Think Pair and Share

Describe Canadas struggles before WWII started.

What was Canadas attitude towards Jews fleeing from

Germany?
What was Canadas response to the declaration of war

by Britain and France?

Immediate effects of declaring war

Declaring war immediately put many Canadians back

to work effectively ending the worst effects of the Great Depression Though the economy was not fixed entirely, the need for munitions, food and soldiers employed almost everyone very quickly

The British Commonwealth Air Training Program (BCATP)

Mackenzie King hoped to keep as many Canadians in

Canada as possible and support the war effort from the home front as much as was possible In Dec. 1939, Canada agreed to host and administer a training plan which would bring pilots from all over the Commonwealth to Canada for their pilot training Over 130,000 pilots would train in Canada under the BCATP which cost $2.2 billion

Question to consider
What do we mean by total war?

Canadas total war

With the increasing technological requirements of

modern warfare, most industries were involved in war production. Canadian factories made:
Munitions Ships Airplanes Armoured cars

Tanks

The focus of Canadian industries on war production

was part of the total war we were now fighting

The Increased Role of Government

Canadas government played a very expanded role in

WWII compared to WWI

Mackenzie King created the new Department of

Munitions and Supplies to oversee the total war effort

Appointed CD Howe its minister Howe was given authority to tell private companies what to make and how to make it. He also told farmers how much more food they needed to produce.

Howes dictatorship
Crown corporations were dedicated to aspects of

wartime production that werent covered by the private sector:

Telecommunications Fuel refineries Parachute manufacture Uranium mining

Wartime Economy
With unemployment ended, people had money to

spend again. However, there were fewer goods to buy with so much production focused on the war effort King desperately wanted to avoid inflation (which could be caused by the problem of too much money chasing too few goods) He also wanted to avoid the massive war debt that had burdened Canada after WWI

Wartime Economy cont

King named James Ilsey from Nova Scotia as his

finance minister. Ilsey took three steps which kept Canada from debt and froze inflation before it got too out of control:
Selling Victory Bonds Raising the Income Tax Rationing

A weekly ration in Canada was ~1 kg of meat, 220g of sugar, 250g of butter, 115g of coffee

Increasing our partnership with the US

When the US began its Lend-Lease program in 1941

(they werent yet at war) to supply the Allies more efficiently, King worried that the Allies would stop buying from Canada Negotiated the Hyde Park Declaration which stated that the US would buy more raw goods from Canada This was a decisive move towards our North American economic focus where before we had stronger ties with Britain

The changing role of women at war

In 1941, Canadas women got official branches in each

of the armed services

By the end of the war, over 46,000 Canadian women

served overseas as cooks, nurses, pilots, mechanics, welders and radar operators. Canadian women were also assigned to coastal defenses Some women also served in the Special Operations Executive (SOE) as secret agents inside Fortress Europe

The changing role of women at home

With factories dedicated to the total war, it wasnt

uncommon to have them open 12 hrs a day, 7 days a week

By 1943, over 1 million women were in the work force Women were still paid less than men for comparable work

and were still expected to give up their jobs on the return of the men Women took on even more manly jobs like welding, machine operating, etcthese ladies were nicknamed Rosie the Riveter.

Women also moved from the country into the cities where

jobs were to be had

Demands for Social Change Unions

Unions had become more of a social and political force

in the interwar period though their legality was still limited The government sought to restrict/suppress the power of the unions during the war because they saw strikes as a potential threat to national security In spite of Howes strong anti-union stance, steel workers in Nova Scotia and coal miners in Alberta and BC went on strike in 1943 In 1944, the government softened their position and allowed workers the right to unionize

Demands for Social Change Government Involvement

The war had seen the governments involvement in

daily life increase for all Canadians and many Canadians wanted to see the involvement continue after the war The CCF (precursor to the NDP) with their platform of government run social reform was increasing in popularity both provincially and federally
In 1943, became the opposition in Ontario In 1944, formed a government in Sask. under Tommy

Douglas

Demands for Social Change Government Invovlement

King responded to this by further increasing Canadas

social assistance programs

In 1940, King had brought in an unemployment

insurance policy (which was now manageable with unemployment so low with the entry of Canada into the war) In 1945, he brought in the Family Allowance program which gave parents money for each child to help with the expenses of child rearing

Economic outcome of the war

Canadas economy basically doubled through WWII In 1939, the GDP (gross domestic product the value of all the goods and services produced in the country) was $5.6 billion, in 1945 it was $11.8 billion We lent $3.4 billion to the Allies and thus had money owed to us after the war (recall the massive debt after WWI) Different sectors became more important too: Paper production increased because Europes traditional paper suppliers were under Nazi rule Oil supplies were in such high demand that new fields were sought out in Alberta Agriculture became secondary to manufacturing in the importance of Canadas economy The massive growth led to massive immigration after the war as

Europeans sought to leave their ravaged continent for somewhere new

Canadas status
Though the Allies won, only Canada and the US came

out truly ahead after the war

Our contributions economically led us to be called the

arsenal of democracy Our military had increased from a tiny thing to including the 3rd largest navy and the 4th largest air force in the world

Canada firmly established themselves as a true middle

power in the world.