Tag: Canada

  • Election 2021: A Style Guide

    Election 2021: A Style Guide

    An Excruciatingly Correct Aide-Memoire

    Whee! It’s election time in Canada again. Last Sunday Justin Trudeau put the rumours to rest by requesting and receiving dissolution of the 43rd parliament. We head to the polls for the second time in two years on 20 September. Aside from the — you know — politics of it all, anyone who cares about Canadian history, or our system of constitutional government, knows it’s going to be a rough five weeks.

    Blame the lack of civics education in this country, the fact that the press corps includes as many lazy and incompetent drudges as any other profession, or the way Canadians binge US news (absorbing the language of a very different system), but a lot of people who should know better are going to spend this election saying dumb things. These will range from errors that are merely annoying (getting terminology wrong) to such egregious misrepresentations of how things work as to amount to disinformation. And the “real journalists”, if history is any guide, will not be much better than the most uninformed chatterer on Twitter or Facebook.

    This is terrible for our civic life but, rather than bitch and moan about it, I’m posting the following excruciatingly correct style guide to Canadian elections. Now, you too can be the annoying know-it-all in your friend group — erm — I mean now you too can be part of the solution!

    Prime Ministers Do Not “Call” Elections

    To begin, dissolving parliament to trigger an election is a crown prerogative, not something a Prime Minister can do alone. In other words, it’s one of the Sovereign’s reserve powers, exercised in Canada by the Governor General as the Crown’s representative. Thus, Prime Ministers do not “call” elections; they can only request that the Governor General dissolve parliament.

    This may seem a distinction without a difference. Under the principle of responsible government the Governor General only acts upon the advice of a First Minister who holds the confidence of parliament (otherwise we could hardly call ourselves a democracy). But we’re not just splitting hairs; in exceptional circumstances the reserve powers of the Crown serve as an important check on abuses of power by partisan politicians.

    A recent example is the British Columbia election of 2017. The outcome was just ambiguous enough (the governing Liberals won more seats than the NDP, but one less than the combined opposition) that Premier Christy Clark felt able to request the immediate dissolution of the provincial legislature. In effect, she wanted a do-over for the election she’d just lost. Quite properly the Lieutenant Governor refused this unconstitutional request. The loss of her majority meant Clarke no longer held confidence in the legislature, there had been a recent election to determine the wishes of the electorate (six months is the accepted norm here), and an alternate government was available in the form of an NDP/Green coalition. Her desperate gamble having failed, Clark resigned (as a First Minister whose advice had been refused by the Crown, she could hardly do otherwise) and the NDP/Green coalition went on to form a government. In the oft-used metaphor, the Crown had acted as a “constitutional fire-extinguisher”.

    Every healthy democracy makes a distinction between the authority and legitimacy of the nation state, which is permanent and unchanging, and the actual exercise of state power through an elected government, which is temporary and subject to electoral defeat. This is the distinction between Head of State (for us, the monarch) and the Head of Government (the Prime Minister).

    To personify the state (effectively to provide an agent for its actions in the real world) republics elect presidents as their heads of state. In constitutional monarchies, such as ours, the Sovereign personifies the state. Either way, the separation between the source of state power, and those who exercise it, prevents either entity from wielding an unrestricted and potentially tyrannical authority. Sloppily attributing Crown powers to the Prime Minister, merely because it is he or she who normally exercises them, dangerously misrepresents this.

    Note: arguably, a constitutional monarchy provides an almost ideal solution for the division of state power. The democratically elected legislature is supreme in governance (that’s what the “constitutional” part guarantees) while having a hereditary sovereign as head of state keeps the office non-partisan and apolitical. The United States takes almost the exact opposite approach with an elected president who is not merely a figurehead (as in many republics) but who combines the offices of head of state and head of government in a single figure.

    Another Note: other crown prerogatives include appointing Prime Ministers (which is crucial to government formation — see below) and enacting laws (which is why bills become laws only when they receive royal assent).

    We Still Have a Government

    In a cack-handed attempt at “objectivity”, the Canadian press has a bad habit of not referring to the Prime Minister as such after the election starts; he’s referred to as the party leader. This creates a false impression that we don’t have a government once the writs are issued. In fact, Prime Ministers do not resign when they request dissolution; throughout the election Justin Trudeau remains Prime Minister, and his ministry will continue to function as the government of Canada. The only thing he cannot do is pass new legislation, which would require parliament be sitting.

    And yet, even accredited journalists have already asked Justin Trudeau who is in charge to deal with the tragedy in Afghanistan that began almost simultaneously with his election announcement. His answer was, of course, “I am” (the CBC — our “national” broadcaster is terrible about stuff like this). Unfortunately, even those who should know better, often don’t. Annamie Paul, leader of the Green Party, has called for parliament to be recalled under the Emergency Powers Act for an emergency debate in the House of Commons about Afghanistan.

    Where to begin… A parliament that has been dissolved cannot be recalled — it no longer exists. The Emergency Powers act does not apply to emergencies outside of Canada. And an emergency debate is nothing more than an opportunity to make speeches, which Paul can do from the hustings. Whether Paul is actually this uninformed, or merely posturing, it’s unfortunate that ignorance of basic civics in this country can cause so much confusion and unnecessary handwringing about our ability to govern ourself during an election.

    Admittedly there is a “caretaker convention” which holds that (for obvious reasons) governments should not undertake major new initiatives during an election. Opponents of the government often claim this prevents it from doing anything they don’t want it to do. But the caretaker convention is a convention rather than a law precisely so it can be interpreted flexibly enough for the government to deal with the unexpected.

    Finally, if the Liberals win enough seats to continue governing, Trudeau will not be “re-elected”, or even re-appointed as Prime Minister. Since he never resigned, his current appointment as Prime Minister will merely continue into his third parliament (Canada’s 44th).

    The Governor General Will Not “Drop the Writ”

    Speaking of writs, it’s often said that an election begins with the Governor General “dropping the writ”. In actuality, the Governor General merely dissolves parliament. The resulting election is conducted by Elections Canada, an independent federal agency headed by the Chief Electoral Officer of Canada. It is the Chief Electoral Officer who issues the writs (all 338 of them) to conduct elections in the 338 electoral districts (or “ridings”) that make up the House of Commons. Technically, then, we are about to have not one election, but 338.

    We Do Not Elect Prime Ministers (Nor Governments)

    Saying that we’re about to have 338 simultaneous elections is another one of those persnickety details that may seem unimportant in practical terms, but actually says something important. We cast our vote in local elections for Members of Parliament to represent our ridings. Even the electors in Justin Trudeau’s riding of Papineau will only be voting for their local MP on 20 September. What our elections do is determine the composition of the House of Commons (parliament’s elected lower house). We elect neither Prime Ministers nor governments.

    Certainly, many Canadians will vote for an MP based on his or her party affiliation — because they want that party to “win”. But this distinction still matters to an understanding of how government formation works.

    Governments are formed in the House of Commons after the writs are returned with the election results and the new distribution of seats is established. The essential consideration is that any government must be able to hold the confidence of the house. That is, it must be able to muster enough votes to pass bills (otherwise it couldn’t function). By convention, all supply (money) bills are confidence votes and losing one will bring down a government.

    If an existing government returns with a majority, or even a plurality of seats, it retains confidence and thus stays in power. There is no need to form a new government (remember that the government never resigned or ceased to exist during the election). Otherwise, a new party (or coalition) that wins either a majority, or the greatest number of seats short of a majority, is the strongest candidate to form government. The Governor General appoints the leader of this party or coalition as Prime Minister. And the new Prime Minister can then forms a government by appointing a cabinet of ministers.

    Side Note: As our governments consist of a cabinet within the legislature, that cabinet is sometimes referred to as “the executive” though this Americanism isn’t an exact fit and is also used to describe the Crown (or the Cabinet plus the civil service).

    Another Side Note: Since we don’t elect them, a new Prime Minister is obviously not a “Prime Minister Elect” during the period between the announcement of their appointment and their swearing in. “Prime Minister Designate” is a better term.

    Yet Another Side Note: A reminder that Justin Trudeau is already Prime Minister and has not resigned. If he “wins” the election (that is, wins enough seats to continue governing) he will not be re-elected Prime Minister nor will he be the “Prime Minister Designate”. He will merely continue his appointment into a new parliament.

    Trudeau Has Not Served “Two Terms”

    “Term” implies a fixed period for an appointment or institution, and so its use is appropriate in the United States, where there are fixed election dates and governments serve for a fixed period to time. However, it doesn’t apply in our parliamentary system, where we neither elect governments, nor do they sit for a fixed period after formation.

    As noted above, our governments are formed and maintained based on confidence. A lost confidence vote can bring a government down at any time, and a Prime Ministers who no longer finds parliament functional can request dissolution whenever they feel the need, the need for speed — er — no, the need for an election. Thus, governments in Canada do not serve for any sort of fixed term. A better word is “parliament”, as in: “a government that has won two elections has been in power for two parliaments” (Trudeau’s current count).

    Side Note: another Americanism that serves as a useful test of civic literacy is “administration.” In the United States this is often used as a synonym for “government” (as in, “the Obama Administration”). It’s appropriate there because so many senior positions in the US civil service are political appointments. In Canada we have a permanent civil service that serves from government to government (even Deputy Ministers, the civil service department heads who act as the professional advisor to their Minister, often retain their appointments through a change of government). So, any commentator who refers to a Canadian government as an “administration” is helpfully revealing their ignorance. It’s better to just say “government” or, since our governments are made up of a cabinet of ministers, “ministry” (as in, “the Trudeau ministry”).

    This Election is not Illegal Under the Fixed Term Law

    There has been a fair bit of chatter about whether the current election is even legal under Canada’s fixed term legislation. In 2007 Stephen Harper introduced Bill C-16, an amendment to the Canada Elections Act which set a fixed election date in October for federal elections and a set term of four years. This was sold as a democratic reform, at the time of its passage, as it would stop Prime Ministers gaming our system by requesting dissolution when it was advantageous for them.

    Such legislation is currently quite popular: the UK and several Canadian provinces also have some form of fixed term legislation. I believe this is due to fixed terms being a simple and easy form of legislation to pass without amending the constitution. In actuality, the whole concept of fixed terms is alien to our parliamentary system.

    The UK gave its Fixed-term Parliaments Act real teeth and the result was a constitutional crisis when Boris Johnson lost a possible confidence vote. This went to the courts to decide whether the confidence convention was triggered and, if so, whether his ministry should fall or continue to the end of its term. If the fixed term did have precedence over the confidence convention, it would call into question whether the reserve power of the Crown to dissolve parliament even still existed. The unintended consequences of the act were so disruptive and potentially profound that the House of Lords is currently conducting an inquiry into the whole mess (at which our own Philippe Lagassé testified).

    Fortunately, Canada’s fixed term act was passed mainly for show and is so toothless that most legal experts think its only effect is to put a four year limit on the life of parliaments. (One less than the maximum of five years set by Section 50 of the constitution). Thus, when Trudeau found the current minority parliament difficult sledding, his right to request dissolution was unaffected.

    As more than six months had passed since the previous election (see above), and he held confidence in the house, the Governor General was bound to grant this request. In a shameless political stunt, the leaders of the Conservative Party and the NDP (who had used their combined majority to obstruct the government while strategically not voting against confidence motions) promptly called upon Her Excellency Mary Simon to refuse dissolution. In doing so they were urging the representative of an unelected Sovereign to act unconstitutionally (a profoundly undemocratic act) and ignoring the basic fact that a Prime Minister whose advice is refused by the Crown is bound to resign — which would trigger the election they claimed to be trying to stop!

    Thus, this early election is neither unconstitutional nor an abuse of Prime Ministerial power. If Justin Trudeau has taken unfair advantage to game the timing of the election, it is the job of voters, not the Crown, to punish him for it. Which is precisely what elections are for…

    Sources

    I hope you found the above useful and even interesting. As a layperson I’ve relied heavily on the knowledge of real constitutional experts. Here are links to the best and of these:

    • Philipe Lagassé: is perhaps our pre-eminent constitutional expert in crown and defence matters. He contributes frequently to journals and maintains a blog at: https://lagassep.com.
    • Emmet Macfarlane: is a professor at the University of Waterloo in constitutional law, and is active (and robustly opinionated) on Twitter as @ EmmMacfarlane; he also maintains a blog at: http://www.emmettmacfarlane.com.
    • Dale Smith: is a veteran Ottawa journalist — far and away the most knowledgeable I’ve found on constitutional matters and how government works generally. He’s active on Twitter as @ journo_dale, has a personal blog at https://www.routineproceedings.com, and publishes regularly with https://looniepolitics.com.
  • Statute of Westminster Day

    Statute of Westminster Day

    The Birth of the Canadian Crown

    If you pass a government building today you may be surprised to see the Royal Union Flag (popularly, the Union Jack) flying alongside the Maple Leaf. This marks an august occasion: 11 December 1931 is Statute of Westminster Day.

    “What the hell is the the Statute of Westminster?” you may well ask. Confederation in 1867, and its Canada Day celebration, is the only history we really memorialize in this country. And yet, 1931 is almost as significant a year in the story of our national development.

    When the British dominions (Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa…) were formed in the 19th and early 20th Centuries they were really self-governing provinces of the British Empire more than independent states in their own right. The British parliament in Westminster retained a veto power over any act of the dominion parliaments and centralized control over over all imperial foreign policy. These were considered essential measures to preserve the unity of the empire against its foreign rivals (and their knavish tricks!).

    Such a limited form of nationhood wasn’t just acceptable to the dominions, but welcomed. As member states of the British Empire they played a significant role on the world stage; by themselves they would have been insignificant minor powers. A lot of interesting work has been done on the nature of Canadian patriotism in the 19th Century and its tendency to express itself in the form of imperial boosterism (rabidly for anglophones but even, to some extent, for francophones).

    War changed all that. The dominions mobilized completely for World War One, remaking their societies and economies to meet its ever increasing demands. Both Canada and Australia eventually contributed complete corps-sized forces to the western front. These fought as distinct national formations and performed as well (often better) than any British corps. After so much sacrifice and effort, a subordinate national status was unacceptable. Letters and contemporary accounts from Canada’s overseas soldiers tell a remarkable story of how four years of blood and hard-won accomplishment created a distinct sense of national identity and pride within the Canadian Corps.

    Westminster Tweet

    To its credit, Britain recognized the dominions’ contributions and lobbied for them to have their own seats at the Versailles peace conference, rather than be included within the British delegation. (The United States, now an ally and trading partner of Canada, argued vehemently against this at the time — on the basis that it was just a trick to get more British votes!).

    The newfound maturity of the dominions remained a prime topic as the dominion and British heads of government met at the Imperial Conferences of 1926 and 1930. Their efforts were realized when the British parliament passed the Statute of Westminster In 1931. This formalized a new relationship within what was still called the British Empire. Essentially, it separated the crowns of the dominions from the Crown of the United Kingdom, creating separate heads of state for each, and putting each dominion parliament on an equal footing with Westminster.

    Thus, it ended the British veto over the dominion parliaments, along with British control of a centralized foreign policy. Effectively, the dominions became full nation states (now more properly styled as realms). It is proper from this point to refer to the dominion sovereigns as the King or Queen of Canada (Australia, New Zealand, etc) as they were now distinct legal personages from the sovereign of the United Kingdom.

    Enabling legislation followed in most of the dominion parliaments. Newfoundland bowed out because of its longstanding financial difficulties, and the Irish Free State barely paused on its road to full independence as a republic. But, with the exception of South Africa (booted out during apartheid), the rest of the dominions who attended those conferences are still joined by the shared monarchy they created in 1931.

    Thus, the Statute (and its accompanying national legislation) remains relevant to this day. It is the foundation of the Commonwealth Realm – an inner group within the Commonwealth of Nations — that share Elizabeth II as sovereign and head of state. Membership has even grown in recent decades as some former British possessions have achieved self-government.

    A final aside: it’s amazing to me that so much of the national development of this supposedly unmilitary nation has been spurred by war. Just as there is a direct line from Canada’s sacrifices and accomplishments in WWI to the Statute of Westminster, Canada’s enormous contribution to victory in WWII set the stage for the next step: the passage of the Citizenship Act, 1946. This established a distinct legal status for Canadian Citizenship, separate from that of British Subject. Since then, Canadians have been citizens of Canada and not — as before — merely British Subjects resident in Canada. The only development of similar importance since is the patriation of the constitution in 1982. It may be a sign of progress that this was managed without a preceding war…


    Fun Facts: Now you can appreciate how ignorant it is to complain about Canada being “ruled by the Queen of England!” Such statements are wrong in three distinct ways:

    1. In a constitutional monarchy the sovereign reigns but does not rule (the country is ruled by governments formed in its elected parliament);
    2. There has not been a Queen of England since 1707, when Queen Anne signed the Act of Union joining the crowns of Scotland and England into a United Kingdom; and
    3. Since the passage of the Statute of Westminster our head of state has been the Queen of Canada (a separate legal personage from the Queen of the United Kingdom, even though both are the same physical person).
  • The Black Flight

    The Black Flight

    The Memoir of Raymond Collishaw, CB, DSO, DSC, DFC

    Raymond Collishaw
    CEF Books 2008

    It’s remarkable that four of the greatest British flying aces of WWI are Canadian. Billy Bishop, with 72 officially credited victories, has the top score for the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) while Raymond Collishaw, at 60, tops the Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS). Donald MacLaren, at 54, is not far behind and achieved more victories in Sopwith Camels than anyone else. William Barker, with 50 victories, won the VC in one of the most celebrated air combats of all time, ending the war as the most highly decorated pilot in British service.


    Amazingly, all four survived the war, and three returned to Canada to be celebrated and showered with business and professional opportunities. Billy Bishop even became a figure of pop culture and appears in various media to this day. You don’t have to be a history nerd to recognize his name. Donald MacLaren was a major pioneer in BC aviation history. And anyone with any interest in air combat at all knows of William Barker’s famous final duel, alone in his Sopwith Snipe, taking on fifteen or more Fokker D.VIIs.

    Raymond Collishaw, in comparison, has remained obscure — despite being, perhaps, the most extraordinary member of this quite extraordinary group. Perhaps this is because he flew for the publicity averse RNAS, or because he continued in British service after the war. But it’s typical that his 1973 memoir, Air Command, wasn’t even released in Canada. Fortunately, it has been republished as The Black Flight (2008) and is now more widely available. I purchased a copy at The Museum of the Regiments during a recent visit to Calgary.

    If there’s any justice, this new edition will introduce Collishaw to a wider audience. It’s a slender volume at 272 pages (with notes) and moves along briskly, concentrating on the highlights of his well-packed military career. Significant events are recalled in sharp detail, though, including things Collishaw couldn’t have known at the time. So the text has also clearly benefited from some post mortem research. (The original release, Air Command was written with the help of ex-RCAF historian Ronald Dodds.) There’s not a lot in the way of personal or family detail, but the book is well written, with a wry sense of humour, that seems to capture Collishaw’s personality.

    The story begins in Nanaimo, British Columbia, where Collishaw was born to British parents who had immigrated in search of adventure and fortune in the gold fields. Their son soon showed that the apple doesn’t drop far from the tree. He joined the Fisheries Protection Service (a sort of proto-Coast Guard) as a cabin boy at the age of just fifteen. Having worked his way up to rank of First Officer by the time war broke out in 1914, he promptly sought a transfer to the Royal Navy. This looked to be a slow process, but the air service was short of flyers and actively recruiting in Canada. The only hitch was the requirement to have your own flying certificate before applying. Collishaw promptly raised the necessary cash and headed to Toronto for private lessons at the only flying school then operating in Canada. He was in a navy uniform and on his way to England by January 1916.

    World War I

    After completing advanced flying training, he was posted to 3 Naval Wing in the Alsace region. This was flying the first independent bombing missions against deep targets and pioneering the techniques of what we would now call strategic bombing. Collishaw flew escort to these raids in Sopwith 1 ½ Strutters and, despite the weather often limiting their flying, soon showed himself a skilled and useful combat pilot.

    After some home leave, and promotion to Flight Commander, he was posted to 10 Naval Squadron, near Ypres. There he achieved what fame he does have with air enthusiasts, commanding the famous “Black Flight”, an elite, all-Canadian flight of black-nosed Sopwith Triplanes. 10 Squadron amassed an extraordinary combat record during the dangerous days of 1917, shooting down 84 enemy aircraft in the critical period of April to July alone. Collishaw accounted for 27 of these himself in his personal Triplane, Black Maria.

    On average only one of the original flyers in each five-plane flight survived Bloody April unwounded. Remarkably, and despite several close calls, Collishaw came through unscathed. More than once enemy bullets passed close enough to shatter his goggles. On another occasion his controls were shot away, resulting in a crash landing. Once, in thick fog, he landed on a German airfield by accident. Upon noticing the black crosses on the other planes, he cracked the throttle open and barely managed to take off before capture. In one dogfight he even manoeuvred so severely, to avoid a collision, that his seat belt snapped and he was flung out of the cockpit. He managed to grab onto the upper wing struts of his Triplane and, despite the plane’s uncontrolled swoops and lunges, eventually levered his legs back inside and regained control.

    Collishaw in a Sopwith Camel
    Collishaw in a Sopwith Camel

    Various observers of this period have noted Collishaw’s outstanding qualities as a leader. To boost the confidence of new pilots, for example, he would take them up as his wingman for their first few flights. If they found a German aircraft, he would lead them into an attack, with the new pilot typically filling the sky with holes while Collishaw put a few short, well-aimed bursts into the enemy’s vitals. Upon return, Collishaw would clap the novice on the back and exclaim: “Well done, old boy — you bagged your first hun!” The terrified and confused novice would swell with pride, and the new-found confidence probably boosted his chances of survival significantly. More than one commentator has calculated that Collishaw’s official victory tally would be significantly higher if it included all the kills he gave away.

    Typically, Collishaw himself says nothing of this. Throughout The Black Flight he does pause the narrative occasionally to comment on various topics, including the true nature of chivalry in the air war, how pilots coped with the dangers they faced, the role of a combat leader, and so on. These asides are always thoughtful and interesting but, the one time he discusses victory claims, it’s only to note how fleeting and fraught are the circumstances in which they’re made, and therefore how unreliable they are (regardless of even good faith efforts to verify them).

    After a period of leave in Canada, and promotion to Squadron Commander, Collishaw commanded a coastal defence squadron for most of 1918, racking up yet more kills in Sopwith Camels. Despite the drastic downsizing of the services at the end of the European war, he was offered and accepted a permanent commission in the newly formed Royal Air Force (which absorbed the old RFC and RNAS).

    Russia

    Western participation in the Russian Civil War has become an obscure footnote of history, but this became the scene of yet more dramatic adventures for Collishaw. He was offered the poisoned chalice of commanding the air contingent being sent to assist White Russian forces against the Bolsheviks. Although this meant cancelling a planned attempt at the first cross-Atlantic flight, Collishaw’s reaction was immediate: “what I had thus far heard about the Bolshies led me to believe they were a thoroughly bad lot, and I accepted without hesitation.”

    Between his arrival in south Russia in June 1919, and the collapse of the enterprise in March 1920, Collishaw’s mixed squadron of fighters and bombers gave air support to Deniken’s White Army. To cope with the vast distances, all his ground support elements were based out of three steam trains (one per flight). Thus organized they could quickly deploy forward or back, hastily setting up flying strips wherever they stopped. For months on end the rapidly changing fortunes of war took Collishaw and his squadron all across Southern Russia. He took part in several missions and even shot down a Red Army Nieuport himself to increase his final score to 60 victories. Less happily, he caught typhus at one point and almost died, surviving only by the lucky chance of falling into the care of a refugee Russian Countess who had been trained as a nurse.

    Collishaw in Russia
    Collishaw in Russia

    When the White cause began to fall apart, Collishaw consolidated his remaining aircraft onto a single train and began a fraught retreat, over the snow-covered countryside, to Crimea and the last Allied held port. Their progress was frequently slowed by weather and the need to repair rails torn up by local Red sympathizers. And, soon, a Bolshevik train was spotted behind them in hot pursuit. This was only kept at bay by frantically tearing up the newly repaired rails as they passed. The fate for anyone who fell prisoner in that murderous internecine conflict didn’t bear thinking about, but the air contingent reached port without losing a man – a remarkable feat of leadership. Collishaw and his squadron remained in Russia almost until the end; when the last Intervention Forces were finally evacuated, he brought the remaining elements of his squadron home with almost no loss of life from their Russian service.

    Between the Wars

    Seemingly allergic to a quiet life, Collishaw then commanded RAF squadrons in Iraq and Palestine, pioneering air re-supply techniques and the use of punitive air raids to quell local rebellions with minimum loss of life (and expense). Energetic and open to new ideas, a typical Collishaw scheme was his decision to fill the inner tube of a bomber tire with water to see if this could speed up re-supply by air. The test, however, did not go well: “The wretched tire and inner tube hit the ground as planned, but as if possessed of some evil intelligence immediately bounced up onto a rolling position and changed course for the hanger line. Those who saw the 750-pound monster bounding toward them at close to 100 miles per hour took violent evasion action, but nothing could save the hanger…” (The book is full of anecdotes like this, though many are such that the other parties must remain nameless.)

    Service with a home squadron in England followed, which he describes as the most boring period of his whole career. This gave him the time, though, to finally marry his sweetheart, the sister of a fellow pilot he met while on leave in Canada. He hadn’t felt able to marry during the war (possibly leaving her a widow), and active service in Russia and the Middle East had interfered since, so it had been a Very Long Engagement indeed. Now happily joined, the couple promptly produced two daughters.

    World War II

    Service on an aircraft carrier followed, and then command of the Desert Air Force in Egypt. Here Collishaw seems to have been in his element, improvising madly as he prepared for another world war in a secondary theatre that would receive only very limited resources. When the Italians attacked out of Libya in 1940, he put his theories of air power to the test, hitting their ground elements with pinprick raids that caused them to disperse their much superior Air Force in a futile attempt to defend everywhere. The odds were so uneven he resorted to rigging machine guns on the undercarriages of his old bombers to make up for the lack of proper fighter escorts. His only modern fighter (a single Hurricane) was kept busy moving from field to field and flying one plane patrols over different sectors each day in an attempt to fool the Italians about his strength. When a supply of ancient (and probably unsafe) 20 lb bombs were found in a warehouse, he had bombers fly over the the Italian positions at night with the crew manually fusing and flinging them out an open door. The 20 pounders were too small to do much damage, but they could ruin the sleep of the infantry.

    Then Collishaw struck with concentrated force, not letting his own squadrons be tied down defending static positions. Despite having to divert planes to Greece and then Crete, he supported the British desert offensive so successfully that the Italian Air Force was almost completely swept from the skies. All for remarkably little loss to his own squadrons.
    Things got tougher when the Germans arrived, of course, but by then Collishaw was approaching fifty – ancient by the standards of wartime command. The reward for his accomplishments was promotion (to the permanent rank of Air Vice-Marshall) and being shuffled off to a quiet command in Scotland. In 1943 he was retired from the service, to spend the rest of the war in the UK as a civil air liaison.

    Retirement

    In 1945 Collishaw and family returned to Canada, laden with decorations and honours: Companion of the Order of the Bath, Officer of the Order of the British Empire, DSO, DFC, Croix de guerre, etc, etc. Unsurprisingly he approached civilian life with the same energy he’d shown in military service. Settling in Vancouver he took up the family business and, for the next two decades, initiated various mineral exploration and mining operations in northern British Columbia. For five years he was president of Craigmont Mines. In 1976 Raymond Collishaw passed away, unknown to most of his fellow Canadians.

    Fortunately, he completed this book before then, in whatever free time his other activities allowed. The Black Fight is a terrific account of a remarkable personality. Amazingly, for a senior officer’s wartime memoir, it is entirely without rancour or score-settling. Collishaw seems to have been that most rare of animals: a hugely successful person who remained utterly humble, self-aware, and at peace with himself. The final paragraph is typical of his tone, so he gets the last word: “I am often asked whether – If I had it to do all over again – I would do it differently. So far as the basic pattern of my life is concerned, I do not think so, although I might try to do everything just a bit better. I must qualify this, though, for my wife may some day read this book. Perhaps, given another chance, I should not wait so long to get married.”

    THUMB UP