Although Canada usually gets a negligible amount of attention in studies of World War II, it actually wound up making significant contributions.  Although reluctant at the war's beginning to commit much of anything, by the time Hitler invaded Poland in 1939, Canada was ready to act, officially entering the war not long after its sometime-ally Britain.  By the time all was said and done, over a million Canadians had served in some capacity during World War II, with nearly 50,000 dead and over 50,000 wounded--this in a country of a population at that time of roughly ten to twelve million.  Canadian warships were charged with the important task of guarding the English Channel for American and British troops landing at the Normandy beaches on D-Day, in June of 1944, and a division of Canadian troops also landed at Juno Beach on D-Day, as mentioned above; of all the divisions that landed that day, the Canadians covered the most ground getting their forces inland.  Canadian fighter pilots also made significant contributions at the Battles of Britain and the Atlantic, specifically, and during anti-submarine and bombing raids in general during the war.