Canada in the Great Power Game 1914-2014 Quotes

“Civilization and culture in North America are more menaced, more strongly threatened, by internal disorders than by external pressure.”
― Gwynne Dyer, Canada in the Great Power Game 1914-2014

“The Canadian public’s uncritical admiration of the United States, which had been Diefenbaker’s undoing, had pretty much dissipated by the end of the 1960s. The growing nightmare of the Vietnam War was sabotaging America’s reputation as an effective operator abroad just as the wave of urban violence was destroying its image as a bastion of justice and democracy at home, and the United States was coming to be seen in Canada as just another muscle-bound great power stumbling around without a clue.”
― Gwynne Dyer, Canada in the Great Power Game 1914-2014

“There have been a few attempts to turn Prime Minister Diefenbaker into the tragic hero of Canada’s lost independence, but that is ludicrous. For one thing, the country’s independence was certainly compromised, but it was not really lost. For another, Diefenbaker is nobody’s hero: he was a bombastic prairie politico who combined a crude but saleable version of English Canadian nationalism with an unwavering commitment to a Cold War view of the world. “Dief” never admitted a mistake, had no particular attachment to the truth and suffered from chronic indecisiveness and low-grade paranoia. The image that lingers from his latter days is that of an old-fashioned and rigidly self-righteous man shaking his wattles in muddled indignation.”
― Gwynne Dyer, Canada in the Great Power Game 1914-2014

“There have been a few attempts to turn Prime Minister Diefenbaker into the tragic hero of Canada’s lost independence, but that is ludicrous. For one thing, the country’s independence was certainly compromised, but it was not really lost. For another, Diefenbaker is nobody’s hero: he was a bombastic prairie politico who combined a crude but saleable version of English Canadian nationalism with an unwavering commitment to a Cold War view of the world.”
― Gwynne Dyer, Canada in the Great Power Game 1914-2014