<strong>Written By:</strong> Dr Caleb
<strong>Date:</strong> 2005-11-09 17:26:03
<a href="/article/172603272-wwi-battle-of-passchendaele-paul-gross-movie">Article Link</a>

The film will be released in Canadian theatres on Nov. 11, 2006, Remembrance Day.

Gross, best known for his role as the upright Mountie in the television program Due South, has spent the last decade trying to get the project made.

He was inspired by his grandfather, one of thousands of Albertans who fought in the small Belgian town in 1917. The main character of the film bears his grandfather's name, Sgt. Michael Dunne.

<a href="http://www.cbc.ca/story/arts/national/2005/11/08/Arts/passchendaele_051108.html">http://www.cbc.ca/story/arts/national/2005/11/08/Arts/passchendaele_051108.html</a>

   

For those unfamiliar with the Battle of Passhendaele (or the third battle of Ypres, on the farm belonging to a man named Flanders. . .), the Brits, Kiwis, and Aussies all tried to capture that hill, and lost 310,000 men. The Canadian Corp (PPCLI) and two British divisions took the hill with 15,000 casualties.<br />
<br />
I'd also invite you to get a copy of the History Channel's series 'For King and Empire', about Canada in WWI.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.kingandempire.com/">http://www.kingandempire.com/</a><br />
<p>---<br>"If you must kill a man, it costs you nothing to be polite about it." Winston Churchill<br />

   

Do you mean Vimy Ridge?

They say that the nation of Canada was born halfway up Vimy
Ridge when the Canadians for the first time had their own
Canadian commanding officers (not British) and they suddenly
realized how good they could be, when they acted independently,
as Canadians.

It was a man named Andrew McNaughton, an Electrical
Engineering graduate of University of Toronto who used his
scientific training to work out the mathematical strategy for their
innovative plan for a rolling barrage of field guns.

The Canadians rehearsed their plan which required strict timing
for it was somewhat like a curtain of protective fire power, which to
fulfil its mission, allowed the infantry to advance very close behind
it. It was dangerous work. But it succeeded.

And that was how the Canadians took Vimy Ridge, which
the British and French armies had tried to do. April 1915.

Lest we forget.

   

Nope. Passchendeale was after Vimy Ridge, July 31 - mid-November, 1917. IIRC, Vimy was the first battle where Canadian soldiers were commanded by Canadian Generals on April 9, 1917. Like most battles Canadians fought in WWI, they did it against the odds, undermannned and with fewer casualties that the other allies.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://canadaonline.about.com/od/ww1battles/">http://canadaonline.about.com/od/ww1battles/</a><p>---<br>"If you must kill a man, it costs you nothing to be polite about it." Winston Churchill<br />

   

Vimy was the first battle where the Canadian Corps fought as one, under the command of General Sir Arthur Currie. Then LCol Andrew McNaughton was key in developing not only the creeping barrage, but also used innovative means on triangulating on German guns and taking them out. McNaughton went on in civilian life to become a cabinet minister and later the first President of the National Research Council.

McNaughton played a key role, but the decisive factor was the extent to which all Canadian soldiers (not just officers) were drilled in how the attack would unfold. Every man knew his role. This was virtually unheard of in other armies - which likely accounted or the massive losses of life suffered by the British and the French.

   

I remember my German college history prof telling us by this time the German army was all but done for anyways. He said it was the nail in the coffin that finally did in the last vestiges of any German hope for victory.

He was by all accounts an expert on WW1, and he says the German army feared no other army except the Canadians on the Western front. Whenever Canadian forces were moved to front line positions the German generals knew they were going to get hit hard. They regarded Canadian forces as their top "to watch" force anywhere on the line.

By accounts of my studies, German counter-attacks whenever possible avoided Canadian parts of the line because we rarely if ever fell back.

While Canada may have "grown up" during those bloody battles, it is more inspiring to me anyways that we have let go that bloody past seeing most of our citizenry being anti-war first, and interventionists second. Our actions in war set us along side any other nation in that regard, but it is our peaceful intentions and actions that the rest of the world respects and comes to know us more for. And that will be our best and longest lasting legacy we could hope for.


---
If there was ever a time for Canadians to become pushy - now is the time - for time is running out on this nation called Canada.

   

Kish: It's good to talk about historical events, lest
names and dates slip out of place (e.g., date of the
Battle of Vimy Ridge, April 1917. Thanks.)

Andrew McNaughton (A.G.L. McNaughton) is
someone who ought to have a movie based upon
his life, too. He was, in fact, chairman of the National
Research Council BEFORE WWII, and merely took
leave of absence for active service, maintaining
almost daily contact with NRC throughout the war.

Did you know he was co-inventor of the earliest form
of radar and Canadians were building radar sets
before Pearl Harbour. McNaughton patented it, in
fact, but made no fuss at all when Britain's Watson-
Watt later patented the process and launched production.

When McNaughton returned to Canada in broken
health, he had a very rough ride as Minister of Defense,
trying to sign up more recruits for the Canadian Armed
Forces still fighting in Italy and Europe.

Post-war, he served as Canada's representative
on the Atomic Energy Board of the United Nations.

What I liked best about Andy McNaughton was his
concern for the soldiers. They called him the Father
of the Canadian Army. Yes, he gave the final orders
for his soldiers to undertake the Dieppe Raid and I
have always wondered if his health broke down,
because of that burden of guilt.

I think McNaughton knew he'd made a grievous
error. But I think he also knew that he'd been
betrayed by the British High Command
(Mountbatten in particular) into making that error.
The Brits had McNaughton fully engaged in
planning an invasion into Norway, when he
should have been concentrating on his own
soldiers' raid on Dieppe.

I've visited Brookfield Cemetery near London where
a 1942 photo shows McNaughton speaking at the
funeral of about 40 soldiers who died on ships or
in British hospitals the day after the Dieppe Raid.

He made a distraught, impassioned eulogy (his
horror shows in his face, as he stood over the mass
grave) saying "You will be avenged, boys!"

Please: no speeches about the badness of war.
Apples and oranges. These thoughts would have no
place in peacetime. But they were understood in the
dark aftermath of a doomed battle.

However, he had no such burden of regret after
the battle plan for Vimy Ridge.