How Canada Gets Invaded
Everything has changed
If you tend to catastrophize like me, you’ve been rapidly going crazy listening to people assure you that “Canada will NEVER get invaded by the US”. Because you have grasped the most fundamental truth of Trump 2.0, everything has changed. Everything.
We can’t trust America anymore. She convulsed in anger, voted against her own interests, and elected a burgeoning fascist dictator. Her leaders have been doing horrible things to the weakest among them and still the world waits for her better angels to arise. America’s leaders are openly talking about annexing Canada and invading our allies, and treating Ukraine horribly. And the silence - acquiescence even - from the halls of power is nearly deafening.
This isn’t to belittle the outcry from individual Americans. We hear you, and we thank you. It is to point out that the Rubicon has been crossed and I doubt the people can arrest the momentum of their government.
So, how does Canada get invaded? Here's a scenario for you.
The White House uses propaganda to build a permission structure: Canada is a failed state. Mexican cartels are running massive drug labs in Canada - “no really, I saw it in the situation room!”1. Canada is letting fentanyl pour across our border. The Canadian government is illegitimate and we need control of that artificial border for our security. Canada is stealing our jobs. The U.S. has been subsidizing Canada’s existence for hundreds of years… and on it goes.
Next a few words get leaked here or there on Truth Social, from the White House, or maybe from the christian media. It's time to invade. Take back our country. The risk is too great to let Canada be a rogue state. Or my personal favorite, some christian “prophet” has a vision about a great menacing evil from the north2. This message builds in certain fringe circles on social media.
Then some of America's well armed idiot militias decide to take matters into their own hands. “America must be protected! Those bastards can’t be allowed to do this!” Canadians die in a terrorist incursion. The Canadian armed forces (CAF) defeat the terrorists. Some American militia folk die and the rest are detained pending due process under Canadian and international law3.
Thus far, the scenario I have described mimics precisely what happened leading up to and after Jan 6th, 2021. And it somewhat mimics what happened leading up to the 2nd Iraq war. Can one seriously believe that the White House would not use such tactics to foment an international crisis with Canada? A crisis that would quickly escalate into a "justified" invasion because Canadians attacked and killed “peace loving American patriots”. We have watched America convulse into war for far less.
America didn't enter a war during Trump 1.0 because there were still adults in the room. Trump 2.0 is asking the US military to draw up options for how it might exert control over the Panama canal - a military whose leadership is transforming into partisan hacks before our eyes. Trump is no lover of peace.
Even if the American people would oppose such an invasion, where are the brakes right now?
Canada, let's stop having failures of imagination. This shit is as real as the threat of nuclear holocaust during the cold war. Wake up!
Tara
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WMD’s anyone? Iraq got invaded off of that obvious lie. Maybe we’ll call this the Drugs of Mass Destruction (DMD) lie.
Don’t laugh. “Prophets” were a huge component of whipping up the Jan. 6th crowd.
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2024/01/january-6-insurrection-mike-johnson-evangelical-christian-apostolic-reformation.html
https://theconversation.com/how-self-proclaimed-prophets-from-a-growing-christian-movement-provided-religious-motivation-for-the-jan-6-events-at-the-us-capitol-152879
They would count as international terrorists after all.
Not to play down the megalomania of Trump and co., but the military task of invading and conquering Canada seems impossible. I'm no expert, but consider the length of that border, the wealth and military preparedness of Canada, the predictable determination and unity of its population, the way the entire West would support it and condemn the US. It looks as if Trump will continue to mess with Canada, inflicting economic harm, but I suspect an invasion would be the end not of Canada but of the Trump administration.
We can’t know all of what form it may take in advance, but the parts of this that ring most true, are the propaganda, self justification and use of militias. We can be sure that Trump will announce in advance his intentions. Most likely saying something like, “we may have to go up there and straighten them out!”. The point of this being to get the American people to believe the following action is not really an invasion. Militia would certainly be used to create friction at the border and for more self justification for later action. The military component of the invasion would be limited at least at first. Probably a quick rush across the border to capture the Ottawa airport. We saw the Russians attempt something very similar when they started their invasion of Ukraine and it was the defeat of those airborne troops that gave the Ukrainians their first big lift and convinced the allies to send more weapons and ammo. In an invasion attempt on Canada. Trump would be looking to get the Canadian government to resign and accept some quisling who would set up a fake plebiscite to rubber stamp annexation that would follow later. That, I think, would be the general outlines of their plan, to avoid the major population centers and concentrate on leveraging a quick thrust to Ottawa into a negotiated capitulation. That would be their plan but they would be as wrong as Putin was in his attempt on Ukraine.
They would fail and their frozen corpses would litter the snow every mile north of the border!