Sergeant Gander Read Online Free PDF

as to the reality of our intent to hold the Island … We
should therefore be most grateful if the Canadian Government
would consider whether one or two Canadian battalions could be
provided from Canada for this purpose…. 7
    The Canadian Cabinet War Committee met on September 23, 1941, to discuss the proposal and on October 2, 1941, Canada agreed to reinforce the Hong Kong garrison.
    The Royal Rifles of Canada and the Winnipeg Grenadiers were selected for the mission. Canada’s best trained units were classified as Class A and units that were not quite as far along in their training were labelled Class B. The remaining units, “due either to recent employment requiring a period of refresher training, or to insufficient training” that were “not recommended for operational employment at
    The Winnipeg Grenadiers
    The Winnipeg Grenadiers trace their origins back to 1908, and were one of the first units mobilized when Canada entered the Second World War. The Grenadiers were an English-speaking unit, recruited from western Canada. First designated as machine-gun unit, they completed basic training during the winter of 1939–40. In May 1940, they were converted to a rifle unit and sent to the island of Jamaica in the Caribbean to perform garrison duty. In Jamaica, the Grenadiers, like the Royal Rifles in Gander, adopted a dog as their mascot. Named “Queenie,” the little dog was a favourite amongst the men. Winnipeg Grenadier William Bell recalls, “At some point while we were there, Queenie became pregnant. I remember one day when members of the regiment were on the way up the mountain near Newcastle and we all had to stop so that Queenie could have her puppies along the way. I don’t know whatever happened to Queenie, but she was a good friend to many of us.” 11
    After sixteen months in tropical Jamaica, the Grenadiers were recalled to Canada and told to prepare for service overseas. Like the Royal Rifles, the director of military training, Colonel John Lawson, had deemed the Grenadiers “insufficiently trained and not recommended for operations.” 12
    Japanese Expansion
    As early as 1931, when Japan seized control of Manchuria, their desire to win complete control over Eastern Asia and the Pacific was evident. In 1934–35, the Japanese began a rapid naval buildup (in violation of the Washington Naval Conferences of 1921–22 13 and later treaties) and in November 1936, Japan joined Germany in an Anti-Comintern Pact, which was ostensibly a defensive alliance against the spread of Communism. 14 On July 7, 1937, Japanese and Chinese troops clashed along the
    Japanese expansion in Asia, 1931–41.

    Chinese-Manchurian border. This skirmish led to full-scale war, and most historians refer to this as the start of the Second World War in Eastern Asia.
    By 1938, the Japanese had penetrated deep into South China. In May of that year Japanese troops landed at Amoy, 483 kilometres northeast of Hong Kong, and by October they had landed troops at Bias Bay, only fifty-six kilometres northeast of the colony. Canton fell to the Japanese later that month and by early 1939 the Japanese occupied all of the territory adjacent to Hong Kong’s mainland frontier. 15 In September 1940, the partnership between Germany and Japan (also including Italy) was further formalized with the signing of the Tripartite Pact, which stated,
    The Governments of Japan, Germany and Italy consider it the
prerequisite of lasting peace that every nation in the world shall
receive the space to which it is entitled. They have, therefore, decided
to stand by and cooperate with one another in their efforts in the
regions of Europe and Greater East Asia respectively. In doing this
it is their prime purpose to establish and maintain a new order of
things, calculated to promote the mutual prosperity and welfare of
the peoples concerned…. 16
    In other words, they intended to establish their own