Historical Presentation, Canadian Style
Marvels and missteps at the Canadian War Museum.
As any regular reader of this blog will know, I am a huge fan of museums, history, and military affairs. So, when I have the chance to combine all three, I jump at the opportunity. My recent trip to Ottawa to visit my many Canadian relatives (and celebrate the marriage of one) allowed me such an occasion. Right in the heart of the Canadian capital’s historic center, just a few minutes’ walk from the absolutely stunning Parliament Hill – seriously, if you ever find yourself in that city, it is a must-see panoply of glorious neo-Gothic architecture – sits the Canadian War Museum. It tells the story of Canada’s martial past, from the internecine wars of its native population, through the colonial conflicts in the 17th and 18th centuries, the World Wars, and the Cold War, to the fight against global terrorism in the modern day.
I have been to several military museums in the past, including the National Museum of WWII Aviation in Colorado Springs, battlefield exhibitions at Verdun, Culloden, and the Plains of Abraham in Quebec City, as well as broader national institutions like the Imperial War Museum in London and Les Invalides in Paris, so I thought I had a pretty good idea of what I would be seeing in Ottawa. But I was both pleasantly and unpleasantly surprised by my visit to Canada’s entry into this august field.
Let’s start with an overview of what the museum included as of my visit in December 2023. There are several permanent exhibitions split into four primary sections: early Canadian history through the wars of the 1800s, World War I, World War II, and the Cold War era through today. Each area was generally well-organized, with clear pathways through the exhibits based on chronology. There were various items on display, from vehicles and weaponry to dioramas, full-scale recreations of, for instance, the trenches at Passchendaele, and wartime relics from the home front to the front lines. These were all fairly well explained by the information panels nearby, but they were a bit more inconsistent than I would have hoped. Another permanent gallery, entirely dedicated to larger combat vehicles, spans the outside of the exposition hall. At the time of my visit, there was a special exhibition on War Games, but this closes up at the end of 2023.
On a more prosaic note, the museum does indeed have a gift shop, although I found it quite underwhelming. What I absolutely loved, however, was the room in which used military history books were set out for sale. This small alcove was wondrous to a history nerd like myself; had I not been with my wife and baby, I could have easily spent an hour just leafing through the pages of the tomes on offer. I did well and only picked up four books – there were several more that caught my eye, but time was short and I didn’t want to give my credit card too much of a workout.
There was quite a lot to enjoy at the Canadian War Museum, including some things I was genuinely not expecting. The best parts of the museum were the exhibitions on the World Wars. This was not at all a shock, as Canadians were key players in both conflicts and have a great deal of well-earned pride in the accomplishments of their countrymen. As a scholar of WWI, I was pleased at its treatment in the museum. The battles, weaponry, equipment, and materiel were all excellently described and displayed. The museum, which is honestly quite a bit smaller than I expected, spent a great deal of time and space on the Great War, which earned it plenty of points in my book. For example, the sacrifices of the men who valiantly fought at Canada’s deadliest-ever battle, the one at Vimy Ridge in 1917, were honored in a manner commensurate with their bravery. For a war that often gets overlooked by Americans, it certainly has a different tenor up north, one which I heartily appreciated.
The Second World War section was just as good. It walked the visitor through both the European and Pacific theaters, focusing on each campaign in which Canadians participated. Sections on the North African campaign, the invasion of Italy, D-Day, and the liberation of the Netherlands were extremely well-presented and delineated. The firsthand descriptions of warfare from the men who fought against the Germans and Japanese were compelling and helped bring the physical materials to life in an approachable and personal way. Some of the particular relics on display were amazing, especially the wreckage of a Canadian hero’s warplane, some fabulous propaganda posters, and the actual armored Mercedes-Benz limousine that Hitler famously rode in – yes, I am just as shocked as you are that this somehow ended up in Ottawa. I was particularly infatuated with the aviation history included here, as my late uncle was a bomber pilot for the Royal Canadian Air Force in WWII. All of this was very well-done.
Throughout the museum, but particularly in the WWI and WWII sections, were the stories of personal heroism that earned the highest honors available to Canadian servicemen, particularly the Victoria Cross. Highlighting these accounts was a wonderful choice by the curators, as it both honors the bravery of these individuals and tells some truly extraordinary and profoundly moving tales. The battlefield dioramas of key clashes like the ones at Vimy, Dieppe, the Plains of Abraham, and more were not just helpful in understanding the lay of the land, but also were captivating ways to show history instead of just telling it. The biggest shock I got – in a very good way – was the significant focus on the Boer War. I study British imperial history, of which Canada is a key part, and the Boer War was an incredibly important conflict in the evolution of the Empire and the future of warfare. That it was granted so much space was genuinely pleasing to me, especially given the fact that so many people have no idea about it at all. This is exactly what museums should do: bring the past, specifically its oft-overlooked aspects, to new audiences of engaged learners.
Unfortunately, not all was good in Ottawa. The museum fell far short in multiple aspects and made some significant missteps in others. The most frustrating thing was in the presentation of the first permanent exhibition, which dealt with Canada’s earliest wars. This area was smaller than the others, although it covered nearly a millennium of conflict. As such, each specific war was presented as a Cliff’s Notes version of the real thing. This was incredibly disappointing, particularly because these were the only wars actually fought on Canadian soil! They contributed immensely to the foundation of the nation itself, yet were treated with a level of disinterest which was unbecoming of the actual history. The Seven Years’ War, American Revolution, War of 1812, and Canadian civil conflicts of the 1800s were almost glossed over. This does a disservice to any visitor, but really misrepresents the history for non-Canadians.
Within this section, bizarre choices were made that would skew the understanding of any layperson who visited. Significant time was spent on Canada’s ‘first peoples’, including a completely inane and incorrect interpretation of Viking combat with the natives of Newfoundland and the other areas the Scandinavian adventurers landed. The Vikings were, according to the museum’s information, defeated militarily by Canada’s natives and pushed back to Greenland for good. This is largely nonsense. The Vikings who landed in Canada were vastly outnumbered by natives – a novel thing for their western Atlantic voyages – and generally decided that it was not worth the trouble of dealing with these belligerent tribes. They were not beaten back, but instead chose to leave of their own volition. A visitor would not have any idea that this happened. This is a theme for the museum, which has fully adopted the woke cultural disease that has ravaged Canada over the past decade.
The inordinate focus on ‘underrepresented’ minority populations is frustrating at best, and deliberately misleading at worst. In an area dealing with the American Revolution, in which Canada was deeply implicated, the three people that are profiled as representative of the conflict are a black man, a native man, and a woman. Sure, these people did play a role in the war, but they are not remotely representative of the broader conflict. Their accomplishments should not be diminished, but they certainly should not be centered. The progressive bent of the museum also comes out elsewhere, including in the section on the Cold War and the modern day. UN peacekeeping missions, despite their near-constant failures, are presented as successes of modern Canadian military strength. The Cold War section is exceedingly kind to the enemies of the West and lambasts NATO & the United States for bringing about a nuclear world. I don’t expect a war museum to be entirely jingoistic, but I do expect it to treat its subject with respect and take its own nation’s side. The feeling one gets from much of the Canadian War Museum is that the curators are embarrassed of their country’s past, especially in its early days and the present. Thankfully, this does not come out in the exhibits on the World Wars, but it should not be present anywhere at all.
The last negative about the museum was the special exhibition, War Games, which was supposed to show the history of wargaming as a hobby and as a tool for military planners. This could truly be a fascinating exhibit, but it fell far short of that potential. It was poorly designed, barely explained any history, and again focused on minority populations over everyone else. The military aspects of wargaming as a strategy and planning tool were almost ignored in favor of popular home board games and video games. These are useful to show, but they should not be the focus of the exhibit given that most people already know about them. It would have been far better to focus on actual military applications over the loves of hobbyists. Settlers of Catan may be fun, but a ‘war game’ it is not. I also found it quite odd that games about Syrian refugees, Ukrainian tractors, and pandemics were included here, while real military planning simulations were ignored. This was really a major missed opportunity to explore how gaming can be used to plan for real-life conflict.
All in all, the Canadian War Museum was worth the visit, but it did not live up to its counterparts abroad. Despite the excellent presentation of the World Wars, the interesting items exhibited throughout the space, and the tales of Canadian heroism, the museum is dragged down by its progressive bias, lack of focus on key early conflicts, and underwhelming special exhibition. If only the curators seemed to enjoy their jobs and love their country’s history more, this could be a truly special place to visit. Unfortunately, it falls short of that ideal. The heroes of Canada’s celebrated martial past deserve far better.