Best Friend We Ever Had

[Zinjanthropos]

Aw. Donnie ….shucks …. We forgot USA has been Canada’s Friend long time, I guess.

Not so much for revolutionaries invading us in 1775 and US regulars doing same from 1812-14 or being a little late getting into WWI & II but WTF is this 1930 plan? Still on the books?

Can we expect US aircraft carriers in Saskatchewan?

https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/war...da-britain

[C C]

Aw.  Donnie ….shucks …. We forgot USA has been Canada’s Friend long time, I guess.

Not so much for revolutionaries invading us in 1775 and US regulars doing same from 1812-14 or being a little late getting into WWI & II but WTF is this 1930 plan? Still on the books?

Can we expect US aircraft carriers in Saskatchewan?

https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/war...da-britain

How the U.S. planned to annex Canada if victorious in a larger war with Britain
https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/war...da-britain

EXCERPTS: In the plan Canada’s hue is crimson and America’s is blue. [...] the plan, first developed in 1925, updated in 1935 and declassified in 1974.

[...] Initially, the strategy wasn’t developed with annexation in mind but with a “the best defence is a good offence” mentality that would result in incursions and short-term occupations until the larger conflict with the British was resolved, one way or another.

The 1935 update, however, declared that the U.S. would hold any gained territory in Canada “in perpetuity.” [...] If the U.S. lost, they assumed Canada would ask for “Alaska be awarded to her” in return for all the hassle.

Thankfully, Canada remains a sovereign nation, but if the Americans did decide to go to war against Britain, here’s how they envisioned it playing out.

Even though they’d been allies toward the end of the First World War, the relationship between the U.S. and Britain remained frosty in the intervening years — due in no small part to the latter’s massive war debt to America.

Further compounding matters was the British Royal Navy had become the superpower of the sea while American shipbuilding was “in a very depressed state” and years from being revived.

If a war were to break out, the probable cause was assumed to be related to one or both countries interfering with the other’s principal foreign trade relationships or routes. And because of both nations’ “proved tenacity” in the theatre of war, the planners “concluded that such a war will be one of prolonged duration.”

Planners also assumed Canada would side with King George V and viewed the nation’s neutrality at the outset of any conflict as “always a matter of doubt.”

[...] Contrary to international conventions, the U.S. authorized “the use of chemical warfare, including the use of toxic agents, from the inception of hostilities.”

[...] In his scholarly study of War Plan Red, University of Hull historian John Major said it was placed in low priority in May 1936 — because a growing threat in Japan, or Orange in colour parlance, was taking precedence. “The following October it was officially declared obsolete by the Chief of Staff, with the directive that no action be taken towards its revision or replacement.”

A scant eight years later, all three nations were allies in fighting Germany and its spreading fascism...

Even the American engineering of globalization after WWII was still the US pursuing its own self-interested agenda behind the more subtle cover of altruism. Using its Navy to protect shipping lanes for everybody else in order to make massive international commerce possible, and militarily providing defense to allies, and role-playing as "world policeman" -- was for the purpose of securing support from most of the world during the Cold War, and reaping investment in the dollar. 

So Trump isn't really anything new -- his administration is just an atavistic return to those that existed in the days before the "virtue-pretense" or "white hat facade" era of American capitalism. Back when the US was more openly blatant about acquiring goods, resources, and territory for itself via whatever necessary measures.

Despite the end of the Cold War in the early 1990s leading to increased globalization, it also commenced the gradual erosion of US commitments in that context. The size of the Navy has been significantly decreased, for instance. The original ulterior motive and purpose for globalization was gone, and maintaining safe shipping lanes and bearing military burdens for others was now benefitting the economic rivals of the US, rather than the US itself. 

Thus breeding fertile ground for Trump's thought orientation, as even back in the 1980s he never seemed to get what the point of globalization was [for the US]. Complaining in interviews about the US spending its money to keep the lanes free for competitors. Today his view happens to align with an altered situation, and it's a return to the tactics of the old ever-expanding or "imperialist" America, before the aftermath of the second world war.

The former was traditionally the "normal", and the post-WWII turn was the temporary aberration. Though admittedly, exploiting do-gooderism is the deceptive and clever approach that garners a better public image worldwide, in contrast to the honesty or upfront nature of the other.

Peter Zeihan: So the Americans came to a conclusion when they were facing down Stalin in the middle of Europe [...] the solution was to bribe everybody to use our Navy to patrol the global oceans so that any one of our allies could go anywhere at any time and interact with any other player, access any material, and especially access the American market, which was really the only one to survive the war. The catch was you had to let the Americans write your security policies.

And so never forget that from the very beginning, the very concept of globalization for the United States was never about economics or trade. It was about security. We pay you to be on our side. And that worked. And after 40, 45 years, the Cold War ended because the Soviet system could not compete, because the Americans not only held the security upper hand, but it created this alliance of economies that were massively larger. [...] We’re no longer in a world where the U.S. economy is as large as everybody else put together.

Based on how you do the math, the rest of the world combined is three or four times the size of the United States. So doing indirect economic subsidization, as the U.S. had for 45 years, became less and less tenable over the next 30. And we’re now in an environment where some of these countries, China, for the most part, are so overextended and so dependent on globalization that the only way they can survive is as the United States increases support, not decreases.

[...] The idea of globalization is no longer benefiting the United States because we’ve never viewed it the same way as everyone else. ... When politics shifts, those factional alliances don’t make sense anymore. And so they have to evolve. ... And if you look at what has happened so far, none of it supports globalization.

So, for example, unions have largely fallen out of the Democratic coalition. The Trump coalition was fairly successful at drawing them out. They are very anti-free trade...

[...] And we are now entering a world where the people who traditionally have done most of the consuming people, 45 and under the folks who are having kids and buying homes and cars, they just don’t exist in the necessary numbers to sustain the system...

[...] So we no longer have the security parameters to make this [globalization] work because the Americans aren’t interested. We no longer have the economic basis to make this work because we don’t have enough young people to consume. ... that is more than enough time to kill any remnants of the globalized system. --Deglobalization: There’s No Stopping It Now

[Yazata]

Don't worry Z-man, it's just an historical curiosity today, like your own corresponding Canadian plan to invade the United States.

Trump isn't going to send aircraft carriers to Saskatchewan (!!! ). He has floated the idea of the US and Canada joining, which would be a great idea in a lot of ways. It would create a country with the land area of Russia, with extraordinary natural resources etc. (And the world's best ice hockey players!) It would be joined by a common language and very similar culture (Quebec excepted).

But yeah, we are aware that Canadians have a subtle but strong nationalism and love for their own identity. There's no suggestion of absorbing them against their will, by force. So I think there's really about zero chance of the two countries joining. Canadians wouldn't vote for it, and I'm not sure Americans would either. (Do we really want all those Canadians voting in our elections?)

Here's what the evil Canadians once were planning:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defence_Scheme_No._1

"Defence Scheme No. 1 was a war plan created by Canadian Director of Military Operations and Intelligence Lieutenant Colonel James "Buster" Sutherland Brown, for a Canadian pre-emptive attack against the United States in the (hypothetical) case of a conflict between the United States and the British Empire...

The purpose of invading the US was to allow time for Canada to prepare its war effort and to receive aid from Britain. According to the plan, Canadian flying columns stationed in Pacific Command in western Canada would immediately be sent to seize Seattle, Spokane, and Portland. Troops stationed in Prairie Command would attack Fargo and Great Falls, then advance towards Minneapolis. Troops from Quebec would be sent to seize Albany in a surprise counterattack while troops from the Maritime Provinces would invade Maine. When resistance grew, the Canadian soldiers would retreat to their own borders, destroying bridges and railways to delay US military pursuit...

Despite Berton's description of the plan and its creator as "quixotic", Berton notes the plan had its supporters, such as General George Pearkes, who remarked that Defence Scheme No. 1 was a "fantastic desperate plan [which] just might have worked."

Christopher M. Bell, however, criticized the plan as "suicidal". Since Brown did not coordinate with the British, he did not know that the British military had no plans to send a large army to Canada on the grounds of not being able to defend its territory against the much larger United States...

In 1928, Defence Scheme No. 1 was terminated by Chief of the General Staff Andrew McNaughton, who sought peaceful US–British relations. Many of the documents relating to the scheme were accordingly destroyed."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defence_Scheme_No._2

[Zinjanthropos]

Comforting knowing our best friend would lob chemical weapons at us. Maritimers vs Maine would have been glorious. Seattle would be no problem.

We’d fight, eventually lose and sue for war reparations.

Fear thy neighbour. No wonder people packing in US, we’re right next door.

[Syne]

The only thing funnier than Canadians rattling sabers would be the French... but there is some overlap in Quebec.

[C C]

Don't worry Z-man, it's just an historical curiosity today, like your own corresponding Canadian plan to invade the United States. [...] Here's what the evil Canadians once were planning:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defence_Scheme_No._1

"Defence Scheme No. 1 was a war plan created by Canadian Director of Military Operations and Intelligence Lieutenant Colonel James "Buster" Sutherland Brown, for a Canadian pre-emptive attack against the United States in the (hypothetical) case of a conflict between the United States and the British Empire...

The purpose of invading the US was to allow time for Canada to prepare its war effort and to receive aid from Britain...

Basically, both Canada and the US were preparing for something that was unnecessary, since Great Britain intended to throw Canada under the bus if the Brits did have a war with the US. There was no British scheme in effect for even using Canada as a base for an invasion. If Canada reflexively declared war on America via just being an ally of GB, it would be left entirely on its own by the Motherland.

British strategy for war against the United States
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_Plan_R...ted_States

The British military never prepared a formal plan for war with the United States during the first half of the 20th century. [...] The British military generally believed that if war did occur, they could transport troops to Canada if asked, but nonetheless saw it as impossible to defend Canada against the much larger United States, so did not plan to render aid, as Canada's loss would not be fatal to Britain.

[Zinjanthropos]

The only thing funnier than Canadians rattling sabers would be the French... but there is some overlap in Quebec.

With France’s backing, French in Quebec would probably form an alliance with US. Considering the overall war successes of the French in the last few centuries, the US might say thanks but no thanks. We would gladly give you a bunch of conscientious objectors anyways.

[Zinjanthropos]

AI…

The phenomenon of seeing people as alphabet letters is called Ordinal-Linguistic Personification (OLP) or personification in short. This is a form of synesthesia where ordered sequences, like letters, numbers, and days of the week, are associated with personalities or genders.