mackenzie King's double edged axe. 14 See J.B. Brebner, North Atlantic Triangle (Toronto, 1966). 15 J.L. Granatstein, 'Getting on With the Americans: Changing Canadian Perceptions of the United States, 1939-1945', The Canadian Review of American Studies, V (Spring, 1974), p. 3. 16 See Bradford Lee, Britain and the Sino-Japanese War, 1937-1939 (Oxford, 1973; hereafter, Lee), p. 216ff; and CA. MacDonald, The United States,

Britain and Appeasement, 1936-1939 (London, 1981; hereafter, MacDonald), pp. 106-24.

17 Lee, p. 217. 1 8

Charles J. Woodsworth, Canada and the Orient (Toronto, 1941), pp. 28,

285-6. 115 19 Quoted in Brebner, North Atlantic Triangle, p. 315. 20 Stacey, Arms, pp. 3, 47-8. 21 Eayrs, Defence, see pp. 175-78. 22 T. Murray Hunter, 'Coast Defence in British Columbia, 1939-1941: Attitudes and Realities', B.C. Studies, 28 (Winter, 1975-76), pp. 3-28. 23 Mansergh, Survey of British Commonwealth Affairs, p. 95ff. 24 Thorne, Allies, p. 44-5.

25 J.W. Pickersgill, The Mackenzie King Record, Volume 1: 1939-1944,

(Toronto, 1960; hereafter cited as MKR), pp. 219-21. 26 See Thorne, Allies, esp. chapter one; and Peter Lowe, Great Britain and the Origins of the Pacific War (Oxford, 1977; hereafter, Lowe, Origins). 27 In particular see Stacey, Arms, pp. 46-8. 2 8 Quoted in CP. Stacey, Mackenzie King and the Atlantic Triangle (Toronto, 1976; hereafter, Stacey, King), p. 49. 29 Quoted in Ibid., p. 61. 30 See above, note 20. 31 R.J. Brown, 'Emergence From Isolation: United States-Canadian Diplomatic Relations, 1937-1941' (Unpublished Ph.D. Thesis, Syracuse University, 1968; hereafter. Brown, 'Emergence'), p. 305. 32 Quoted in Stacey, King, p. 52-3. 33 Public Archives of Canada, W.L. Mackenzie King Papers, Diary, 21 November 1941 (hereafter. King Diary). 34 Quoted in J.L. Granatstein, Canada's War: The Politics of the Mackenzie King Government, 1939-1945 (Toronto, 1975; hereafter, Granatstein, Canada's

War), p. 318. 35

For a wide ranging discussion of this aspect see H. Blair Neatby,

'Mackenzie King and the Historians', in John English and J.O. Stubbs, eds.,

Mackenzie King: Widening the Debate (Toronto, 1977), pp. 1-14; and for the

'into the arms of the United States' theme see D.C Creighton, 'The Decline 116 and Fall of the Empire of the St. Lawrence', Canadian Historical Association

Annual Report (1969), pp. 14-25; and for the 'wrecker of the Empire' theme see C. Barnett, The Collapse of British Power (London, 1972). 36 Stacey, King, p. 65ff; and see also CP. Stacey, A Very Double Life (Toronto, 1976), in passim for the so-called 'good-luck' thesis. 37 See Thorne, Allies, p. 107. 38

D.C Creighton, The Empire of the St. Lawrence (Toronto, 1936); and for a brief assessment of the impact of Creighton's work see Carl Berger, The

Writing of Canadian History (Toronto, 1976), esp. chapter nine.

117 Notes to Chapter One

I A.R.M. Lower, Canada and the Far East - 1940 (New York, 1940), p. 9. 2 See Williams, The Tragedy of American Diplomacy for growing American presence in the Far East; and Thorne, Allies, p. 19. 3 Quoted in Clazebrook, p. 53-4. 4

Quoted in Barnett, The Collapse of British Power, p. 264.

5 Quoted in Clazebrook, p. 59.

J.B. Brebner, 'Canada, the Anglo-Japanese Alliance, and the Washington

Conference', Political Science Quarterly, 50 (1935), p. 48; and see

Clazebrook, p. 59. 7 Thorne, Allies, p. 20. g See Ian Nish, Alliance in Decline (London, 1972), esp. p. 365 - Curzon, for example, wrote of the termination of the alliance in 1921: '...we shall certainly be left worse off than before'; and see also Lee, p. 3. 9

Quoted in Michael G. Fry, 'The Development of Canada's Relation with

Japan, 1919-1947', in Keith Hay, ed., Canadian Perspectives on Economic

Relations with Japan (Montreal, 1980; hereafter. Fry), p. 23.

10 Quoted in James Eayrs, 'The Roots of Irritation', in Peter Lyon, ed.,

Britain and Canada: Survey of a Changing Relationship (London, 1976), p.

43.

II Quoted in Ibid.

Ibid. 1 3 Quoted in Clazebrook, p. 66. 14

Quoted in Fry, p. 9.

15 Quoted in Ibid.

16 See Ibid., p. 10. 17 Ibid., p. 9.

118 1 o The full story will not be repeated here. The details can be found in

Christopher Thorne, The Limits of Foreign Policy (New York, 1973; hereafter, Thorne, Limits); and for Canada's part see Alan Mason, 'Canada and the Far Eastern Crisis, 1931-1933', Paper presented to the Canadian

Historical Association, 6 June 1974 (hereafter. Mason); S. Mack Eastman,

Canada at Geneva (Toronto, 1946); and Gwendolen Carter, The British

Commonwealth and International Security (Toronto, 1947). 19 Quoted in Eayrs, Defence, p. 7-8. 20

See Donald C. Story, 'Canada, the League of Nations and the Far East,

1931-33: The Cahan Incident', The International History Review, 111 (April,

1981), pp. 236-54 for an excellent re-assessment of Canada's policy at this time. I am most grateful to Professor G. Egerton for drawing my attention to this article. 21 Lowe, Origin, p. 7. 22 Quoted in Thorne, Limits, p. 266. 23 Quoted in Ibid. 24 See Ibid., p. 267ff. 25 Quoted in Mason, p. 18. 26 Quoted in Ibid., p. 13. 27

Quoted in Thorne, Allies, p. 20.

Lee, p. 6. 29 See Thorne, Allies, p. 30; and Thorne, Limits, p. 247ff. 30 Quoted in Thorne, Allies, p. 30. 31

See Story, 'The Cahan Incident'. The critics of Cahan include Mason, p. Studies, 32 (1976-77), pp. 126-38; and interview with F.H. Soward, 12 June 33; F.H. Soward, 'Forty Years On: The Cahan Blunder Re-examined', B.C. 1981 - at which time he told the present writer that Cahan had not obeyed

Ottawa. This view is now seriously challenged by Story and in the view of

119 this writer the critics are mistaken in their assumption that Cahan made a deliberate mistake. 32 Quoted in Story, 'The Cahan Incident', p. 246. 33 Fry, p. 25-6. 34 Quoted in Mason, p. 31. 35 Quoted in Fry, p. 26. 36 Quoted in Mason, p. 31. 37 Story, 'The Cahan Incident', p. 247. 2 8 Quoted in Mason, p. 32. 39 Quoted in Ibid. 40 Quoted in Ibid., p. 36.

41 Quoted in Stephen Roskill, Hankey: Man of Secrets, Vol. Ill, 1931-1963

(London, 1974; hereafter, Roskill), p. 30. 42 See esp. Thorne, Limits, on this question. 43 Thorne, Allies, p. 26-9. 44 Quoted in Ann Trotter, Britain and East Asia, 1933-1937 (Cambridge, 1975), p. 72.

45 See Ibid., p. 73ff. 46 Quoted in Roskill, p. 109. 47

Ibid., pp. 112, 121-47; and see Ann Trotter, 'The Dominions and Imperial

Defence: Hankey's Tour in 1934', Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth

History, II (1974), pp. 318-32. Roskill and Trotter are in disagreement over the origins of this tour. Trotter argues that it was intiated by Australia in early February 1934 where a debate was taking place over defence and certain

British officials were invited to come and discuss the problem. After a careful examination of the evidence, however, it is clear that the Cabinet had waited for the appearance of the D.R.C. report of 28 February 1934 and then decided to use the Australian invitation as a way to make a much wider tour

(see Roskill, p. 112, note 2 and p. 113). It is also worthy to note the 120 following passage in that D.R.C. report: 'there is much to be said for the

view that our subservience to the United States in past years has been one of

the principal factors in the deterioration of our former good relations with

Japan'. 48 Quoted in Roskill, p. 120. 49 Quoted in Ibid., p. 131 . 50 Trotter, 'Hankey Tour', p. 327.

51 This document and other despatches are reprinted in full in J.L.

Granatstein, 'The "Man of Secrets" in Canada, 1934', Dalhousie Review, 51

(1971-72), p. 504-21.

52 Ibid., p. 505.

53 Ibid., p. 513. 54 Quoted in Trotter, 'Hankey Tour', p. 328. 55 Granatstein, 'Man of Secrets', p. 514. 5 6 For the 'Empire Man' view see Mason, passim. 57 Granatstein, 'Man of Secrets', p. 515. 5 8

Quoted in Paul Haggie, Britannia at Bay: The Defence of the British

Empire against Japan, 1931-1941 (Oxford, 1981; hereafter, Haggie), p. 74;

and for a detailed discussion of the negotations see S.W. Roskill, Naval Policy Between the Wars, Vol. II (London, 1974), p. 291 ff. 59

Quoted in M.W. Berg, 'Admiral William H. Standley and the Second London

Naval Treaty, 1934-1936', The Historian, 33 (1970-71 ), p. 224; and see

Haggie, p. 75. 60 Eayrs, Defence, p. 134. 61 328 Wigram to Latham, 3 January 1935: quoted in Trotter, 'Hankey Tour', p. 62 Quoted in Eayrs, Defence, p. 138. 6 3

Ibid; this document is reproduced in Eayrs, Defence, pp. 213-22,

Reference will be made to page number. 121 64 Ibid., p. 214.

65 Ibid., p. 218.

66 Ibid. 67 DCER: 6, no. 97, 'Appreciation of Canada's Obligations with Respect to the Maintenance of Neutrality in event of a War between the United States of

American and Japan1, 14 October 1936. 68 King Diary, 10 September 1936; and Eayrs, Defence, p. 139. 69

Eayrs, Defence, p. 139.

70 In particular over munitions production, see: DCER: 6, nos. 135, 136.

71 Hankey to Baldwin, 22 October 1936: quoted in J.L. Granatstein and

Robert Bothwell, 'A Self-Evident National Duty: Canadian Foreign Policy,

1935-1939', Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, 2-3 (1974-75), p.

218. 72 Lindsay to Vansittart, 8 March 1937 with minute by Vansittart, 31 March 1937, F0371/20670/A2082: reproduced in Robert Bothwell and Norman Hillmer, eds.. The In-Between Time (Toronto, 1975), pp. 156-7. 73

218. Quoted in Granatstein and Bothwell, 'A Self-Evident National Duty', p. 74

3. Quoted in Lawrence Pratt, East of Malta, West of Suez (London, 1975), p. 75

Quoted in Ibid., p. 4.

76 Roskill, p. 271 ff; and DCER: 6, no. 106, Bladwin to King, 27 March 1936.

77 Quoted in Roskill, p. 272. 7 8

DCER: 6, no. 146, 'Minutes of Proceedings, Imperial Conference, 1937', 24

May 1937. 79 Roskill, p. 281. 8 0

Hankey to Sir E.J. Harding, 9 May 1938: quoted in Granatstein and

Bothwell, 'A Self-Evident National Duty', p. 218.

122 Quoted in Norman Hillmer, 'The Anglo-Dominion Alliance, 1919-1939'

Rapports II, Editura Academiei (Papers of the 15th International Congress the Historical Sciences, 1980), p. 545.

123 Notes to Chapter Two

I Foreign Relations of the United States, 1937, vol. Ill (Washington, D.C,

1952-1956; hereafter FRUS), p. 150ff; Lee, pp. 23-4; Lowe, Origins, p. 15; and Nicholas R. Clifford, Retreat From China: British Policy in the Far

East, 1937-1941 (Seattle, 1967), p. 1. 2 Thorne, Allies, pp. 23, 25, 31. 3 The words are those of Neville Chamberlain in a radio broadcast he made on

27 September 1938: quoted in Keith Feiling, The Life of Neville Chamberlain

(Conneticut, 1970), p. 372. H Soward, et. al, Canada in World Affairs, vol. 1, p. 3.

5 Lowe, Origins, p. 17.

6 Quoted in Aron Shai, Origins of the War in the East (London, 1976), p. 25.

7 Alan Mason, 'Canadian-Japanese Relations, 1930-1941' (Unpublished

University of Toronto Research Paper, 1973; hereafter. Mason, '1930-1941'), p. 77. g Skelton to King, 26 February 1936: quoted in Ibid., p. 74. g

Quoted in Lee, p. 32.

10 Chamberlain to Hilda, 29 August 1937: quoted in MacDonald, p. 35-6. II Quoted in Lee, p. 54. 12 Toronto Star, 12 August 1937. 13 See Mason, '1930-194V, p. 78-9. 1 4

I was unable to find out what the American reaction, if any, was to this interview. Hull's statements are in FRUS, 1937, I, p. 699-700 and FRUS:

Japan, 1931-1941, I (Washington, 1943), p. 355. 15 See Canada, House of Commons Debates, 1938, I, p. 66ff. 16 See Lowe, Origins, p\ 21.

17 Quoted in Shai, Origins of the War, p. 33. 1 8 Lowe, Origins, p. 21.

124 19 See Haggie, esp. chapter five and R.J. Pritchard, 'The Far East as an

Influence on the Chamberlain Government's Pre-War European Policies',

Millennium, II (1973-74), pp. 7-23 for the views of the Chiefs of Staff and the Admiralty. 20 Quoted in Lowe, Origins, p. 27. 21 King Diary, 26 August 1937 and 30 August 1937. 22 Thorne, Allies, p. 23. 23 Quoted in Ibid., p. 43. 24 King Diary, 25 August 1937. 25 See Lee, p. 38-9. It should be noted, however, that there were many who felt that communism was somehow alien to the Chinese character, see

Thorne, Allies, p. 26. 2 6

See Lowe, Origins, p. 21; Lee, p. 41; and for Knatchbull-Hugessen's own account see his Diplomat in Peace and War (London, 1949). It would be interesting to speculate on what would have happened if the British Ambassador to Berlin met with the same accident. 27 Kingsmere Memorandum, 3 September 1937: quoted in Mason, '1930-1941', p. 80; and King Diary, 3 September 1937 and 26 August 1937. 28 See above introduction and Mason, '1930-1941', in passim. 29 See Glazebrook, vol. I, pp. 216-219. 30 Eayrs, Defence, p. 178. 31 Quoted in Ibid. 32 FRUS, 1937, II, p. 191-92. 33 Quoted in Stacey, Canada and the Age of Conflict, vol. 2, p. 155. 34 FRUS, 1937, II, p. 193. 35 Canada, House of Commons Debates, 1937, I, p. 1030. 36 Ibid., p. 956. 37 Roosevelt to Hull, 4 August 1937: paraphrased in Brown, 'Emergence', p.. 59.

125 38 Hull to Roosevelt, August 1937: quoted in Ibid.

FRUS, 1937, II, Hull to Armour, 3 September 1937, p. 194. I was

unfortunately unable to obtain a copy of Roosevelt's letter to Hull regarding

this matter. 40 Ibid. , p. 195-6.

41 DCER: 8, no. 106, Christie to King, 16 October 1940; and Eayrs,

Defence, p. 179. 42 Quoted in Eayrs, Defence, p. 178. 43 Quoted in Robert Dallek, Franklin D. Roosevelt and American Foreign Policy, 1932-1945 (London, 1979; hereafter, Dallek), p. 147; text of the

speech printed in the New York Times, 6 October 1937. 44 Public Archives of Canada, Hume Wrong Papers, MG30/D94, vol. 3, no. 111, Marler to King, 7 October 1937. I am indebted to Alan Mason for providing me with a copy of this despatch.

45 Ibid; and see Mason, '1930-1941', p. 85. 46 Armour to State Department: quoted in Brown, 'Emergence', p. 57. 47 Quoted in Mason, '1930-1941', p. 87. 48 King Diary, 26 August 1937. 49

DCER: 6, no. 835 , Skelton Memorandum, 20 October 1937; and see Mason,

'1930-1941', p. 88-9. 50 Quoted in Mason, '1930-1941', p. 89. 51 See DCER: 6, no. 138, Christie Memorandum: 'Re Monroe Doctrine', 16

ruary 1937.

Dorothy Borg in her The United States and the Far Eastern Crisis of

1933-1938 (Cambridge, Mass., 1964), pp. 381-86 argues that Roosevelt had no

'plan' in mind. John McVickar Haight, in his article 'Franklin D. Roosevelt and a Naval Quarantine of Japan', Pacific Historical Review, 40 (1971 ), pp.

203-26 argues that Roosevelt did envisage a policy of economic sanctions.

126 Dallek, p. 152-3, supports Borg's contention. This issue, however, is by no

means resolved. 53 Chamberlain to Hilda, 9 October 1937: quoted in Lowe, Origins, p. 27. 54 Quoted in Dallek, p. 150. 55

Quoted in William Roger Louis, British Strategy in the Far East (Oxford,

1971), p. 244.

56 DCER: 6, no. 848, Wrong to King, 17 November 1937.

57 Quoted in Nancy Harvison Hooker, ed.. The Moffat Papers (Cambridge,

Mass., 1956; hereafter, Moffat Papers), p. 181-2; MacDonald, p. 48; and see Lee, pp. 70-8, for a full analysis of this Conference. 58 MacDonald, p. 45. 59 Moffat Papers, p. 178-9. 60 DCER: 6, no. 855, Wrong to Skelton, 29 November 1937; and for a full analysis of Canada's part at the Conference see Mason, '1930-1941', pp.

90-100. 61 Quoted in Lee, p. 78. 6 2 See esp. MacDonald, p. 48-9; and Lee, p. 78. 63 Lee, p. 59. 64 Ibid., p. 48. 6 5

In this brief discussion of racism I am utilizing Thome's adaptation of

Hugh Tinker's definition of 'racist'. Tinker, in his Race, Conflict and the

International Order (London, 1977) writes: 'We have a racial factor when one group of people, united by their own perception of inherited and distinctive qualities, are set apart from another group with (supposedly) separate inherited and distinctive qualities. We have a racist factor when one group claims a dominant position, justified by the supposed inferiority of the other group '(see Thorne, Allies, p. 6). 66 67 Quoted in Lowe, Origins, p. 25. Quoted in Lee, p. 94.

127 68 Ibid., p. 89; and Roskill, p. 395. 69 Quoted in Thorne, Allies, p. 6 and 3. 70 Quoted in Ibid., p. 3.

71 See Ibid., pp. 8, 158-9, 167-8. 72 See W. Peter Ward, 'British Columbia and the Japanese Evacuation',

Canadian Historical Review, 57 (1976), pp. 289-308; Fry, p. 43; F.G. Scott

in the Vancouver Sun, 17 November 1937; and see also Patricia E. Roy,

'Educating the "East": British Columbia and the Oriental Question in the

Interwar Years', B.C. Studies, 18 (Summer 1973), pp. 50-69. 73

Quoted in Roy, 'Educating the "East"', p. 64; and see Fry, p. 43-4. It should be pointed out, however, that many of these assessments of Japanese power were deliberately exaggerated in an attempt to show how dangerous the

Japanese could be. The Implication was that getting rid the Canadian

Japanese would be getting of the threat. The federal government would not and did not fall for this argument. Nevertheless, the underlying fear of

Japanese subversive capabilities was there, as the reaction to Pearl Harbour demonstrated - and in fact, we shall later see that some of these fears may have been justified. In any case blackouts along the B.C. Coast were not uncommon in the aftermath of Pearl Harbour (Interview with Professor F.H. Soward, 12 June 1981). 74

MacDonald, p. 55.

75 Haggie, p. 116.

76 Lee, p. 95. 77 Haggie, p. 118. 78 Lee, p. 94. 79

This document is reproduced in full in Lawrence Pratt. 'The

Anglo-American Naval Conversations on the Far East of January 1938',

International Affairs, 47 (1971 ), pp. 745-63, the document is on pp. 760-3.

128 80 Ibid., p. 763. Many historians have played down the significance of this

document because it never led to concerted action. Pratt is, however, in the

view of the present writer, entirely correct in noting that the talks 'were

neither as technical nor "low level' as Ingersoll implied1 when he appeared

before the Joint Committee of Congress on the Investigation of the Pearl

Harbour Attack on 12 February 1946. In fact, the talks, as Pratt notes,

'explored the foundations of the two powers' naval strategies ...'.

81 Haggie, p. 118. 82 Quoted in Eayrs, Defence, p. 179. 83 Quoted in Dallek, p. 155. 84 Paraphrased in Stacey, Arms, p. 97. 8 5

Memorandum by the Chief of the General Staff, 'Conversations on Defence

Questions', 23 January 1938, Army Records. This document is reproduced in

Eayrs, Defence, pp. 180-82. 86 King Diary, 11 January 1938. 87

Quoted in M.A. Earle Kelly, 'Canada's Pacific Defence Problem', The

National Review, 111 (1938), p. 69. 88 ' Quoted in Eayrs, Defence, p. 183. 89 Quoted in Ibid., p. 178. Ernest Lapointe was the Minister of Justice from 1935 until his death in 1941. 90

Canada, House of Commons Debates, 1938, vol. I, p. 66.

91 Ibid., 1938, vol. II, p. 1648.

92 Ibid. , 1938, vol. Ill, p. 3179. 93 King Diary, 22 July 1938. 94 Quoted in Eayrs, Defence, p. 183-4; King Diary, 20 August 1938. 95 DCER: 6, no. 465, 'Memorandum' (author unknown), 19 August 1938. 96 King Diary, 24 October 1938. 97

DCER: 6, no. 465, footnote, this note may have been written by Hume 129 Wrong. 98 King Diary, 20 August 1938. 99

In addition to the examples already cited, there is an entry in the King

Diary, 7 July 1938 in which he speaks of the new era - 'the era of the air'.

He also expresses a great horror of war and the massive destruction it can cause in the entry for 22 July 1938. 100 That is to say that nowhere in the King Diary, for example, do we find

Mackenzie King expressing concern about public opinion or demonstrating that the decision to arm and defend the West Coast was made as a result of political pressure. If such had been the case, the present writer is quite confident that the Prime Minister would have written of it, especially in the

Diary - decisions of this sort gave Mackenzie King a great deal of trouble and he often agonized over making them. Moreover, the evidence presented here seems to suggest that there were far greater forces at work behind the decision. 101 King Diary, 18 August 1938. 102 I was unable to view the Roosevelt papers. It can only be hoped that some answer may lie in them. 103 Russell F. Weigley, 'The Role of the War Department and the Army', in D. Borg and S. Okamoto, eds.. Pearl Harbor as History (New York, 1973), p. 167. 1 04 See T. Murray Hunter, 'Coast Defence in British Columbia' for an idea of the actual deployment. 105 Quoted in Dallek, p. 157. 1 06

Documents on British Foreign Policy: third series, vol. VIII, no. 338,

Craigie to Halifax, 14 December 1938 (hereafter, DBFP). 107 Ibid., Foreign Office to Admiralty, 13 February 1939, p. 548.

108 Ibid., Admiralty to Foreign Office, 29 March 1939, p. 549-50. 109 Quoted in Thorne, Limits, p. 403. 110 See Lowe, Origins, pp. 72-102.

130 111 Quoted in Lee, p. 189. 11 2 DBFP: third series, vol. IX, no. 264, Lindsay to Halifax, 26 June 1939. 113 MacDonald, p. 159. 114 DCER: 6, no. 971, Pearson to King, 9 June 1939. 11 5 See Granatstein and Bothwell, 'A Self-Evident National Duty', p. 218-9. 116 Quoted in Mason, '1930-1941', p. 117.

117 DBFP: third series, vol. IX, no. 618, Craigie to Halifax, 5 September

1939.

118 Quoted in Dallek, p. 199. 11 9 Quoted in Granatstein, Canada's War, p. 117.

131 Notes to Chapter Three

I DCER: 6, no. 1005, Skelton Memorandum, 'Canada and the Polish War: A

Personal Note', 25 August 1939. 2 King Diary, 22 August 1939; Granatstein, Canada's War, p. 5-6; Canada,

House of Commons Debates, 16 January 1939, p. 52.

3 King Diary, 24 August 1939. 4 Granatstein, Canada's War, p. 42. 5

CP. Stacey, ed.. Historical Documents of Canada, 1914-1945 (Toronto,

1972), document no. 243, "'Form and Objectives" of Canadian War Polciy', 24

August 1939. Chiefs of Staff Memorandum, 5 September 1939: quoted in Mason,

'1930-1941', p. 122.

7 King Diary, 6 September 1939. g

DCER: 6, no. 994, Keenleyside Memorandum, 24 August 1939.

9 Quoted in Mason, '1930-1941', p. 123.

10 Peter Lowe, 'Great Britain and the Coming of The Pacific War, 1939-1941',

Royal Historical Society Transactions Fifth Series, 24 (1974), p. 43. II Thorne, Allies, p, 62; DCER: 7, no. 558, King to Churchill, 10 May 1940. 12 Thorne, Allies, p. 63; DCER: 7, no. 588, King to Menzies, 2 August 1941. 13 Stacey, Arms, p. 22. 14 Gerald Campbell,.Of True Experience (New York, 1947), p. 97. 15 Robertson to Pearson, July 1938: quoted in J.L. Granatstein, A Man of

Influence (1981), p. 74. 16 Eayrs, Defence, p. 190; and Toronto Star, 4 April 1940. 17 Quoted in Eayrs, Defence, p. 190. 18 .... Ibid.

19 Ibid., p. 169. 20 Ibid., p. 171; and see DCER: 7, chapter 6. 132 21 Quoted in Ibid. The State Department apparently had faulty intelligence

regarding this matter. Even so, American suspicions of Canada, though

totally absurd, demonstrate the actue sensitivity Washington displayed in this

area. This is most important to bear in mind because the United States would

later display the same attitude towards Britain, though, of course, on a much

bigger issue - the post-war international order in the Far East.

22 DCER: 8, no. 42, Keenleyside to King, 23 May 1940. 23 Ibid., no. 43, Keenleyside to King, 26 May 1940. Keenleyside's trip was conducted with the utmost secrecy and this document (and the one following)

were specially coded and abbreviated. 24 Ibid., no. 45, Keenleyside to King, 29 May 1940. 25

MKR, I, p. 117-18; and see also Granatstein, Canada's War, p. 120-21.

26 MKR, I, p. 118.

27 Ibid. , p. 119. TO DCER: 8, no. 49, King to Churchill, 30 May 1940. 29 Ibid., no. 51, Churchill to King, 5 June 1940. 30 Ibid., no. 58, Churchill to King, 24 June 1940. 31

Professor Granatstein in his Canada's War, p. 126-27, argues that few

Canadians though seriously of a possible British defeat. The present writer finds this to be surprising because the record is full of references to a possible British defeat. It is perhaps most strongly expressed in the King

Diary, entries for 26 July 1940; 6 August 1940; and 17 September 1940. See also DCER: 8, no. 43, Keenleyside to King, 26 May 1940 for the same fear in the United States. Lowe, Origins, p. 141-42; and Lowe, 'Great Britain and Coming...', p. 32 45. 33 Quoted in Thorne, Allies, p. 69,

133 34 Quoted in Lowe, Origins, p. 143-44. The destruction of the French Fleet

at Mers-el-Keber and Oran nearly brought a French declaration of war upon

Britain. 35 Minutes of meeting 209 of COS, 5 July 1940: quoted in Haggie, p. 174. 36 Quoted in Lowe, 'Great Britain and the Coming p. 47. 37 Quoted in Thorne, Allies, p. 68. 38 Thorne, Allies, p. 39. 39 DCER: 7, no. 923, King to Massey, 11 July 1940. 40

Quoted in Eayrs, Defence, p. 175.

41 DCER: 8, no. 116, Skelton to Power, 22 June 1940. C.G. Power was at

this time acting Minister of National Defence replacing Norman Rogers, who was killed in a plane crash on 10 June. Power held the position until replaced by J.L. Ralston on 5 July 1940. 42 DCER: 8, no. 1174, Memorandum by Skelton, 2 July 1940. 43 Stacey, Arms, p. 16. 44 See Granatstein, Canada's War, esp. chapter 5. 45 Keenleyside Memorandum, 'An Outline Synopsis...', 17 June 1940: quoted in Granatstein, Canada's War, p. 127. 46 DCER: 8, no. 112, Keenleyside Memorandum, 'The United States, the War, and the Defence of North America', 27 June 1940. 47 Eayrs, Defence, p. 202. 48 King Diary, 14 July 1940. 49 Moffat Papers, p. 315. 50

Eayrs, Defence, 204-6; and Stacey, Arms, p. 333-36.

51 See Moffat Papers, p. 314.

52 King Diary, 26 July 1940 and 6 August 1940.

53 Ibid., 15 August 1940.

54 MKR, I, p. 151. 55 King Diary, 16 August 1940; and MKR, I, p. 130. 134 56 Eayrs, Defence, p. 208.

57 Granatstein, Canada's War, p. 132.

58 Ibid.

59 MKR, I, p. 138.

60 Ibid., p. 142.

61 DCER: 8, no. 272, Skelton to King, 20 October 1939 with minute by King. 62

Except for the persistence of Congressman Magnuson, the Head of the

United States Commission, who declared in early November 1939 that the

highway would go ahead - see DCER: 8, no. 273, Skelton Memorandum, 6

November 1939.

63 Ibid., no. 274, Skelton to King, 1 July 1940.

Ibid. 65 Ibid., no. 276, Skelton to King, 20 July 1940. 66

Brown, 'Emergence', p. 305. The evidence is from a Memorandum of a conversation between Hull and King 17 April 1941 (Department of State Files

842.12/327).

67 DCER: 8, no. 96, Churchill to King, 22 August 1940. Granatstein in his

Canada's War, p. 130, writes of the British Cabinet's decision: 'More

specious and silly reasoning is difficult to imagine'. True, but this does not take into account an ardent Imperialist watching his Empire ebb away - a

feeling certainly reflected in Churchill's telegram. That Canada had to suffer

such an injustice as this forms but one part of this study's wider contextual analysis. 68 See Granatstein, Canada's War, p. 131. Apparently King packed this telegram with him at all times. 69 Hugh Dalton to his diary, 8 July 1942: quoted in Thorne, Allies, p. 105. 70 See Ibid., p. 106-7. 71 DCER: 8, no. 1190, Dominions Secretary to King, 4 September 1940. 72 Ibid., no. 1197, Hankinson to King, 25 September 1940. 135 73 Ibid., no. 1200, King to Dominions Secretary, 30 September 1940; and see no. 1195, Skelton to King, 24 September 1940 for draft telegram. 74

Ibid., no. 1060, Skelton to King, 14 September 1940; and no. 1066,

McCreer to King, 17 September 1940.

75 Ibid., no. 1070, Skelton to King, 23 September 1940.

King Diary, 17 September 1940. 77 DCER: 8, no. 1207, Campbell to King, 8 October 1940. 78 Ibid., minute by King. 79 MKR, I, p. 150-51. 8 0

Cabinet War Committee minute no. 19, 8 October 1940: quoted in Mason,

'1930-1941', p. 135.

81 MKR, I, p. 151. 82 DCER: 8, no. 1209, Skelton Draft for King, 9 October 1940. 83 Ibid., no. 1210, King to Skelton, 11 October 1940. 84 Ibid., no. 1211, King to Churchill, 11 October 1940. 85 Moffat Papers, p. 332. 86 MKR, I, p. 190. 87 See N. Ike, Japan's Decision For War (Stanford, 1967), p. 72ff. 88 Thorne, Allies, p. 54. 89

DCER: 8, no. 1309, Dominions Secretary to King, 22 July 1941.

90 DCER: 8, no. 1311, King to Churchill, 23 July 1941.

91 Quoted in J.P. Lash, Roosevelt and Churchill, 1939-1941 (New York, 1976), p. 403. 92 Ibid., no. 1313, Dominions Secretary to King, 24 July 1941. 93 See Lowe, Origins, p. 237-8; and Dallek, p. 240-1 . 94 Cabinet War Committee minute no. 3, 10 September 1941: quoted in Mason, '1930-1941', p. 156. 956 Quoted in ThorneIbid., ,p .Allies 56. , p. 73. 136 97 Quoted in Lowe, 'Great Britain and the Coming...1, p. 55.

98 MKR, I, p. 245.

99 Ibid., p. 245-6.

100 DCER: 7, no. 941, Dominions Secretary to King, 19 September 1941.

101 Quoted in Mason, '1930-1941', p. 159. 102 .... Ibid., p. 160. 1 03 Ted Ferguson, Desperate Siege (Scarborough, Ont., 1981), p. 48. 104

Quoted in Oliver Lindsay, The Lasting Honour (London, 1978), p. 13.

105 MKR, I, p. 221 .

106 Ibid., p. 296. 107 Quoted in Thorne, Allies, p. 77. 1 08

Quoted in Ibid; and DCER: 8, no. 1401, Wrong to King, 1 December

1941.

137 Notes to Chapter Four

See Stacey, Arms, p. 47-8. Stacey attempts to argue that Mackenzie King

greatly exaggerated the threat of a Japanese attack so that he could escape

his responsibility of sending troops to Europe. We will shortly see, however,

that this argument does not exactly square with the evidence. 2 Campbell to Foreign Office, 15 August 1941: quoted in Thorne, Allies, p. 107. 3

See Thorne, Allies, pp. 133-4, 156-7, 288-9. The figures for the

deployment of troops and machinery are interesting. By the end of 1943 the

United States had except for aeroplanes, more of its resources tied up in the

war against Japan:

Germany Japan men: 1,810,367 1,878,152 aeroplanes: 8,807 7,857 combat ships: 515 713

4 MKR, I, p. 307; and see also pp. 314, 316, 345 and 379.

5 DCER: 8, no. 1254, Massey to King, 28 February 1941.

The "Magic" Background of Pearl Harbour, Volume 1 (Washington, D.C,

1977), no. 135, Tokyo to Vancouver, 15 February 1941.

7 Ibid., no. 131, Matsuoka (Tokyo) to Koshi (Washington), 15 February 1941.

It is not the intention of this study to make a mountain out of what may

prove to be a mole-hill. Nevertheless, these documents do exist and, to the

best of the present writer's knowledge, have not been brought to light. It can only be hoped that future research in this area may be able to trace the actual extent of Japanese activity in Canada.

8 lbid- 9

DCER: 9, no. 965, Robertson to King, 9 December 1941.

10 Ibid; Skelton died of a heart attack on 28 January 1941. Robertson officially became Under-Secretary on 24 June 1941. 138 11 Ibid., no. 966, Keenleyside to Robertson, 10 December 1941.

12 Ibid., no. 950, Robertson to King, 22 December 1941. 13 Ibid. 1 4

Ibid., no. 951, Keenleyside Memorandum, 'Recent Trends in United

States-Canada Relations', 27 December 1941. In addition to the instances

mentioned here were problems with the U.S. Maritime Commission, the already

cited radio detector issue, the 'threatening' language the American Minister

used when attempting to 'browbeat' Canada into acceptance of U.S. policy

towards St. Pierre and Miquelon, the U.S. refusal to let Canada have a seat

the Rio de Janeiro Conference and Canada's ommission from the ABCD

Conference held before Pearl Harbour. 15 .... Ibid. 1 ft Ibid., no. 957, F.H. La Guardia to O.M. Biggar, 2 January 1942. 17 Ibid. 1 g Ibid., no. 962 , Pope to Stuart, 16 January 1942. 19 ,u-Ibid^ . 20 See Ibid., no. 963, Pope to Embick, 19 January 1942, for the Canadian refusal to comply. 21 Ibid., no. 978, Minutes of the Cabinet War Committee, 12 February 1942. 22 .... Ibid. 23 See Stacey, Arms, p. 348. 24 DCER: 9, no. 982, Keenleyside to Robertson, 3 March 1942. 25 Ibid., no. 981, Extract from the Journal of Discussions and Decisions of PJBD, 26 February 1942. 2 6

See Ibid., no. 983, Extract from Minutes of Cabinet War Committee, 5

March 1942. The present writer is still in the dark with regard to the extent of the pressure the United States brought upon Canada. There is some evidence to suggest that Roosevelt may have been considering going over the government's head - see DCER: 9, no. 979, Memorandum of Conversation 139 between Robertson and Hickerson, 13 February 1942 - therefore Canadian concurrence was merely a formality to make matters less worse than they were. It can only be hoped that future research in the private papers of

Canadian and American officials will shed some light on this question. 27 Quoted in J.L. Granatstein and R.D. Cuff, Canadian-American Relations in Wartime: From the Great War to the Cold War (Toronto, 1975), p. 108; and

King Diary, 21 March 1942. 28 Quoted in Ibid; and King Diary, 18 March 1942. 29 DCER: 9, no. 967, Wrong to Robertson and King, 1 April 1942. It is interesting to note that, other than this brief transcript, no record of the meeting was made. 30 Ibid., no. 968, Robertson to King, 6 April 1942. 31 See Stacey, Arms, p. 48. By the spring of 1943 there were 35,000 Canadian soldiers on active service in B.C. 32 Granatstein, A Man of Influence, p. 121. 33 DCER: 9, no. 1252 , Extract from Minutes of Cabinet War Committee, 31 March 1943. 34

Ibid., no. 1253, MacDonald Memorandum, 'Note on Developments in North

Western Canada', 6 April 1943.

35 MKR, I, p. 436. 36

See DCER: 9, no. 1254, Extract from Minutes of Cabinet War Committee, 7

April 1943. 37 Ibid., no. 1260, Order in Council, P.C. 3758, 6 May 1943. 38 Ibid., no. 1262, King to McCarthy, 26 May 1943. 39

Ibid., no. 1075, Keenleyside Memorandum, 'Evidence Relating to United

States Efforts to Obtain Post-War Advantages from Wartime Expenditure in

Canada', 11 December 1943; and on the Canol Project see Richard J.

Diubaldo; 'The Canol Project in Canadian-American Relations', Canadian 140 Historical Association Papers (1977), pp. 179-195. 40 Quoted in Thorne, Allies, p. 121-22; and see also p. 103 and esp. p. 115.

Richard Law (later Lord . Coleraine) told Thorne that 'what struck him most about Roosevelt's face was that it suggested a man who was 'corrupted by power". 41 Quoted in Stacey, Arms, p. 387. 42 See W.R. Louis, Imperialism at Bay (Oxford, 1977), p. 21-2 for this rather startling revelation. 43

See Thorne, Allies, p. 132. In early December 1942, for example,

Roosevelt asked Vice-President Henry Wallace if, at a recent conference held under the auspices of the Institute of Pacific Relations, 'the Britishers took their typical (imperialist) slant'. The President then said to Wallace, in his usual roundabout way, 'that when there were four people sitting in at a poker game and three of them were against the fourth, it is a little hard on the fourth1. Wallace later noted: 'This I took to mean that he, Stalin and Chiang Kai-shek would be playing the game together'. 44 See Ibid., esp. chapters 31 and 32. 45 MKR, I, p. 644. 46 MKR, III, p. 219. 47 Quoted in Thorne, Allies, p. 715.

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(3) Unpublished Papers and Theses

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Relations, 1937-1941' (Unpublished Ph.D. Thesis, Syracuse University, 1968).

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Paper Presented to the Canadian Historical Association, 6 June 1974).

152