Any answer yet?
The American military doesn’t have to win to fuck up a place real good, and their poor win record doesn’t seem to deter them.
We got a chance to meet up for dinner a few weeks ago, but I forgot to ask. I did see someone in the restaurant wearing a maple leaf sweater and she didn’t stab them to death with her salad fork, though, so there’s that.
Did the two of you leave together, or did she “forget her cell phone in the ladies’ room, but I’ll see you later”?
That’s good to hear!
An invasion will be a catastrophe for both countries. No one would win.
In this asymmetrical war, would the ruin also be asymmetrical? To use a highly exaggerated scenario for illustration, the US could reduce Toronto to rubble quickly. Could Canada do anything like that kind of damage in retaliation? Scale this up or down as seems reasonable, but the issue remains.
During the Vietnam war, someone suggested the US would bomb North Vietnam back to the Stone Age. Someone quipped, “that will set them back a couple of weeks, tops.” There was some truth in that: much of the country did not depend on sophisticated infrastructure. That’s not true in Canada. In some ways we are much more vulnerable than Vietnam and Afghanistan, where blowing up a hut means two days’ work to rebuild it and return to farming. Does this affect how we might think of possible effects of a war between Canada and the US?
Yes. An insurgent force cannot create the devastation that a modern military can. Not even close.
To the degree the Canadian armed forces can immediately counterattack on US near-border cities and facilities, the destruction per square mile can be comparable. But the total square mileage affected will be much larger on the Canadian side and a much, much, larger percentage of all-Canada than all-USA.
A credible argument can be made that in the event of US attack, the Canadian Forces would do better to spend themselves attacking the US targets rather than trying to defend Canadian ones. Making that threat loud and long ahead of time might be the only thing to give the US public pause enough to stop the propaganda-fueled rush to war in the first place. Sort of the classic movie trope: “We’re know we’ll be overwhelmed by your larger gang, but we’re going to make it very bloody for you too on the way down. Which of you feels lucky enough to stand up front and take the first counter-blows? Well?”
Once the Canadian government has folded, then the insurgency becomes the only game for Canada. At which point @orcenio’s point stands.
Not in a conventional sense. The CF cannot project that at all. It really cannot be overstated how badly equipped our army is, and even to attack “close” targets requires movement in force that would be easily pummeled by American aircraft. No-to-few significant military targets could be reached and attacking civilian targets is morally repugnant and would cost us one of our biggest assets - the position of being in the right. Our air force will be destroyed more or less immediately. The conventional defense can only ensure maximum casualties are inflicted and that a government-in-exile can escape and set up shop elsewhere. The post-invasion insurgency is where Canada would fight back.
Are we back then to the “Surrender pronto or we’ll level Toronto” scenario?" Where a handful of maquis in the hastily organized East Kootenay Anti-Imperialist Brigade (as PM Pearson quipped) blows up a building in Fargo and Toronto gets pummelled?
What does this scenario of resistance actually look like look? Are we in some version of the Heydrich problem, where a few people decide to kill Heydrich and Nazi reprisals kill 1,200? I don’t know how to do this math.
Partisans should be focused on making the occupation as difficult and costly as possible and there’s a long history of resistance movements to draw inspiration from.
However, I would hope in Canada proper, the public masses will stick to non-violent resistance to keep the destruction minimal and reprisals low. The brash open strikes and attacks should be left to the professionals.
For these people I’m thinking akin to the Aux Units, that the British set up in preparation for the eventually invasion of UK by Hitler’s forces (Operation Sea Lion). They predicted that Churchill would be killed, and that the Nazis would reinstate the Duke of Windsor (who would need to be “dealt with”). Stuff like this.
Minot AFB is about 120 miles as the chopper flies from CFB Shilo, and offers some, uh, isolated and strategically sensitive targets.
"A spoonful of sugar helps the engine break down, the engine break down, the engine break down/A spoonful of sugar helps the engine break down, in a most delightful way!"
Potatoes…
Exhaust pipes…
I seem to recall reading about old ladies on staircases in the metro in occupied Paris, whose walking sticks mysteriously got entangled with German officers’ legs and somehow the officers fell down the stairs.
With an American invasion of Greenland suddenly looking ever more likely, I’m wondering if THAT would be the thing that would open people’s eyes about the risks here.
It doesn’t look any more likely than it did last week - I.e. not at all.
This argues that America has overplayed its hand (limited gift link, followed by normal link to same article).
Excerpt:
But President Trump seems to have overplayed his cards — big time. His decision, announced this weekend, to send a high-powered U.S. delegation to the island, apparently uninvited, is already backfiring. The administration tried to present it as a friendly trip, saying that Usha Vance, the wife of Vice President JD Vance, would attend a dogsled race this week with one of their sons and that Michael Waltz, the national security adviser, would tour an American military base. But instead of winning the hearts and minds of Greenland’s 56,000 people, the move, coupled with Mr. Trump’s recent statement that “one way or the other, we’re going to get it,” is pushing Greenland further away.
Over the past 24 hours, the Greenlandic government has dropped its posture of being shy and vague in the face of Mr. Trump’s pushiness. Instead, it blasted him as “aggressive” and asked Europe for backup. And the planned visit may only strengthen the bonds between Greenland — an ice-covered land three times the size of Texas — and Denmark. “This will clearly have the opposite effect of what the Americans want,” said Lars Trier Mogensen, a political analyst based in Copenhagen. “
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/24/world/europe/trump-greenland-us.html
That article seems to think that what the Greenlanders want will have any bearing on what the toddler tyrant will do. Hint: it won’t.
Bit of dark humor satire. But as I’ve said before - Canada’s best hope may be Trump Team’s incompetence.