The price paid for not taking war seriously

The Globe and Mail · The Editorial Board · 2026-11-03 11:45 UTC

Ottawa’s national security strategy flags a war as a possibility, but Canada’s preparedness falls woefully short

Eighty-five years ago this month, 2,000 Canadian soldiers were dispatched to Hong Kong to bulk up British defences in the colony as a deterrent to Imperial Japan. Ill-trained and poorly equipped, the two infantry regiments found themselves on the front lines of a global war less than a month after arriving as Japan launched a broad offensive. Seventeen days later, Allied forces in Hong Kong capitulated, with the survivors entering a four-year captivity.

That was the price paid in 1941 for not taking the prospect of war seriously.

This November, around the same number of Canadian military personnel are stationed in Latvia, in what would be the front line of a conflict between NATO and Russia. Those soldiers are much better trained than their 1941 counterparts and better equipped, though there are notable vulnerabilities that have taken far too long to address.

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