Review of War Junk by Alex Souchen

 Cross-posted from MichiganWar Studies Review (https://www.miwsr.com/2022-017.aspx)

2022-017

14 Feb. 2022

Review by Gregory J. Dehler, Westminster, CO 

War Junk: Munitions Disposal and Postwar Reconstruction in Canada

By Alex Souchen

Vancouver: UBC Press, 2020. Pp. xv, 282. ISBN 978–0–7748–6293–6.

Descriptors:

Volume 2022, 20th Century, World War II, Canada

Print Version

As the fourth largest Allied producer of military material, Canada was an arsenal for democracy during the Second World War; Canada produced 800,000 military transport vehicles, 50,000 tanks, 40,000 guns and artillery, 1.7 million small arms, 16,418 aircraft, over 4,000 ships, and a vast array of sundry components and kit items.[1] What happened to all this detritus of war once the fighting ceased is the subject of Alex Souchen's War Junk. Souchen (PhD., Univ. of Western Ontario, 2016) used government records and reports, contemporary periodicals, and other primary documents in this well researched work that crosses the boundaries of military, environmental, waste, and material histories.

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This book argues that the death of war machines was really their rebirth…. In that sense, the death of war machines was not something to lament, nor was it the final chapter of an object's existence. Rather, it was a necessary reincarnation: between 1943 and 1948 Canadians fused the tools of war into the tools of peace. (5)

Swords refashioned into plowshares were just one of the contradictions Souchen discusses. He contends that the surplus military material, broadly defined, lived a second, peaceful life, and played a vital role in Canada's postwar political and social development. "In effect, the disposal of surplus assets became enmeshed in the early development of Canada's welfare state" (23).

Informed by their First World War experience and driven by a desire to avoid another Great Depression, the Canadian government established a system to slowly release surplus military items to the marketplace in a way that supported rather than hindered economic growth. By fall 1944, it had fashioned a legal framework to manage the transition to peace with a War Assets Commission (WAC) tasked as the responsible agency. 

The government assigned the WAC three critical objectives. In the first place, to promote economic growth and recovery by preventing the glut of goods that occurred after the Great War. Secondly, regarding the budget, to recover as much of the enormous expense of the war as it could through sales of surplus military items. Ironically, as Souchen points out, taxpayers paid twice for the same item: first, to build it, and then to decommission, sell, or destroy it. Sales of surplus items brought $500 million to the Canadian treasury. The third imperative was to dispose of ammunition, unexploded ordnance, chemicals, and other substances too dangerous for private use. 

The WAC created strict regulations through licensed companies (priority holders) that used existing commercial networks to deliver items to the market in a controlled and efficient way. Although the WAC was confident in its plan, the enormity of rapid demobilization after V-E Day quickly forced it to decentralize and loosen its more rigid rules.

Sales of wartime buildings and properties caused a major storage conundrum. The stress on cost cutting and recouping money led to low wages, few benefits, and no pensions, which forced the WAC to rely on temporary workers. Rapid demobilization also limited the ability to draw on experts in the armed forces who were trained in several unique areas, such as explosives and the mechanics of military vehicles. At the management level, the return of the "dollar-a-year" executives to the private sector created a brain drain. Equipment scattered in out-of-the-way places and the handling of hazardous materials presented serious logistical hurdles. Being a governmental agency liaising between the military and private sectors put the WAC in an unenviable middleman position. 

The WAC sometimes failed to meet these challenges, but overall, Souchen gives it a favorable rating. He cites examples of fraud or mismanagement, but theft was small scale, consisting of isolated cases of warehouse break-ins. 

War Junk is also part of an exciting recent merger of environmental and military history. Although the WAC moved as much surplus material onto the consumer market as it could, many items were unsuited for civilian purposes. These were abandoned in place, destroyed, or dumped. Seventy-five years later Canada continues to pay an environmental cost for its mishandling of this material. Ammunition was dumped in the ocean to prevent its finding a way into the international arms market. Souchen notes that over three thousand contaminated sites off the coast of Canada continue to leak harmful chemicals into the ocean. Other material was burned, releasing toxins into the air with little effort to protect workers or nearby population centers. Hardware, including vehicles filled with gas, oil, and other fluids in far off locations, particularly the Arctic, were deemed too costly to move. One can still see their rusted remnants where they were left seventy years ago. The attempt to redeem precious metals from ordnance led to long-term contamination in recreational areas like Simmes Lake and Georgian Bay, Ontario. 

On the other hand, decommissioned surplus provided many long-lasting social benefits. Liquidation of buildings and properties benefited hospitals, schools, colleges and universities, and alleviated the postwar housing shortage. The healthcare system and Red Cross received valuable medicines and equipment. Educational facilities, small businesses, and farmers purchased furniture, tools, and many other surplus items at bargain prices. 

With the third largest navy in the world at war's end, Canada's corvettes, frigates, mine trawlers, and other ships were transformed into fishing and merchant marine vessels and even yachts. Airlines purchased considerable amounts of materials and property. Large automotive firms acquired spare parts and components from tens of thousands of disassembled vehicles. Construction companies obtained both heavy equipment and parts like doors, windows, electrical wiring, flooring, light fixtures and switches, plumbing, grates, toilets, sinks, and a host of other objects sold from dismantled buildings. Manufacturers and suppliers of all types procured machinery and real estate from the WAC. In addition, radios, tools, wires, nuts, bolts, screws, and seats, lived another life refashioned as, or, made part of a new, consumer item. Even scrap dealers enjoyed a boom selling what others would not buy from "boneyards" of decommissioned airplanes, automobiles, and ships.

Individuals, too, could purchase items. The phenomenon of "barnyard bombers" offers a metaphor for the entire project of finding peaceful uses for war materials in Canada. 

In fact, the acquisition of "barnyard bombers" became commonplace and an integral part of farm life in the late 1940s. Since these aircraft contained several thousand components, they were veritable treasure chests of goods, materials, and technologies. When configured as an aircraft, the parts had little value for farmers, but if they were broken apart, the salvaged components could be reused for different purposes or integrated into new technological systems. In that sense, barnyard bombers (like many other surplus assets) were valuable to Canadians only if their forms and functions were transformed. (170)

Equipment left in Europe at the end of the war was given to allies, like the Netherlands, who used it in their attempt to re-establish its empire in the Dutch East Indies (Indonesia). Canada used some military hardware in Europe as assets to pay off war debt or exchanged them for war credits. Such an arrangement liquidated Canada's debt to Great Britain. Unlike the case in other nations, few of Canada's firearms made their way onto the surplus market. If not sold to nations for military purposes these weapons were broken to prevent future use. 

With War Junk, Alex Souchen has made a well researched, interesting contribution to an emerging, very pertinent field of scholarship. The environmental problems caused by the destruction of surplus materials and the Canadian experience after its withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2013 in the wake of the 2009 Great Recession show that the lessons of 1945 remain relevant seven decades later.

[1] "Canadian Production of War Materials," Veterans Affairs Canada; "Canada and the War," Democracy at War, Canadian War Museum. Available online.

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Michigan War Studies Review and Stevenson's 1917: War, Peace, and Revolution

Need help deciding which military history book read? I highly recommend the Michigan War Studies Review . There are a vast number of quality book reviews covering topics from the ancient world to the present. I have been honored to review several books for this site. Here is my latest: David Stevenson's masterful 1917: War, Peace, and Revolution  Click Here.

2019-074 19 Aug. 2019

1917: War, Peace, and Revolution by David Stevenson.New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 2017. Pp. xxv, 480. ISBN 978–0–19–870238–2.

Review by Gregory J. Dehler, Front Range Community College (gregdehler@centurylink.net).

In his new book, historian David Stevenson (London School of Economics) argues that, by 1917, the European belligerents of the Great War found themselves ensnared in a conflict they knew to be unsustainable. Both sides sought to break the deadlock by launching massive offensives. Their desperate gambles failed to bring victory and hundreds of thousands of combatants died in Flan- ders, France, Italy, and Russia. That year1 saw the entry of the United States into the war and the historic revolutions in Russia. Brazil, China, Greece, and Siam also joined the war in that year, making the conflict a true “world war.” Unrest in India forced a reluctant Great Britain to accede to a degree of home rule that ultimately led to independence. And, too, the Balfour Declaration changed the future of the Middle East. In short, 1917 marked a dramatic shift in world history.

Other authors have sought to better understand the First World War by concentrating on a single year of its duration.2 Indeed, Stevenson’s last book was an account of 1918.3 There is a cer- tain logic to this tactic, since elections, military operations and campaigns, and vagaries of agri- cultural and industrial production make each calendar year unique. The present volume, however, adopts a broader, global view, surveying events in the Americas, on Europe’s battle- fields, in the Middle East, and across Asia.

The fourth year of World War I witnessed greater coordination among members of both the Central Powers and the Entente. Political leaders exerted increasing influence on strategy and policy making, but could not altogether wrest control from military commanders. The complexi- ties of conducting a global industrial war while managing developments on the home front and in imperial holdings simply overwhelmed economic, military, and political leaders. Most of their policy choices were reached only after contentious debates and little consensus.

"Decisions were taken not in calm and isolation but in rapid-fire succession and as fragments of an interconnected whole. The sheer range of choices confronting the belligerents—from Flanders to Russia, India, and Palestine, to say nothing of the home fronts—seems overwhelming. Certainly statesmen must by definition be risk takers, and challenging and contested choices lie at the heart of their responsibilities. Yet in wartime the stakes grow higher and the imponderables vaster. (398)"

The first of the book’s four parts, “Atlantic Prologue,” comprises three chapters concerning major trends: (a) the German resumption of unrestricted submarine warfare in an effort to cripple Great Britain before the United States could properly mobilize its forces; (b) President Woodrow Wilson’s request for a declaration of war against Germany, with an eye to influencing any postwar settlements and making the world safe for democracy; and (c) Britain’s implementation of the convoy system, a move the war cabinet had to force on Adm. John Jellicoe, who would have pre- ferred to keep his destroyers at Scapa Flow to guard against the German fleet.

Part II, “Continental Impasse,” contains six chapters: two on Russia, and one each on France, Flanders, Italy, and the peace initiatives of 1917. As in 1916, both sides conducted joint planning conferences to coordinate their operations. The order of the day was more of the same, but on a grander scale, featuring new weaponry, absurdly optimistic expectations, and underestimations of enemy strength. The French Nivelle, British Third Ypres (Passchendaele), and Russian Kerensky offensives all fit this pattern. Nivelle succeeded only in triggering mutiny among his own troops, while Kerensky broke the will of the Russian army and people, opening the door for the Bolshe- viks as the only anti-war party.

The Entente held no monopoly on military efforts that backfired. The humiliating defeat the Austro-Hungarians and Germans inflicted on the Italians at Caporetto ironically caused their en- emy to rally to the flag as it had not done since 1915; moreover, increased support from its western allies left Italy in a better position than it held prior to Caporetto.

The final chapter of Part II examines the several peace initiatives of 1917. Various belligerents conducted backchannel discussions largely unbeknown to their allies and without the full support of their own governments. In fact, such negotiations tended to be ploys meant to divide enemies rather than genuine attempts to end the war. No matter how bad the situation on the front lines or at home, no governmental leaders, with the exception of the Bolsheviks, seriously considered peace in 1917.

The three chapters of Part III focus on the “Global Repercussions” of poorly considered policy choices of 1917 that resonate to this day. The European powers never understood that they had lost control of events. Believing they were making measured moves, in reality they opened a Pan- dora’s Box. Britain used India (which then included present-day Bangladesh and Pakistan) as its base for military operations in Mesopotamia, but also as a source of manufactured supplies and equipment, tax revenues, and, crucially, manpower at a time when Prime Minster David Lloyd- George was dunning British colonies for more troops. All this placed great strains on Indian socie- ty and led to demands for reforms, including home rule. But the concessions the British made in the 1919 Government of India Act did not give the Indians all they wanted. They were, depending on one’s perspective, a first step either in the right direction or down a slippery slope, as Lord Curzon of the War Cabinet argued. Each reform led to calls for more complete home rule; this ultimately undermined both British control in South Asia and European global imperialism in general.

In the Middle East, as Gen. Edmund Allenby’s force was driving towards Jerusalem, the British feared that the Zionist movement leaned too sympathetically toward Germany. Policy-makers in London felt a need to win over an increasingly important international constituency (especially after the American entry into the war) and undermine Ottoman control in the region, with a view to constructing a zone of control in postwar Palestine to protect the Suez Canal. They gave little thought to what creating a Jewish national homeland might actually mean or its potential impact on the Arab population.

"Sympathy with Zionism carried less weight, unsurprisingly, than perceptions of national and impe- rial interest. The same applied to France’s Cambon Declaration, which paved the way for the British one, although American support appears to have been derived more simply from Wilson’s idealism. The British hoped to use the Zionists, as the Zionists hoped to use the British, and both sides over- estimated what the partnership might bring. But for all the opportunism that surrounded it, after other 1917 legacies had receded the declaration’s consequences would endure. (361)"

Formerly neutral nations began to join the Entente in 1917. The experiences of Greece, Brazil, Siam, and China proved that a belligerent could participate in the conflict in various ways. Brazil, for example, made little contribution to the war effort, while Siam sent a contingent of 1,254 vol- unteers to join the fight; Greece provided over 150,000 men to the Entente campaign in the Bal- kans. China sent no armed forces, but dispatched over 100,000 laborers to the Western Front to haul supplies and dig trenches, among other tasks. The experiences of Brazil and Siam illustrate the scope of the German submarine strategy, which affected more than just the United States. In- ternal debates over the proper course of action proved divisive in the halls of neutral powers. The question of declaring war brought both Greece and China to the brink of civil war. In the end, like Wilson, both nations wagered that any hardship they endured would further their national securi- ty goals in the postwar peace. Like other high-stake calculations made in 1917, this one failed to pay off.4

The concluding Part IV, “Towards 1918,” concerns the Bolshevik takeover of the Russian gov- ernment and the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, which took Russia out of the war and placed even more emphasis on the Western Front. In one last desperate venture to end the war, the Germans went over the top in 1918. Their spring offensives shocked the British and French and threatened Paris, but the arrival of the Americans, who put a million men on the front lines before the armistice, turned the tide. As in their rationale for resuming unrestricted submarine warfare the year before, the Germans had bet against the United States and, once again, lost badly.

1917: War, Peace, and Revolution represents a thoughtful synthesis of relevant secondary literature and published primary and archival sources. Its narrative is enriched by an invaluable bibliography, maps and photographs spread throughout the text, and helpful lists of abbreviations and principal personalities. It is a seminal work that will engage and inform students, scholars, and general readers alike.

Footnotes:

1. More precisely, December 1916–January 1918.
2. E.g., Max Hastings, Catastrophe 1914: Europe Goes to War (NY: Knopf, 2013); Lyn Macdonald, 1915: The Death of Inno- cence (NY: Holt, 1995); Keith Jeffery, 1916: A Global History (NY: Bloomsbury, 2015); and Gregor Dallas, 1918: War and Peace (NY: Overlook Pr, 2001).
3. Viz., With Our Backs to the Wall: Victory and Defeat in 1918 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard U Pr, 2011).

4. See Margaret MacMillan, Paris 1919: Six Months That Changed the World (NY: Random House, 2003).MichiganWarStudiesReview 2019–074