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Unsurprisingly for the average politician, the newly elected Prime Minister Robert Borden’s naval policy was rather hypocritical. His party had previously been the ones to bring up the cause of naval defense during the Foster Resolution many years ago and being a supporter of the original planned merger of the fisheries protection service into a local defensive element, Borden supported a Canadian Navy. It just turned out to be nothing close to what Laurier had envisioned. It seems that the ideal plan rolling around within Borden’s head consisted to attempting to stitch together some kind of financial contribution to Britain while also building a permanent naval element for Canada itself. Placing himself at a crossroads where contributionists and nationalists would hopefully back his schemes, he had doggedly fought Laurier’s expanded ocean going fleet. Once actually in power though, Borden knew he had to tread lightly. Even though his party had won the election, the Canadian political system was still sagging with the weight of over a decade of Liberal rule, just waiting to strike back at Borden to make up their previous loss. This was also compounded by his previous allies in Quebec, who were more than likely to also oppose any naval policy. Borden’s original plan seemed to consist of simply ignoring the naval issue for as long as possible while covertly siphoning the navy of whatever resources it already possessed.

Even after a chance meeting with the illustrious Sir William White and their subsequent discussions regarding the future for the Royal Canadian Navy, Borden remained quiet. After his inaugural speech from Britain did not even mention the topic of the navy, Laurier leapt at the opportunity to tighten the screws around Borden. Laurier went to far as leveling a motion to declare the new government as unconstitutional given in his eyes that it, “had formed a cabinet whose members held diametrically opposite views on such a question of the highest importance to the dominion and empire.” Borden completely dismissed these allegations and went on the offensive, retorting that Laurier’s naval plan had been “ineffective, expensive and ill-considered”, resulting in a Canadian fleet full of useless and outdated ships built at a ridiculous price at home. When pushed for answers regarding his own naval ambitions, Borden replied with;

“The whole policy must be reconsidered, and we shall reconsider it. In so grave and important a determination, affecting for all time to come the relations of this dominion to the rest of the empire, it is infinitely better to be right than to be in a hurry. The question of permanent co-operation between this dominion and the rest of the empire ought to be threshed out and debated before the people and they should be given the opportunity of pronouncing upon it. I say, further, that we shall take pains to ascertain in the meantime what are the conditions that confront the empire.”


As it seemed just about time for Borden to once again bury the naval issue under some other bit of controversy, events in Europe moved to displace Borden’s plans. When the Admiralty announced the 1912-1913 Royal Navy estimates and their subsequent abandonment of the two-power standard in favor of a 60% advantage in dreadnoughts over Germany, the military of Britain was called forward to speak regarding a potential war with Germany. Following a humiliatingly awful showing by First Sea Lord Sir Arthur Wilson in regard to the war plans of the Admiralty, he was quickly whisked away and replaced by Sir Francis Bridgeman. On the order of Prime Minister Asquith, Home Secretary Winston Churchill was elevated into the office of First Lord of the Admiralty. At the hands of British Columbia Premier Richard McBride who was an old friend of Churchill, a connection was made eventually to Borden. Through McBride, Churchill offered the fullest assistance to the Canadian government regarding any naval development or inquiries they require.

“They can consult the Admiralty in perfect confidence that we will do all in our power to make their naval policy a brilliant success; and will not be hidebound or shrink from new departures provided that whatever moneys they think fit to employ shall be well spent according to the true principals by which sea power is maintained.”

There is no records of Borden and Churchill directly communicating until near the end of May 1912 in which he wrote to Churchill regarding meeting him in early July for the Committee of Imperial Defense. At this conference, it was explained that while the Royal Navy could likely rise to the challenge of Germany, a potential alliance with Austria-Hungary would result in them having to transfer a minimum of 3 battleships into the Mediterranean to counter the threat. While Britain could take the financial hit of these 3 additional ships, the potential response from Germany was feared. It was believed that if Canada sent in for the order itself, it would lessen the impact while still allowing Britain to have the battleships at it’s command in wartime. Churchill would state on the matter,

“If we could say that the new fact was that Canada had decided to take part in the defense of the British Empire, that would be an answer which would involve no invidious comparisons, and which would absolve us from going into any detailed calculations as to the number of Austrian and German vessels available at any moment. If it is the intention of Canada to render assistance to the naval forces of the British Empire, now is the time when that aid would be most welcome and most timely.”

In Borden’s mind, the potential for Canadian dreadnoughts would please both the contributionists, nationalists and imperialists alike but in the end, it would do no such thing. Similarly to Laurier, Borden was swept up in the grand ideals and overly optimistic talk of imperial conferences. While much of the time spent in Britain revolved around the reinforcement of the peril of the Royal Navy in the Mediterranean, Borden also looked into developing a permanent naval policy of his own. Borden and his team had toured multiple naval dockyards and shipyards, looking for the opinions of the great shipbuilders of Britain. In the end though, Borden largely wanted the Admiralty to produce a memorandum in which he could take back to Canada and use to champion the cause of dreadnoughts for Britain. The memorandum he eventually received did not give him the proper ammunition he needed to defeat his opponents, Borden went so far as to express his displease to Churchill with the statement of, “If this contribution was the best we could expect, it would be idle for you to expect any results whatever from the government or people of Canada.”

While the dreadnought question had fell somewhat flat, Churchill stayed true to his word and before Sir Francis Bridgeman himself was replaced by Prince Louis of Battenberg, he delivered a detailed memorandum. Disappointingly though, the report itself barely mentioned Canada for more than 2 pages. Besides the recommendation for reinforcing shore-based defenses at various cities along the west and east coast, the report proposed Canada maintaining extensive torpedo boat flotillas. Canada would operate 3 separate flotillas, the first pair would consist of 4-6 torpedo boats and 3 submarines, being placed in Vancouver and Halifax. The final flotilla would consist of a cruiser, 12 torpedo boats and 9 submarines placed in and around the Gulf of St Lawrence. This fleet plan was much more appealing to Borden, being drastically cheaper both monetarily and manpower wise. Hopefully due to this plan being much closer to the expanded fisheries service and serving as a solely coastal defense force, it would also quash the notion from French nationalists that a Canadian fleet was solely built for Imperial use.


But as was standard, nothing came of this fleet as Borden teetered back and forth privately regarding how best to introduce such a bill before his enemies. While his supporters correctly assured him that they should deal with issues one at a time and with the introduction of the Naval Aid Bill would soon be upon them, a pair of bills would likely end in disaster. As the most contentious parliamentary debate since confederation though, the Naval Aid Bill threatened to break the Canadian government apart at the seams.



Hello everybody, thanks again for tuning in. I apologize for the delay in the posting of this chapter however, I believe that I have finally settled on a reasonable schedule for posting. I was thinking 3 posts a week on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. This should allow me to break chapters down into relatively smaller sizes while also keeping up a fair pace. We are rapidly approaching our point of deviation but I don't want to rush in. Feedback as always is appreciated, have a good one