# If you had to choose, which should the US take over and why? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [October 10, 2000, 5:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-to-choose-which-should-the-us-take-over-and-why/36378 "2000-10-10T05:43:43Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Aghris](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecccb3/32.png) [@Aghris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aghris)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2000, 12:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-to-choose-which-should-the-us-take-over-and-why/36378/21 "2000-10-10T12:28:04Z")
Whoops… that didn’t come out as planned. Apols. ---
**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Chance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jonathan_chance/32/701_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2000, 12:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-to-choose-which-should-the-us-take-over-and-why/36378/22 "2000-10-10T12:37:08Z")
Just for the ‘alt-history’ fun of it I’d go with Mexico. We like the Canadians too much. Heck, with the new government in Mexico practically begging for closer ties and chunks of Latin America already threatening to adopt the US Dollar as local currency it would be pretty straightforward. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2000, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-to-choose-which-should-the-us-take-over-and-why/36378/23 "2000-10-10T13:22:35Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Palm Cove \* > \*\* > > > [@](#): > > > > Originally posted by Tristan > > But, had we chosen to, with the possible exception of Serbia, we could have done so. > > > > Maybe not all at once, but we could have done it. > > > > \*\* > > Proof Please!! > > Next you’ll be saying you’re the worlds best sporting nation. \*\* Speaking as a guy who used to be in the Canadian Armed Forces, and who knows a pretty fair amount about matters military AND who studied Yugoslavia’s civil war quite a bit, I am confident in stating that had NATO invaded Serbia, they would have swept the Serb army aside like midgets before a bulldozer. It would have been a fight, unlike much of the ground war in Iraq, but it would not have been an even fight. This would have left them occupying a country full of hostile people, but they would have “won,” insofar as you’re a winner when you get Yugoslavia. As to Canada, har. I’m sure we would have put up some resistance but I sincerely doubt that Canada’s brave but very small armed forces could hold them off for a week. ---
**Author:** ![Feynn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ecb155/32.png) [@Feynn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Feynn)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2000, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-to-choose-which-should-the-us-take-over-and-why/36378/24 "2000-10-10T17:17:33Z")
Methinks that Tristan should become aquainted with the Canadian bitch slap… The real reason why certain dolts suggest this is because they know that we are cooler than they are. ---
**Author:** ![Joe\_Cool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ecb155/32.png) [@Joe\_Cool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joe_Cool)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2000, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-to-choose-which-should-the-us-take-over-and-why/36378/25 "2000-10-10T18:42:20Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Jonathan Chance \* > \*\*Just for the ‘alt-history’ fun of it I’d go with Mexico. We like the Canadians too much. Heck, with the new government in Mexico practically begging for closer ties and chunks of Latin America already threatening to adopt the US Dollar as local currency it would be pretty straightforward. \*\* No way, we need to go north first, if for no other reason than to stop those idiots from whining aboot the _@#&^!!_@% CN Tower once and for all!!! Maybe even knock it down, then it can claim to be the “world’s tallest building, freestanding structure, and pile of indeterminate rubble”. ---
**Author:** ![Suo\_Na](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/898d66/32.png) [@Suo\_Na](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Suo_Na)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2000, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-to-choose-which-should-the-us-take-over-and-why/36378/26 "2000-10-10T21:32:03Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by RickJay \* > \*\* > As to Canada, har. I’m sure we would have put up some resistance but I sincerely doubt that Canada’s brave but very small armed forces could hold them off for a week. > \*\* Who says you have to be part of the military to defend your country? I’m sure a few of the Canadian civilians living in the States would be happy to plant some strategically placed bombs… ---
**Author:** ![Omniscient](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omniscient/32/3290_2.png) [@Omniscient](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omniscient)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2000, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-to-choose-which-should-the-us-take-over-and-why/36378/27 "2000-10-10T21:49:29Z")
May I refer you to [Canada or Mexico](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=21612). ---
**Author:** ![MysterEcks](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f475e1/32.png) [@MysterEcks](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MysterEcks)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2000, 10:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-to-choose-which-should-the-us-take-over-and-why/36378/28 "2000-10-10T22:49:59Z")
**RickJay** said: > [@](#): > > As to Canada, har. I’m sure we would have put up some resistance but I sincerely doubt that Canada’s brave but very small armed forces could hold them off for a week. When I was in college, I knew this ex-US Marine. He told me once that if we ever tried invading Canada, we had better have a lot of body-bags on hand–he didn’t think you guys would go down very easily. An invasion is a lot different than a defensive war, especially if the civilians in the target country are fairly well armed and strenuously object. The US could probably win a war such as the OP envisions, but it would involve a lot of American casualties–ground war does–which is why there would have to be a serious threat before it was even considered. And this is ignoring all international political factors–if we invaded Canada, we have just made war on the British Commonwealth, and on a NATO country, and we’re not gonna have any allies or international support at all. If **Tristan** really is looking for story ideas, he probably needs to look elsewhere–it would be virtually impossible to write. ---
**Author:** ![racinchikki](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/eada6e/32.png) [@racinchikki](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/racinchikki)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2000, 10:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-to-choose-which-should-the-us-take-over-and-why/36378/29 "2000-10-10T22:55:49Z")
Neither. I love Canada. I love all my Canadian friends. I love Canadian money. I love the fact that I have twelve friends from Toronto, ten of whom are named Chris, Kris or Kristy. I’ll shut up now. ---
**Author:** ![Tristan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tristan/32/18058_2.png) [@Tristan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tristan)\ **Post date:** [October 11, 2000, 12:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-to-choose-which-should-the-us-take-over-and-why/36378/30 "2000-10-11T00:19:37Z")
In my defense, I would like to state that I meant this more as an amusing question, to spurn some ideas for a short story I’ve been bantering around. However, the first response I got was a bash against the US, founded in fallacy. It got my dander up, I will admit. I did not mean to imply that we _should_ invade one of our neighbors. I didn’t intend to stand on top of a nuclear missle pounding my chest and waving a flag. I know that the internet, and this board, are an international community, and outside of a few choice spots in Europe we are viewed with dis-taste. Whether or not this is deserved is a topic for a whole new thread. It just strikes me as odd, that there are so many individuals that dislike the US, and Americans by default. However, when something happens that requires international aid such as a famine of natural disaster, we are one of the first on the scene. We even offer aid to countries that don’t like us a lot, but we do it. Ah well… next time I will make sure to make my posts a bit more tounge-in-cheek, as those are lest likely to get me called a “dolt”, and other lovely phrases. ---
**Author:** ![Rysdad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/7cd45c/32.png) [@Rysdad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rysdad)\ **Post date:** [October 11, 2000, 12:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-to-choose-which-should-the-us-take-over-and-why/36378/31 "2000-10-11T00:36:08Z")
To hell with taking over Canada or Mexico. Let’s take over French Polynesia!! And then guarantee that all loyal Merkins are given at least one free week per year, full Merkin plan, until we ruin it and go looking for some other island paradise to overrun. The Galapagos, maybe? Serve tortoise burgers at new Mickey D’s. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [October 11, 2000, 1:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-to-choose-which-should-the-us-take-over-and-why/36378/32 "2000-10-11T01:30:06Z")
Most countries have plans to invade others, it’s the sort of thing that no matter how unlikely it seems, if you need it and don’t have it you are in a lot of trouble. So, I wonder what the US invasion plans for Canada and Mexico are? ---
**Author:** ![Gregor\_Samsa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a6a055/32.png) [@Gregor\_Samsa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gregor_Samsa)\ **Post date:** [October 11, 2000, 12:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-to-choose-which-should-the-us-take-over-and-why/36378/33 "2000-10-11T12:28:54Z")
Oh, you crazy Americans! If you’re going to get into a scrap, do it right. Take on **China.** Or, get into a land war with **the former Soviet Union.** ---
**Author:** ![system](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/original/2X/e/e489c3b7d8fce19c4b355dd4fc3f88cc39c34b87.png) [@system](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [October 11, 2000, 1:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-to-choose-which-should-the-us-take-over-and-why/36378/34 "2000-10-11T13:05:59Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Jman \* > \*\*We lost Vietnam because we never sent a concentrated force. If we’d attacked with the full military force we were capable of, we’d have destroyed N. Vietnam without question. As it was, they just kept sending just enough for the war to go on, but not enough to win…just kept siphoning our troops into death. Had we performed strategic assaults, air raids, etc, as in a full WAR, we’d have crushed them. Stupid politicians. > > Jman \*\* Perhaps it escapes the poster that winning required conquering Vietnam in a bloody, fruitless neo-colonial war. Could it have been “won” sure, but ever hear the phrase “pyrrhic victory” Losing by winning. Wouldn’t that just have won us, the USA, the accolades of the World? A bloody war of extermination against the nationalist-communist rebels?! My what would we have achieved politically, other than a grade school level satisfaction of never having gotten a bloody nose? Our friends were already condemning the war in Vietnam, stepping it up to “win” --and of course virtually wiping out N Vietnam-- would have given the Soviets a propaganda victory far more valuable than their allies’ What a victory, better to lose. But hey the chest beaters could claim victoy in their playground understanding of the world. We lost Vietnam becuase (1) we didn’t understand other countries also have nationalist feeling just like us (golly gee beaver!) (2) Simplistically equated communist influence with direct Soviet control (3) mistakenly equated support of a corrupt and abusive South Vietnamese regimes with somehow supporting democracy. Victory in Vietnam, in the sense of achieving the original policy goals which were to stop the spread of communism required (a) understanding the anti-colonial, nationalist element of North Vietnamese appeal to the South. Lots of folks didn’t like Communists too much but the Euros & Co. behind the southern government(s) looked like the hated French colonialists in more ways than one (b) understanding of how to appeal to the former (anti-colonial/nationalist) while supporting a southern regime. Note: Korea we had it easier cause the old colonialists were fellow Asians, the Japanese, so we came in without the baggage. In Vietnam everyone knew that we had funded the French colonial regime’s last struggle to hold onto power, in fact we paid for the French war almost in its entirety. I say, stupid macho nationalists who don’t understand anything. Smart politicians who knew a losing proposition when it came along. Pity stupid ones dug us in deep to begin with. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [October 11, 2000, 5:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-to-choose-which-should-the-us-take-over-and-why/36378/35 "2000-10-11T17:45:04Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by MysterEcks \* > **RickJay** said: > > > [@](#): > > > > As to Canada, har. I’m sure we would have put up some resistance but I sincerely doubt that Canada’s brave but very small armed forces could hold them off for a week. > > When I was in college, I knew this ex-US Marine. He told me once that if we ever tried invading Canada, we had better have a lot of body-bags on hand–he didn’t think you guys would go down very easily. I’m flattered, but he was wrong. We WOULD go down very easily. The Canadian army is entirely conventional, for the most part completely inexperienced in unconventional means of warfare, and its doctrine is entirely based on a standard combined-arms European-style conflict. I doubt its leaders would have the balls or brains to fall back and try geuerrilla tactics; my WAG is they’d stumble about, trying to defend key points while being subjected to incessant aerial attack, until finally surrendering in hopeless desperation. The fact that a very small army is spread out over such vast distances would only make it worse, as individual units could not coordinate. Occupying the country would totally suck and cost many lives, of course, but such is the price of the initial victory. ---
**Author:** ![betenoir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/258eb7/32.png) [@betenoir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/betenoir)\ **Post date:** [October 11, 2000, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-to-choose-which-should-the-us-take-over-and-why/36378/36 "2000-10-11T21:32:50Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Tristan \* > \*\* > It just strikes me as odd, that there are so many individuals that dislike the US, and Americans by default. However, when something happens that requires international aid such as a famine of natural disaster, we are one of the first on the scene. We even offer aid to countries that don’t like us a lot, but we do it. > > Ah well… next time I will make sure to make my posts a bit more tounge-in-cheek, as those are lest likely to get me called a “dolt”, and other lovely phrases. \*\* It strikes Americans as odd that so many people dislike us because we know we’re all lovable and well intentioned and only want the best for the world, but we don’t have to live under the results of our foriegn policy decisions (see Iran, Chile, the Congo, etc. etc. And note I am talking about the policy of the past 50-75 years. It may not be ancient history to them.) And maybe, just maybe, not all of those desicions were motivated entirerly by concern for the best interests of the country in question. Oh and we’re not always first in line with international aid. Sometime we even get in the way of other aid getting there(see Rawanda). But…um…I figures your OP was toungue in cheek and I don’t think your a dolt. Anyway: I say Canada. Just remember the lesson of Hitler and Napoleon: Never invade Canada in winter. ---
**Author:** ![Tretiak](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a88e57/32.png) [@Tretiak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tretiak)\ **Post date:** [October 11, 2000, 11:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-to-choose-which-should-the-us-take-over-and-why/36378/37 "2000-10-11T23:06:27Z")
How come I get the feeling that if we invaded Mexico first all the Canadians would complain about being shown so little respect. “What we’re not good enough to be invaded?” ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2000, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-to-choose-which-should-the-us-take-over-and-why/36378/38 "2000-10-12T01:20:20Z")
Okay, but if Canada wins, they get Maine. If the USA wins, Canada has to take all of New England. ---
**Author:** ![jabe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/db5fbb/32.png) [@jabe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jabe)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2000, 5:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-to-choose-which-should-the-us-take-over-and-why/36378/39 "2000-10-12T05:23:36Z")
I resent that New England crack. Lets give Canada the Virgin Islands. What good are they anyway? ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2000, 1:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-to-choose-which-should-the-us-take-over-and-why/36378/40 "2000-10-12T13:06:36Z")
I was misconstrued. Maine and the Virgin Islands??? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-to-choose-which-should-the-us-take-over-and-why/36378.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-had-to-choose-which-should-the-us-take-over-and-why/36378.md?page=3)