Canada can easily manufacture nukes. We have all of the scientific and technical skills to pull it off. I hope we never need one of the damn things though.
That said if a dump invasion took place I’m sure we could count on France to give us one to decapitate the dump.
The French nuclear umbrella being extended to other EU states is still only a suggestion (though even as just a suggestion it is a very strong political message). What that would mean for French nuclear doctrine in practice is yet unclear. Would France nuke Russian troops/infrastructure/cities and risk all-out nuclear war to protect Romania? Moldova?
Funnily enough the entire reason why France has an independent Nuclear program at all is De Gaulle did not trust the US to risk New York being glassed in order to save Paris from a Russian invasion. Which was probably correct. Unfortunately, the reverse logic also applies and France will not risk Paris being glassed to save Toronto. The only reason why a sovereign European nuclear umbrella makes sense on paper is that an attack on any EU member state hits close enough to home as to arguably be existentially threatening, unlike a war an ocean away.
Unless you meant France selling nukes, but that would violate every nonproliferation treaty out there and just be a complete mess that even with a sane US administration would lead to a complete diplomatic meltdown. The current suicide cult at the helm would probably actually start a nuclear war for less than that.
It's French but has a weird legal status where the citizens are French and therefore have an EU passport and vote in EU elections, but it is not part of the EU and Schengen from what I understand.
Anyway technicalities aside, France generally doesn't care much for its overseas territories. Quality of living varies wildly from territory to territory and there's still ongoing mid 20th century style colonial oppression in places like Nouvelle-Calédonie.
So while a Falklands type situation is quite possible if anyone tries to invade an overseas French territory, it's doubtful that France would risk actual nuclear war over one. Especially Saint Pierre and Miquelon which does not have a strategic military value as far as I can tell, unlike other territories which serve as force projection multipliers and have naval bases, especially for the Charles de Gaulle aircraft carrier and the nuclear deterrence submarines. Without those France wouldn't be able to operate in the Pacific theater.
In a less stupid world, Canada/Europe allying with Russia instead of US is freedom for the colonies. It also means that Canada/NORAD protects the US, since Trump likes to complain about US protection of Canada, and that means US must pay for the privilege of NORAD. Buying nuclear defense from North Korea is the cheapest.
A single nuclear detonation on Permean Bassin collapses the US economically. Their debt levels only gives them a few years anyway. The quest for Canada is mostly about diluting debt, IMO, rather than resources.
I'm not sure we can. Our reactors don't produce the right material, I think. We should buy from France, tomorrow.
CANDU reactors don't make Pu out of the natural U we use as we break down to daughter elements. That being said, two things:
After some quick interneting, apparently we have the technical and industrial capacity to do so, but lack intention, having committed to peaceful, civilian use of the technology through non-proliferation treaties, etc.
I mean, in an ideal world, that's how it should be.
Sorry I didn't mean we can't of course we can given the people we have. I meant that I think we don't have the benefit of our reactors producing fissile material suitable for weapons. Could be wrong.
I would very much rather we err on the side of caution when it comes to our sovereignty and Trumps erratic, ego driven foreign policy.
We would need new reactors, since the CANDU is specifically designed to not breed weapons-grade material...but in order to design a reactor like that, we necessarily must also have the expertise to design one for the opposite reason. Biggest issue is probably construction time
The eggs must flow
This. Ukraine has shown us the way. There is no great counter to cheap drones yet...
Indeed. Due to our proximity to the US, short/medium ranged arms would be ideal.
Maybe we can talk the French into give us a few TNA's 😉
Poland is thinking of that.
This isn't the case.
I am very glad that Canadians are uniting and sticking up for their local businesses like never before, but we cannot lose sight of what the real danger is.
The US is very unlikely to launch a physical invasion. It would be extremely foolish for numerous reasons, chief of them being our massive unprotected border and how our major urban centres are right beside US cities. We are not a country on the other side of the globe.
No, the real danger is the US economically weakening us and putting us into a position where we are forced to capitulate much like Mexico. Canada does have leverage over the US but that only remains if we protect our industries which make up our economic backbone. Donald placed a 250% tariff on Canadian dairy which, on paper, seems pointless because the US doesn't really buy any Canadian dairy. But it does send a message that he knows dairy is a protected industry in Canada and he wants to attack it.
It is so important that we have leaders willing to protect these industries and be willing to spend money to expand them.
Ah yes. I'm glad we can be so confident the current administration would never do something foolish or damaging to themselves or others.
Also it only took them days to stop multi drug resistant tuberculosis treatment half way, and giving countless babies HIV that wouldn't have had it, if not for the recent actions of this administration. Or blatantly and loudly planning an ethnic genocide. Also following the putin method by the letter, and letting Russian media into the oval office while they try to put down Zelenskyy.
Hmm, what is the Russian 'go to' behaviour for shared borders?
I think we need to be developing anti drone tech among other things. I'm not saying it will happen, and it would likely instigate or be included in a civil war. I would usually think all of this sounds crazy, but we live in unprecedented times, full of familiar historical rhymes. I'm sure their preference is to take over without having to actually fight, so they can grow their power, but also things might escalate as they continue to rob and abuse the masses. There are more reasons than i can summize here, but I think pretending there is no danger is wilfully ignorant at this point. I hope for the best, but I don't trust these people to not be thoughtlessly monstrous.
The US is very unlikely to launch a physical invasion. It would be extremely foolish
It would be extremely foolish to avoid preparing to defend yourselves based on expecting this administration to avoid foolishness.
I never said we should avoid it.
Canada should 100% be securing its borders, arms, and making new allies. Joint military cooperation with the EU would be a huge boon, as would civil defence measures. Finland is a great example of how to prepare when living next to a hostile power.
@TheFeatureCreature @noxypaws I think Finland is a good model, also for other European countries. Western European countries especially could do with some societal resiliance and militancy.
Finland went full Tropic Thunder in joining NATO. They had a good model.
Canada will be waiting fuckers!
To add : Support communication infrastructure outside of AWS : that can be as simple as showing up on Lemmy regularly, visiting CBC website and a variety of Canadian information sources all the way to having a computer offline with a copy of early 2025 Wikipedia and various open sources software and decent local LLM.
Community involvement will be for two objectives: increasing preparedness is evident but also your own mental health that will be way more stable with you actively doing something tangible + the support network.
This is a great list, and considering I am approaching old, happy to report that it's almost like my non-work CV. Feeling nearly prepped, never fully.
ADHD has been good for gathering a basic set of skills in a wide range of situations.
Next is to play with community mesh networks and work on the Ham radio experience.
Add HAM radio to the list!
The only takeover Canada is risking at this moment is one from within. It's insane there is anyone in Canada that wants to be part of the US... And apparently there's a decent number of these idiots.
Yeah it's like 10%
The CBC interviewed one of these people and that guy was basically only cared about money and though paying lower taxes would be better. Probably didn't factor in paying more money for health insurance.
But there was a guy nearby out walking his dog. When told what the interview was about he said "Is that what that rock over there is for? So we can throw it at him?"
I think it's just terminally online people that are greedy as fuck. But there isn't much risk of that 10% taking us over. If anything, they're the ones taking a risk if they express their collaborator bullshit publicly. 10% with soft support vs. 90% that are absolutely against everything they're about.
We're also underestimating how much Americans pay for insurance every month. It's like a whole second rent. Which I guess we pay through higher taxation but then again, we don't have to worry about setting up a gofundme if we get sick. Not to mention the secondary effects of this precarity: the whole premise of Breaking Bad for example doesn't make sense in Canada.
Yeah so much of American culture is influenced by their terrible healthcare. Feelgood stories about people pooling together their money to help someone with their medical bills. It making sense to sue a family member for being injured in their house because it'll mean their insurance will cover the medical bills.
It's really insane.
The deficit level is also very extreme in US. Everything so far under Trump means much higher levels, and low growth so that expands faster as % of GDP. The illusion that deficits/debt is free is something GOP complains about when they are out of power, but their "more tax cuts for the rich solution" and soylent green for the rest when they get power doesn't solve the problem.
Collapse of the US will harm world, economically. A good defense to being an attractive takeover target, unfortunately, is defend Canada through large deficits to match their collapse timing, unless we stop making US enemies are own enemies.
I second this. America is an enemy of humanity in multiple ways. Our culture is a culture of materialist escapism and our people are indoctrinated to be pawns for an ignorant machine of an evil force that manipulates and uses humanity as fuel.
Considering how pissed off and united we are over some off the cuff comments about 51st state and the fact it’s personal for trump, he really hates Trudeau, I don’t think they would be ready for the absolute carnage some of us would unleash on them. IRA showed everyone the way forward.
I wouldn't say months of repeated messaging in official speeches is "off the cuff"
Yeah we need deterrents. This shit ain't funny anymore and there's no guarantee Trump will be the last in the string of fascists.
His son is already floating the idea of running in 2028, so the wild ride with this particular fascistic dynasty is far from over. It will probably continue into the next decade or so, at the very least. And if Canada maintains its sovereignty over the next four years, that does not mean we're in the clear. Far from it.
I'm 100% with you on 'deterrents.' I think it would reveal an extreme lack of competence, not to mention a dangerous lack of planning for our leaders not to consider seriously the idea of a robust deterrent at this point. I hope it's already being floated.
The fact that our leadership created the conditions for or allowed to worsen our over-reliance on a single trading partner doesn't speak much to the levels of competence we should expect out of Ottawa.
The fact that our leadership created the conditions for or allowed to worsen our over-reliance on a single trading partner doesn’t speak much to the levels of competence we should expect out of Ottawa.
The opposite, really. Countries that trade with each other tend not to go to war with each other. Strong trade relations make wars very expensive. Before invading Canada the US will need to reduce it's trade with us, or a war could result in an economic collapse of the US. Trump is right now finding out how expensive it is to the US to even do tariffs. A war would be a whole other level of expensive for the US.
That being said, the US has extremely unstable leadership right now. A war would be stupid, but then so are tariffs, so we can't predict the depths of stupidity the US will sink to. But any country in the world could fall to fascism, so what can we do? I guess never trade with anyone? Become more likely to be attacked by rational actors because of fear of irrational actors?
I see your point, but I feel like spreading the risk a little would've been the more secure trade policy. 70% reliance on one country seems borderline obscene. Of course, hindsight is 20/20 so there's not really any point in me complaining about what should have been. All we can do now is work to correct the mistake.
i declare war to start on march 25th
actually war is pushed back to April 1st
ok it’s war time! wait why is my economy hurting, pause the war
ok war for real now. wait, sorry one sec, war partially pushed back to next month
why is Canada attacking us?
Who had 'Canada invokes article 5 as Trump prepares land grab over price of eggs.'
You've heard of Lebensraum, but who expected we'd be worrying about trumps insatiable lust for Eierraum.
I'm not sure the rest of NATO would be falling over themselves to defend a different trading partner from a (theoretical) ally and nuclear power.
There would be some stern rebuke at the UN, but I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for boots on the ground.
There are many of us in the US who will help the resistance
I recommend you follow the "Simple Sabotage Field Manual" the CIA put out many moons ago. :)
Already read it :)
thanks for using Leebra!
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Never thought I'd ever say it, but I'm not terribly opposed to an independent Canadian nuclear deterrent these days.
I can think of no other workable solution if we're serious about remaining Canadian. The Ricans would steamroll us conventionally. Without a credible deterrent, Slobba the Slut could very well ramble himself incoherently from 'economic pressure' to 'occupational force.' We don't know what his puppetmasters and wormtongues are whispering in his ear, or how far he and his sycophants are willing to go for a cheaper egg.
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