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The US invading Canada isn't a realistic possibility. Any attempt to do so would trigger a civil war within the US, to say nothing of obliterating the geopoliti

by jjk166 1y ago

The US invading Canada isn't a realistic possibility. Any attempt to do so would trigger a civil war within the US, to say nothing of obliterating the geopolitical system. Attempting to annex in any way shape or form is currently nothing more than the musings of an old man, the only way any territorial changes could happen are through peaceful, mutually agreed upon transfer. If the US were to seriously entertain the notion of invading its neighbor, 300,000 poorly trained reservists aren't going to seriously change the calculus. Canada is strong per capita but it has a fraction of the absolute population, military strength, and economy of the US. Nearly all of its major population centers are within extremely close proximity with the US border. It's military and economy are both heavily intertwined with the US, regardless of what rhetoric is being thrown around. A reserve force is for freeing up the active military to be used most effectively, defending key chokepoints, launching offensives, and operating complicated equipment, with the reservists doing things like preparing defensive lines, manning low risk areas, and supporting logistics. In a war between the US and Canada, the US would be able to launch large assaults with professional soldiers in multiple places with no natural obstacles over the short distance between their origin and objectives. There would be little for reservists to do to help - there would be no low risk areas to man, no defenses to prepare, very little in the ways of logistics to be concerned with. If Canada had serious concerns about the US invading, its money would be better spent on disentangling its armed forces from the US, acquiring counters to US systems, and establishing defensible positions between its border and major population centers.

silisili 1y ago
> Any attempt to do so would trigger a civil war within the US What makes you say that? I could see heavy protests, even violent protests, as it's not something Americans want. I'm not sure I could envision any semblance of an actual civil war, though, but perhaps I'm underestimating things.
- carlosjobim 1y ago
  > What makes you say that? Because the group of men fit to fight such a war would rather rebel against the government than fight a brother war. From lowest recruit to highest general.
  - nemomarx 1y ago
    how are they handling being deployed to US cities right now? I think they could be swayed into it with the right rhetoric.
    - kulahan 1y ago
      The US military being deployed is doing things like cleaning up trash, guarding federal buildings, and otherwise goofing off. There's zero indication they'd be easily swayed. Reserve Generals have directly stated they will defend the state, not follow the Presidents orders.
  - jszymborski 1y ago
    Much as is the case in the US and Canada, families and friends transcend the borders of Ukraine and Russia. That wasn't enough to stop the Russian invasion of Ukraine. While Americans enjoy much, much broader freedoms of expression (albeit that's also under great threat), I wouldn't imagine the reaction from our American "brothers" would be much different from Russian when it invaded its "brother". Your use of "brother" is apt. There's a Ukrainian joke that goes something like: "A Ukrainian man and a Russian man are walking together. They happen upon a $20 bill on the sidewalk. The Russian man says, 'Let us share it as brothers'. The Ukranian man says 'No, let us share it equally'".
    - carlosjobim 1y ago
      I guess we'll find out when it happens (or not happens). The only realistic scenario I can think of when your American "brothers" would go to war across the border is if the Canadian government commences war against its own population. Then I could see the US government intervening, or US fighters independent from the government taking sides in Canada.
      - I-M-S 1y ago
        And where do you think the idea the Canadian government is waging war against its own population will come from? The problem is that most people think of these scenarios as something that happens overnight, when in reality consent is manufactured over time. There's a reason you don't microwave a frog.
- Teever 1y ago
  If the United States tries to seize Canada they will do so after a protracted blockade in winter that coincides with air strikes on Canadian infrastructure. A lot of Canadians talk big talk about some sort of insurgency like Iraq, Afghanistan or Vietnam but all those places have borders with other countries that can enable smuggling of supplies to the resistance. Canada will be blockaded and after a period of cold and hunger the Canadian people will give up.
  - aceofspades19 1y ago
    How are you going to blockade an almost 9000 km long border(with a huge variety of terrain) and a 243,000 km long coastline? The US can't even stop drugs and people coming through the 3,145 km border with Mexico. This argument also presumes that no Americans would smuggle supplies to Canada which seems unlikely to me because lots of Americans & Canadians are either related or friends.
  - testing22321 1y ago
    Keep in mind the Canadians burnt down the Whitehouse. Twice. Then simply marched back home and said “stop being so stupid.”
    - ipcress_file 1y ago
      Not quite. Late in the war, the British Navy landed British troops who burned the White House. About 85% of all Canadian militiamen remained at home when called up in 1812. In 1812 and 1813, British regulars and Indigenous warriors (from both the U.S. and Canada) invaded Michigan and Ohio, but didn't get any further than that before the U.S. counter-attacked.
  - badc0ffee 1y ago
    Canada makes more than enough food to feed itself, and has the infrastructure and fuel to move it around. It also produces all the energy it needs domestically for heating. A trade blockade would have massive effects, but I'm not sure cold and hunger are the top of the list.
vharuck 1y ago
>The US invading Canada isn't a realistic possibility. Any attempt to do so would trigger a civil war within the US If you had told me this last year, but replaced "invading Canada" with "sending armed military forces into cities under false emergency declarations", I would've also agreed. But here we are. Which state wants to be the first to defect and pit it's national guard (half of whom would probably desert) against the US military? >If Canada had serious concerns about the US invading... It's best course of action would be the same as any individual preparing for a doomsday scenario: make friends with those around you. If the US invades or even just encroaches on Canada, I wonder if every European country would realize they're next. Canada can't beat the US alone, but it's allies could make it an extremely painful and unpopular war for the American public.
dragonwriter 1y ago
> The US invading Canada isn't a realistic possibility. Any attempt to do so would trigger a civil war within the US Ok, maybe, but then: > In a war between the US and Canada, the US would be able to launch large assaults with professional soldiers in multiple places with no natural obstacles over the short distance between their origin and objectives. Given your earlier claim, surely you must believe that if they defied your wisdom and chose this course of action, they wouldn't be able to do this because they would have to devote a substantial fraction of their military capacity to domestic counterinsurgency efforts, leaving far more limited combat power to actually execute the invasion?
- jjk166 1y ago
  > Given your earlier claim, surely you must believe that if they defied your wisdom and chose this course of action, they wouldn't be able to do this because they would have to devote a substantial fraction of their military capacity to domestic counterinsurgency efforts, leaving far more limited combat power to actually execute the invasion? That does not follow. First, my scenario for how an invasion of canada would go down fundamentally assumes that the conditions preventing an invasion of canada from happening don't exist. The world where Canada must defend itself from a US invasion is a magical, fictional world where the US has managed to launch an invasion. Further, successfully invading Canada would not require the full force of the US military, and it is not established that the resources needed for the invasion of Canada would even be the same as those required for fighting domestically, nonetheless that the resources would be required concurrently. The men and materiel necessary for disabling the Canadian armed forces and seizing key territory would in general be useless in a domestic counter-insurgency scenario, and vice versa. The problem with civil war is not its drain on your military resources, it's that the campaign to regain control over the rebelling regions requires you to inflict destruction on your own people. A victory is inherently pyrrhic, and if you aren't careful you may breed sympathy for the rebellion in even more regions. The US should avoid civil war because it's catastrophically bad, not because it would interfere with the canadian invasion effort.
JumpCrisscross 1y ago
> The US invading Canada isn't a realistic possibility Of course it is. Troops would just be moved to “temporarily” occupy shit we want. (Or move to liberate Alberta.) Hell, you could probably do it with ICE agents. > Any attempt to do so would trigger a civil war within the US You’d take up arms against the U.S. because it invaded Canada? Of course you wouldn’t. Neither would others. It would be brushed way as an another atrocity. > 300,000 poorly trained reservists aren't going to seriously change the calculus It’s people you have to shoot through. Hong Kong versus Ukraine. Raises the costs from a low-effort political gambit to a real military campaign. This comment reminds of one on HN from Kharkiv on the eve of the invasion. If you assume something can’t happen or cannot be opposed, that’s indistinguishable from an invitation for an autocrat.
- jjk166 1y ago
  > You’d take up arms against the U.S. because it invaded Canada? In a heartbeat. I oppose violence in general, but if forced to choose between fighting an innocent Canadian and fighting someone who has betrayed America's ideals and turned the nation I love into a mockery of itself, it's a very easy choice. Anyone willing to brush such an unjustified invasion away as another atrocity is an enemy of the US. > Of course it is. Troops would just be moved to “temporarily” occupy shit we want. (Or move to liberate Alberta.) Hell, you could probably do it with ICE agents. That's not a realistic possibility. > It’s people you have to shoot through. Hong Kong versus Ukraine. Raises the costs from a low-effort political gambit to a real military campaign. Canada has a real military of nearly 100,000. They are highly skilled and well equipped with modern weaponry. If you don't consider fighting them to be a real military campaign, shooting through 300,000 desk clerks who don't even have uniforms isn't going to make it one. > This comment reminds of one on HN from Kharkiv on the eve of the invasion. If you assume something can’t happen or cannot be opposed, that’s indistinguishable from an invitation for an autocrat. I am not saying it can't happen, indeed I gave a long explanation of how it could; I am saying it won't happen. I'm not saying it can't be opposed, I'm saying this is a bad way to oppose it, and gave my recommendation for how it ought to be opposed.
  - JumpCrisscross 1y ago
dboreham 1y ago
Yes but presumably other NATO members would counterattack, e.g. the UK has Trident missiles capable of significantly degrading the US. Modulo any kill switch those might contain.
- jjk166 1y ago
  Presumably they would do so anyways without Canada adding 300,000 reservists.
skissane 1y ago
> Attempting to annex in any way shape or form is currently nothing more than the musings of an old man, the only way any territorial changes could happen are through peaceful, mutually agreed upon transfer. A possible scenario: Alberta votes for independence, and then applies to join the US - similar trajectory to how Texas went from Mexico to the US via independence, albeit likely much more peacefully Is this actually going to happen? Probably not. But personally I think it is more likely than all the other farfetched scenarios some people here seem to be taking seriously
- k12sosse 1y ago
  Rumours of an Albertan independence have been greatly exaggerated. There's astroturfed big oil preying on grade 10 dropouts on Facebook, And the rest is American CIA bullshit like they've been doing down south for decades.
  - skissane 1y ago
    Speculation (watching this from the other side of the planet): Danielle Smith doesn’t actually want an independent Alberta; she wants the threat of one to use to extract concessions from Ottawa I think ideal outcome for her would be for independence to be narrowly defeated-that way she doesn’t have to deal with the headache of trying to actually implement independence, but the narrower the defeat the easier it is to use it to pressure Ottawa to come to the table
theoldgreybeard 1y ago
[dead]
testing22321 1y ago
A external war that triggers a civil war would be a great way to cancel elections now wouldn’t it.
- jjk166 1y ago
  If you are in a civil war and a war with a foreign power at the same time, you're already suffering the worst possible consequences of cancelling elections.
  - testing22321 1y ago
    Not when holding onto power is the goal. Force and more force.
    - k12sosse 1y ago
      Hold onto power? The cult of personality is one foot in the grave from natural causes. Canada has longer winters.
      - testing22321 1y ago
        JD and plenty of others will just move in and hold on for as long as they can

by jjk166 1y ago

silisili 1y ago

> Any attempt to do so would trigger a civil war within the US What makes you say that? I could see heavy protests, even violent protests, as it's not something Americans want. I'm not sure I could envision any semblance of an actual civil war, though, but perhaps I'm underestimating things.

carlosjobim 1y ago
> What makes you say that? Because the group of men fit to fight such a war would rather rebel against the government than fight a brother war. From lowest recruit to highest general.
- nemomarx 1y ago
  how are they handling being deployed to US cities right now? I think they could be swayed into it with the right rhetoric.
  - kulahan 1y ago
    The US military being deployed is doing things like cleaning up trash, guarding federal buildings, and otherwise goofing off. There's zero indication they'd be easily swayed. Reserve Generals have directly stated they will defend the state, not follow the Presidents orders.
- jszymborski 1y ago
  Much as is the case in the US and Canada, families and friends transcend the borders of Ukraine and Russia. That wasn't enough to stop the Russian invasion of Ukraine. While Americans enjoy much, much broader freedoms of expression (albeit that's also under great threat), I wouldn't imagine the reaction from our American "brothers" would be much different from Russian when it invaded its "brother". Your use of "brother" is apt. There's a Ukrainian joke that goes something like: "A Ukrainian man and a Russian man are walking together. They happen upon a $20 bill on the sidewalk. The Russian man says, 'Let us share it as brothers'. The Ukranian man says 'No, let us share it equally'".
  - carlosjobim 1y ago
    I guess we'll find out when it happens (or not happens). The only realistic scenario I can think of when your American "brothers" would go to war across the border is if the Canadian government commences war against its own population. Then I could see the US government intervening, or US fighters independent from the government taking sides in Canada.
    - I-M-S 1y ago
      And where do you think the idea the Canadian government is waging war against its own population will come from? The problem is that most people think of these scenarios as something that happens overnight, when in reality consent is manufactured over time. There's a reason you don't microwave a frog.
Teever 1y ago
If the United States tries to seize Canada they will do so after a protracted blockade in winter that coincides with air strikes on Canadian infrastructure. A lot of Canadians talk big talk about some sort of insurgency like Iraq, Afghanistan or Vietnam but all those places have borders with other countries that can enable smuggling of supplies to the resistance. Canada will be blockaded and after a period of cold and hunger the Canadian people will give up.
- aceofspades19 1y ago
  How are you going to blockade an almost 9000 km long border(with a huge variety of terrain) and a 243,000 km long coastline? The US can't even stop drugs and people coming through the 3,145 km border with Mexico. This argument also presumes that no Americans would smuggle supplies to Canada which seems unlikely to me because lots of Americans & Canadians are either related or friends.
- testing22321 1y ago
  Keep in mind the Canadians burnt down the Whitehouse. Twice. Then simply marched back home and said “stop being so stupid.”
  - ipcress_file 1y ago
    Not quite. Late in the war, the British Navy landed British troops who burned the White House. About 85% of all Canadian militiamen remained at home when called up in 1812. In 1812 and 1813, British regulars and Indigenous warriors (from both the U.S. and Canada) invaded Michigan and Ohio, but didn't get any further than that before the U.S. counter-attacked.
- badc0ffee 1y ago
  Canada makes more than enough food to feed itself, and has the infrastructure and fuel to move it around. It also produces all the energy it needs domestically for heating. A trade blockade would have massive effects, but I'm not sure cold and hunger are the top of the list.

vharuck 1y ago

>The US invading Canada isn't a realistic possibility. Any attempt to do so would trigger a civil war within the US If you had told me this last year, but replaced "invading Canada" with "sending armed military forces into cities under false emergency declarations", I would've also agreed. But here we are. Which state wants to be the first to defect and pit it's national guard (half of whom would probably desert) against the US military? >If Canada had serious concerns about the US invading... It's best course of action would be the same as any individual preparing for a doomsday scenario: make friends with those around you. If the US invades or even just encroaches on Canada, I wonder if every European country would realize they're next. Canada can't beat the US alone, but it's allies could make it an extremely painful and unpopular war for the American public.

dragonwriter 1y ago

> The US invading Canada isn't a realistic possibility. Any attempt to do so would trigger a civil war within the US Ok, maybe, but then: > In a war between the US and Canada, the US would be able to launch large assaults with professional soldiers in multiple places with no natural obstacles over the short distance between their origin and objectives. Given your earlier claim, surely you must believe that if they defied your wisdom and chose this course of action, they wouldn't be able to do this because they would have to devote a substantial fraction of their military capacity to domestic counterinsurgency efforts, leaving far more limited combat power to actually execute the invasion?

jjk166 1y ago
> Given your earlier claim, surely you must believe that if they defied your wisdom and chose this course of action, they wouldn't be able to do this because they would have to devote a substantial fraction of their military capacity to domestic counterinsurgency efforts, leaving far more limited combat power to actually execute the invasion? That does not follow. First, my scenario for how an invasion of canada would go down fundamentally assumes that the conditions preventing an invasion of canada from happening don't exist. The world where Canada must defend itself from a US invasion is a magical, fictional world where the US has managed to launch an invasion. Further, successfully invading Canada would not require the full force of the US military, and it is not established that the resources needed for the invasion of Canada would even be the same as those required for fighting domestically, nonetheless that the resources would be required concurrently. The men and materiel necessary for disabling the Canadian armed forces and seizing key territory would in general be useless in a domestic counter-insurgency scenario, and vice versa. The problem with civil war is not its drain on your military resources, it's that the campaign to regain control over the rebelling regions requires you to inflict destruction on your own people. A victory is inherently pyrrhic, and if you aren't careful you may breed sympathy for the rebellion in even more regions. The US should avoid civil war because it's catastrophically bad, not because it would interfere with the canadian invasion effort.

JumpCrisscross 1y ago

> The US invading Canada isn't a realistic possibility Of course it is. Troops would just be moved to “temporarily” occupy shit we want. (Or move to liberate Alberta.) Hell, you could probably do it with ICE agents. > Any attempt to do so would trigger a civil war within the US You’d take up arms against the U.S. because it invaded Canada? Of course you wouldn’t. Neither would others. It would be brushed way as an another atrocity. > 300,000 poorly trained reservists aren't going to seriously change the calculus It’s people you have to shoot through. Hong Kong versus Ukraine. Raises the costs from a low-effort political gambit to a real military campaign. This comment reminds of one on HN from Kharkiv on the eve of the invasion. If you assume something can’t happen or cannot be opposed, that’s indistinguishable from an invitation for an autocrat.

jjk166 1y ago
> You’d take up arms against the U.S. because it invaded Canada? In a heartbeat. I oppose violence in general, but if forced to choose between fighting an innocent Canadian and fighting someone who has betrayed America's ideals and turned the nation I love into a mockery of itself, it's a very easy choice. Anyone willing to brush such an unjustified invasion away as another atrocity is an enemy of the US. > Of course it is. Troops would just be moved to “temporarily” occupy shit we want. (Or move to liberate Alberta.) Hell, you could probably do it with ICE agents. That's not a realistic possibility. > It’s people you have to shoot through. Hong Kong versus Ukraine. Raises the costs from a low-effort political gambit to a real military campaign. Canada has a real military of nearly 100,000. They are highly skilled and well equipped with modern weaponry. If you don't consider fighting them to be a real military campaign, shooting through 300,000 desk clerks who don't even have uniforms isn't going to make it one. > This comment reminds of one on HN from Kharkiv on the eve of the invasion. If you assume something can’t happen or cannot be opposed, that’s indistinguishable from an invitation for an autocrat. I am not saying it can't happen, indeed I gave a long explanation of how it could; I am saying it won't happen. I'm not saying it can't be opposed, I'm saying this is a bad way to oppose it, and gave my recommendation for how it ought to be opposed.
- JumpCrisscross 1y ago

dboreham 1y ago

Yes but presumably other NATO members would counterattack, e.g. the UK has Trident missiles capable of significantly degrading the US. Modulo any kill switch those might contain.

jjk166 1y ago
Presumably they would do so anyways without Canada adding 300,000 reservists.

skissane 1y ago

> Attempting to annex in any way shape or form is currently nothing more than the musings of an old man, the only way any territorial changes could happen are through peaceful, mutually agreed upon transfer. A possible scenario: Alberta votes for independence, and then applies to join the US - similar trajectory to how Texas went from Mexico to the US via independence, albeit likely much more peacefully Is this actually going to happen? Probably not. But personally I think it is more likely than all the other farfetched scenarios some people here seem to be taking seriously

k12sosse 1y ago
Rumours of an Albertan independence have been greatly exaggerated. There's astroturfed big oil preying on grade 10 dropouts on Facebook, And the rest is American CIA bullshit like they've been doing down south for decades.
- skissane 1y ago
  Speculation (watching this from the other side of the planet): Danielle Smith doesn’t actually want an independent Alberta; she wants the threat of one to use to extract concessions from Ottawa I think ideal outcome for her would be for independence to be narrowly defeated-that way she doesn’t have to deal with the headache of trying to actually implement independence, but the narrower the defeat the easier it is to use it to pressure Ottawa to come to the table

theoldgreybeard 1y ago

[dead]

testing22321 1y ago

A external war that triggers a civil war would be a great way to cancel elections now wouldn’t it.

jjk166 1y ago
If you are in a civil war and a war with a foreign power at the same time, you're already suffering the worst possible consequences of cancelling elections.
- testing22321 1y ago
  Not when holding onto power is the goal. Force and more force.
  - k12sosse 1y ago
    Hold onto power? The cult of personality is one foot in the grave from natural causes. Canada has longer winters.
    - testing22321 1y ago
      JD and plenty of others will just move in and hold on for as long as they can