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The Drone Age (Part 1): The game-changing power of innovation in war

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An item from the Legion Magazine.

Ukrainian Special Group Alpha operators alongside a multirotor FPV drone in 2023.
[Lycksele-Nord/Wikimedia]

The Drone Age (Part 1): The game-changing power of innovation in war

STORY BY RICHARD FOOT

The first in a two-part series examining the impact of drones and autonomous weapons on modern warfare. Part 1 considers drones alongside some of history’s other groundbreaking innovations that changed the nature of war.

This is, for better or worse, a revolutionary time in military terms. The world is witnessing one of those game-changing moments when a new idea or technology tested on the battlefield upends conventional wisdom about how to fight a war.

Drones and autonomous weapons have humbled both Russia in Ukraine and the U.S. in the Persian Gulf, sending their militaries reeling like prizefighters unexpectedly knocked to the mat.

HMCS Alberni circa 1943-1944. [DND]

Juno Beach Centre safeguards HMCS Alberni artifacts removed from wreck

STORY BY ALEX BOWERS

“We’re a museum of stories,” said Alex Fitzgerald-Black, the Juno Beach Centre Association’s executive director. “We’re not necessarily a big collections museum.”

The Canada-based charity head, whose efforts support those at the main site in Normandy, France, nevertheless stressed that artifacts still have a vital place in those tales—especially when they provide a tangible link to the past.

Two of the centre’s most recent acquisitions, the bell and shipbuilder’s plate from the Second World War-era HMCS Alberni, offer just that. But for Fitzgerald-Black and other custodians, it’s also critical that such artifacts are safeguarded. These new Alberni items had originally been removed from the more than 80-year-old wreck in British waters by independent divers, who subsequently put them up for auction in June 2025.

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Arthur Meighen: Remembering Canada’s unmatched wartime orator

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An item from the Legion Magazine that may be of interest to members.

Prime Minister Arthur Meighen at the memorial event at Vimy Ridge honouring Canadian war dead on July 3, 1921. [Public domain]

Arthur Meighen: Remembering Canada’s unmatched wartime orator

STORY BY RICHARD FOOT

Canada Day feels like a fitting moment to remember Arthur Meighen, one of Canada’s finest statesmen, whose insight and eloquence helped guide the country through the darkest days of the First World War.

As Eugene Forsey, the renowned former senator and constitutional scholar once wrote: “[Meighen] was incomparably the greatest parliamentarian and orator of my time, probably the greatest Canada had ever had, and from the first time, I listened enthralled … The speeches were masterpieces.”

Meighen delivered one of those masterpieces on July 3, 1921—105 years ago on Friday—atop the scarred landscape of Vimy Ridge. Having become prime minister the previous year, Meighen was attending a ceremony to dedicate a Cross of Sacrifice erected on the site, years before the creation of the full monument that stands today.

Retired Canadian lieutenant-general Eric (Rick) Findley

Canadian Eric Findley on overseeing Norad’s 9/11 response

STORY BY ALEX BOWERS

“I have to admit,” said retired Canadian lieutenant-general Eric (Rick) Findley, a former director of operations at the North American Aerospace Defense Command, “that when I first got to Norad, it was relatively quiet. 9/11 changed everything.”

A major-general in September 2001, the helicopter pilot-turned-overseer of continental air defence found himself at the centre of an unprecedented tragedy, one that left the U.S. reeling from a terrorist attack that claimed 2,977 lives.

“It didn’t matter what flag you had on your shoulder,” Findley continued. “It really didn’t matter.” Far more pressing to the Maple Leaf-uniformed senior officer was defending against the surprise threat and rapidly shifting events.