If Canada came of age during the First World War, then the Second World War brought the country to robust adulthood. In his illustrated history of Canada’s contribution to the Second World War, historian J.L. Granatstein writes, “The nation that emerged from the struggle was rich and powerful, confident and secure.”

Canada’s achievements during the war are astonishing. Starting from essentially nothing, Canada trained and armed an army, navy, and air force that contributed indispensably to victory. In the process, war production invigorated a moribund economy, thereby eliminating Depression-era unemployment, providing incomes sufficient for Canadians to buy $12.5-
billion in war bonds and delivering today’s equivalent of $100-billion in goods and food for the war. This effort helped ensure Canada a place in the postwar world as the leading middle power. But all this was just a bonus, Granatstein points out, to defeating “a monstrous evil” in “a just war, the last good war.”

The book is solid but, by its nature, offers only a brief overview of Canada’s efforts both at the front and at home. Observations on the political imperatives behind Canada’s war policies are particularly well done. The disasters at Hong Kong and Dieppe, as well as the successful postwar policies that maintained economic growth, are seen in a new light when considered in the context of the political forces bearing on a government intent on re-election.

The Last Good War takes the same design as Granatstein’s First World War history, Hell’s Corner. They are both gorgeous books – oversized, beautifully laid-out, and containing many rarely seen period illustrations and photos – and make a handsome set. The editor of this volume appears to have made a trade-off in the text: gone are the repetitions in the previous history, but we are now confronted with such awkward phrases as “Kingian goobledegook,” “naval penis envy,” and nursing sisters providing “TLC.”

Entitling a book The Last Good War may seem a provocative choice for those who didn’t fight in the war. It’s hard to quibble, though, when the history shows us the justice of the cause and the engagement and sacrifice of a nation and its triumphant emergence into adulthood. Sixty years later, what have we gained and what have we lost that make it difficult to believe that there was once a war without moral ambiguity?