posted
After a late night conversation I decided to write down our thoughts of that conversion between me and some friends. The conversation revolved around this central question: "Can Canada successfully resist a full scale invasion from the United States?"
First allow me to state that this is not propaganda inspired by anti American thoughts, nor is it intended to give a distorted view of the military situation, it is merely a thought excersize to go about a plausible plan of defence in case of American attack, to clarify, neither do I believe it plausible or likely that the United States would risk their stature in the world, and extend the considerable capitol it would take to attack, invade, and occupy not just a sovereign nation, but a long time neighbour and friend not just located "anywhere" but as said, to their very northern border.
However facts, are the facts, Canada has the second largest reservoir of fresh water in the world, and with the melting of the polar ice caps, Canada's frozen lands to the far north can be exploited for natural resources and facilitate sea travel through the north, lands that Russia and the United States have laid claim to, albeit dubiously. The possibility and plausibility unfortunately as it sounds is there that in the not so distant future, American politicians, think tanks, and their military-industrial complex will seek out justifications to rationalize a punitive military endeavor to secure Canada's resources, our infrastructure, and our living space for their own needs.
Should we accept this inevitability and give up and collapse at the first sign of trouble? Will we as Hitler said "come crashing down"? My answer to which I will explain in detail is a solid "No!" We will not surrender, we would not be defeated so easily as outside observers would think, we would survive such an invasion, not only that but we would successfully repel the hypothetical invaders.
To begin, let us not focus as to "why we would win" but rather more gloomily, why "we would likely lose." Canada possesses many things, among them are strategic obstacles. Firstly, Canada is really big. Size in a military sense is not fortunate in our case as by being a large country we also have the longest unprotected border in the world with, you guessed it, the Americans.
Secondly, our total military strength is barely 87,000, meaning that we would easily lose a war of attrition against an invasion force that could easily consist of upwards of 500,000 (see Op. Desert Storm) also regarding issue I, it would mean that any effort to defend our entire border would be without foreknowledge and time for preparations, futile and foolish. The best our meager sized military could do is evacuate the border area, which unfortunately consists of over half of out population.
Thirdly, not only is our ground forces hopelessly outnumbered our navies are horribly uneven, while there is no doubting our efficiency, our bravery, and our training and equipment we do not have the numbers to do the goals outlined for the Navy, 1) Defend our coast, 2) protect and escort our shipping, 3) interdict and blockade enemy ports and lines of shipping.
Fourthly, to my knowledge nearly all of our military equipment is imported, or built on a license, we have military productive capacity but no real military-industrial complex capable of engineering new designs to counter the current state of the art American equipment, I won't even mention the ability to counter next-generation equipment set to roll out of the production lines within a few years.
5thly, our national cohesion is unlikely, while I do not doubt the patriotism of many French-Canadians, I fear that there are still many who would jump at the chance to form an independent "Republic Du Quebec" even as a result of American bayonets.
Next, population. The United States have roughly 300,000,000 people or more, Canada has nearly 40,000,000. We would be outnumbered nearly 6 Americans to nearly every 1 Canadian. As much as our bravado would demand dismissing them as "an even fight" as our Sangheili friends would say it is most definately not an even fight, we would be so deep into this that we would not be able to see the light of day, but there is light, the light of hope. Let me explain.
While there is no doubt that we would as a nation, a people, a legacy face many challenges fighting a war for our very existence however there is hope, firstly our large size makes it possible to trade space for time, sophisticated mobile warmachines such as tanks, APC's, and jeeps make it possible to fight a war of maneuver to slowdown the enemy but still manage to retreat. There are still problems with this as it would be us reacting to the Americans and not them reacting to us, the Americans could, can and will attack in multiple places, and there is little encouragement knowing that their main thrust would undoubtedly be between Regina and Winnipeg aiming fr Lake Athabasca and the city of Churchill. Such a move would split Canada apart, and do so over the ground best suitable for amoured warfare, blitzkrieg tactics and would be the place best suited for total air suporiority.
We however have the advantage that we have the most tenacious of Generals the Americans could face, Brigadier General Winters. Deep snow would make American gas guzzling Abrams tanks ridiculously expensive to use and would cover little ground in large amounts of time, while our German designed Canadian variant Leopard tanks however are far more suited for the conditions of winter warfare.
The prairies are also good conditions for tunneling all year round, allowing for effective resistance just as the Vietnamese had done, with tunnels we can smuggle news, munitions and weapons behind enemy lines, ambush patrols and delay the American advance until winter where an invasions would undoubtably slow down.
Time people is what we would be fighting for, A) international assistance, most likely from Great Britain, our other NATO allies, and with some degree of plausibility Russia and China seeking to undercut American influence by keeping them mired in Canada unable to declare victory. The military objective should never lose sight of the political goal and vice versa. To fight a prolonged war of attrition as nation states is impossible, a geurrila resistance of a People's War variant utilizing mechanized forces is the only viable alternative should international assistance fail to materialize in time, so our military goals should be to:
I) Delay American advances, hinder supply lines, harass occupational forces.
II) Arm and equip and if possible train, Canadian citizens unlikely to evacuate the warzone in time, and will thus have to fight a geurilla war with limited information or assistance from the Ministry of Defence.
III) Stockpile munitions, supplies, and weapons in areas unlikely to be immediately or unlikely period to be found by American patrols and occupation forces to help support the resistance.
IV) Keep our fighting ability and core strength and organization intact, as much as possible at all times, our army as a military unit should not ever be destroyed or damaged beyond the ability to fight on an effective and coordinated defence of our homeland.
V) Encourage urban combat with American spear heads as much as possible, funneling actions encouraged, no modern military has ever entered and left an urban scenario unscathed, a Stalingrad, type battle in Montreal, Toronto, and Ottawa would tie up so many American resources and cost so many lives that it is believed in my opinion to delay American forces indefinitely.
While our navy and airforces can only do so much there is stuff they can do. Submarines can remain undetected for long periods of time, our ability to launch SLBMs (conventional not nuclear) would be crucial to disrupt American logistical operations. Our missile frigates could easily hide within our fjordes history has shown that even large ships like the Tirpitz can hide fairly easily and be relatively safe within them until needed.
Our shipping would almost be entirely be at the mercy of American blockade and we would have to rely on foreign merchant shipping to facilitate trade, actions however to encourage American interception and sinking of foreign shipping entering or leaving Canadian waters will be taken to help fasten foreign intervention on our behalf. Missile boats can be useful in a more tactical sense of bombarding American coastal positions and possible hit and run raids at docked American warships.
The mountains of British Columbia would also work to our advantage, American efforts there with even the smallest of detachments would be in vain unless accompanied by overwhelming force, mounternous terrain,especially with it forested, would give our experienced mountaineers excellent time and ability to fight a defencive war of maneuver, hit and run raids, ambushes, would be the word of the day.
Quebec and eastern Ontario being heavily populated and urbanized would be easy relatively to defend, fighting would be mostly house to house, and with ample population and an overabundance of small arms easy relatively speaking to arm a militia to supplement our regular forces and primary reservists. I would even go as far as predict that we would be able to easily hold the line roughly corresponding to the St Laurence river, the island of Montreal with a fierce fighting in the West island, going to Ottawa.
large tracts of land would be aside from the occasional helicopter or HUMVEE patrol unoccupied allowing us leeway for maneuever, and the moving of supplies. Armed resistence would be hard to catch and crush. The Americans with barely 250,000 fighting men and woman have not been able to effectively occupy Iraq with the dubious intention of liberation from a corrupt regime. Canada is a fully working parliamentary democracy, American invasion would be hated, and resisted by nearly all strata of society except collaborators and some french people.
With some over seven million guns lying around, and with the second largest nation in land area an effective resistence, both in a standard conventional sense and a People's War sense are both possible, Canadians are strong, hearty fighters known for our bravery and effectiveness in combat going back as far as the Boar War.
There are many things that can be done to mitigate and improve our odds, increased military funding, a rapid expansion of the armed forces, conscription and a new ship building program can all increase our nation's ability to defend itself from possible avenues of attack, whether it be from the North, the East, the West or the south.
posted
We want your living space in the not so distant future? Isn't the US the third largest country in the world? If China has living space for 1.3 billion and they are smaller than us, I think we can find the space for 300 million plus. If we take you over, we'll blow up your infrastructure in the fight to take you over. Resources you might have something, but we'd have to literally be devoid of resources, or the ability to reasonably purchase them for that to happen. We're more than 100 years from that I think, barring extreme unforseen circumstances. But hey, just for the fun of it...
It's doubtful that we'd use, or really need an Abrams for large parts of the invasion. Anti-tank missiles from the air and infantry would blow your Leopards to pieces, or for that matter, and more likely, Hellfire missiles from Apache Longbos and stealth UAVs. Likely, you'd never see it coming. Besides, once we capture your oil fields, we'll likely have the biggest thing that we want. We have all terrain weapons platforms that we can use to go after your people after that.
And I'm unconvinced that the rest of the world would help you in the way you think. If we're THAT desparate for resources, it's likely the entire world is, and if you won't give them up, it's likely the rest of the world will shut up for a piece of the pie. Besides, while we're doing that, China is invading Russia, where I honestly think more attention will fall on. They have nukes, both of them, you don't.
The Tirpitz didn't have to worry about an army of US satelites trying to find them. Your Navy would be destroyed in the first strike, including your subs. You don't have many of them, and the United States turned tracking enemy subs into an artform during the Cold War, and that was two generations of subs ago. Sorry but, we sunk your battleship.
If we were only going for your resources, I think it's possible we'd virtually ignore a lot of your main population centers. In return for not taking you over entirely, not killing your citizens, and you know, blowing you off the face of the Earth, you'd cough up some of your larger resources in the vastly unpopulated portions of your country. Tenacious as you are, and as good of fighters as you have been in the past, I don't think you'd lose half the population of your country to the United States in a war. Honestly I think you'd be more willing against a nation that doesn't mostly share your philosophies. Your world would change a lot more under Chinese or Saudi oppressors than American.
Your best hope is guerilla warfare (under which, the French Canadians would be your BEST hope, since they actually speak a second language that might befuddle some Americans), but you're hurt by the fact that as of now, Americans are probably the best at fighting Guerilla warfare in the world (well, not totally true, the Russians would mow you down, whereas we'd actually try to minimize your deaths).
Another part of your problem? You have to deal with a LOT more than just the 500,000 people officially in our army. You're literally footsteps away from some places, which means we don't have to pay prohibitive costs to ship troops to you, they can walk there. You'd face millions of people (I mean hey, in the hypothetical that we'd ACTUALLY attack you, we might as well go all out).
In other words, I think it's EXTREMELY unlikely that it would ever happen, but if it did, you'd get the crap kicked out of you, and we'd take your resources. On the bright side? Your courage is admirable, certainly; you'd give back serious fatalities to our side, if you wanted to, patches of resistance could probably hold out forever. There's nothing lacking in your will to exist freely, I just think circumstances are too strong to overcome. But kudos anyway.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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posted
I have to say that the guerilla option seems the only feasible one. As to winter fighting, everybody remembers the brilliant results invading during the Russian winter has produced, and we wouldn't attack then. Unlike the Russians, your population centers are close enough to the border that an unopposed force could control a large majority of your population within a few days. Even if resistance is stiff, 500,000 of the best trained and equipped soldiers in the world shouldn't have too much problem taking it in, say, one summer.
However, the Desert Storm/Iraq War model of arial strategic bombing worked too well to not use it again--within a week, it's likely that Toronto, Quebec, Ottowa, Winsdor, Winnipeg, Vancouver, and several other cities would find themselves without electricity, running water, and other nice western amenities which you, like us, have grown rather used to. I'm not aware that the Candian Air Force has power to even attempt to resist this (they don't, do they?)
But with the guerilla war...I don't know. If the change in lifestyle after the war is minimal (as it would probably be), would the canadian people seriously fight to the death a la French WW2 resistance? I don't know...
"There are many things that can be done to mitigate and improve our odds, increased military funding, a rapid expansion of the armed forces, conscription and a new ship building program can all increase our nation's ability to defend itself from possible avenues of attack, whether it be from the North, the East, the West or the south."
Who on earth is going to attack you from the north? The polar bears? (Or the east, for that matter. West is the same enemy as south.)
Posts: 9 | Registered: Feb 2007
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Summary: The US plan (War Plan Red) for attacking Canada was to subdue you quickly before your British allies came to your aid. Canada's plan ('Defense Scheme No. 1') involved a preemptive attack in the event of an American invasion. It's a good article.
So, something I've wondered: where would we draw a more natural, defensible border with Canada (rather than the 49th parallel)?
quote:Who on earth is going to attack you from the north?
Once the sea ice is gone? Russia.
I don't really see a more natural border than the one we mostly have. From Michigan to Maine there are natural waterways, but from Wisconsin over to Washington, I don't see anything. There're mountain rangers, but don't most of them go north to south rather than east to west? I don't know Canadian topography nearly as well, maybe Blayne could tell us.
I don't see the cold being a super huge factor. In the frigid far north we just wouldn't attack in the winter. Other than that, where much of the population centers are, it's not much colder than in the Northern US. We'll attack in the summer and starve you in the winter.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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posted
Wow, you've really spent alot of time thinking about this.
Let's see, in this age of modern warfare, a guerilla warfare would be extremely difficult due to satelites. Plus, the advantages of having air superiority almost immediately would neutralize most of your tanks.
If I were a Canadian general and determined to keep up the fight, what I would do is try to dig in and hide as much as possible. A network of tunnels would be amazingly helpful, however with current seizmic technology tunnels in the frozen tundra wouldn't be too hard to find. Mobility would be the key. Population centers could be effectively placed under seige by Americans, so fighting there would be difficult and nearly suicidal.
Posts: 208 | Registered: Sep 2007
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I was under the impression that we don't own any sub capable of staying submerged for more than 3 days. We don't have any nuclear-powered subs, do we? And our diesel subs are second-hand and falling apart (and have managed to kill at least one Canadian seaman while in transit from purchase in Britain).
Posts: 353 | Registered: Sep 2003
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quote: ...Other than that, where much of the population centers are, it's not much colder than in the Northern US...
Oh boy, you only wish. Edmonton, Winnipeg, Northern Quebec, and the entire Canadian East Coast (along with Newfoundland) get really, really cold. For a big chunk of the year. Not to mention the Athabasca Oilsands (Canada's big oil deposit) gets even colder (I should know, that's where I grew up.) I guess you wouldn't call them "population centers" though...
You're probably right about waiting us out, too. We can only survive for so long without American Media Posts: 353 | Registered: Sep 2003
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posted
Funny, I'm not sure how much longer the US can survive WITH American Media.
I said much, mostly in reference to Ontario and border cities, where many of your population centers are. Once we cut off your heat, water, and food shipments, frankly I have to wonder how much better you'd be at surviving than us in the more extreme cold. I wouldn't worry about Michiganders. A large percentage of us are hunters and woodsmen. Not so much the cityslickers (yeah yeah, I grew up in the burbs), but all of us are used to cold, and a lot of us are able to live without modern comforts. I know the stereotypes and jokes about Canadians, but how many do you really think, in northern cities, bigger cities, would be able to hunt and gather their own food, get clean water, and find warm shelter at night? I don't know the answer, but it's an honest question.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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posted
There's a really easy way for America to successfully occupy Canada: displacement of citizens.
It's not like Iraq where you're trying to build up the prior population and support it. Just move all of the prior inhabitants to camps and reservations. Pull some Trail of Tears stuff. And/or, if you're particularly looking to be nasty, just break the infrastructure and let noncompliants starve to death. Anything pops its head out, stamp it out.
Posts: 15421 | Registered: Aug 2005
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posted
If the premise is that Canada would be attacked for the sake of its freshwater supplies, the most obvious (if horrendous) retaliation is to poison the water supply.
That said, it's difficult (not impossible, but difficult) to imagine a geopolitical situation in which a U.S. invasion of Canada wouldn't be met by worldwide condemnation, and the United States is not now, nor likely in the near future, to be able to withstand the ramifications of the entire rest of the world's disapproval.
Posts: 3826 | Registered: May 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: Well following that vein of thought, nuking them would be easiest.
I'd assume it would be best to take it easy on the nukes, for the most part. Even displacement is optional if you can force the government into survival compliance with a modern version of Sherman's March to the Yukon.
But yes, it's a wacky hypothetical. Nukes all around!
Posts: 15421 | Registered: Aug 2005
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posted
Well I figured if we aren't going to try and be humane in our invasion, but instead a bit more like the Russians, then everything was on the table, otherwise, let's carpetbomb them and strafe down the stragglers with A-10 Warthogs and Apache Longbows.
Even in a crazy hypothetical, the US, barring some unforseen circumstance is going to try to minimize civilian (basically ALL) casualties. Come at us with a gun and you get clipped, but otherwise we're likely to be a humane invasion force. You know. Generally. Philosophically.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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posted
Why bother. Judging just from the number of SUV's, stoping at our stoplight on or about the Vernal and Autumnal equinox, with Alberta and Saskatewan licence plates it happened a long time ago. At least it did in the Great Basin.
Posts: 1167 | Registered: Oct 2005
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posted
I'd think that the initial stages of the war would go a lot like the "shock and awe" stage of the Iraq war. Within a week every bridge, power station, airport, or highway would be destroyed in the lower part of Canada (the part that matters).
The actual war is already largely won, with only anti-aircraft weapons inflicting any casualties on the American side. We're all watching the war on Foxnews on our high definition TVs, in our air-conditioned (or heated) apartments. Meanwhile, the Canadian populace has to cope without power, heat, or running water for their homes, and no gasoline for their cars.
Getting the Canadian government to surrender takes a month, tops. I see the Canadian people submitting not long after that, once we promise that when they do we will restore their infrastructure.
But... I don't see any reason that America would ever invade Canada. I think it much more likely that Canada and America peacefully merge, possibly with Mexico, to form a "North American Union".
Posts: 5656 | Registered: Oct 1999
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posted
Once we cut off your power, your internet, your source for your Daily Hatrack fix, you are doomed my friend, DOOOMMMMMMMMMMED!!!
Posts: 11895 | Registered: Apr 2002
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Blayne Bradley
unregistered
posted
never, there is significant Canadian political resistence to the idea of a merger.
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quote:never, there is significant Canadian political resistence to the idea of a merger.
Of course there is. That's why we aren't merged right now.
However, "never" is a long time. Think back to right before WWII, and consider telling them about the formation of the EU. They'd probably laugh in your face. That was about 70 years ago. Can you predict the politics in the world 70 years from now?
I'm not claiming that the merge will happen in the North America, just that I could see it happening in my lifetime. I think all it would take is a pressing reason to do so.
Posts: 5656 | Registered: Oct 1999
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posted
The monarchy would have to be abolished first, and the monarchy is actually fairly popular here. I certianly can't see Canada and the U.S. merging when we're all still subjects of the monarchy you guys rebelled against.
But at the state/provincial level, group trade agreements are already being worked out in the Pacific northwest, for example. I think a balkanization followed by Euro-style unification is more likely than a straight-up merger between the two countries as they are now. Added: The catalyst for balkanization would be Quebec's secession from Canada.
Posts: 10886 | Registered: Feb 2000
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posted
Nothing will facilitate talk of merging Canada with the US more then the EU getting more powerful and China absorbing it's neighbors.
Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
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quote:The monarchy would have to be abolished first, and the monarchy is actually fairly popular here. I certianly can't see Canada and the U.S. merging when we're all still subjects of the monarchy you guys rebelled against.
Ya'll are just jealous you didn't get in on the ground floor.
In all seriousness, in the near future I don't see merger as a realistic happening. But in the next hundred years? Some sort of closer union, maybe even some sort of shared government would be a possibility in a hundred years, a real one. We'd have a great deal for each other in benefits, and not many sacrifices.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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posted
I just finished a satirical novel called Jennifer Government in which Canada (and Australia, and the UK, and large parts of the rest of the world) had become U.S. territories not through war, but through changes in systems of business and trade.
Admittedly it was a satire and somewhat over-the-top, but it still seems in some ways more likely that a conventional military conflict.
(To quote the late Phil Hartman: "And don't forget the Canadians! NAFTA screws them, too!")
Posts: 3826 | Registered: May 2005
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posted
I see a US invasion of Canada playing out more like the Austrian anschluss in 1938. There are a lot of parallels between Canada/US relations and Austria/Germany relations and like Canadians, Austrians have a great deal of national, cultural pride. They resent being mistaken for Germans in much the same way that Canadians resent being mistaken for Americans.
If there were a significant external threat and economic upheaval combined with internal strife (think Quebec), many Canadians might see joining the US as their best chance for survival. Although many Canadians would naturally resist, if the US had an aggressive leader that also favored unification with Canada and the US, I'm confident "engineered" elections and a little help from the CIA would be enough to facilitate a rapid nearly bloodless invasion.
Posts: 12591 | Registered: Jan 2000
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quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: Ya'll are just jealous you didn't get in on the ground floor.
Nah, we think you guys were too hasty. What with the lynch mobs, expulsion, confiscation of goods, and unfair taxation of loyalists (what was that about no taxation without representation?), and bloody revolution. You folks down south are just in too much of a hurry for our tastes. Posts: 2849 | Registered: Feb 2002
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1. A division of a city or town, especially an electoral district, for administrative and representative purposes. Could fit. 2. A district of some English and Scottish counties corresponding roughly to the hundred or the wapentake. As much as I love the word "wapentake", this one doesn't really fit. 3. 1. A room in a hospital usually holding six or more patients.Sure, I could buy this one. 2. A division in a hospital for the care of a particular group of patients: a maternity ward.Ditto. 4. One of the divisions of a penal institution, such as a prison. A prison on the border? Okay. 5. An open court or area of a castle or fortification enclosed by walls. Perhaps the coolest definition for an 8 year old to fantasize about. 6. 1. Law. A minor or incompetent person placed under the care or protection of a guardian or court. Dual-citzenship, perhaps? 2. A person under the protection or care of another. Ditto. 7. The state of being under guard; custody. Doesn't fit, since Jonboy used it as a noun. 8. The act of guarding or protecting; guardianship.Again, noun. 9. A means of protection; a defense.Could fit. 10. A defensive movement or attitude, especially in fencing; a guard. Bit of a stretch. 11. 1. The projecting ridge of a lock or keyhole that prevents the turning of a key other than the proper one.Nope. 2. The notch cut into a key that corresponds to such a ridge.Nope.
It's amazing that almost half of those definitions could be massaged into making sense in Jonboy's statement.
Edit: dammit Jonboy! Suppose I should just delete this now. Probably only amusing to me anyway.
Posts: 5656 | Registered: Oct 1999
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quote:Originally posted by Xavier: 7. The state of being under guard; custody. Doesn't fit, since Jonboy used it as a noun. 8. The act of guarding or protecting; guardianship.Again, noun.
How, exactly, do those not fit because I used "ward" as a noun? Especially considering that you're looking at a bunch of definitions for the noun "ward"?
Posts: 9945 | Registered: Sep 2002
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