Beyond Operation Oblivion (A Canadian Spy Before, During, and After the Fall of Hong Kong, 1941)

Beyond Operation Oblivion tells the life story of Francis “Mike” Kendall, a prickly Canadian adventurer who found himself in Hong Kong in the turbulent years leading up to the Second World War and ended up leading one of the most daring covert initiatives of the conflict.

Born in Vancouver, BC, Kendall’s work in the mining industry took him to abroad to many locations, including South America, Southeast Asia, and the South China Coast. In 1941, with the war in the Pacific heating up, he was recruited by Britain’s Special Operations Executive (SOE) where he created Z Force, a group of saboteurs and spies dedicated to fighting behind Japanese lines in the event of an attack on Hong Kong. When that attack came in December 1941, Kendall and his team engaged in active operations including leading a daring escape from the Crown colony of some seventy-five spies, officials, and sailors. After conflicts with British, Australian, and Chinese Nationalist figures, he was assigned to an SOE guerilla training school in India, vigorously promoting plans to return to Hong Kong to conduct espionage and sabotage operations, an initiative dubbed Operation Oblivion.

As part of this covert operation, Kendall recruited and trained of a group of Cantonese-speaking Chinese Canadians. They trained at a secret SOE camp in the Okanagan Valley of British Columbia, before heading to Australia for final preparations. Although Operation Oblivion was cancelled in early 1945 (a victim of an on-going strategic struggle between Britain and the United States over post-war spheres of influence), its legacy made a significant contribution to the status of Chinese Canadians. Kendall and the members of Operation Oblivion were instrumental in the successful post-war political struggle to regain the civil rights of Canada’s Chinese community and overturn the Chinese Exclusion Act. Mike Kendall’s uniquely Canadian role in a tumultuous period in history is a fascinating story that echoes in today’s geopolitical chaos.