Donald Trump is not joking about making Canada the 51st state, Justin Trudeau warns in hot mic comments
Donald Trump is not joking about making Canada the 51st state, Justin Trudeau warns in hot mic comments
Donald Trump has securing Canada’s resource wealth on his mind, and “one of the easiest ways of doing that is absorbing our country. And it is a real thing.”
Summary
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, in a private meeting inadvertently broadcast via a hot mic, warned that Donald Trump is seriously considering annexing Canada to secure its critical mineral resources.
Speaking to business and labor leaders, Trudeau claimed Trump’s administration is keenly aware of Canada’s resource wealth and sees annexation as a means to control it.
The comments, cut off after staff realized they were audible, underscore growing economic and political tensions.
He also stressed the need to diversify trade, noting, “Geography means we’re always going to both benefit and be challenged by trade with the United States.”
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We should join the EU, fast
I fucking wish man. I have wanted to live in Iceland for my entire adult life and I finally could. I know they aren't EU but they are Schengen before someone says "well actualyl"
That's not enough. They should immediately negotiate an agreement with Britain and France to have British and French nuclear weapons stationed on Canadian soil. Have them there long enough until Canada can acquire their own domestic arsenal.
Canada needs the bomb. It sounds insane, but I am not joking. That is the obvious lesson of the Ukraine war. Canada is already an advanced near-nuclear state. They could have a domestic arsenal within a year or two if they wanted. And borrowing a few nukes from London or Paris in the meantime would provide cover to allow that.
And I say this as an American. I know Canadians may be loathe at the idea of a Canadian nuclear arsenal. But be realistic. It is the only way for Canada to ever be able to credibly deter a direct threat from the US. We can no longer be trusted.
Canada needs the bomb.
Yes, absolutely, you are an American. Nobody needs a damn atomic bomb. Not even the USA in WWII. If Trump tries to take Canada by force, it's the end for him. The enemies of the USA will find all the wholes they need in USA's northern and southern borders. For the first time in a long time, war would be fought in USA territory, and everyone would know who caused it.
The fact that that your comment even makes a bit of sense is so completely fucked. Of course I don't speak for everybody but I think it's fair to say that most Canadians do not want to be a nuclear power. We do not want to hurt or threaten anyone, particularly our American brothers? When Pearl Harbour was attacked we declared war on Japan before America did ffs.. shit is fucked up down there
When Pearl Harbour was attacked we declared war on Japan before America did
Must be nice having allies like that. Those are the kind of friends you should hold on to and not inflict ridiculous tariffs on or anything like that.
Unfortunately, this is not about what Canada wants. This is about what Canada needs. I do not want Canada to have to build a nuclear arsenal either. Realize, I am advocating for the construction of nuclear weapons that will be pointed at my own head. THAT is fucked up. I do not make this recommendation lightly.
Reality check. 90% of the Canadian population lives within 150 miles of the US border. An M1 Abrams tank can drive that distance in an afternoon. The Canadian military is woefully unprepared to resist such an advance. The Canadian military is not designed to resist the might of the US. It's designed to provide some valuable but niche roles as part of the NATO alliance. And this is not some failure to plan on the part of my Canadian brothers. Frankly, Canada was never going to be able to develop such a capability. Canada has approximately 12% of the population of the US, and a vast territory to defend. Even if Canada become as militaristic as North Korea, Canada simply does not have the resources to develop the capability to militarily resist the US using conventional arms.
Do you think an alliance will save you? NATO membership means nothing in this context. When an outside country invades a NATO member, they can activate Article 5. However, nothing happens automatically. The NATO members then must convene to formulate a response, and any single member can veto the resolution. Greece and Turkey, both NATO members, have fought several armed conflicts while both being NATO members. NATO will not be coming to save you.
The Commonwealth? Could you dust that thing off and appeal to King Charles for aid? I'm sure he'll send his dearest sympathies, but the redcoats will not be coming to save you this time. Compare the stats of the US Navy to the Royal Navy and let me know how that would go. I'm sure the Royal Navy's 160 aircraft will be a formidable match for the US Navy's 2600. We could also look at other military branches. But the disparities would be similar, and the forces of King Charles would have no way to get to Canadian soil. I'm sorry to say, but 1812 was a very long time ago. The forces of King Charles would struggle to resist, with conventional arms, a US invasion of the UK mainland. Realistically, if the UK wanted to offer any meaningful assistance to Canada, it would have to come in the form of thermonuclear weaponry.
What about the EU? Could Canada join the EU? Would that save you? First, it takes years to join the EU. But even if you could waive a magic wand and join tomorrow? The EU does have the population and economy to potentially stand up to the US. But they don't have the defense sector necessary. There is no vast EU expeditionary army that is going to sail across the Atlantic and go to-to-toe against the US Army and Marines. There is no formidable EU Navy that's going to serve as a credible threat to the Americans. In time, the EU could build that capability. But we're talking, extremely optimistically, a decade to spin up that magnitude of a military industrial complex. US army soldiers will be fishing on the northern coast of Nunavut before the EU parliament even passes the budget appropriations.
Could Canadian irregulars resist the advance? Canada is not some war-torn country in the Middle East that has had insurgent fighting going on for decades. There isn't some vast network of Canadian insurgent groups with the skills and resources to build improvised explosives and knowledgeable of insurgent tactics. There aren't thousands of guerilla fighters that might credibly slow down a US invasion. How many suicide bombings has Canada had in the last year? Canada is not Iraq or Syria. I have no doubt that a fierce resistance movement would eventually develop after a US invasion. But irregulars would not be able to actually prevent such an invasion.
If Canada wants to actually deter a US invasion, they need to consider a domestic nuclear arsenal now. They should have considered it the moment Trump started talking about annexation. Canada should negotiate with Britain or France to have British or French weapons stationed on Canadian soil. And that would provide a meaningful deterrent while Canada develops their own arsenal.
Now, the French or UK arsenals cannot come close to matching that of the US. Combined they have 500 warheads, while the US has 5,000. But nuclear weapons are the great equalizer of international politics. Even 50 nuclear warheads on Canadian soil would successfully deter any potential US invasion. It would mean that whatever the US might hope to gain from invading Canada would be dwarfed by what the US would lose in the conflict.
Sorry for the long response. But TLDR, Canada is hopelessly outmatched against the US in conventional military forces, and there is no realistic way its allies will be able to defend it using conventional weapons. A nuclear arsenal is the only way for Canada to ensure its survival as a nation against a US gone mad. And I write this as an American.
So basically, strategically, Canada should get the bomb and become allies with China, since it's the only country that can match the US military
An M1 Abrams tank can drive that distance in an afternoon.
Just one thing...
No, it can't. Took us 16 days to drive a squadron of them from Kuwait to Baghdad. Most of the time they spent on flatbed tractor trucks, because of the a) fuel consumption per mile (Like 15 gallons per mile or so) and b) maintenance. Those things throw tracks bad on asphalt. But, they slow down a lot on dirt.
OK, I just looked up the top speed and divided by the distance, but there may be logistics issues that make that impossible. But really, 2 weeks or an afternoon? It makes little difference.
Might help to remember he is at war with everyone who isn't far right, even citizens. Canada is seen as a country of liberals. Your conservative party could fit in with some of the democrats that he calls far left lunatics.
He is open to doing things like denying disaster relief to blue states for not voting for him and sending in the military to force them into enforcing hate.
With him there is no moral standard or relationship that matters besides if he can personally profit off of you. If he knows he can do anything to you and there is nothing you can do about it he will exploit that. It's not about ties between countries but ties between your country and him personally.
His support is a little less than a third of the country. The majority of Americans still look at Canadians as close friends.
Countries don't have brothers, they have interests.
Certainly true for the US.
And domestic politics - moreso than interests, even. Kissinger and the "realists" were kind of full of shit because of that.
When Pearl Harbour was attacked we declared war on Japan before America did ffs… shit is fucked up down there
I had not heard that.
At the point in history their government was working at least as well as ours (for good or evil), so I don't know what conclusion to draw.
I'm not an expert in WWII but by that point Canada had been at war in Europe for a few years already, and America was trying to stay out of it. I guess it took a day or two for the sleeping giant to wake up, or something to that effect
Oh, you mean we were already in WWII, not that we specifically responded to Pearl Harbour.
No, after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, Canada and Britain declared war on Japan before the US did.
Interestingly, though the United States suffered the most casualties and damage from Japan’s multiple attacks on December 7 (December 8 in Japan and east Asia), the American government wasn’t the first to declare war on the Japanese Empire. Even before President Roosevelt convinced Congress to approve a declaration of war, both Britain and Canada had declared war on the Imperial nation on December 7, 1941.
Oh, you do mean that. TIL, wow.
Wikipedia makes it sound like they basically just decided to do it really fast to make a point. I suppose already being in a state of total war also helps.
Fun fact: we used to have a secret one the Americans gave us.
We could probably whip one up in a month or so. We have all the technology and manufacturing capabilities required. And if CSIS doesn't have some blueprints squirreled away somewhere, I'm going to be surprised and disappointed.
If we're talking nukes and their ultimate results, we could just make our reactors go Chernobyl if they invade.
Ironically, with our reactors, it's actually easier to make weapons materials than it is to make them go boom. It's one of the reasons why we never sell them to non-nuclear nations.
You should watch Perun's "All bling, no basics". Maintaining a nuclear arsenal is expensive.
You're assuming Canadians will be immediately granted American citizenship and representation. Most likely, Canada would become a US territory like Guam or Puerto Rico, and kept that way for at least a generation.
I really don't think you can not give 41 million people the vote. Even trump when he says 51 state implies that it's a merger, to use that word.
Why not? Denying 41 million a right to vote is a minor crime compared to forcefully conquering a peaceful neighbor that had been your closest neighbor. You're talking about a conflict that would easily kill 10% of the Canadian population, and likely level every major Canadian city, by the time the resistance efforts were finally stomped out.
He's saying they would make a 51st state eventually. The US's client state, Israel, denies the right to vote to nearly half of the population of the areas it controls. And we're their greatest ally. Why can't we deny the right to vote to 10% of the people in the territory we control? (Canada's population would represent about 10% of the combined US-Canadian territory's population.) Hell, we already disenfranchise millions due to felonies. And we disenfranchise millions through voter purges. And it was only in the 1960s that we stopped outright legally disenfranchising people due to skin color. You're seriously trying to argue that a fascist government would have moral qualms about disenfranchising large numbers of people!
The US could quite easily even go far as to say, "all Canadian citizens in the occupied territories are resident aliens and will not have the right to citizenship. Their kids will have citizenship, but no one who has ever held Canadian citizenship will get US voting rights." Every Canadian currently alive simply never gets to vote.
This is entirely possible. A right wing authoritarian government is not stupid. They're not going to immediately grant voting rights to people that will immediately vote them out of office. The only way they would do that is if they were confident that elections were so utterly corrupted that giving Canadian's American citizenship wouldn't change the outcome.
Since you seem to be taking this seriously, the only way to do this without becoming THE international pariah on the likes of North Korea is to do it peacefully.
If there is an invasion that comes to blows, the US will become person non grata on the international stage. Everyone will boycott everything from the US and to do with US. This is where you say but but but iraq, and that's where I say that was different. If the US invades an ally, its finished internationally. I know it's all rah rah USA number 1 but you need international support/trade/commerce/cooperation. It's not that people care that much about Canada, it's that no one will ever want to do or find the need to do business with the US again when there is no trust. They would have just showed that there is no such thing as cooperation with the US. It will be down to Russia and NK (and China will sell things, but China basically thinks they are above having friends/allies). So it you think a right wing authoritarian government is not stupid, they wouldn't do it, except "peacefully".
They would try.
I'd consider supporting it, if there was a serious public discussion on the matter.
The one argument against it - besides the lame "that's violent" or "we couldn't actually need one" - is that saving this one nation isn't worth the increased risk of a nuclear exchange.
saving this one nation isn't worth the increased risk of a nuclear exchange.
If a nuclear exchange happens anywhere, I imagine every country on the planet is going to be affected by it, so you might as well protect yourself.
Risk as in risk of it happening, not risk if it does happen.
Nuclear proliferation is what we're talking about, and the basic idea is that if you have n nuclear powers, that's O(n2) potential conflicts that could start at any moment.
I don't think you have time for "serious public discussion on the matter".
Once all the 2025 assholes are in place it's go time.
Hmm... I'm actually not sure if the government could do this without passing a bill. If they have to pass a bill, you bet there will be public discussion during the debate period, and probably before as well.
The the government of the day could just do it, I guess it's not impossible, although they'd have to be a Doug Ford-level blowhard.
I feel it would kinda be a :
wink wink nudge nudge
Holy shit! 3 UK and 2 French nukes just appeared in our arsenal! Would you look at that!! They even have the keys and everything!! Guess we didn't even know we had them this entire time! What were you saying now, you orange colored sack of shit?
You must be smoking some good shit.
The US did not allow nukes in Cuba in the 60s. We very nearly had a nuclear war over it. You think the US will roll over and allow a second tier power like France to do it now?
The difference here is that we're not in a cold war with Canada or France.
Russia was a peer adversary and we had a very intelligent and calm president at the time.
Today France can’t project power into Africa without the US providing logistical support and our President is nuttier than a fruitcake and is itching to let the military off the chain with any pretext to annex Canada.
Dream on.
I cannot stress enough how bad of an idea it would be to allow nuclear proliferation at this point
Nuclear proliferation is always bad. I don't give a damn about the second cold war.
No one said it was good. I said you're too late. The proliferation is happening regardless.
I used to be like you, but then I learned to stop worrying and love the bomb
Gentlemen, you can't fight in here! This is the war room!
If i were Taiwan or Iran or Ukraine it would be my top priority.
I cannot agree with you more, and i'm very sad to see so much upvotes in favor of nuclear intensification Bombs do not protect from bombs, guns do not protect from guns
That's a nice and noble idealism, but what evidence do you have for it? Ukraine gave up its nuclear weapons, and look how that turned out for them. There is a reason Zelensky has been pushing so hard for NATO membership. It's easy to idealistically reject nuclear weapons when you're a nation that is comfortably protected by the nuclear umbrella of a friendly allied superpower. It's easy to tut-tut, scoff, and say "bombs do not protect from bombs." But I have yet to see a nuclear-armed nation ever face an existential threat of invasion from a hostile outside power. Despite how much you might claim they are useless, nuclear-armed countries sure do tend not to get invaded. Notice how Trump routinely talks about invading Iran, but no one talks about toppling the North Korean regime anymore? Or why haven't the Western powers come riding to Ukraine's aid like they did Poland in World War Two? Despite your idealism, as a practical matter, it is not possible to invade and annex a nation that has a nuclear arsenal.
Nuclear weapons, despite how distasteful they are, are the international relations equivalent of "high fences make good neighbors." Canada has been protected by a nuclear arsenal for generations. But they've had the luxury until now of pretending they aren't.
Canada needs the bomb.
Youre talking about countries. I do not care abouy contries. Bombs do not protect people, guns do not protect people.
Killing peoples with guns in third world country to avoid killing with bombs in eu/na is not a win. Getting bombs or guns just temporarily deflects the violence on someone else. The day everyone has bombs, wars wont stop.
You cannot want a safe world for people and want bombs at the same time. It is only viable if you think abouy nations instead of people, but who cares?
Bombs do not protect from bombs
So, why are we letting Russia run roughshod over Europe?
guns do not protect from guns
Dead nazis agree.
Weren't around for the Cold War?
War is just another game
Tailor made for the insane
But make a threat of their annihilation
And nobody wants to play
If that's the only thing that keeps the peace
[Chorus]
Then thank God for the bomb
You're in NATO, if the USA betrays NATO and attacks NATO, they will presumably trigger the famous Article 5 and be at war with all of NATO.
Besides that, you're also in the Commonwealth, and as such I expect the UK and her allies to come to your aid. Our government is spineless shite these days, but I expect we won't shirk our most solemn of obligations.
Either way, if the fascist US invades Canada, it'll be all out war between the US and all of NATO. Won't end well for anybody, but it definitely won't end with the US annexing Canada.
Might end with the Western world being an atomic crater (including the USA) with nations like Russia and China picking over our corpses to establish a new world order, but won't end with Canada being annexed.
The US government would have to be suicidal to do this. Utterly suicidal, to the point of actually being traitors to their own nation.
if the USA betrays NATO and attacks NATO, they will presumably trigger the famous Article 5 and be at war with all of NATO.
If the US used military force (unlikely), they'd just do what the Russians did in 2014. They'd little green men in who were obviously American soldiers, but where there was (barely) plausible deniability.
No sane country wants to actually go to war with the US, so that would give the NATO allies the excuse they needed not to declare war on the US. They'd just lament the tragic incident, and demand an investigation into who these soldiers actually were, and then it would all be over.
Most likely, the next thing to happen would be negotiations with the US like the negotiations with Germany after the Anchluss, with European leaders playing the role of Neville Chamberlain, attempting to appease Trump.
Utterly suicidal, to the point of actually being traitors to their own nation.
Well boy do I have news for you
American here: yep. NATO is going to become effectively useless in short order, and it’ll be all our fault. Save yourselves; hopefully we can get our shit together at some point, but I’m not counting on it tbh.
there's a reason France maintains a second, non-NATO, arsenal. there's also a reason Poland is buying what France is selling
Um it's still NATO. It's just under their command.
there’s also a reason Poland is buying what France is selling
Oooh. What's the story there? Like literally buying equipment, or just suggesting some kind of new defence pact (that Canada should definitely join).
no longer trust their sources for USA licensed designs so drawing on the NATO compliant, but not NATO standard, French weapons. France has maintained those since the founding of NATO because they side eye us in all things. a behavior i bet they're feeling pretty good about right now
France has maintained those since the founding of NATO because they side eye us in all things
Historically, the US shat on France every time we got the chance. Started about 2 years after they financed our revolution.
we're the worst friends to have
Oh cool. Sweden also has some stuff.
We make armoured troop carriers... and that's it AFAIK.
My question is: when push comes to shove, what are you gonna do if Trump declares war on Canada?
another American here: i'm gonna do my best to be a hindrance to my government. i fundamentally disagree with wars of expansionism
I'll oppose my own government then. With force, if required.
We'll just rebrand as United Earth and welcome you with open arms.
We have a land border with denmark and a martime border with france.
The head of our government is a a European king.
Hans Island and Saint-Pierre and Miquelon, respectively, for anyone head-scratching on this one.
Well, by that account... There's a bridge linking France and Brazil.
Hans Island isn't a colony.
St. Pierre and Miquelon has more direct ties to the French government.
Guyana is not a colony, it's an overseas department, part of France as the Normandie or whatever, just happens to be across the Atlantic. They quite recently voted against more autonomy.
Please do. Like, yesterday.
