"We are thus not only the first country in the world with the capability to produce nuclear weapons that chose not to do so, we are also the first nuclear armed country to have chosen to divest itself of nuclear weapons."
Pierre Trudeau United Nations, 26 May 1978
From 1963 to 1984, US nuclear warheads armed Canadian weapons systems in both Canada and West Germany. It is likely that during the early part of this period, the Canadian military was putting more effort, money, and manpower into the nuclear commitment than any other single activity. This important book is an operational-technical history and exposÈ of this period.
Its purpose is to bring together until-recently secret information about the nature of the nuclear arsenal in Canada, and combine it with known information about the systems in the US nuclear arsenal. The work begins with an account of the efforts of the Pearson government to sign the agreement with the US necessary to bring nuclear weapons to Canada. Subsequent chapters provide a detailed discussion of the four nuclear weapons systems deployed by Canada: the BOMARC surface-to-air guided interceptor missile; the Honest John short range battlefield rocket; the Starfighter tactical thermonuclear bomber; the VooDoo-Genie air defence system. Each chapter also includes a section on the accidents and incidents which occurred while the weapons were at Canadian sites. The final chapter covers the ultimately futile efforts of the Maritime Air Command and the Royal Canadian Navy to acquire nuclear weapons. An appendix includes the text of the until-now secret agreements Canada signed with the USA for the provision of nuclear weapons.
Illustrated throughout with photographs and diagrams, and supported by extensive transcriptions of original documents, Canadian Nuclear Weapons will be of great value both to scholars and interested laypersons in its presentation of what has been a deeply hidden secret of Canadian political and military history.
Authors
- Bibliography, etc. Note
- Includes bibliographical references
- Control Number Identifier
- CaOOCEL
- Dewey Decimal Classification Number
- 355.8/25119/0971
- Dewey Decimal Edition Number
- 21
- General Note
- Issued as part of the desLibris books collection
- Geographic Area Code
- n-cn---
- ISBN
- 1550022997 9781554881215
- LCCN
- U264.5.C2
- LCCN Item number
- C53 1998eb
- Modifying agency
- CaBNVSL
- Original cataloging agency
- CaOTU
- Physical Description | Extent
- 1 electronic text (309 p.)
- Published in
- Canada
- Publisher or Distributor Number
- CaOOCEL
- Rights
- Access restricted to authorized users and institutions
- System Control Number
- (CaBNVSL)thg00603110 (OCoLC)244771111 (CaOOCEL)410585
- System Details Note
- Mode of access: World Wide Web
- Transcribing agency
- CaOTU
Table of Contents
- Table of Contents 6
- Acknowledgements 8
- Acronyms 12
- Introduction 16
- Chapter 1 Pearson's Cabinet and the Political Agreement to Acquire Nuclear Weapons for the Canadian Military 28
- Chapter 2 BOMARC: the Weapon and the Squadrons 56
- Chapter 3 Starfighter: the Weapons 92
- Chapter 4 Starfighter: the Squadrons 118
- Chapter 5 Honest John: the Weapon and the Batteries 154
- Chapter 6 The CF-101B VooDoo and Genie Rocket 178
- Chapter 7 Anti-Submarine Warfare 218
- Concluding Thoughts 240
- Appendix 242
- The 1963 Agreement and the Service-to-Service Technical Arrangements 242
- Commanding Officers 289
- Bibliographic Notes, Sources, Files, Archives, Libraries, and Agencies 294
- Endnotes 298