The RCAF was actually the fourth iteration of a Canadian air force, none of which had amounted to much of anything.

The first of them, the Canadian Aviation Corps (CAC), was formed in 1914 and attached to the Canadian Expeditionary Force in Europe. It was the spawn of the minister of militia and defence, Sam Hughes, a staunch nationalist whose five-year cabinet tenure was marked by patronage and flawed decisions.

The CAC was an air force in name only. It consisted of three personnel—two officers, neither qualified to fly, and a mechanic—and one aircraft, a rudimentary float plane. Cashing in on a political debt, Ernest Lloyd Janney persuaded Hughes to commission him a captain, appoint him the Corps’ commander and give him $5,000 to buy the plane, which was promptly disassembled, crated, shipped and reassembled overseas. It was ultimately left abandoned, a “heap of worthless junk,” on Salisbury Plain in England having never flown a single combat op. 

After the American Burgess-Dunne AH-7 was declared unfit to fly, Janney went on an unauthorized tour of British airfields and aircraft factories. He was listed as absent without leave. With his air corps—such as it was—in tatters, he appealed to the federal government for a grant of $116,000 to form a squadron.

Janney’s chutzpah only carried him so far. His bid was rejected and he was ordered home, where he was stripped of his commission and forced to resign in disgrace in December 1914. The CAC was dissolved eight months after it was formed.

The blustery Hughes muddled on for another two years before Prime Minister Robert Borden, who had “profound misgivings” about appointing him in the first place, could no longer tolerate his charge’s litany of missteps and corruption—the infamous Ross rifle and a dirty laundry list of subpar equipment among them.

Borden fired Hughes on Nov. 9, 1916, for his “strong tendency to assume powers which [he did] not possess.” In his letter, the PM said he no longer had the “time and energies” to continue solving all the problems Hughes was creating.

Hughes later claimed in Who’s Who to have served “in France, 1914-15.” The Boer War veteran, who tried to nominate himself for two Victoria Crosses, was a federal minister in 1914-15, had never been given an operational command since South Africa. What time he did spend in France, was limited to visiting troops.

As for Janney, in 1917 he incorporated the Janney Aircraft Company in Munroe, Mich., for $30,000, just $8,000 of it in cash. The articles of incorporation claimed the firm would manufacture “aerial craft, motorboats, dirigibles and articles of that nature.” It built one biplane, which never made its test flight.

Janney skipped town, leaving behind US$137 (worth about 30 times that today) in unpaid rent on a house. He was arrested in San Francisco on charges of impersonating an officer, according to a Detroit Free Press article of the day. He was later charged back east with obtaining money under false pretenses.

By 1932, Janney had disappeared from public view, only to return as war clouds mustered again over Europe in September 1939. The colourful erstwhile commander of the country’s first, albeit short-lived, air force sent a message to Ottawa: “Am still full of the old pep—let me know what I can do.”

New Canadian pilots were receiving flight training in Britain and the U.S. when the Royal Air Force and Canadian Air Force were formed in 1918.

A destined-to-be-short-lived Royal Canadian Naval Air Service (RCNAS) also existed, but all its aircrew were off learning to fly. It was the United States Naval Reserve Flying Corps that was flying out of Eastern Passage and North Sydney, N.S., patrolling North Atlantic waters for what Britain claimed were German U-boats capable of traversing the ocean.

It was August and Canadian ace Billy Bishop (see page 25), now a lieutenant-colonel, was only just setting up the first CAF squadrons—one fighter and one bomber.

In fact, there wasn’t a lot of setting up to do. The CAF units, as it turned out, were repurposed RAF squadrons—81 Squadron at Upper Heyford in Oxfordshire, which became the all-Canadian No. 1 Squadron, CAF, and 123 Squadron, which became No. 2 and moved from Duxford, Cambridgeshire, to join its sister squadron at Upper Heyford. No. 1 was equipped with Sopwith Dolphins, while No. 2 had de Havilland 9As, all provided by Britain.

Recruiting, pay and clothing was a Canadian responsibility, administered by the newly formed Directorate of Air Services. Neither Canadian squadron saw action. The war ended in November before either could reach France. In early 1919, they moved to Shoreham, West Sussex, instead. Alas, within weeks, both would be disbanded—No. 1 on Jan. 28; No. 2 on Feb. 5. The Directorate of Air Services was dissolved.

Back in Nova Scotia, the U.S. navy had been providing short escorts to ships leaving and entering port. They never located a single U-boat, although 110,000 tons of Allied shipping were sunk in North American waters in the last two months of the war.

RCNAS aircrew hadn’t completed their training before the armistice. The Canadian naval air service was disbanded having never flown a sortie. The Eastern Passage air station would remain operational, however, while North Sydney was rendered inactive until the Second World War.

The Royal Canadian Navy would not operate aircraft until WW II, when it commanded the escort carriers HMS Nabob and Puncher. Several Canadian navy pilots were seconded to the Royal Navy and flew from British aircraft carriers with the Fleet Air Arm, including the Victoria Cross recipient, Lieutenant Robert Hampton Gray. The RCN independently operated aircraft until 1968, when its aviation operations were absorbed by Air Command in the unification of the Canadian Armed Forces.

In 1919, Canada became the first country to comprehensively legislate aviation, implementing rules and regulations governing all flight within its borders. To do so, it created the Air Board, a handful of middling bureaucrats who, at the onset of the age of flight, were responsible for rule-making, traffic management and licensing.

These were the foundations of what W.A.B. (Alec) Douglas described in The Official History of the Royal Canadian Air Force, Volume 2, as the conversion of “the expansive potential of aviation, so clearly demonstrated in war, to constructive peacetime uses, a focus of commitment which coincided nicely with the prejudices of an unmilitary people tired of war and a government bent on economy.

“The real foundations of a nation’s airpower, it was reasoned, lay in the widespread development of civil aviation, including extensive commercial operations and a healthy aircraft manufacturing industry. This in turn would provide the foundation on which a military air force might later be built.”

These same bureaucrats were also tasked with the job of devising a temporary means of air defence. This they did in 1920 with a new Canadian Air Force, a small air militia charged with providing 28-day refresher air and ground courses to veterans once every two years out of Camp Borden in Ontario.

Despite the emerging role of air power, the formation of an air force in Canada was far from a given. “Canada’s need for an air force was not readily identifiable,” Douglas wrote. “The country faced no discernible external threat. Canadians had little appreciation of the potential of airpower and little enthusiasm for expenditures on such esoteric military commitments. A minuscule active militia and an even smaller navy had served the national interest in prewar years and would continue to do so, but there was no institutional tradition for an air force to build upon.”

As Mackenzie King, opposition leader at the time, put it: “Where does the Minister expect invasion from?...defence against whom[?]”

Thus, Canada’s new air force was, as Douglas put it, “firmly tied to the civil sector and intended to be used in close conjunction with it.”

The CAF headquarters, staffed by six personnel, opened on May 17, 1920, at 529 Sussex Street in Ottawa. Its regulations were adapted from the Royal Air Force. Ranks were holdovers from the First World War—some RAF, some army.

“In the earliest days, the choice to use army or RAF ranks seemed to be along civil versus military flying duties,” says a Defence Department brief on the subject.

“Quite often, members employed the army ranks when flying in support of the civil branch of the Air Board,” the report continued. “The same individual would then utilize the air-force rank when flying within the military branch.”

Some 1,271 airmen and 550 officers passed through the CAF training program before it was shut down on March 31, 1922. A short time later, the Air Board itself was merged with the Department of Militia and Defence and the Department of Naval Service to form the Department of National Defence, effective the following January.

It would be another 16 months before the emergence of what today would be a more recognizable—and permanent—air force. The driving force behind its creation were three Canadian aviation pioneers: First World War aces William Barker and Billy Bishop, and the first flyer in the Commonwealth, Silver Dart pilot John McCurdy. 

Prime Minister Robert Borden and key members of his cabinet remained unconvinced of aviation’s promise. McCurdy, a member of Alexander Graham Bell’s Aerial Experiment Association since 1907, and the first Canadian to be issued a pilot’s licence, had been advocating for an air arm since prewar hostilities began to stir in Europe.

He had tried to persuade Sam Hughes of the need for a military air contingent in 1914. Hughes would have none of it, at least at the time, telling McCurdy: “The aeroplane is an invention of the devil and will never play any part in the defence of a nation, my boy!” Borden also initially rejected the idea, and the government’s subsequent experience with Hughes’s associate Janney and the miserable failure of his Canadian Aviation Corps didn’t enhance McCurdy’s cause.

Even the chief of the general staff of the militia, Lieutenant-General Willoughby Gwatkin, had pooh-poohed a separate air force in 1917, considering it unnecessary and militarily inefficient. But he did think that one “should undoubtedly be formed” after the war—and, with the rank of air vice-marshal, he served as the CAF’s inspector-general until 1922.  

Postwar, Borden was preoccupied with international affairs, spending much time abroad. His cabinet, noted Douglas, lacked sustained direction. There was little support in Parliament or the government for aviation and the dispersed young air veterans were not well placed to have much impact on the people who mattered.

After discussing aviation with several parliamentarians, one close observer found that “with one or two exceptions they know nothing at all.”

“They say, ‘Yes, I have read the stories about our aviators and they are brave men, but about the possibilities of aviation in Canada we know nothing.’”

Another suggested Borden’s government was “somewhat skeptical” about the prospects for flight. Aviation discussions at the Paris Peace Conference in 1919, however, caught Borden’s attention and highlighted the need for domestic legislation to guide national aeronautical development.

Control of international air traffic in the cluster of Europe was a must. Planes could take to the air, but cross-border flights were not monitored or regulated, and no common safety standards existed for aircraft and crews. Consequently, the International Commission on Aerial Navigation convened in Paris in 1919 to arrange a global regulatory system.  

Former Alberta premier and chief justice Arthur Sifton, now Borden’s customs and inland revenue minister, was one of two Canadian delegates to the conference.

He appeared well versed in the potential and likely course that aviation would take in Canada—impressively so for his time and circumstance—and he strongly resisted Britain’s assumption that the “colonials” would readily accept strong imperial leadership on the issue.

Sifton reacted scathingly to the British push to impose a European-based, centralized system to control international airspace, pointing out to the prime minister its irrelevance to North America. He said the British were attempting “to foist on [delegates] an absurd, poorly drawn document, evidently prepared by people without the slightest knowledge of the subject of which they are dealing.

“The whole subject of air traffic from a commercial standpoint is so utterly unknown,” wrote Sifton, “that for anyone to sit down and attempt to draw a treaty for the civilized world is a manifest absurdity, and to attempt without consultation to include a country like Canada where if commercial air traffic is a success it will be of vastly more importance than it is likely to be in any of the countries who are assuming to settle the matter, is a blunder that would generally be called a crime.”  

As Sifton perceptively surmised, the British were primarily interested in establishing air transportation between European population centres, flying over relatively short distances, possibly multiple borders, with ready access to ample ground facilities. Canada’s challenges were quite different, he noted: vast distances, a near-complete absence of ground facilities and a strong international connection with the U.S., with which it shared an 8,900-kilometre border.

Such a country, he said, “could [never] agree to be governed even in regard to technical matters by a commission meeting in Paris.” Still, Ottawa’s approach to flight appeared haphazard. No single minister, department or agency had been made specifically responsible for it.

“Everybody’s business is nobody’s business,” Gwatkin said in 1919. “Nearly every department of state is concerned but no one department is charged with aviation.”

Gwatkin drafted an order-in-council for his minister in February 1919 to prolong the militia’s wartime oversight and create a body to administer everything related to aviation.

A gun-shy cabinet rejected it.

Proposals to integrate military forces, bringing them under one defence department, had become fashionable since the war. Key Canadians watched with interest as British and American services constantly debated the question. Arthur Currie, First World War commander of the Canadian Corps and inspector general of the militia, recommended integration in 1920, but he, too, was rejected.   

Ironically, it was under newly minted Prime Minister Mackenzie King—who in opposition once said “an air service for military purposes is the height of absurdity”—that a permanent air force would come to be.

King’s Liberals—“pledged to a rigid economy,” as Gwatkin put it—won the 1921 election.

Within days, Major-General James H. MacBrien, chief of the general staff and an ardent advocate of integration, sent the prime minister a proposal for consolidating the three military services under a single ministry of defence.  

MacBrien’s submission was bolstered by another from Currie and a third from Eugene Fiset, deputy minister of militia and defence. Currie suggested that service integration could “effect a very large saving.”

Fiset was more to the point, contending that “by such amalgamation a strong and experienced man could save between three and four million dollars a year” by joining the four staffs that were then administering the different services.

King liked what he heard and charged his former leadership rival, George P. Graham, with the job. “I want defence consolidated...
 a ‘cleaning up’ of the dept. and a ‘showing up’ of expenditures and waste,” King demanded.

Graham’s legislation cruised through the House and received royal assent on June 28, 1922. The act came into force on Jan. 1, 1923.

Given the prevailing public and government sensitivities and outright aversion to militarization, combined with the need for an authority to co-ordinate an emerging industry, the Royal Canadian Air Force—officially created on April 1, 1924—was at first tasked with duties more akin to what today would be considered civilian responsibilities.

Though a directorate of the army until 1938, the RCAF did grant its own commissions from the start, wear its own light-blue uniforms and use ranks commensurate with those of the fully independent RAF—group captain, wing commander, squadron leader, flight lieutenant, flying officer, pilot officer and so on.  

Canada’s sparse aeronautical resources, primarily accumulated since 1918, along with a significant proportion of its airmen, had been disposed of as casually as they had been acquired. Ottawa’s piecemeal wartime approach to aviation had therefore left a badly fragmented inheritance.

But its duties included no less than pioneering the application of fast-developing aviation technology to a variety of civil challenges: forest patrols and firefighting, aerial surveys and photography, exploration, rescue, crop and forest dusting, and policing the skies—all largely in previously remote parts of the country.

“The force had responsibility not only for its own narrow service concerns but also for overseeing the development of the entire field of Canadian aviation,” wrote historian Douglas. “The RCAF’s civil functions were focused inwards, towards the economic development of Canada’s hinterland, while the force’s service traditions were directed outward to Britain and the Empire-Commonwealth.”

McBrien continued to press for a greater defence role for the air force, urging that it be made a separate branch of the military, “so that it can without hindrance fulfil its full functions in case of war.

“One of the many reasons for the adoption of a purely military organization,” he wrote in 1923, “was that the Defence Forces of any country cannot be considered complete or effective if they lack a well trained military Air Force.

“This is generally accepted by all countries in the World in which Air Forces are maintained.” By the late-1920s, the plethora of water-borne aircraft were being overtaken in number by wheeled machines using a national airway of interconnected airfields in the populated south—and King’s support for civil aviation had been secured.  

For 15 years, RCAF personnel did everything from registering civil aircraft and controlling the airspace to supervising the design and construction of machines, all while attempting to stimulate a national aviation industry.

Militarily, however, Canada’s air force continued to languish. In 1927, King said he wanted it “understood that the civil work should form the basis of the whole, the military to be an outgrowth rather than vice versa.”

“Government attitude varied from apathy to downright disapproval until in 1932, when world economic conditions struck a new low level, the Force was more than decimated, even though the first rumblings of 1939 could already be heard,” noted The R.C.A.F. Overseas: The First Four Years, the official history of the Second World War force.

“The ensuing six years saw a constant struggle to maintain an efficient air force with little money and very limited personnel.” The prime minister would ultimately have no choice but to embrace air defence. As the winds of war that stirred in Europe through the 1930s turned to a global storm, the RCAF would find itself in the vanguard of a glorious and bloody new age. More struggles lay ahead.   

The RCAF had been ostensibly relieved of direct responsibility for civil aviation in July 1927, when civil regulation, inspection, licensing and control were handed over to a government directorate.

“Ostensibly” because air force personnel still formed the core of the system. They were even delivering mail. 

“RCAF pilots wore air force blue, saluted, drilled, and otherwise observed the eternal military verities, even though their day-to-day working lives for most of the interwar years were spent on civil flying operations,” wrote historian Douglas. Air force training—the RCAF’s primary focus—was concentrated  at Camp Borden near Barrie, Ont., until the base at Trenton, Ont., was opened in 1931.

“I never thought of a weapon; I never saw a weapon or fired a machine gun or whatever,” said the future air marshal, C. Roy Slemon. “We were just as busy as we could be doing purely civil government flying.

“We began to get some military training—all along there were military elements, but they were tiny in comparison to the civil government air operations.” Said another officer: “We were bush pilots in uniform.”

Officers and airmen were sent on RAF courses for advanced and specialized training such as flying instruction, army co-operation, photography, armament, air navigation, wireless, explosives and aeronautical engineering.

Recruiting and training airmen, mechanics and tradesmen initially proved difficult. When the RCAF integrated with the permanent force, many trained airmen got civilian work with the Air Board instead of with the force. Others were deemed unfit. Darker times lay ahead.

In 1932, in the midst of the Great Depression, the government slashed air force and civil aviation budgets. Some 78 officers, 100 airmen and 110 civilians were let go and vacancies left unfilled. Training was curtailed. Programs were cancelled and purchasing halted. Even aircraft maintenance was scaled back.

There was a single beacon of light piercing the gloomy state of affairs: Though they continued to perform some civil tasks, especially aerial photography, the government was coming around to the view that the civil sector was too large and complex to keep within a Department of National Defence that was facing growing military responsibilities.

The new Department of Transport assumed control of civil aviation in 1936. The following year, Trans-Canada Airlines became a national carrier, opening a new era of city-to-city air transportation. It would take a world war to bring the RCAF to its rightful place—ultimately positioning it at, or near, the forefront of military aviation.

By 1937, the rumblings of war in Europe were, as elsewhere, becoming more acute. In Ottawa, the government boosted the defence estimates by almost $14.4 million to $33.7 million.

The RCAF allotment went to $11.4 million from $4.6 million in 1936. It skyrocketed the next year to nearly $30 million—a whopping 1,614 per cent increase over its early-1930s allotment of just $1.75 million.

The reason? The Munich Crisis—Nazi Germany’s demand for the annexation of the Sudetenland, the mountainous, heavily fortified Czech territory of some three million people bordering Germany. Germany waged low-intensity, undeclared war in the Czech borderlands in September 1938.

The issue was settled Sept. 30 by the Munich Agreement, which ceded the territory to Germany after negotiations that also involved France, England and fascist Italy. It was known to some as the “Munich Betrayal” because it essentially broke an alliance and subsequent military pact between Czechoslovakia and France.

“The Munich Crisis itself was one instance of a game of chicken in a series of chicken games that inevitably led to…the invasion of Poland on 1 September 1939,” said a University of Maryland, Baltimore, brief on the subject.

“Games prior to this crisis (remilitarizing the Rhineland for instance) gave the reputation to the Allied powers as ‘swervers,’ giving Nazi Germany the confidence to continue its ‘unswerving’ course of action all the way to the start of World War II.”

While the Defence Department asked for just $361,000 for government air operations—a year-over-year drop of $153,987—an accompanying memorandum estimated RCAF personnel needed to be increased by 48 officers and 565 airmen, to a strength of 195 officers and 1,498 airmen.

The non-permanent air force was to be increased from 97 officers and 666 airmen to 118 officers and 946 airmen.

soon be passé as factories flooded with new generations of fighters, bombers and other military aircraft. And in a move that would come to haunt military procurement for decades to come—notably air force acquisitions—the defence memorandum said “special efforts have been and will continue to be made to have any new aircraft required by the Department of National Defence made in Canada; and the question of producing aero engines in Canada will continue to receive most careful attention.”

New buildings and works were to be built in Nova Scotia, Ottawa, Trenton, Ont., Vancouver, Vancouver Island and Prince Rupert, B.C., with minor additions or repairs at other points.

“Ground services are essential,” said the memorandum, “and as much progress as possible will be made in this direction during the coming year.

“Some flying equipment, munitions, large stocks of tools, spare parts, as well as wireless telegraphy equipment, and mechanical transport will be obtained.”

As it happened, a British air mission arrived in 1938 as part of its quest to buy American planes and explore the possibilities of increasing Canadian aircraft production and the manufacture of British types under licence.

As a result, Canadian Associated Aircraft Ltd. was formed to build Handley-Page Hampden bombers; the Canadian Car and Foundry company was granted a licence to produce the Hawker Hurricane fighter and the Avro Anson crew trainer; Toronto’s National Steel Car would build Westland Lysanders; and Noorduyn was to add the assembly of North American Yale trainers to its production of Harvards and Norsemen.

In February 1939, some 20 of the iconic Hurricanes were delivered to Canada from Britain—a pattern aircraft for Canadian Car and Foundry and the remainder to 1 Squadron, RCAF.

In August, the first eight Fairey Battles arrived and the inaugural run of Lysanders rolled out of the National Steel plant destined for 2 Squadron. No. 3 Squadron gave up its 1920s-era Wapiti biplanes, moved to Halifax from Rockcliffe, Ont., and faded from existence.

Nevertheless, by the time Germany invaded Poland on Sept. 1, 1939, the RCAF had grown to some 20 squadrons and 4,061 personnel. Its 270 aircraft left something to be desired, however, and consisted of just 104 operational planes, the bulk of which were dated. The rest were mainly trainers and transports. It wouldn’t take long to bring the RCAF up to scratch. 

Squadron Leader Ernest A. (PeeWee) McNab’s account of the RCAF’s first kill typified the brevity of fighter pilots’ after-action reports: “I was Blue 2 [right-side wingman in the three-plane Blue Section] and took off at 1530 hours on orders to patrol Beachy Head. Two enemy bombers Do. 215 were sighted flying in close formation (at 16,000 ft. eastwards along the Thames Estuary) and I did a stern attack on them firing a short burst with no apparent effect before breaking off. On my next attack, after the first burst, the rear gunner ceased firing and the enemy aircraft started to lose height. I followed him down, firing. His engines began to smoke and he crashed in some marshy ground just west of Westgate-on-Sea. As my ammunition was used up, I returned to my base and refuelled.” 

It was spring of 1940 before 1 Squadron headed to England, where the British were preparing for the onslaught that would become the Battle of Britain.

Hitler’s blitzkrieg had swept through Western Europe. British boats of every shape and size had engineered a miraculous evacuation of troops at the French resort town of Dunkirk. And now Britons cast their anxious eyes skyward, as the Luftwaffe settled in at airfields across France and Belgium.

A cross-Channel invasion was an all-but-foregone conclusion. But first, Hermann Göring’s air force would have to eradicate British air defences. Airfields would be the objectives of the German Dornier Do 17, the Heinkel He 111 and Junkers Ju 88 bombers. But fighter aircraft would do the dogfighting—Messerschmitt Bf 109s and 110s versus Hawker Hurricanes and the vaunted new Supermarine Spitfire.

Before leaving Canada, No.1 absorbed Montreal-based 115 Squadron, along with personnel from three bomber reconnaissance squadrons and recruits from a Toronto depot.

Its numbers had swelled to more than 300 by the time they boarded RMS Duchess of Atholl for the transatlantic voyage. It was the first Canadian squadron to deploy overseas.

It arrived on June 20, 1940, and headed straight to an airfield, Middle Wallop. Under the command of Squadron Leader Ernest A. (PeeWee) McNab (see above), they were to be part of 10 Group under RAF Fighter Command.

The sector was located well west of where the main battle was anticipated to take place. It was an ideal area in which to acclimatize and train for what was to come.

Two weeks later, however, No. 1 transferred to 11 Group and relocated to Croydon just south of London, one of 18 group airfields distributed across eight sectors in southern England. Sector B, with RAF Croydon, Kenley and Redhill, would bear the brunt of the impending battle but, for the first stage of it at least, the Canadians would continue operational training.

July 10, 1940, dawned gloomy and wet. Luftwaffe raiders had been hitting targets in England, Wales and Scotland for three weeks now. There were air battles, night and day, and both sides suffered casualties. But at first light on this day, 11 Group began dispatching whole squadrons, rather than flights, to forward airfields. What historians came to consider the initial phase of the Battle of Britain was about to begin. The German attacks would be intensified. Masses of bombers, escorted by fighters, would first attempt to blockade the British Isles by attacking ports and shipping, and mining harbour approaches and sea lanes. On this grey English morning, enemy air activity appeared heavier than usual. Luftwaffe aircraft started weather reconnaissance sorties at dawn; tactical reconnaissance continued through the morning, with a few intercepts.

At 8:15 a.m., RAF Pilot Officer Charles Cooke was leading a section of No. 66 Squadron Spitfires when a Do 17 came into view near West Beckham, on the east coast north of London. Even as the three Spits approached, the Dornier was jinking and sliding in anticipation of the hailstorm it was about to endure.

Oberleutnant Hilmar Bott had left Antwerp on this recon flight at dawn. He fought hard, manoeuvring his lumbering aircraft in attempts to afford his three gunners their best shots at the fighters. A burst forced the lead Spit to break off, but the second, with eight guns blazing, scored numerous hits in repeated passes.

All four German crew were killed as the aircraft splashed into the sea off Yarmouth. Cooke descended and kept one eye peeled for open fields on which to conduct an emergency landing as cold air rushed through his windscreen, holed and splintered by the German’s 9mm rounds. His Merlin engine survived, however, and by 9 a.m. the three pilots were back at base celebrating their victory.

The Germans kept coming, however, targeting a large convoy heading southwest for the Dover Straits, and the Spits and Hurricanes kept fighting them off.

A seasoned RAF flying officer, Tom Higgs closed on one of the Dorniers alone. He was so absorbed in his attack that he clipped his target. The bomber fell away, with Higgs’ aircraft tumbling after it, one of its wings gone. Higgs apparently managed to bail out. Another Dornier crewmen photographed the incident. A launch picked up two of the Germans, but the rest of the crashed aircrew, including Higgs, couldn’t be found. His body washed ashore on the Dutch coast on Aug. 15. He was buried in Noordwijk General Cemetery, officially the first Allied death of the Battle of Britain.

The RAF lost six aircraft in multiple actions that day; the Luftwaffe 13. The Battle of Britain had begun. The next 114 days would decide the fate of the world.

The No. 1 pilots, based in Croydon, embarked on a six-week operational training program at nearby Northolt. McNab and one of his flight commanders, Flight-Lieutenant Gordon McGregor of Montreal (later to become Air Canada’s first president), were attached to 3 Squadron, RAF, to gain operational experience.

On his rookie combat mission on Aug. 15, 1940, McNab became the first No. 1 pilot to score a kill, taking down a Dornier over Kent. “The Hurricanes were patrolling the Thames Estuary, water gateway to London,” wrote Canadian Press correspondent Sam Robertson in a story published in newspapers back home the following day. “The British fighters and the Canadian dived into the attack immediately and McNab picked out one of the raiders.

“The German rolled and corkscrewed over the sky trying to shake the Canadian, but McNab held him in his sights and when the German steadied for a moment, his plane was riddled by a short burst of machine-gun fire.

“It took another burst, after some more maneuvering, to send the raider crashing into a marshland—the first victim of the guns of an airman from the RCAF.”

Later in the day, about 15 Bf 110 fighter-bombers broke through at Croydon and made a low bombing attack on the aerodrome. The damage was extensive, but British fighters exacted a heavy toll—3 Squadron alone destroyed four German aircraft and damaged four more.

The No. 1 pilots were still training at Northolt when the attack took place. They returned to find their armament and orderly rooms demolished. The armament stores were on fire and ammunition was exploding spectacularly. The fire was extinguished within a half-hour, but not before two ground crew were wounded.

“The injuries, suffered when [they] were caught in a spray of bomb splinters, were…not serious enough to keep them from an impromptu celebration staged in honor of squadron leader McNab’s success,” CP’s Robertson reported.

The attack was part of a short-lived series of strikes the Luftwaffe mounted on airfields beginning Aug. 13. They destroyed aircraft and critical radar systems, whose import the Germans had yet failed to fully appreciate. Historians have long maintained that had this continued, it would have paved the way for a full-scale invasion.

As it was, the defenders were feeling the pinch. RAF losses were mounting, and the new offensive exacerbated the situation. While aircraft production was reaching capacity, more pilots were needed.

Two days later, on Aug. 17, 1 Squadron moved to Northolt permanently, and immediately became operational. The Canadians were itching for a fight, but for 10 days they stood at readiness, scrambling time and again without gratification.

“The Canadian pilots sat in dispersal—that bare, almost squalid, wooden hut, where present-day air crews spend so many of their waking hours,” said the 1944 edition of The R.C.A.F. Overseas. “The pilots lay around and waited for the telephone to ring—and hence the phrase, descriptive of their mental condition, that ‘they lay around with telephones ringing in their bellies.’

“The long hours in dispersal, when the unit is at readiness, are much more wearing on fighter aircrew than are the short periods of their scrambles—or the longer sorties of their brothers of the bombing units.”

Enemy raids were small-scale that first week, but on Aug. 24, large-scale attacks began again with the Germans focusing on fighter aerodromes and aircraft factories. No. 1 was confined to patrols over Northolt, prohibited from intercepting enemy aircraft operating in other sectors for fear of leaving the vital local aerodrome unprotected.

The squadron got off to an inauspicious start, though, accidently shooting down two Bristol Blenheims of RAF Coastal Command, killing three crewmen.

On Aug. 26, however, the Canadians were ordered to North Weald to relieve one of the sorely pressed RAF units.

“The first patrol of the day was unexciting and it was a browned off (the layman would probably call it ‘fed up’) lot of pilots who landed, firm in the conviction that their lot was to be stooging (uneventful flying over a patrol area) rather than fighting,” said The R.C.A.F. Overseas.

On their second patrol, they were directed to intercept a raiding force of between 25 and 30 Do 215s escorted by 109s approaching from the northeast at 4,267 metres (14,000 feet).

“The bandits were first attacked by a Spitfire squadron and the fighter escort drawn off,” said the official account. “The Dorniers belonged to No. 1, and its pilots took full advantage of their opportunity.

“McNab led his Hurricanes into the sun in line astern, climbed, shifted the formation to sections in echelon to starboard and dived on the quarry from 16,000 ft. [4,877 metres], with all guns blazing. McNab destroyed the bomber on the left wing of the enemy formation, but was forced to land as his own aircraft had been damaged by the Hun’s return fire.”

McNab’s second-in-command, Flying Officer Robert L. Edwards of Cobourg, Ont., opened fire from close range on the next Dornier in line and shot off its tail assembly, but not before the enemy gunners found their mark. Edwards’ Hurricane spun down out of control and crashed. Edwards, 28 and married, was the first 1 Squadron pilot killed. He was buried in Brookwood Military Cemetery in Surrey.

In all, the squadron destroyed three Dorniers and damaged four in their first encounter with the enemy. In its first seven days of action, it fought four engagements, destroyed eight German aircraft, probably eradicated another and damaged nine. In the process, it lost one pilot killed, four wounded and seven Hurricanes destroyed.

The Canadians had officially joined Churchill’s “Few,” probably the most revered pilots in the history of military aviation. 

The last Luftwaffe bombers to appear in significant force over southern England during daylight hours faced heavy losses on Sept. 15, 1940. Britain snatched victory from the jaws of defeat, though skirmishes continued into October and the Blitz went on for eight months.

Indeed, No. 1 Squadron had its most successful day of the battle on Sept.27. While it started the day with only eight serviceable aircraft and ended it with just six, the lone RCAF squadron in the fight survived engagements with 70 enemy aircraft through 26 sorties in three scrambles. By the time it was over, 1 Squadron pilots were a “very tired and unshaven group of warriors,” said the unit’s diary.

No. 1, along with their station mates, 229 RAF and the Canadian-
led 303 Polish squadrons, recorded a Ju 88 destroyed, a Ju 88 probable, four Me110s destroyed, an Me 109 destroyed and an Me 110 damaged. Flying Officer Otto Peterson of Lloydminster, Sask., was the third and last 1 Squadron pilot killed in the Battle of Britain.

Estimates of the Luftwaffe losses on Sept. 15 have been downgraded in the years since, from inflated figures of between 175 and 185 German aircraft to 56-61. No. 1 was reassigned to 13 Group in relatively placid Scotland on Oct. 9.

During 53 days of near-constant patrols and daily encounters with the enemy, 28 pilots flew with the Canadian squadron. Besides three killed, 11 were wounded and 16 aircraft lost. No. 1 had claimed 30 enemy aircraft destroyed, eight probables and 35 damaged.

Two squadron members, Gordon McGregor and Blair Dalzell (Dal) Russel, achieved ace status, while both, along with McNab with 4 victories and one shared, were awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross.

Just 59 of the estimated 115 Canadian pilots to fly with RCAF and RAF squadrons in the Battle of Britain would survive the war. Like other RCAF units, 1 Squadron was given a 400-series number in March 1941 to distinguish it from its RAF counterparts and identify it as distinctly Canadian. To this day, it remains 401. Its original “YO” squadron code has never changed, still one of the most recognizable Canadian aircraft identifiers of the war. Its Spitfires replaced its Hurricanes later in 1941. 

No. 401 would finish the war with 186.5 aerial victories, far and away the most of any RCAF unit. A new era of air warfare had begun, and Canadian airmen and ground crew played no small part in it. Between 1939 and 1945, the RCAF enlisted 232,000 men and 17,000 women. It mounted 86 squadrons, 47 of them overseas.

RCAF personnel crewed bomber, fighter, reconnaissance, transport and other missions around the world. Tens of thousands of Canadian aircrew also served with the RAF. And more than 17,000 Canadian airmen were killed in action, over 10,600 of them with Bomber Command. Another 2,000 were taken prisoner.

Six years of war proved the making of Canada’s military aviation corps. In 1944, it had grown into the world’s fourth-largest air force. While the years ahead would present new challenges, the RCAF would languish no more.

With the Second World War behind it, the ranks of the RCAF were scaled back to 12,735 men in 1946. The last of the Women’s Division ranks were discharged by December. The air force was reorganized and, at the onset of the jet age, new planes were ordered, including 90 de Havilland Vampire F.3 jet fighters from the U.K. and 16 Canadair-built Douglas DC-4M North Star transports.

The latter would soon be put to work on long-haul supply flights across the Pacific Ocean. War is the ultimate proving ground and so, after Soviet-equipped and -trained forces crossed from North Korea into the South on June 25, 1950, war it would be.

At the outset of the Korean War, no RCAF pilot had flown a fighter more advanced than the Vampire, a first-generation jet that, despite being in service only four years, was fast falling behind in jet fighter development.

Canadair in Montreal had just begun producing CL-13 Sabres, a variant of the F-86 Sabre built under licence from North American Aviation. Most were designated for Canada’s home defence or NATO duties. Sixty were sent to the U.S. air force.

The RCAF was not formally involved in a combat role in Korea, but 22 RCAF fighter pilots flew F-86s on exchange duty with the Americans during the 1950-53 conflict.

The usual tour was 100 missions; RCAF pilots were restricted to 50. But there were exceptions. Flying Officer Sanford (Bruce) Fleming, who arrived before the restrictions had been set, flew 82 missions. Flight-Lieutenant Omer Levesque flew 71.

A Second World War prisoner of war, Levesque became the first British Commonwealth pilot to down a German FW 190 on Nov. 22, 1941. In December 1950, the Mont-Joli, Que., native became the first Canadian to fly air combat operations in the Korean War and, on March 31, 1951, he became the first Commonwealth pilot to bag a Soviet MiG. It was his fifth aerial victory over two wars spanning 10 years, making him an ace.

United Nations forces achieved total air superiority in the skies over the Korean peninsula within weeks of the war’s outbreak and followed up their successes by pounding North Korean airfields.

Communist fighters were relegated to bases in Manchuria, where several MiG-15 fighter wings took refuge from the American B-29s. The MiGs, however, lacked the range to reach the front lines in South Korea, so UN forces were never threatened by enemy air attacks.

In three years, seconded RCAF fighter pilots were credited with nine MiG-15s destroyed, two probables and 10 damaged in 1,036 sorties. They were awarded eight U.S. Distinguished Flying Crosses, a Commonwealth Distinguished Flying Cross (DFC) and 10 U.S. Air Medals.

One pilot, Squadron Leader Andrew (Andy) R. Mackenzie, was shot down by friendly fire and captured. He endured countless interrogations, poor food, brainwashing attempts and 465 days of solitary confinement. He lost 70 pounds.

He wasn’t released until December 1954—two years after his capture; 17 months after the Korean Armistice Agreement was signed.

Flight Lieutenant Ernie Glover of Niagara Falls, Ont., a Second World War Hurricane pilot, shot down three enemy planes in a week flying an F-86, earning the Canadians’ only Commonwealth DFC.

As an air force, the RCAF’s main contribution to the Korean War came in the form of transport. No. 426 (Transport) Squadron was attached to the Military Air Transport Service, flying from North America to Japan on what was known as “The Long Haul.” 

Flying Officer James Shipton did two tours with 426 on the Korean airlift delivering cargo and mail into Japanese staging areas. Flying North Stars out of McChord Air Force Base (AFB) in Tacoma, Wash., he would travel 2,400 kilometres to Elmendorf AFB in Alaska, then another 2,400 to Shemya at the far end of Alaska’s Aleutian Islands. The final leg covered 3,400 kilometres to Tokyo. Crews would lay over partway, then replace the next crew through.

The so-called Shemya-Matsushima run skirted the edge of Soviet airspace, so pilots and navigators had to be on their toes. The difficult job was made harder still by Soviet efforts to jam comms and navigational aids.

Shipton sometimes plotted his flight’s progress by dead reckoning, but cloud cover often forced him to resort to pressure pattern navigation, which used wind velocities and horizontal gradients of atmospheric pressure to calculate course and position.

“It was a sonofagun,” said Shipton. “The leg down to Tokyo was a bit of a problem.” A remote island chain, the Pribilofs, extended toward Japan and “we never knew if the Russians had fighter aircraft there or not.” They didn’t.

Once the payload was delivered, the Canadians would take reconfigured aircraft loaded with sick and wounded from Osaka, Japan, back to Fairfield-Suisun airport east of San Francisco, Calif., later renamed Travis AFB, via the disputed Wake Island and Honolulu—55 stretchers stacked along the sides of the fuselage with seats down the middle. Onboard nurses included Canadians on exchange to the USAF. 

The round trip took at least 50 hours of flying and was often punctuated by icing, storms and hair-raising crosswind landings at the short, exposed airstrip on Alaska’s Shemya Island.

“The real challenge was for the pilots,” said Shipton. “The wind was so bad [at Shemya] they built the barracks in trenches. It was one hell of a spot.”

As is procedure for crosswind landings, the pilots would yaw into the wind, then kick the rudder straight at the last second, flare, touch the windward wheel down first, and bring it in. Two-thirds of 426 Squadron aircrew were seasoned WW II vets. Shipton had joined in 1948.

The four Merlin engine-powered North Stars and 12 crews made five flights a week. Shipton, a native of Kingston, Ont., made the journey 18 times.

The final Canadian mission left McChord on May 31, 1954. No. 426 Squadron had flown 584 round trips, logged 34,000 flying hours, carried 13,000 personnel, and airlifted 3,500 tonnes of freight. It suffered no losses.

Shipton logged 1,685 hours in two deployments. He would go on to serve 37 years in the RCAF, retiring as a flight lieutenant. 

The 1950s ushered in a brave new world, rife with fear. Enemies were now friends. Friends had become enemies. And a nuclear arms race cast an ominous shadow over the entire planet.

Canada was a founding member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in 1949. The group’s sole purpose was to ward off the newfound threat posed by what many consider the biggest contributor to WW II’s Allied victory: the Soviet Union, 26 million to 30 million of whose citizens had died turning back Hitler’s forces in Eastern Europe between 1941 and 1945.

The RCAF established No. 1 Canadian Air Division—four wings of three fighter squadrons apiece, based in France and West Germany. The Pinetree Line, the Mid-Canada Line and the Distant Early Warning, or DEW, Line radar stations were built across the country to help keep the growing Soviet nuclear threat in check. They were largely an RCAF responsibility. In 1957, Canada and the U.S. created the joint North American Air Defense Command (Norad), based in Colorado.

Coastal defence and peacekeeping also became emerging priorities during the 1950s and 1960s.

In 1968, the RCAF, the Royal Canadian Navy and the Canadian Army were amalgamated to form a unified Canadian Forces. The controversial merger maintained several existing organizations and created some new ones:
• In Europe, No. 1 Canadian Air Division operated Canadair CF-104 Starfighter nuclear strike/attack and reconnaissance aircraft under NATO’s Fourth Allied Tactical Air Force.
• Air Defence Command operated McDonnell CF-101 Voodoo interceptors, CIM-10 Bomarc missiles and the SAGE radar stations within Norad.
• Air Transport Command provided strategic airlift for NATO and UN peacekeeping missions.
• Training Command was flying Canadair CT-114 Tutor jets—which the Snowbirds demonstration team still flies—before it was eventually outfitted with Canadair CF-116 Freedom Fighters.
• Aviation assets of the Royal Canadian Navy were combined with the RCAF Canadair CP-107 Argus long-range patrol aircraft under Maritime Command.

In 1975, the different commands, and the military’s scattered aviation assets, were consolidated under Air Command. Along with the other commands of the Canadian Armed Forces, it reverted to its historic moniker in August 2011, becoming the Royal Canadian Air Force once again.

On Jan. 17, 1991, CNN launched a seminal broadcast from the Al Rasheed Hotel as the first bombs fell on Baghdad. The rumble of explosions and breathless commentary gave it an old-time radio quality reminiscent of the reports from Matthew Halton, Peter Stursberg and Edward R. Murrow a half-century earlier. The forces of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein had invaded and occupied neighbouring Kuwait on Aug. 2, 1990. And now a UN-sanctioned, American-led coalition of 42 countries, including Canada, was set on driving him out.

Three Canadian navy ships set sail from Halifax Harbour on Aug. 24. The Canadians would also operate a field hospital in Al Qaysumah, Saudi Arabia, a joint headquarters in Manama, Bahrain, and a formidable air force contingent based in Doha, Qatar.

Twenty-six CF-18 fighter-bombers and 40 pilots from two squadrons, backed by 300 support crew, engaged in more combat flying than any Canadian military aviation contingent in 40 years. They were known as the Desert Cats, and they flew around the clock, sharing in the destruction of an Iraqi patrol boat and conducting 56 bombing sorties against Iraqi forces.

With pilots already flying patrols in Operation Desert Shield, the newly formed group assembled in Baden, Germany, to work up for the job ahead. They arrived in Doha about mid-November.

Shortly after 2:30 a.m. on Jan. 17, U.S. helicopters blasted Iraqi radar sites, opening a narrow corridor along the Saudi border through which the coalition could fly. The choppers had no sooner done their work when their pilots reported a flood of coalition jets pouring through the gap.

Soon the skies over Baghdad were lighting up with cruise-missile strikes launched from U.S. navy ships in the Persian Gulf and aircraft attacks on surrounding radar and anti-aircraft sites. These were followed by massive strikes on bunkers, missile launch sites, communications and radio facilities, storage areas and airfields.

Coalition aircraft flew 2,775 sorties in the first 24 hours. Iraqi air-defence systems, installed by the Russian military, were largely ineffectual. In more than 100,000 sorties, 75 coalition aircraft (52 planes; 23 helicopters) were lost.

With Iraqi orders flowing out of Saddam’s headquarters, the coalition began the systematic elimination of command-and-control facilities.

The Canadians were propelled into combat with the first strikes. At the base in Doha, ground crews started a pool on when the first missile would be fired by a Canadian and what type it would be—heat-seeking or radar-guided. The CF-18s carried both, along with three fuel tanks.

They didn’t have to wait long. On the night of Jan. 30, 1991, Major David Kendall and his wingman, Captain Steve Hill, received a proposal they couldn’t refuse from their ship-borne controller: “Would you like to strafe a boat?”

The Iraqi patrol boat had survived an attack by an American Intruder when the aircraft ran out of ordnance. After receiving final clearance to engage, the two CF-18 pilots emptied their 20mm cannons during multiple strafing runs, scoring numerous hits.

With only air-to-air missiles remaining, they attempted to acquire an infrared lock to fire an AIM-9 Sidewinder. The boat’s heat signature was low and, after some trouble, Hill acquired a radar lock and fired an AIM-7 semi-active radar missile. It hit the water short of the target and the pilots returned to base.

The boat was eventually finished off by U.S. bombers, but the Canadians were officially awarded an “assist” to the kill and Hill and Kendall were extolled by senior military brass at home for their “example of Canadian can-do.”

The commander of the Canadian Air Task Group-Middle East, Colonel Roméo Lalonde, however, told media the pair should have made fewer passes to minimize their exposure.

“He was not entirely happy about the attack,” Lieutenant-Colonel Darcy Molstad wrote in his 2011 paper, CF-18s in Combat from Iraq to Libya: The Strategic Dividend of Fighters. “They had, after all, wasted a $250,000 air-to-air missile on a boat in the first offensive action by the Canadian military since the Korean War.”

Molstad, now a major-general, described the engagement as “admittedly unorthodox,” but noted Lalonde’s criticisms were viewed as “a little harsh” by most officers in the fighter community. Regardless, somebody at Doha won big.

RCAF Captain David Deere had just finished Top Gun Canada—officially the Fighter Weapons Instructor Course—when he transferred from Norad defence duties with 441 Tactical Fighter Squadron to 416 Tactical Fighter Squadron. For a fighter pilot, his timing couldn’t have been better.

A 10-year air force veteran, he was among the 40 pilots from 416 and the Baden-based 439 Squadron to form the Desert Cats, a derivative of their respective nicknames, Lynx and (Sabre-Toothed) Tigers.

Deere’s first sortie was launched amid the wail of air-raid sirens warning of an incoming Scud missile. He flew multiple missions over the Persian Gulf each day, protecting “high-value assets”—all manner of warships from across the coalition. Over time, they worked closer to the Iraqi border and eventually into Iraq itself as the ground forces moved north. Coalition air forces had nearly a 4:1 advantage—2,250 aircraft, 1,800 of which were American, while Iraq had 934 planes, just 550 of them operational. Coalition pilots shot down 38 Iraqi aircraft in the first week of combat.

Soon, the Canadians were flying sweep escort missions ahead of and behind American and British bombers penetrating deep into Iraq. “We’d be 10,000 to 15,000 feet [3,048-4,572 metres] above the bomber force,” said Deere.

Three refuelling aircraft, 610-1,219 metres (2,000-4,000 feet) apart vertically, kept them flying. It was a precision operation in which the fighters pulled up like cars at a gas station every 60-90 minutes. Each plane took its spot at the end of an air-to-air refuelling boom as soon as the one ahead was finished. Typical missions lasted three to four-and-a-half hours, refuelling just before the assembly point and again on the way back.

“That was one of the most impressive aspects of the Gulf War,” said Deere. “You had multiple missions—inbound, outbound—intercepting these fuel tankers completely radio-silent.

“As we were arriving at one of the tankers, we would see four or eight aircraft departing the tanker just as we were getting there. The co-ordination was remarkable. And nobody said anything—we’d just show up on-time and on-target.”

Later in the campaign, the Canadians shifted to actual bombing, making the Desert Cats the only coalition squadron to conduct all three assignments—defensive air combat patrols, offensive sweep escorts and bombing missions.

The eight 500-pound all-purpose weapons they carried lacked on-board guidance systems—not so good for hitting specific buildings, but eminently workable in stopping retreating columns of trucks, tanks and armoured vehicles.

Deere described bombing as “intense.” They rolled over from 6,096 metres (20,000 feet) and dropped their loads in a 45-degree high-angle dive, avoiding small-arms fire simply by staying at altitude until they were ready to attack.

Most of the bombing missions were flown during the day, but they saw little of the action on the ground. During night escorts, the pilots couldn’t help but witness the massive fireballs wrought by the lumbering B-52s with their formidable payloads.

“You really, really had to pay attention, do as you’re told and bring in all of the training that you’ve had,” said Deere. “You’re so focused on what you’re doing, you don’t have time to look at the sights.

“Any fear you may have basically is redirected into doing the damn best job you can because your life depends on it. All of us had our own ways of dealing with it.” Deere said he wouldn’t have missed it for the world. A 737 captain and technical pilot at WestJet since, he amassed 3,600 of his 15,000 hours in the air flying military aircraft. “Every pilot deep inside wonders if all the training will be exercised,” he said. “It was pretty exciting, thrilling, concerning.

“The friendships and camaraderie we made during military service is second to none. You don’t often make those kind of deep connections and friendships that you do when you’re actually brothers in arms.” 

More than seven decades have passed since the Truman Doctrine of March 12, 1947, pledged American “support for democracies against authoritarian threats,” a not-so-subtle message to Soviet Communist hegemony.

It effectively launched the Cold War, which ended with the collapse of the Soviet Union in December 1991. And yet, to this day, Canadian and U.S. fighter aircraft still intercept 1950s-era Russian bombers skirting the edge of North American airspace six or seven times a year. Norad says it does not consider the patrols threatening.

Commissioned as tensions escalated in 1956, the Tupolev Tu-95 Bear turboprops that precipitate most of the encounters usually conduct operations in pairs, sometimes more, travelling sporadically in different flight patterns across the Arctic, and as far south as the California coast.

Most of the incursions into what are called the Air Defense Identification Zones (ADIZ) of Canada and the United States take place off Alaska, said a Norad spokesperson.

The zones begin where sovereign airspace ends and are “a defined stretch of international airspace that requires the ready identification of all aircraft in the interest of national security.”

The Russian defence ministry characterizes the “visits” as routine patrols “carried out in strict compliance with international regulations and with respect to national borders.”

Canada is an expansive landmass strategically located at the northern reaches of the continent. Virtually its entire northern border is connected to Russia by a 6,700-kilometre-long ice bridge at least nine months a year, the closest points between the world’s 
 two largest sovereign states just 88 kilometres in the Bering Strait.

Canadian soil, air and waters therefore mark the continent’s first line of defence against Russian aggression. Expensive ships and aircraft are the foundations of Canada’s military presence in its far-flung borders and territories. With the Cold War warming up  through the 1950s, the strength “ceiling” of the RCAF expanded again in 1954, to 51,000 personnel—quadrupling its postwar low. 
The organization peaked at 41 squadrons the following year. 

Canada’s air force began development of the Avro CF-105 Arrow fighter-interceptor in 1955 after two years of preliminary studies. Soviet bombers posed a rising threat to North America and the delta-winged aircraft was projected to reach Mach 2 at altitudes exceeding 15,000 metres (50,000 feet).

The first Arrow Mk. 1, RL-201, was rolled out to the public on Oct. 4, 1957, the same day the Soviets launched Sputnik I, the first artificial Earth satellite. Flight testing began the following March. The plane demonstrated excellent handling and overall performance, reaching Mach 1.9 in level flight.

Four more Mk. 1s were completed, RL-202 through -205. A lighter and more powerful engine was readied for testing and RL-206, the first Mk. 2 equipped with it, was prepared to make its maiden flight by early 1959.

On Feb. 20, before the new engine testing could be begin, Prime Minister John Diefenbaker abruptly scrapped the entire project. Canada subsequently tried to sell the Arrow to the U.S. and Britain, but no deals could be made.

Two months later, the assembly line, tooling, plans, along with all existing airframes and engines were ordered destroyed—victims of politics (both military and otherwise) and American pressure. The threat was evolving too, toward intercontinental ballistic missiles.

Ottawa opted for second-generation jets—McDonnell F-101 Voodoo interceptors and Canadair CF-104 Starfighters—along with Bomarc anti-aircraft missiles. More than 14,000 Avro employees, and 15,000 more in the company’s supply chain, lost their jobs. Untold Canadian industry potential was squandered.

For succeeding decades, RCAF duties consisted largely of patrols and exercises, punctuated by peacekeeping, peacemaking and humanitarian missions. Maritime patrol squadrons stationed on the east and west coasts flew Lancasters, and later Neptune and Argus aircraft, on anti-submarine and fisheries enforcement ops. As a peacekeeper and humanitarian force, the RCAF mainly provided transportation and supply. Post-Second World War squadron battle honours are few and far between, primarily consisting of the Gulf War, Kosovo and Afghanistan.

In July 2022, the Royal Canadian Air Force announced the formation of a new entity, 3 Canadian Space Division. But Canadians shouldn’t expect combat pilots with the Maple Leaf on their shoulders to be taking Star Wars-style sorties beyond Earth’s atmosphere any time soon. The space division, which followed the formation of a similar organization south of the border, focuses on “extraterrestrial matters,” and that doesn’t involve aliens or missions beyond the point 100 kilometres up, the so-called Kármán line, that’s generally agreed to mark the planet’s stellar boundary.

“Space-based capabilities are vital to modern military operations and as such, space must be integrated across the Canadian Armed Forces and steeped in our operational planning,” the defence chief, General Wayne Eyre, said at the time.

“The establishment of 3 Canadian Space Division marks another step forward in growing the space expertise and capabilities we depend on to successfully and effectively conduct operations.” Canada’s military interests in space touch mainly on such things as communications, command and control, navigation, weather and situational awareness.

Affected operations include search-and-rescue missions, monitoring Canada’s maritime approaches and reinforcing Arctic sovereignty, as well as supporting Norad and overseas operations.

“Astronauts and space exploration, this really continues to be the purview of the Canadian Space Agency,” said the division’s first commander, Brigadier-General Mike Adamson. “They’re looking at the science of space.

“We’re more concerned with looking at those components of space on which we have become increasingly reliant as a society in Canada,” including ATMs, internet and cellphone technology, TV and GPS-dependent infrastructure.

The division, which emerged following a country-wide Rogers Communications outage in July 2022 that took down cellphone and cable services—including 911—as well as internet and banking for more than a day, is training a league of specialists.

“As the international security environment becomes increasingly complex, space is a critical domain for our national security,” said the defence minister of the day, Anita Anand.

Unlike the American version with its “Guardians,” Canada’s “modest” space division is not a separate military branch and will not have its own uniforms. Adamson called it “a recognition of the fact” that it has outgrown its predecessor, the office of director general space.

It was projected to employ about 175 military and civilian personnel within a few years. It also re-established 7 Wing, made up of 7 Space Operations Squadron and 7 Operations Support Squadron, providing “space-based data and capabilities in support of CAF operations.”

Among the concerns: Space in the planetary neighbourhood is becoming increasingly crowded and contested. The head of U.S. space operations told the 2021 Ottawa Conference on Security and Defence that he was seeking new ways to manage the traffic jam of satellites and space junk crowding the skies—and to prevent fender-benders and extraterrestrial road rage in the process.

Lieutenant-General Stephen Whiting of U.S. Space Operations Command said humankind is entering “a second golden age of space” but, like all things human, it brings along unwanted baggage.

Among the concerns: Space in the planetary neighbourhood is becoming increasingly crowded and contested. The head of U.S. space operations told the 2021 Ottawa Conference on Security and Defence that he was seeking new ways to manage the traffic jam of satellites and space junk crowding the skies—and to prevent fender-benders and extraterrestrial road rage in the process.

Lieutenant-General Stephen Whiting of U.S. Space Operations Command said humankind is entering “a second golden age of space” but, like all things human, it brings along unwanted baggage. “The space domain…has become congested, contested and competitive,” said Whiting, explaining that the U.S., Canada and their allies are keeping their collective eye on some 30,000 pieces of debris and other objects orbiting the Earth.

And he described escalating interactions, including intimidation tactics and confrontations, between rival satellites that demand a more co-ordinated defence among like-minded nations.

“The number of active satellites is literally booming,” he said. “From 2019 to 2020, the number of payloads launched increased by almost 300 per cent, from just over 400 payloads in calendar year ’19 to over 1,200 payloads in calendar year ’20.”
Some 2,325 commercial satellites were deployed in 2022, an increase of more than 35 per cent over 2021.
It’s a new space race, as rival countries clamour to gain dominance over the high ground and all the opportunities, both commercial and military, that come with it.
Where it will take the country is anybody’s guess but, one thing is certain, 100 years on, the RCAF will remain a fundamental element of Canadian defence and security.