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Punching Above Our Weight takes readers on a riveting exploration spanning one hundred and fifty years of Canadian forces.
This photograph-rich history of 150 years of the Canadian military traces the evolution of the country’s armed forces from a small, underfunded, poorly trained militia to the modern, effective military it is today. From the Red River Resistance and the Boer War through the world wars to modern peacekeeping and the long war in Afghanistan, David A. Borys details the conflicts and operations that Canadian soldiers have served in. He highlights the key battles, among them Amiens, the Scheldt Estuary, and Operation Medusa; the significant people, including Louis Riel, Arthur Currie, and Guy Simonds; and the decisive moments, such as the passing of conscription in August 1917, Canada’s declaration of war in 1939, and the peacekeeping crises of the 1990s, that came to define the scope of Canada’s participation in international conflicts and cement its global reputation.
Borys also explores the challenges that the Canadian nation and its military have faced over those years, including major cultural and demographic shifts, a continual struggle for resources from generally disinterested governments, battlefield failures, and notorious and shocking scandals, along with ever-changing global threats. Punching Above Our Weight brings to light a new perspective on the Canadian military and its place in the world.
Punching Above Our Weight offers an excellent summary of Canadian military history since Confederation while providing a timely, non-partisan warning that punching above should not mean doing more with less.
Punching Above Our Weight brilliantly sums up our place in both history and the current world, succinctly yet thoroughly, reading almost like a gripping adventure novel, but one with a very important message: will we be prepared for whatever the future throws at us?
If you thought Canadian history (and especially Canadian military history) could be boring, read this book and you’ll have a re-think.
David A. Borys is a Canadian military historian and a faculty member at Langara College in Vancouver, British Columbia. His published works include a wide variety of topics in the realm of Canadian military history and have been printed in academic journals such as Canadian Military History and in print media such as the Globe and Mail. His previous book, Civilians at the Sharp End, examined the relationship between the Canadian army and civilian populations in northwest Europe. He has been seen on such television history programs as APTN’s Nations at War, National Geographic’s Hitler’s Last Stand, and Knowledge Network’s documentary Tzouhalem.
Introduction
1 The Expanding Nation
2 Fighting for the Empire
3 The First World War: 1914-1916
4 The First World War: 1917-1918
5 The Interwar Years
6 The Second World War: The Conflict at Sea and in Air
7 The Second World War: The Conflict on Land
8 International Challenges: The Cold War and Korea
9 The Era of Peacekeeping
10 A Tumultuous 21st Century: From Peacekeepers to Peace Enforcers
In Summary
Acknowledgements
Appendix 1: Cast of Characters
Appendix 2: Timeline
Appendix 3: Military Formations
Notes
Select Bibliography
Image Credits
Index