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31 The End of the Beginning The Canadian Corps in 1917 PAUL DICKSON If the First World War had ended with a negotiated peace in 1916 or the winter of 1917, the reputation of the Canadian Corps would have been mixed at best. Historians would have pondered the “what ifs?,” characterizing the Corps as an overly politicized formation that never fully realized its potential, had expanded too rapidly, had too few senior commanders qualified to lead higher formations and had suffered because Canada’s permanent force could not provide the trained staff required to sustain a corps headquarters. The Canadian Corps that took Vimy Ridge was not the “elite” formation it would become in 1918, but the foundation was firmly in place. The Canadian Corps at Vimy was a work in progress, a formation that had shed the last vestiges of its amateurish politicized beginnings. Its leaders were ready to take advantage of improvements to its reinforcement and training system, new technology and with time, to assess the experiences of the Allied offensive operations on the Western Front. One could argue that the approach to the assault on Vimy Ridge was as much a result of the need to build confidence in the Corps’ new direction as it was reflective of a particular operational culture. By 1916, good habits and a good organizational climate were forming. Equally important, by the end of 1916, the Canadian Corps had stability denied most other corps in the British Expeditionary Force (BEF), one paralleled only in the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps. That stability made adaptation to tactical developments quicker and more effective, particularly when the Corps had significant periods of time to consider the lessons of the previous two years. Neither the climate nor the stability came easily. As other studies have demonstrated, the Canadian Corps evolved.1 Like any evolutionary process, there were winners and losers. The critical element in that evolution was the 2 32 PAUL DICKSON creation of an organizational climate that fostered and rewarded critical thinking and innovation. By 1917, the officers and men of the Corps who had survived the battles of 1915 and 1916 had more experience. But so did the British, French and German armies on the Western Front. What made the Canadian Corps unique? What kind of army was it? When the soldiers of the 1st Canadian Division filtered into the trenches on the Western Front in 1915, there was no reason to believe they would be any more or less successful than the soldiers of other national armies. The Canadian Expeditionary Force (CEF) shared many of the problems encountered by other armies on the Western Front as it struggled with the implications of rapid expansion and new technologies that allowed defensive tactics and techniques to stay just ahead of operational developments. Did the Canadians Corps have better material to work with? The profiles of the Canadian contingents suggest nothing remarkable about the men themselves. The conclusion, still maintained by some historians, that the Canadians had more potential because of their pioneering origins, was a natural consequence of the Canadian Corps’ later success.2 Even General Sir Arthur Currie, who knew better, waxed poetic about the virtues of the Canadian pioneers in the immediate aftermath of the war: “The rugged strength of the Canadian is depicted in his broad shoulders, deep chest and strong, clean-cut limbs…while behind the calm gravity of his mien lies a tenacious and indomitable will.” These, he concluded, are the “invaluable gifts of our deep forests and lofty mountains, of our rolling plains and our great waterways, and of the clear light of our Northern skies, gifts which have enabled the Canadian to adapt himself readily and well to the new conditions he found confronting him as a soldier.”3 Stylistic conventions of the period aside, Currie’s suggestion that the Canadian Corps’ successes stemmed from the pioneering tradition and the results of natural “laws of selection” was still qualified. He concluded that the Canadian soldier was returning to civilian life “still possessing” the qualities that made him an excellent soldier, but in addition “having learned…the value of well-organized, collective effort, backed by discipline and selfrestraint .”4 Currie can be forgiven for wanting in the flush of victory to emphasize the contribution of the individual solder; still, even Currie had to acknowledge that the success of the Canadian Corps did not come easily. The CEF was not far different...

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