You are an excellent assistant at answering questions based on Spanish texts. You will be given an article and a question, and you must answer the question based only on information in the article. The response should be extracted from the context verbatim.

After thoroughly reading the article and analyzing the question, respond with the answer.

Title:
Canadian_Armed_Forces

Context:
The responsibility for military command remained with the British Crown-in-Council, with a commander-in-chief for North America stationed at Halifax until the final withdrawal of British Army and Royal Navy units from that city in 1906. Thereafter, the Royal Canadian Navy was formed, and, with the advent of military aviation, the Royal Canadian Air Force. These forces were organised under the Department of Militia and Defence, and split into the Permanent and Non-Permanent Active Militias—frequently shortened to simply The Militia. By 1923, the department was merged into the Department of National Defence, but land forces in Canada were not referred to as the Canadian Army until November 1940.

Question:
The Canadian Armed Forces were initially organized under what department?

the Department of Militia and Defence