No stupid question… it seems Trump is ready to invade (military) Panama and Greenland (red white blueland), so even if with Canada he always talk about economic war and annexing Canada blablabla…
What would happen if USA invades Canada? What would be the reaction of the Canada King (Charles III is the king of Canada)? The Commonwealth? NATO?
Domestic insurgency at home. Guerilla warfare in Canada.
America loses another war. We haven’t won one in 70+ years. Should be used to it.
Yeah, if our stupid country tries to invade an ally, I’m going to start utilizing the CIA Simple Sabotage Field Manual, and invite everyone to do the same.
Was meant to be used against the Nazis, but if we’re invading allies then we’re the Nazis.
I really struggle to see a unilateral mobilization and that the US military truly goes through with it.
Especially when foreign assets are getting absolutely left stranded by Trump, programs are getting gutted (he hasn’t touched the VA, yet) and everyone who helped after 9/11 were getting shafted by their government in terms of Healthcare.
If you take away the rather potent motivators of “national security and safety or preventing terrorism” I think you’re gonna get a lot more of a strike from soldiers. Unless you can somehow believably apply that to canada.
It would be a shit storm of unimaginable proportions. The US would be attacking another NATO nation and Canada would almost certainly invoke Article 5. Those not assisting militarily would probably sanction the shit out of the US and many of their previous treaties, pacts, and agreements would be withdrawn.
Recent polling in the US has shown that US citizens are greatly opposed to the ongoing trade war with Canada and would be even more opposed to further conflict. The executive branch ordering an attack on a historic ally and neighbour would cause catastrophic rift in the US military chain of command and I’d imagine many would disobey orders. States along the Canada/US border would likely be fiercely opposed to having their states turned into battlegrounds and would resist legally in whatever way they could.
Canada does not have the military for a large prolonged conflict, especially from our closest ally. An actual war would probably be quite shortlived, but it would also probably be the last thing the Trump administration ever does. The economic and civil-unrest blowback would rip apart his administration. Ordering your citizens to kill their neighbours, friends, and even family is not something you do without major consequences.
I would expect an invasion order to be a breaking point that causes US political collapse and possibly a civil war.
The military brass might very well break the chain of command and refuse to follow an order to invade Canada. While I think that would be the right move, it would be a major constitutional crisis and there is no resolution that would not send one political faction or another completely off the rails.
This whole administration is one major constitutional crisis
Agreed. But it’s a slow-rolling one so far. I think defiance of an order of war would boil over a bit faster.
I really hope we won’t find out.
My guess is that the military command would probably refuse the order. Or at least some parts would refuse, some would follow, it would be chaotic and could easily trigger a civil war.
But if they all follow the order…?
I really hope there would be major unrest across all US cities. General strike and millions on the street. This could end the trump presidency relatively quickly. Something like in South Korea recently, just much bigger.
But if not?
From a military point of view, Canada and Europe wouldn’t stand a chance. Unlike the Russians in Ukraine this would be a quick operation. However, the guerrilla war afterwards would be pretty damn fierce. But it would be a damn big shock for the global economy. The USA would suddenly be completely isolated. Global trade would probably grind to a halt. China would attack Taiwan. Organizations like the UN would be on the ground. The rest of the world would immediately try to arm itself with nuclear weapons. The global economy would collapse. Sooner or later we would have total chaos.
It’s the world’s longest border, a military defeat is certain but hundreds or thousands of Canadian partisans will easily get through to commit acts of terrorism and sabotage.
My thought was that there’s just so much land. It’s inhospitable, yes, but there so much they’d never be able to cover it all. They could invade and take the cities, but there’s absolutely no way they could control the countryside.
Yes that’s another really good point. Any sort of foreign support from Russia or China or Europe that brings weapons in would mean a permanent thorn in their side, Canada wouldn’t see peace for decades, if at all. Similar to the quagmire in Afghanistan and Iraq.
That’s in addition to how easily we could strike at their home territory in cross border raids, which will be even more unacceptable domestically.
It would be the point of no return for the USA, and the conclusive end to the “Pax Americana” . Invading a peaceful neighbor? Unthinkable for a “so-called” stable country. The rest of the world rally to Canada’s side, there would be an effort to ‘contain’ the further damage we could do. (Mexico would finally pay for that wall :-/ ) We would no longer be trusted, and in that vacuum of power the rest of the countries of the world would be thrown into such a frenzy to fill that power, or to align with who they think could.
We would no longer be trusted
I’m afraid that damage has already been done, though we’re trying to pretend like things are cool so that you won’t bomb us or something.
I think that would cause those who wield true military power to reassess the strategic landscape and dispense with the greater threat. Nahmean?
Keep in mind that Greenland and Canada are both members of NATO, and thus the US would be forced to intervene…
Oh, well…
You mean seriously? Who knows? Both sides have nuclear weapons, don’t they? This is not something that ever happened. Would the US armed forces go along with the plan or will there be a coup? Will everybody keep their heads leveled and avoid exchange nuclear explosions even with people dying at home / on the front? Will somebody just put a bullet on Trump’s head and stop the madness?
But the thing I can tell is that if you are expecting country lines and military treaties to be immutable, that’s not how they work.
Canada does not have nukes, but to nuke any highly populated area of Canada would have huge affects on the US
Canada does not, but if the US wanted to unilaterally attack and occupy our land, there’s very good reason to believe we would look closely at all offers to move nukes from the EU, China, or Russia into Canada, and even potentially use them. We burned down the white house once - next time it might need to be the entirety of DC…
Outside of the White House and Capitol (and maybe adjoining buildings) I would not want to do too much damage to the rest of Washington DC, as I think we could find lots of allies there.
Florida, on the other hand…
A 500t nuke could take out the white house, capitol hill and not too much fallout beyond.
What would be the reaction of the Canada King (Charles III is the king of Canada)?
Absolutely nothing. Maybe some strong words. He has no power.
The Commonwealth? NATO?
Tough to say. Getting actively involved in a war in North America would be very difficult logistically for the European countries or the Commonwealth, so I don’t think there would be an immediate military reaction. Possibly a Ukraine-type situation where the NATO countries try to aid Canada with equipment as best as they can. But even that will be difficult across the Atlantic ocean, which the US can probably blockade. Local politics would be absolute chaos, with an ally that many countries have relied on suddenly turning enemy. With the US having military bases everywhere, they could also threaten countries into keeping out of the war. I think the situation would unfortunately be quite bleak for Canada.
I hope the NATO push would be stronger than simple arms supplies, if nothing less based on the likely crumbling of the alliance. If it were to fall it’s very conceivable Canada would strike deals with the Chinese, or even Russia to maintain its independence. Protected guerrilla warfare regardless, which the USA does not have a great track record, especially considering it’s never tried it with as well armed and aligned nation as Canada.
Judging from what happened in Ukraine, the King will be walking around in T-shirts a lot /s. In reality, only bad things can happen from this.
The US milirary will have hardcore maga cultists vs the “normal” conservatives + everyone else in the military that’s pro-constitution and they’ll fight each other. National Guards might also be join the fight. All Democratic governors will tell their national guard to disobey any trump orders and declare any of such orders unconstitutional, and they’ll be ordered to help the pro-consitution side. republican governors… that’ll depend. If they have a “Brad Raffensperger” type of governor, they’ll also tell their National Guard the same thing and fight for the pro-consitution side, but then you have those maga republican governors that’ll tell their national guard to help the maga side.
But it ultimately comes down to the people holding the guns and which orders they obey.
So… to re-iterate: there will be an internal conflict before Canada would ever see the invading US forces, and if the pro-constitution side wins, they use the 13th amendment to remove any congress people that supported the illegal invasion, then new elections are held (and for the senate, temporary appointments will happen if the state allows it, and they serve until the special election). There would probably be a huge overhaul of the country, and it will be like post- Civil War USA, but this is v2. This will be the second “Reconstruction”, hopefully it doesn’t fail again like the last time.
Practically speaking since war is unthinkable is would result in as much economic isolation as Europe can bear. It would be the end of NATO. Almost immediately there’s be European voices saying ‘What’s the real harm?’ and other appeasers. I think the political lash back would only last 5-10 years as parties opposed would find the only tool at hand - economic punishment - to be unsustainable. It would legitimise nationalistic sentiments in Europe even further. Britain would, naturally, talk of betrayal but not be able to make any resistance of any substance.
It would be an invasion and occupation. Very very few Canadians would cooperate with the annexation, and more than likely it would look something more like Afghanistan or Ukraine, but with much better equipment being provided to resistance forces.
I honestly suspect that if Trump were to order an invasion of Canada, the military would refuse.
There’s far too much goodwill among the military and populace to invade Canada without some sort of provocation happening first. It would likely just be taken as an unlawful order and refused.
How trained are US military in the notion of unlawful orders?
Given that Trump is CiC, I’m sure all the Generals brushed up on it.
What do you think will happen for Panama then? Do you think military will refuse too?
I’d die. Thats what would happen.
