In this you are absolutely correct, however, had we taken our national defence sufficiently seriously (which we haven’t in at least the last forty years) we certainly could have had a military (including a serious presence up north) that would have imposed some cost on an invader. That we can’t do at all.
Our situation was so bad, IMO, that by the end of the ‘90s, I would not have been surprised had the fed gov’t disbanded the CF. I also believe that 9/11 and our subsequent involvement in Afghanistan, actually saved us.
It’s not simply a question of not being armed enough; it covers a vast realm of crap including procurement cock-ups (deployment of destroyers to the Gulf War with no close-in air defence capability, to the extent that ships’ companies were trained to go to “CIWS-stations” (or something of that nature) with C-7 rifles; the EH-101 cancellation; the VICTORIA class submarine acquisition debacle (we had a young Lt(N) die during an onboard fire in one of those boats); sending ground troops to Afghanistan in woodland camouflage (dark green against brown); sending troops to Afghanistan with Iltis vehicles (essentially going to war with green VW Things); relatively new (at the time) vehicles that have to be left running all day in winter (I’ve seen this and had it explained to me by the users) otherwise they can’t be started; the criminal trial of Adm Mark Norman (a former shipmate of mine btw) because the fed govt had concocted a conspiracy theory associate with one of our shipyards and an associated MP; the start of Nanisivik and so on). Every one of these things could have been accomplished with some level of efficiency, but we have consistently sabotaged ourselves.
Yes, most of what has been said upthread is accurate, but it is disgusting and appalling that we continually screw ourselves.
Realistically, Canada defending against the US means nukes or guerilla war. The difference in size and economic power combined with Canada’s lack of defensive depth means that realistically, a conventional military defense just can’t work.
If we’re talking “should have beens”, what Canada should have done is developed nuclear weapons before Trump took office. Now it’s too late; trying would be enough to instigate the conquest.
As with all empires, it would come to making a sustained occupation too costly to continue. The US can project power halfway across the globe, but cannot justify sustained military occupation of an unwilling population for more then a couple of years.
As for the American people, they don’t care when their country wages economical war against Canada, Trump supporters largely don’t care that their own American cities are undergoing military occupation, so why would they react if Trump waged a military occupation of a foreign country.
Americans have been swallowed by Trump’s fascism. I bet they won’t even reject Trump’s insanity in the upcoming midterms.
It is fairly common before a war that pundits are sure which side will win, and are wrong.
Canada would be united, the U.S. badly divided.
What would the U.S. be trying to do? When I first thought about this, I thought the U.S. focus would be Ottawa. But given that this would likely be an extension of a Greenland campaign, I now think the goal would be the Northwest Passage.
Who has more icebreakers? Canada, I think. And much of the U.S. arctic capability would be hung up in Greenland.
Trump doesn’t give a shit about costs, man. A fascist invader isn’t worried about that, and a stable, democratic USA wouldn’t invade. And who cares what’s up NORTH? The USA’s coming from the south.
Yes, we have neglected the CF, but let’s not pretend that affects our ability to defend ourselves from a fascist USA. That requires one of two things; nukes or insurgency.
Sorry. Quite impossible. Any government that tried doing that would have been out of office in three days.
Sorry to interrupt people’s Red Dawn fantasies, but now it comes to light that Carney was shown the ad weeks prior to it being shown at the world series.
And didn’t stop it then.
He isn’t interested in a deal. He is interested in people talking about the US invading Canada because that keeps his base riled up enough to not question his lack of progress in other areas and years of prior misrule.
And likely colluding with Ford. Ford wants his billions of subsidies for battery plants, etc, that a federal conservative government isn’t likely to support.
So as soon as Carney puts out the Ford fire, he’s going to have one on the west coast to deal with. But so it goes with Trump, who might get mad about this or might not. Or might get mad about literally anything else Canada does. There’s no avoiding pissing him off, he gets mad because he wants to be mad, not because we’ve actually done something that hurts him.
Trump outlined it all in his post. The executive is granted powers to tariff during emergencies …like when baby hates a TV ad. Makes perfect sense in US-lala-land.
Keep the lines open and talk (if only to keep talking as this is a virtue), but don’t expect anything but a continued dive deeper and deeper into chaos and malice from the crazies down south. Nothing means anything there now. It’ll only get worse and worse, until the Americans, themselves, want to pull the plug.
I have yet to see this happening. Trump’s supporters DON’T CARE about anything. They have NO BOTTOM nor values.
Really? Carney saw the ad and agreed with it. Why are you talking like he couldn’t stop it when apparently he didn’t try?
Frankly, the concern should be on why he didn’t try.
Trump is a symptom. He can only treat Canada like this because we haven’t become the economic powerhouse we could be.
We chose to be weak and lock in our resources relying on the good will of the US to trade with us. What counter do we have? Stop the precious metals moving south? No. We don’t mine them although we could. Worth trillions and countless jobs.
They can’t threaten us if the foundation of our economy is strong. Why isn’t it?