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The D-Day Invasion, June 6, 1944
In order to defeat Nazism and Fascism, the Allies invaded Nazi-occupied Europe. Canadians took
part in the liberation of Italy in 1943–44. In the epic invasion of Normandy in northern France on
June 6, 1944, known as D-Day, 15,000 Canadian troops stormed and captured Juno Beach from the German
Army, a great national achievement shown in this painting by Orville Fisher. Approximately one in ten
Allied soldiers on D-Day was Canadian. The Canadian Army liberated the Netherlands in 1944–45 and
helped force the German surrender of May 8, 1945, bringing to an end six years of war in Europe.
In the Second World War,
the Canadians captured
Juno Beach as part of
the Allied invasion of
Normandy on D-Day,
June 6, 1944
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The Second World War
The Second World War began in 1939 when Adolf
Hitler, the National Socialist (Nazi) dictator of
Germany, invaded Poland and conquered much
of Europe. Canada joined with its democratic
allies in the fight to defeat tyranny by force of
arms.
More than one million Canadians and
Newfoundlanders (Newfoundland was a separate
British entity) served in the Second World War,
out of a population of 11.5 million. This was a
high proportion and of these, 44,000 were killed.
The Canadians fought bravely and suffered
losses in the unsuccessful defence of Hong
Kong (1941) from attack by Imperial Japan, and
in a failed raid on Nazi-controlled Dieppe on the
coast of France (1942).
The Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) took part
in the Battle of Britain and provided a high
proportion of Commonwealth aircrew in bombers
and fighter planes over Europe. Moreover,
Canada contributed more to the Allied air effort
than any other Commonwealth country, with over
130,000 Allied air crew trained in Canada under
the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan.
The Royal Canadian Navy (RCN) saw its finest
hour in the Battle of the Atlantic, protecting
convoys of merchant ships against German
submarines. Canada’s Merchant Navy helped
to feed, clothe and resupply Britain. At the end
of the Second World War, Canada had the third-
largest navy in the world.
In the Pacific war, Japan invaded the Aleutian
Islands, attacked a lighthouse on Vancouver
Island, launched fire balloons over B.C. and
the Prairies, and grossly maltreated Canadian
prisoners of war captured at Hong Kong. Japan
surrendered on August 14, 1945—the end of four
years of war in the Pacific.
Regrettably, the state of war and public opinion
in B.C. led to the forcible relocation of Canadians
of Japanese origin by the federal government and
the sale of their property without compensation.
This occurred even though the military and the
RCMP told Ottawa that they posed little danger to
Canada. The Government of Canada apologized
in 1988 for wartime wrongs and compensated the
victims.