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Back in 2002 and into 2003, a tempest swirled in an Ottawa teapot over the combat fatigues Canadian troops were wearing to a war 10,600 kilometres away. Here were our soldiers, God forbid, wearing green in the arid climes of Afghanistan. The uniforms were an... -
On Sept. 28, 1918, General Erich Ludendorff, commander of the German army, admitted that the war was lost. “If we had the strength to reverse the situation in the West, then of course nothing would yet have been lost,” he stated. “But we had... -
Historian Matthew White estimates that 123 million people died in wars in the 20th century, and just 37 million of them were military. The rest were collateral civilian deaths (27 million), genocide and other mass murder (41 million) and consequential famines (18 million). Surely if... -
Early 1942 was a dark period for the Allies in the Second World War. The United States was by now a belligerent, but the situation was bleak. The Soviet Army was hard pressed to withstand the German onslaught that threatened Moscow, and Soviet Premier... -
The thing about Canada and peacekeeping is that while 7 in 10 Canadians consider it one of the country’s signature characteristics, the reality has always been something quite different from the fantasy. Sure, Canada helped revolutionize third-party roles in bringing conflicts to an end—decades ago.... -
It does not require hindsight to criticize Montgomery’s strategy in September 1944. As Allied supply lines stretched farther and farther from the Normandy beaches, the problem of supplying the advancing troops was rapidly becoming unmanageable. With the French rail system still in chaos from bombing,...
Face to Face
With hindsight, qualified by the modern moral temperament, the deliberate destruction by Canadian troops of much of Friesoythe on April 13-14, 1945, is indefensible. Ostensibly, Major-General Christopher Vokes’ exact orders were: “Burn the fucking town!” The order arose from his understanding that Argyll and Sutherland Highlander commander Lieutenant-Colonel Frederick Wigle had been killed by...
