"Looking Back at History" The Mystery of the Disappearance of Canada's Arrow Fighter
2024-08-07
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[Global Times Comprehensive Report] The 1950s was the height of the Cold War, with tensions rising between the two camps. Canada, located to the north of the United States, was worried about an attack from the Soviet Union, so it developed an "Arrow" fighter jet to intercept Soviet bombers. The "Arrow" fighter jet was one of the most advanced fighter jets of that era and was the pride of many Canadians, but the development plan was suddenly canceled, leaving many military fans both regretful and curious. What happened before the project was canceled?
After World War II, the Soviet Union began to develop long-range bomber formations that could drop bombs on North America and Europe. In response to this threat, Canada, like other Western countries, developed interceptors, hoping to destroy enemy bombers before they reach their targets. In 1952, the Royal Canadian Air Force's requirements report on a new interceptor was submitted to Canada's Avro Company.
Avro was founded in 1945 to repair and maintain aircraft at Malton Airport in Ontario. In 1946, the company began designing the country's first jet fighter for the Canadian Air Force.
In 1958, the Arrow fighter made its first flight.
After receiving the contract, Avro designers developed an upgraded version of the existing interceptor, the Arrow, which was about 78 feet long and had a wingspan of 50 feet. It began to be manufactured in 1955.
In 1958, the Arrow fighter began to test fly, but at that time, Canadian think tanks, senior generals and politicians believed that the world had entered an era of "pressing a button" warfare, and that interceptors and bombers no longer played a leading role. Declassified documents show that since 1953, some senior Canadian military officers have begun to question the development plan of the Arrow fighter. Senior generals of the army and navy strongly opposed its development. Only senior general of the air force, Hugh Campbell, has always supported it.
In 1957, the ruling party changed in the Canadian political arena. The fate of the Arrow fighter was also changed. In the same year, the then Canadian government signed the North American Aerospace Defense Agreement with the United States. After several negotiations with the United States, the Canadian Minister of Defense proposed to cancel the Arrow fighter project in 1958. In 1959, the five Arrow fighters that had been built were destroyed along with most of the assembly lines.
The cancellation of the project also brought a series of effects - thousands of Avro employees lost their jobs, and the company eventually collapsed and went bankrupt. Richard Mayne, a historian of the Royal Canadian Air Force, said: "It was a wrong decision to cancel the development plan because the threat of bombers has always existed, and it still exists today. We are doing wedding clothes for others. Many Avro engineers later went to NASA to help it complete the Apollo program."
The Arrow was envisioned to be able to fly at Mach 2 at altitudes exceeding 50,000 feet, making it one of the most advanced fighter aircraft of the 1950s and putting Canada ahead of most countries in international military aviation and engineering.
"The performance of the aircraft showed that it was one of the most advanced aircraft at the time. When the project was cancelled, Canada was faced with a 'what to do' moment," said Mayne.
After the dream of flying in the aviation field was shattered, rumors spread and people were discussing why the project was suddenly cancelled. Some analysts said that the United States did not want Canada to build a better aircraft than its own. Others believed that Canadian intelligence personnel deliberately misinterpreted intelligence and misled public opinion to support the government's decision and provide an excuse for it to shirk its responsibilities.
But some people expressed the opposite view, saying that this aircraft was never as good as people imagined, and that Canadians had too high expectations and believed that the Arrow fighter was the best aircraft in the world at that time. As Alan Barnes, a senior researcher at Carleton University in Ottawa, said: "The aircraft has almost a mythical status in the hearts of most Canadians." (Hou Tao)
