If this better fits in What-If please move it there. As we know; the United Kingdom had a plan for evacuation to Canada if Germany ever broke the island. So it must be tallied that there would likely be a funnel of Military and civilian peoples heading for north America. My question is would be a Thinly spread nation of 11 million be able to support the flow of RN, RAF and all the soldiers arriving in Canada? So my question is: How good was Canada off supporting a Large military force that would be dumped on them in such short time?
Hi totenkopf, In analyzing the possibilities you could look at the numbers put the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan and the amount of food, goods, and military machinery as well as money sent and given to Britian during World War II. I have no doubt that the coordination would have been handed over to C.D. Howe C. D. Howe - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Just an excerpt from here: "Under Howe’s direction, the government created 28 Crown corporations for large scale production of manufactured goods. Production expanded rapidly: by 1942, Canada was producing more than 4,000 aircraft a year, and exports to the United Kingdom were increasing rapidly. To keep the supply of goods flowing, Canada arranged credit for the United Kingdom, and in 1944 exports reached $1.2 billion. By the end of the war Canada ranked fourth among the Allies in terms of war production with 80% of its output going to other military forces, primarily the British. From 1939 to 1941, the number of employees in Canada’s manufacturing sector increased by 50%. The manufacturing-driven growth, however, created regional disparities. Although all the regions of the country grew during the war, the Atlantic and Prairie provinces trailed Ontario, Quebec, and British Columbia in employment and growth because of the high concentration of manufacturing industries in these three provinces. Canada’s war effort of 1939-1945 necessitated a dollar expenditure that was ten times greater than that of the Great War of 1914-1918. The means to deliver the weapons of war fell to the new Department of Munitions and Supply and to C. D. Howe. Within months, he created a multitude of Crown Corporations and Boards that would serve to provide the necessary raw materials, establish manufacturing facilities, and create supply lines to meet the military requirements of Great Britain, the United States, and Canada. Howe’s enthusiasm and drive seemed to transfer into energizing the war effort of the ordinary citizen.[citation needed] Howe knew that what Canada lacked was not money or resources but "managerial skill." From all over Canada, he recruited his "boys." The press called them the "buck-a-year men," but they were the best in the business and now the business was winning a war.[citation needed]"" For some purely economic perspective on Canada as written in one of the pamphlets on the American Historical Association's website about the GI Roundtable Pamphlet series issued during World War II Canada: Our Oldest Good Neighbor: What Kind of Economy Does Canada Have? Another item to look at would be the work of William Stephenson, the existence of Camp X - the training facilities for various intelligence services and the communications links that ran through Canada. There were underwater telephone and telegraph cables that went to Canada from Britain and Europe. The population was small in comparison to many others, but it had space. It had national transportation and communication systems that were not in the hands of private industry. And we had access to the sea from our east and west coasts and to the north we also had other sea routes and the abilities to use them, and a large friendly border with our southern neighbour (across which planes used be pulled by horse and rope in order to bypass certain US laws). The British and Canadian governments were certainly not caught by surprise that they were at war. While there was a desire for peace, it did not mean that preparations had not begun at the governmental levels. My thoughts all though I could do some further digging and research if you like...... By the way thanks for the question as it has me researching and thinking about what was planned and our national capabilities at the time.
Oh my, 9 years later - this came up in a random search. Did Totenkopf ever do more research or come up with and answer?
