The Role of War Planning in Canadian-American Relations, 1867–1939

The Canadian Review of American Studies, Volume 10, No. 3, Winter 1979 TheRole of WarPlanningin Canadian-American Relations,1867-1939 N. F. Dreisziger Richard A. Preston. The Defence of the Undefended Border: Planningfor War in North America, 1867-1939. Montreal and London: McGill-Queen's University Press, 1977. 300 + xiv pp. North American society was born in the crucible of war. Following the establishment of the first European colonies, the continent witnessed several major wars as well as countless Indian raids, campaigns and other local conflicts. This state of affairs did not come to an end even when Britain gained control of most of the continent's inhabited regions during the Seven Years War. Two decades later the land was again divided and major conflict again became a possibility. Indeed, war did break out in 1812, bringing the number of major confrontations in North America to six, not counting any of the Indian wars. Strategic planning for these early North American wars was at best haphazard, at worst improvised or almost non-existent. It is an irony of the continent's history that planning for war became a serious enterprise only after a continental war, that is an armed conflict between the United States and Canada, ceased to be a part of the realm of reality. In 1867 no one could foresee the coming of an epoch of peace in the relations of the Republic and the Dominion. Yet peace did come, and the great turning point in Canadian-American history can now be seen to have taken place in 1871, a date which, according to Colonel C.P. Stacey, ~eparates "the era of wars and threat of wars from that of gradually tncreasing friendship and co-operation." 1 The half century preceding this fateful date, in the words of Richard Preston, witnessed '"not so much a 342 N. F. Dreisziger balance of power as an equilibrium of weakness" (p. 21). Periodic tension kept both sides concerned about defence, and resulted in the maintenance of a border that was far from undefended, but armed conflict was avoided. Actually, the "equilibrium of weakness" had ended some time before 1871. As the American Civil War drew to a close, and Yankee power stood triumphant, it became obvious that the United States could no longer be challenged in the northern half of the continent. This fact, and the crises the Civil War had caused in Anglo-American relations, gave rise to much concern in British and British North American circles regarding defence against the United States. During the mid and late l860's, several studies were made of the problem by British officers. While no consensus was reached on strategy, the British gradually accepted the position that m an all-out confrontation with the United States, Canada could not b,.;hdd, and the best policy for Britain would be withdrawal. The departure of the British regulars from Canada and th~ settlement of most Canadian-American and Anglo-American differences by the Treaty of Washington in 1871marked the beginning of an era of decreasing anxiety about a conflict in North America. Defence spending and preparedness declined so drastically in Canada that in 1877 the General Officer Commanding the Canadian Militia had to refer to the danger of "Communism" in order to justify military readiness in the country (p. 65). Although this relaxation of tensions lasted until 1895, British planning for the defence of Canada and American planning for her invasion continued. The year 1895 witnessed a recurrence of Anglo-American tension and revived the possiblity of armed conflict between the United States and Canada. President Cleveland's high-handed intervention in the border dispute between Venezuela and British Guiana awakened the Canadian government from its usual apathy towards defence and resulted in more than just token attention being paid to the Canadian militia during the crisis. At the same time, Canada's military leaders embarked on drawing up a scheme of mobilization. In the United States, military reactions to the crisis were mixed. The War Department was "apparently very little disturbed" (p. 13I), but in naval circles preparations were started for a war on the Great Lakes. The navy's plans called for preemptive...