The Avro Arrow is a topic that has fascinated Canadians since its controversial cancellation in 1959. However, in the last ten years the narrative has changed dramatically from an American plot to ruin our aerospace industry to a decision made by the Canadian government based on very real calculations about the security threat to North America and the changing defence landscape of the late 1950s. In this episode we talk with Alan Barnes who has recently uncovered some incredible research that shows how important Canadian intelligent services were to the decision to cancel the Avro Arrow project. Alan has clearly uncovered that not only was the cancellation of the Arrow a highly calculated move by the Diefenbaker government but Canada’s newly established intelligence services played a key role in helping the Canadian government predict the future of defence issues which in turn spelled the end of the Arrow project.
Alan Barnes was an analyst and a manager of analysts in the Canadian intelligence community for over 25 years. He served as a military intelligence officer, and as the Middle East analyst in the Political Intelligence Division of the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade. Mr. Barnes moved to the Intelligence Assessment Secretariat (IAS) of the Privy Council Office when that organization was formed in 1993 and was the Director of the IAS Middle East and Africa Division from 1995 until his retirement in 2011. Mr. Barnes played a key role in the IAS's efforts to improve analytical tradecraft and in the training of new analysts. Since his retirement Mr. Barnes has continued his work on issues related to intelligence assessment. He is currently researching the history of strategic intelligence in Canada since 1945 and is Project Co-Leader of the Canadian Foreign Intelligence History Project (CFIHP).
CFIHP is a collaborative effort to encourage the study of foreign intelligence in Canada and to facilitate access to archival records on this subject. By working together, researchers have a better chance of overcoming the many challenges associated with working in this field.
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S5E5 A Murder in the Desert – The Canadian Airborne Regiment and the Somalia Scandal
S5E4 Amherst’s VIP Prisoner: Trotsky in the Maritimes
S5E3 The Buffalo Alliance – Poundmaker and Crowfoot
S5E2 The Pirate Queen of Canada – Maria Lindsay Cobham
S5E1 Canada’s Forgotten Battle – The Battle of the Medak Pocket
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*Special Episode* D-Day 75
S4E17 Subordinate No More! Canada’s Inter-War Move to Independence
S4E16 The Chatham Coloured All-Stars
S4E15 Separate Spheres Turned Upside Down – French Women and the Survival of New France
S4E14 A Search for Asylum – Sitting Bull in Canada
S4E12 “The Riot Heard ‘Round the World” – Vancouver’s 1907 Anti-Asian Riot
S4E11 Thérèse Casgrain
S4E10 Eugenics in Alberta
S4E9 ‘Kill the Indian, Save the Child’ – Residential Schools in Canada
S4E8 Montreal’s Poet Laureate: The Life and Music of Leonard Cohen
S4E7 The Assassination of D’Arcy McGee
S4E6 Canadians on the Bridge Part Two: James Doohan
S4E5 The First World War Remembered
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