Canada's relationship with the United States has become THE hot topic up here in the Great White North. Certainly the tariff war launched by the Trump regime is a big part of that because of the widespread economic damage it's already causing. But it's affected the recent provincial election in Ontario (and not in a good way) and will likely be a major topic in the forthcoming federal election. And there are darker, deeper undercurrents surfacing in the news.
Here are a few relevant articles.
In The Walrus, Canada's equivalent to The Atlantic, David Moscrop asks Why Won't Trump Shut Up About Canada?
As much as Canadians might wish to believe Trump’s attention is driven by something particular to our country, we seem to be, at best, incidental to his grander designs. Trump wants American dominance without the responsibility of soft power exercised through foreign aid or disproportionate spending on a military umbrella that stretches across the continent and the Atlantic Ocean. (He recently argued that countries like Taiwan should pay the US for defence, comparing it to an insurance arrangement.) He also wants American industry and workers to thrive without reliance on trade deficits—or wealthy people paying taxes.
To the extent that Trump views Canada as standing in the way of his hemispheric and domestic plans, by way of a trade imbalance, an under-securitized border, inadequate defence spending, and an inconvenient geographic location in the Arctic, he will bully this country by any means necessary—and annex it if he must. Wrong place, wrong time, Canada.
If the country can’t or won’t serve Trump’s nineteenth-century program, he’ll force it to, as a hammer forces a nail into a plank. And to Trump, that is what Canada is—a nail, piece of a project, no more animate or sacred or sovereign than a tiny spine of metal.
In this Substack post, Warren Kinsella looks at ways in which Canada might become a stronger economic force without the United States.
US President Donald Trump’s tariff threat has, however, shifted the Overton window. There is now a growing political consensus to unlock Canada’s economic potential and reduce its dependence on exports to its southern neighbour. That task will fall to either Prime Minister Mark Carney or opposition leader Pierre Poilievre following an election this year.
Canada’s GDP has long trailed its G7 peers, ranking 16th globally in purchasing power parity terms. A country with its geography could clearly generate higher output. To do so, the Canadian economy needs to become more efficient, raise investment and attract more high-skilled workers. Here’s how.
In the Globe and Mail Andrew Coyne outlines some ways (gift link) in which Canada could respond to US threats and economic aggression.
Beyond that our defences against attempted American domination are more general than specific. We are limited in the degree to which we can “decouple” from them. We share a continent, and we have to work with them. Whether we do so from a position of weakness or strength, however, is something we can affect.
One area in which this may apply more and more in future is in our capacity to resist disinformation campaigns. To now the focus of these efforts has been countries like China or Russia. It seems naive to think that an administration that is so frankly admiring of those regimes, and moving fast to align itself with them, would not resort to similar tactics.
Second, Mr. Trump has seemed keen to try to probe our divisions as a country. That has failed so far – the sudden emergence of this external threat has served to unify us to a quite unusual degree – but there is no guarantee that will last. We need to be thinking about national unity as an element of national security.
So far as our electoral system, for example, encourages parties to target their appeal to certain regions while ignoring others, racking up seats in the former while being all but shut out of the latter, it’s worth looking at systems in which every party can win seats in every part of the country, and every party must.
As well as booing the US national anthem at hockey games and cancelling trips to the US, Canadians are choosing to buy Canadian. This article from CTV describes some of the many "Buy Canadian" apps that are being developed to help consumers give their money to Canadian companies.
Finally, Malcolm Nance, a US intelligence and foreign policy analyst has published a report on Substack suggesting that Trump will invade Greenland and Canada with dire consequences for Canada and the US. (archive link)
The political rhetoric in the first five weeks of the Trump regime is giving clear indications that the United States fully intends to invade and seize Canada and Greenland at President Trump’s command. The possible timeline is 6-18 months of political destabilization to weaken the Canadian economy, split political parties, and carry out secret destabilization efforts, including identifying and making contact with Canadians who would betray their country.
The best hope is that the operation would be compromised and the planning publicized well in advance of mobilization by anti-Trump loyalists to the Constitution in the intelligence and armed forces who would recognize the campaign's foolhardiness. However, this does not guarantee that Trump would not carry out the attack.
The occupation of Canada would quickly become a continent-wide, high-intensity modern war akin to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. It would rapidly devolve into a higher-intensity insurgency, which could lead to the deaths of thousands on both sides. Any operation would most likely collapse the American economy and precipitate a violent Second American Civil War.
The overall outline of a possible plan makes sense though there are some details that I don't think were well thought out. (IEDs in beaver dams?!). I do think resistance would be widespread and fierce. Canadians aren't known as a gun loving country, but in northern and rural areas there a lot of long guns and people who know how to use them. Anyone who thinks that Canada can be taken by military force does not know this country or Canadians.
Let's just hope that this does not come to pass. But given the anti-reality insanity of the last two months, I would not bet against it.
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