| This dissertation provides a history of Canadian ideas about nuclear weapons from the late 1950s until the end of the Trudeau era in 1984. Throughout this period, Canadians reacted to the insecurity they felt in the world around them by expressing many conflicting, often irreconcilable views about a range of nuclear weapon issues, including Canada's acquisition of nuclear warheads in 1963, the U.S. ABM program in the 1960s and early 1970s, the role of Canadian nuclear technology in the development of India's first nuclear explosion, and the Trudeau government's decision to allow the U.S. military to test cruise missiles in northern Canada. The dissertation concludes with an examination of the emergence of a broadly-based, increasingly mainstream and influential anti-nuclear movement in the early 1980s, the clearest manifestation of the insecurity Canadians experienced at the time.;Keywords: Nuclear weapons, Deterrence, Arms Race, Arms Control, Disarmament, Proliferation, Security, Canada, Foreign Policy, Public Opinion, Public Discourse.;The nuclear debates examined in this dissertation reveal that Canadians were divided over nuclear weapons, nuclear strategy, the arms race, proliferation, and arms control and disarmament. In particular, they came to fundamentally different conclusions about how Canada's nuclear weapon policies, and its support for the nuclear policies of its alliances, would contribute to international stability and order. Some believed that their security rested on the maintenance of a strong Western nuclear deterrent and supported Canada contributing to its credibility; others believed that the constant modernisation of nuclear arsenals fuelled by the superpower arms race posed a serious threat to their security. This conceptual dilemma---the security through nuclear strength argument versus the fear that the quest for security through quantitative and qualitative improvements of nuclear stockpiles increased the likelihood of nuclear war---left Canadians divided over the value and utility of nuclear weapons and the strategies developed around them. At the same time, Canadians' ideas about nuclear weapons provide insight into how they envisioned and struggled over their country's place in the world, its international security role, and the Canada-U.S. relationship. |
