a central role in the major alliances.

It was an ally of the United States, but there were several

foreign policy differences between the two countries over the course of the Cold War.
Canada was a founding member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in 1949, the North
American Aerospace Defence Command (NORAD) in 1958 and played a leading role in United
Nations peacekeeping operations – from the Korean War to the creation of a permanent UN
peacekeeping force during the Suez Crisis in 1956. Subsequent peacekeeping interventions
occurred in the Congo (1960), Cyprus (1964), the Sinai (1973), Vietnam (with the International
Control Commission), Golan Heights, Lebanon (1978), and Namibia (1989–1990).
Canada did not follow the American lead in all Cold War actions, sometimes leading to tensions.
Canada refused to join the Vietnam War and in 1984 the last nuclear weapons based in Canada
were removed. Relations were maintained with Cuba and the Canadian government recognized
the People's Republic of China before the United States.
The Canadian military maintained a standing presence in Western Europe as part of its NATO
deployment at several bases in Germany – including long tenures at CFB Baden-
Soellingen and CFB Lahr, in the Black Forest region of West Germany. Also Canadian military
facilities were maintained in Bermuda, France and the United Kingdom. From the early 1960s until
the 1980s, Canada maintained weapon platforms armed with nuclear weapons – including nuclear-
tipped air-to-air rockets, surface-to-air missiles, and high-yield gravity bombs principally deployed in
the Western European theatre of operations as well as in Canada.

Contents

 1Background
 2Early Cold War (1946–1960)
o 2.1Domestic anti-Communism
o 2.2Peacekeeping
 3Canada–U.S. tensions (1961–1980)
 4Final years of the Cold War (1980–1991)
 5Post-Cold War
 6See also
 7Notes
 8References
 9Further reading
 10External links

Background[edit]
The Royal Canadian Air Force, February 1945. By the end of World War II, Canada fielded a significantly large
air force, and navy.
Canada emerged from the Second World War as a world power, radically transforming a principally
agricultural and rural dominion of a dying empire into a truly sovereign nation, with a market
economy focused on a combination of resource extraction and refinement, heavy manufacturing,
and high-technology research and development. As a consequence of supplying so much of the war
effort for six long years, Canada's military grew to an exceptional size: over a million service
personnel, the world's fifth largest surface fleet and fourth largest air force. Despite a draw-down at
the end of the war, the Canadian military nonetheless executed Operation Muskox, a massive
deployment across the Canadian Arctic designed in part to train for a ground and air war in the
region. Canadians also assisted in humanitarian efforts, and sending observers for the United
Nations to India and Palestine in 1947 and 1948.
There was never any doubt early on as to which side Canada was on in the Cold War due to its
location and historical alliances. On the domestic front, the Canadian state at all levels fought
vehemently against what it characterized as communist subversion. Canadian and business leaders
opposed the advance of the labour movement on the grounds that it was a Bolshevik conspiracy
during the interwar period. The peak moments of this effort were the Winnipeg General Strike of
1919 and the anticommunist campaigns of the depression, including the stopping of the On-to-
Ottawa Trek.

Early Cold War (1946–1960)[edit]

In February 1946, the Canadian government disclosed to the public the defection of a Soviet cipher
clerk, Igor Gouzenko, in Ottawa; who also disclosed the existence of a Soviet spy ring in the country.
The event has been used by historians to mark the beginning of the Cold War era in Canada, with
the Gouzenko affair triggering another red scare in Canada.[1][2][note 1]
Canada was a founding member of NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization), of which Prime
Minister St. Laurent was a chief architect. Canada was one of its most ardent supporters and pushed
(largely unsuccessfully) to have it become an economic and cultural organization in addition to a
military alliance.

A map depicting the location for the Dew Line, the Mid-Canada Line, and the Pinetree Line, a series of early
warning radar systems developed in the 1950s.
To defend North America against a possible enemy attack, Canada and the United States began to
work very closely together in the 1950s. The North American Aerospace Defense
Command (NORAD) created a joint air-defense system. In northern Canada, the Distant Early
Warning Line (Dew Line) was established to give warning of Soviet bombers heading over the north
pole. Similar early warning radar systems were also developed in the middle of Canada, known as
the Mid-Canada Line; and across the 50th parallel north, known as the Pinetree Line.

Domestic anti-Communism[edit]
Canada addressed the threat posed by Communist sympathizers in a manner more moderate than
in the United States. The United States wished the Canadian government would go further, asking
for a purging of trade unions, but the Canadian government left the purge of trade unions to the AFL-
CIO. The American officials were especially concerned about the sailors on Great Lakes freight
vessels, and, in 1951, Canada added them to those already screened by its secret anti-communist
screening program. The Communist Party of Canada had not been outlawed since Section 98 was
repealed by Prime Minister Mackenzie King in 1935. [3]
Despite its comparatively moderate stance towards Communism, the Canadian state continued
intensive surveillance of Communists and sharing of intelligence with the United
States. PROFUNC was a Government of Canada top secret plan to identify and
detain Communist sympathizers during the height of the Cold War.[4]
Tensions between Canada and the United States heightened during this time as on April 4,
1957, Canadian Ambassador to Egypt, E. Herbert Norman, leaped to his death from a Cairo building
after the United States Senate Subcommittee on Internal Security released a textual record of a
previous hearing to the media. Despite having been cleared several years earlier, first by
the RCMP in 1950, then again by the Canadian Minister of External Affairs, Lester B. Pearson, the
United States media portrayed Norman as a spy and traitor. The only evidence the United States
had was that as a student at Cambridge and Harvard he was a part of a Marxist communist study
group. This made Pearson, who was still External Affairs Minister, backed by outrage across the
country, send a note to the US Government, threatening to offer no more security information on
Canadian citizens until it was guaranteed that this information would not slip beyond the executive
branch of the government.[5]

Peacekeeping[edit]
Further information: List of Canadian peacekeeping missions

Two Canadian officers during the Korean War. During the war, Canadian Forces were dispatched as a part of
the United Nations forces.
It was during the Cold War period that Canada began to assert the international clout that went
along with the reputation it had built on the international stage in World War I and World War II.
In the Korean War, the moderately sized contingent of volunteer soldiers from Canada made
noteworthy contributions to the United Nations forces and served with distinction. Of particular note
is the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry's contribution to the Battle of Kapyong.
Canada's major Cold War contribution to international politics was made in the innovation and
implementation of 'Peacekeeping'. Although a United Nations military force had been proposed and
advocated for the preservation of peace vis a vis the U.N.'s mandate by Canada's
representatives Prime Minister Mackenzie King and his Secretary of State for External Affairs Louis
St. Laurent at the United Nations Conference on International Organization in San Francisco in June
1945, it was not adopted at that time.
Lester B. Pearson, Secretary for External Affairs, 1957. The previous year, Pearson proposed the creation of
a United Nations Emergency Force to diffuse the Suez Crisis.
During the Suez Crisis of 1956, the idea promoted by Canada in 1945 of a United Nations military
force returned to the fore. The conflict involving Britain, France, Israel and Egypt quickly developed
into a potential flashpoint between the emerging 'superpowers' of the United States and the Soviet
Union as the Soviets made intimations that they would militarily support Egypt's cause. The Soviets
went as far as to say they would be willing to use "all types of modern weapons of destruction" on
London and Paris – an overt threat of nuclear attack. Canadian diplomat Lester B. Pearson re-
introduced then Prime Minister Louis St. Laurent's UN military force concept in the form of an
'Emergency Force' that would intercede and divide the combatants, and form a buffer zone or
'human shield' between the opposing forces. Pearson's United Nations Emergency Force (UNEF) –
the first peacekeeping force, was deployed to separate the combatants and a cease-fire and
resolution was drawn up to end the hostilities.

Canada–U.S. tensions (1961–1980)[edit]

See also: Canada–United States relations
Great debate broke out while John Diefenbaker was Prime Minister as to whether Canada should
accept U.S. nuclear weapons on its territory. Diefenbaker had already agreed to buy
the BOMARC missile system from the Americans, which would be not as effective without nuclear
warheads, but balked at permitting the weapons into Canada.
A RCAF CIM-10 Bomarc missile in North Bay, Ontario. Viewed as an alternative to the defunct Avro
Arrow program, its adoption garnered controversy given its nuclear payload.
Canada also maintained diplomatic and economic ties with Cuba following the Cuban Revolution.
Prior to the Cuban Missile Crisis, the insistence on a much more placated policy towards the Cuban
government had been a source of contention between the United States and Canada. [6] Prime
Minister Diefenbaker firmly stood by his policy decision, insisting that this was the result of the rights
of states to establish their own forms of government, rejection of current US interpretation of
the Monroe Doctrine as well as Canada's right to establish its own foreign policy. [6] Concern in the
Canadian government was focused primarily on nuclear weapons, many politicians in the opposition
and in power believed that as long as the US president retained absolute control of the nuclear
weapons, Canadian forces could be ordered to undertake nuclear missions for the US without
Canadian consent.[7] During the Cuban Missile Crisis, Canada was expected to fall in line with
American foreign policy, in that Canada's military forces were expected to go on immediate war alert
status.[8] Diefenbaker however, refused to do so emphasizing the need for United
Nations intervention.[8] It would only be after a tense phone call between President John F.
Kennedy and Diefenbaker that Canada's armed forces would begin preparations for "immediate
enemy attack".[8] Although the crisis would eventually be solved by diplomatic talks between Nikita
Khrushchev and Kennedy, nothing would loom larger over the Canadian state in the months
following the crisis than the governing party's disarray on the question of nuclear arms. [9]
In the 1963 Canadian election, Diefenbaker was replaced by the famed diplomat Lester B. Pearson,
who accepted the warheads. Further tensions developed when Pearson criticized the American role
in the Vietnam War in a speech he gave at Temple University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. See
also Canada and the Vietnam War.
Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau and U.S. President Richard Nixon, 1972. Tensions between Canada
and the U.S. increased shortly after the implementation of the Nixon Shock in 1971.
Shortly after the implementation of economic policies, and tariffs, known as the Nixon shock, the
Canadian government began to articulate a Third Option policy; with plans to diversify Canadian
trade, and downgrade the importance of its relationship with the United States. In a 1972 speech in
Ottawa, Nixon declared the "special relationship" between Canada and the United States dead. [10]
During this period, Canada played a middle power role in international affairs, and pursued
diplomatic relations with Communist countries that the US had severed ties with, such
as Cuba and China after their respective revolutions. Canada argued that rather than being soft on
Communism, it was pursuing a strategy of "constructive engagement" whereby it sought to influence
Communism through the course of its international relationships.
Canada also refused to join the Organization of American States, disliking the support and tolerance
of the Cold War OAS for dictators. Under Pearson's successor Pierre Trudeau, US-Canadian
policies grew further apart. Trudeau removed nuclear weapons from Canadian soil, formally
recognized the People's Republic of China, established a personal friendship with Castro, and
decreased the number of Canadian troops stationed at NATO bases in Europe.

Final years of the Cold War (1980–1991)[edit]

Brian Mulroney and Ronald Reagan had a close relationship, but the 1980s also saw widespread
protests against American testing of cruise missiles in Canada's north.[11][citation needed]
In addition, Canada may have played a small role in helping to bring about glasnost and perestroika.
In the mid-1970s, Alexander Yakovlev was appointed as ambassador to Canada, remaining at that
post for a decade. During this time, he and Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau became close
friends.[12]
In the early 1980s, Yakovlev accompanied Mikhail Gorbachev, who at the time was the Soviet
official in charge of agriculture, on his tour of Canada. The purpose of the visit was to tour Canadian
farms and agricultural institutions in the hopes of taking lessons that could be applied in the Soviet
Union; however, the two began, tentatively at first, to discuss the need for liberalisation in the Soviet
Union. Yakovlev then returned to Moscow, and would eventually be called the "godfather of
glasnost",[13] the intellectual force behind Gorbachev's reform program.

As a result of the White Paper on Defence, 1987, the Canadian government developed the Theseus to lay an
acoustic array throughout the Arctic seaboard, in an effort to detect Soviet submarines.
In 1987, Canada released a long-awaited White Paper on Defence;[14] signalling its intent to re-assert
sovereignty over its Arctic Waters. Concerned that Soviet submarines were operating in Canada's
Arctic Archipelago, several programs were proposed to close the gap between Canada's current
capabilities and its commitments to NATO. Project Spinnaker was born, a joint Canada–US
endeavour whose secret purpose was to provide the capability to monitor submarine traffic in
Canadian Arctic waters by deploying acoustic listening posts on the seafloor. This project required
the development of a large autonomous underwater vehicle – named Theseus – whose sole
purpose was to lay communications trunk cables on the seafloor in waters with a permanent ice
cover. In the spring of 1996, Theseus was transported to CFS Alert (on the northeastern tip of
Ellesmere Island) then was deployed from an ice camp where it laid 180 km of fibre optic cable on
the seafloor in ice-covered waters, successfully delivering it to an acoustic array deployed on the
edge of the Continental Shelf.

Post-Cold War[edit]
When the Cold War ended, Canadian Forces were withdrawn from their NATO commitments in
Germany, military spending was cut, and air raid sirens were removed across the country.
The Diefenbunkers, Canada's military-operated fallout shelters designed to ensure continuity of
government, were decommissioned. In 1994, the last active United States military base in
Canada, Naval Station Argentia Newfoundland, was decommissioned and the facility was turned
over to the Government of Canada. The base was a storage facility for the Mk 101
Lulu and B57 nuclear bombs[15] and a key node in the US Navy's SOSUS network to
detect Soviet nuclear submarines. Canada continues to participate in Cold War institutions such as
NORAD and NATO, but they have been given new missions and priorities.

A CF-18 Hornet at CFB Baden–Soellingen, shortly before the airbase's closure in 1993. The end of the Cold
War saw the withdrawal of Canadian military formations in Europe.
The Cold War in Canada came to an end during the period 1990–1995 as the traditional mission to
contain Soviet expansion faded into the new realities of warfare. The Cold War required permanent
foreign deployments to Western Europe, something which was no longer necessary, and as such
bases closed down. Less equipment was needed, and so much was sold off, soon to be replaced by
newer equipment designed for future conflicts. At home, bases were closed and operations
consolidated and streamlined for maximum efficiency, as by the early 1990s many Canadians were
openly questioning the necessity of large defence budgets.
In 1990, Canadian troops were deployed to assist provincial police in Québec in an effort to defuse
tensions between Mohawk Warriors and the Sureté du Québec and local residents. In 1991
Canadian Forces personnel deployed in support of the American liberation of Kuwait. By 1992,
Canadian peacekeepers were deployed to Cambodia, Croatia and Somalia. In 1993 Balkan
involvement expanded into Bosnia and Canadian troops participated in some of the fiercest combat
since the Korean War during Operation Medak Pocket.
By the end of the 1990s, Canada would have a completely different military, one more inclined
towards the rigours of peacekeeping and peace-making operations under multi-national coalitions.
The country would be further involved in the Yugoslav Wars throughout the rest of the decade,
would become involved in Haiti, and would further see action again in Zaire and East Timor. The
Navy, by decade's end (and prior to the modern post-9/11 era), was comparatively brand new, the
Air Force well-balanced and modern as well. The Army began to acquire new equipment, such as
the LAV-III, Bison APC and the Coyote Reconnaissance Vehicle as it transitioned to fighting irregular
warfare instead of the large tank battles once feared would rage across Western Europe. It is with
Canada's late-Cold War and early-Peacekeeping Era military that Canada would embark on its
deployment to Afghanistan, currently Canada's longest-running war.