​Story outline

The dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima in Japan and, days later, Nagasaki, ends the necessity of sending  80,000 Canadian troops who volunteered to serve in the Pacific into battleJapan surrenders - V-J Day.

 

The Second World War is officially over. Few had expected the long struggle or heavy death toll. A war fought supposedly for liberal freedoms against Prussian militarism had exposed uneasy contradictions, including compulsory military service, broken promises to farmers and organized labour, Some women had received the right to vote, The resulting post-war debt of some $2 billion was owed mostly to other Canadians, a fact which fundamentally altered the nature of the post-war economy.

 

Politically, the war was also critically destructive. Borden’s efforts to win the 1917 election and carry the nation to victory succeeded in the short term, but fractured the country along regional,and class lines. English and French relations were never lower,and accusations of French traitors and English militarists were not soon forgotten. Quebec would be a wasteland for federal Conservative politicians for most of the next 40 years. Labour, newly empowered by its important role in supporting the war effort, pushed for more rights, first through negotiations, and then through strikes. Farmers seethed over agricultural policies and Ottawa’s broken promise on conscription. In the post-war period, both groups would form powerful new political and regional parties.