Canada Used to Have Aircraft Carriers! What Happened? It still surprises many Canadians to learn that their country once operated aircraft carriers – not museum pieces or hand-me-down curiosities, but real, operational warships flying the White Ensign and serving in NATO’s front lines.
From the end of the Second World War into the early 1970s, Canada fielded a succession of carriers: HMCS Warrior, HMCS Magnificent, and HMCS Bonaventure. These ships weren’t symbolic gestures. They were powerful expressions of a country that once took its maritime responsibilities seriously – seriously enough to maintain fixed-wing naval aviation in the stormy waters of the North Atlantic.
Today, the very notion of a Canadian aircraft carrier would provoke bewilderment or bemused disbelief. In a country now better known for UN blue helmets and climate virtue signaling than for sea power, the idea that Canada once launched jets from a moving flight deck seems like a fantasy. But the history is real – and its disappearance tells us something unsettling about the country we’ve become.
Why Did Canada Have Aircraft Carriers?
The postwar Royal Canadian Navy was not an afterthought. During the early Cold War, Canada fielded one of the most capable maritime forces in the Western alliance. At its peak, it ranked third in the world in tonnage. The carriers HMCS Magnificent and HMCS Bonaventure were not mere flag-waving platforms. They were integrated into anti-submarine warfare formations, participating in real NATO operations aimed at deterring and countering Soviet naval threats. Canadian pilots flew Banshee jet fighters and Tracker sub-hunters from their decks. Canadian sailors trained to NATO standards and deployed alongside U.S. and British fleets. For a brief but meaningful chapter of history, Canada was not just talking about security – it was delivering it.
And then, almost without debate, it stopped.
When HMCS Bonaventure was decommissioned in 1970 and scrapped the following year, it was not replaced. No successor was planned. No phased transition to another form of fixed-wing naval capability was undertaken. The Trudeau government of the day simply ended the carrier program, citing rising costs, technological change, and shifting priorities. At the time, it seemed a prudent economy. But in truth, it was a strategic abdication – the moment when Canada began to walk away from the idea that it needed to project power at sea.
The reasons were not just fiscal. Nor were they entirely technological – although the shift from propeller aircraft to high-performance jets did challenge the utility of smaller carriers like HMCS Bonaventure. The real driver was a loss of strategic seriousness. By the early 1970s, Ottawa had already begun embracing a different vision of Canadian military identity – one rooted less in hard power and deterrence than in peacekeeping, soft diplomacy, and moral suasion. The sea, long central to Canada’s economic lifeblood and strategic geography, began to recede in Ottawa’s mental map of the world.
But the oceans didn’t go anywhere. Canada remains bounded by three: the Pacific, the Arctic, and the Atlantic. Its economy still depends on maritime trade. Its sovereignty, especially in the North, is still contested. And its alliances – NATO and NORAD – still hinge on credible defense contributions in the maritime domain. The idea that Canada could remain a maritime nation without a capable navy, let alone without a serious debate about sea power, would have stunned those who served aboard HMCS Bonaventure or HMCS Magnificent.
The disappearance of Canada’s carrier fleet is, in this sense, emblematic of a deeper malaise. It wasn’t just that the ships were sold for scrap. It was that the political culture surrounding them was also dismantled. The professional cadre of fixed-wing naval aviators dissolved. The institutional knowledge about carrier operations withered. And the very notion of a Canadian capacity for maritime force projection became unthinkable. This wasn’t decline – it was deliberate forgetting.
Of course, in 2025, no one is seriously advocating that Canada rush out to build a new carrier. The price tag alone would make that politically radioactive, even if the strategic rationale existed. But the point is not nostalgia. The point is that the carrier once represented something larger than itself: a Canada that understood the strategic utility of maritime power and was willing to invest accordingly. A Canada that didn’t flinch from hard responsibilities. A Canada that pulled its weight.
Today, that Canada is harder to find.
We can see this most clearly in the current state of the Royal Canadian Navy. Our frigates are aging. Our submarine fleet, long a source of national embarrassment, is barely seaworthy. Our replenishment and logistics vessels remain years away from operational readiness. Even modest procurement projects become political sinkholes. And the discussion in Ottawa rarely rises above vague declarations of support for a “rules-based international order” – as though rules without force mean anything in a world where revisionist powers are building navies, testing thresholds, and contesting sea lanes.
The American-led order Canada once helped uphold is under increasing strain. China’s naval build-up is unprecedented. Russia is surging undersea and ice-capable platforms into the Arctic. Even middle powers like India and Turkey are expanding their fleets. In this context, Canada’s maritime neglect is not just a national failing – it is an allied liability. We talk about sovereignty, but sovereignty without capability is an illusion. We talk about deterrence, but deterrence without credible force is an empty gesture.
The legacy of Canada’s aircraft carriers is not about hardware – it’s about mindset. Once, we believed we had a role to play in securing the maritime commons. Once, we were willing to put steel in the water and pilots in the air to back that belief. That’s the legacy we need to recover – not the specific form of the carrier, but the spirit of strategic seriousness it embodied.
That spirit should animate our response to today’s challenges. Instead of wistful remembrance, we should invest in the capabilities appropriate for our geography and alliances now: long-range submarines, ice-hardened surface vessels, naval strike aircraft, and a replenishment and logistics fleet capable of sustaining extended operations. We should rebuild the institutional confidence to lead NATO maritime operations in our own backyard – not follow them from the margins.
We may never launch another Banshee jet from a Canadian flight deck. But we can, and must, reclaim the will that once put it there.
Canada didn’t lose its aircraft carriers by accident. It abandoned them. And in doing so, it surrendered more than a class of warship. It surrendered a piece of its identity as a serious country. In an increasingly multipolar and dangerous world of great power competition, that is a luxury we can no longer afford.
About the Author: Dr. Andrew Latham
Andrew Latham is a non-resident fellow at Defense Priorities and a professor of international relations and political theory at Macalester College in Saint Paul, MN. Andrew is now a Contributing Editor to 19FortyFive, where he writes a daily column. You can follow him on X: @aakatham.
