From: Adrian Johnson <ajohnson@i...>
Date: Fri, 11 Dec 1998 21:10:46 -0500
Subject: [FT][SG][DS] Canada, the US Civil War II, structure of the NAC
Hello all! I didn't really mean to start a serious debate on the Canada/Quebec issue - rather give a quick and dirty thought to the beginnings of how the NAC came about, from a rather Canadian perspective. This may, however, be getting a bit obscure for some. I'm responding to Thomas' first long post, both because I find the topic interesting, and because Thomas took the time to think and respond to my ramblings. We do draw this back into issues around the US civil war by the end, and much more so (esp. the NAC itself) in Thomas' next post - so the thread does maintain some relevance to GZG. I thought I'd throw in this comment for those who fall into the "but what about the KV railguns" category... :-) OK Thomas, I have some responses to your responses to my responses, but I'm going to snip out quite a bit... > As a corollary of that, the Mohawks and other Native People This rather pessimistic scenario has been spoken of quite a bit. I'm a bit more optomistic, and think that it won't come to that. I think limited protests and some politically motivated violence may happen, but the leaders of all three communities (Les Quebecois, the First Nations peoples, and the Rest of Canada) all realize the enormous potential for destruction and violence - and will go a long way to make sure it doesn't happen. Many people predicted a war in Czecholslovakia when it started to break up. Didn't happen, 'cause people there managed to take a step back, calm down, and try to work it out. There was massive tension - but clearer heads prevailed. If there's one thing many Candians have learned through the years of watching Eastern Europe, Northern Ireland, and Africa tear themselves apart is that we don't want it to happen here. Yes there are lots of hotheads - plenty on all sides. I think each of the various governments will squash them hard if they have to, to prevent a devolution into war. To paraphrase (sort of) what someone else said in a recent post, Canadians have a radically different view or federal-provincial relations AND patriotism/nationalism, and there really are not a lot of Canadians who would be willing to fight and die to keep the country together. Yes the hot-heads, but not too many else. Besides, if we did start to really fight, the Americans would be across the border in about six seconds - what the heck else is Fort Drum for...? :-) > but retains the Canadian dollar as its currency, The sepratists have already started talking about post-separation defense agreements as being logical... Yes they want their own military - but there would not be much impetus to change the structure too dramatically. It would not be in Quebec's interest to go it alone militarily - for lots of reasons, and loss of international prestige and influence by losing membership in NORAD, NATO, etc would be one of the major ones. The Quebec military would be really tiny. > causing the beginnings of a recession in both Canada and Quebec. > I believe both would like to do this, but I suspect the Markets would No, they wouldn't be happy. I hypothesized a cleaner situation with a nicer result because that worked better with the story line. The markets would be skeptical, but desperate for stability - nobody likes to lose money. The markets would be happy to see joint "peace and stability" declarations - if they *believed* them 'cause the declaration was backed up by actions that showed commitment. I don't buy the "Native Civil War" scenario, romantic tho' it may be. Yes, I remember the Oka crisis - but that was a very limited scenario, out of which both the Native community and the Quebec and Canadian governments learned a great deal. If the James Bay project didn't get a war started, with the Natives losing hundreds of thousands of acres of their land to new lakes, it isn't going to happen. Especially if the seperatists are smart and co-opt the Natives with a guarentee of land rights (which is possible) as part of the negotiated separation agreement. <snip> > I don't believe that. I don't think Clinton will be impeached, but I No, they aren't going to impeach him. It was, dare I say it, a joke... <snip> > The economic situation in Canada and Quebec stabilizes, particularly I don't think this likely, but it would make for interesting headlines at the very least... Probably even get a 10 second clip and two or three lines on CNN. <cynical g> The odds of this whole > thing ever being resolved in our lifetimes is low What a horrible thought....generations of Parizeaus whining and insulting immigrants... > Resolution of this issue is almost more science fiction-ish than any But what the heck, we're writing (science) fiction - so why not build in a convenient end to the problem... The real issue here is how did the NAC form and what was Canada's place in it. As I pointed out in another post, I think this clean-cut resolution to "the Quebec problem" is rather utopian and convenient, but it works for the storyline - and given that we know that Quebec joins the NAC, I liked this type of scenario better than the idea of us going out and conquering them again. <snip response to Jarred comment> > Relations between Quebec and the US stabilize after Quebec joins Maybe. Depends on how the actual breakup goes. The US might use the opportunity to try and force a renegotiation of NAFTA, which would really bugger things up for Quebec - 'cause there's no way Canada will let that happen. It will be a lot easier for everybody, particularly from an economic stability point of view, if the integration of an independent Quebec into the North American and North Atlantic political systems goes as smoothly as possible. The sepratists, when they stop sloganeering and think, understand and recognize this. It is very much in their best interest. As for the US, the New York lobby alone would push hard for stable relations with Quebec - they want the cheap electricity. <snip response to Jarred comments> > The Canadian federal government had no interest in Ireland isn't exactly a resource rich area. Neither is Singapore. Both do really well with higher value-added industries like the high-tech stuff. With intelligent investment in the Maritimes, maybe by using the money saved by eliminating massive governmental redundancies, they can start down the same route. And thirty years from now, when this "story" takes place, they could be alot better off. > A consortium of major shipping companies in the No, really! There aren't many good protected deep water anchorages along the US East Coast. I read a big article recently all about this - there is a competition going on being run by the big shipping companies who are trying to develop a single major port for all of the Eastern Seaboard. The idea is that the shipping companies and local/state/provincial/federal governments would invest a whole lot of money in building a totally high-tech, modern seaport and distribution facility, and service the whole Eastern side of the continent from it. It would be built to suit a new generation of monster transport ships the shippers want to build - and at present don't have ANY port facilities that can handle them. There were several locations in the running, and Halifax is one of the preferred choices 'cause it is such a good deep-water anchorage. It has a good location from a ship-to-Europe point of view, also - hence it's use as the major jumping-off point for the WWII convoys to Britain and the Soviet Union. The article had some strong negative commentary about the seeming lack of governmental interest, particularly from the Canadian federal government, in winning the multi-billion dollar deal. If Halifax won, it would be turned into a major economic portal into North America. <snip> > >Tensions between the newly-enlarged U.S. and Quebec continue, now Meanwhile, > >regional differences in the U.S. are exacerbated by the ongoing I agree with you completely. (Jonathan's comment... sorry Jonathan) > And perhaps secessionist movement from some States. This was written with the idea that we made the Canada-Quebec separation deal work thirty years from now, and have dealt with thirty years worth of more immigration (ie the migrations from Africa, the Indian sub-continent and Asia that we've seen for the past 10 - 15 years are now 30 - 40 years old, with second-generation descendants in positions of political power in Ottawa...) OK, the immigration has been mostly to Vancouver, Montreal and Toronto, but there will be a trickle-down to the rest of the country. That's why Calgary has a Chinatown today. It's easy to mock Toronto 'cause it's the economic centre and people on Bay Street who make the national headlines saying stupid things actually believe their own press. Try visiting Chinatown. Or Little Italy. Or The Danforth (Greek neighbourhood). We have the largest Carribean celebrations outside of the Carribean. We have one of the largest urban Italian speaking populations in the world, including many cities in Italy. You can go to restaurants from over 90 different cultures. Don't get me wrong, I'm not blindly beating the Toronto drum - there are certainly lots of people here who really wonder why the West makes all that fuss - or even worse don't bother wondering at all. But there's lots of faces to this city - it's a big place. Multiculturalism here WORKS, and works rather well. Better than just about anywhere else, actually. > If the civil war affects Seattle, it'll affect Vancouver almost Why? Look at Yugoslavia. Didn't (yet) suck in Romania, Austria and some of the other CLOSE nations, and that has been a long, ugly war. Kept within it's borders though, pretty much. I don't really see Seattle as being particularly interested in fighting anybody. Too busy being odd at Starbucks... :-) > The Canadian Who knows what the Germans and the Brits will have parked out in the Prairies thirty years hence, with Germany already out of space and Britain almost equally so... > The German I was only thinking of the German whatever in Manitoba, but see my previous comment. Heck - even now they have more tanks in Canada than we do - well, so do the Brits actually, and it isn't saying much since we've only got maybe a hundred... > By this time, the British and Canadian governments have As large as we want it to be. Remember, we put over a million people into uniform in WWII, from a total population of only what, 9 million. If it was important for Canada to get a big military, we'd get one. And if the Americans disolved into a civil war and started chucking nukes about and rolling tank divisions through the Great Plains fighting over missile silos, there'd be plenty of motivation to prevent some warlord from getting clever and annexing Alberta... Remember this is taking place a long time from now. Look at the thirty years from 1918 to 1948. We went from a WWI army of *divisions* of troops, to an army with less than 500 regular officers pre-WWII, to over 1 million in uniform, and back down to what - maybe a couple of brigades in 1948. Don't sell us short. And yes, it would not be compared to pre-war formations. But I highly doubt that the US military in 2020 will be as large as it is today. Not by a long shot - there's no way they'll be able to afford it, and introduce all the wonder-tech they want to. Not at $100 million per fighter and $5 million per tank. After several years of civil war, I imagine most of the high-tech gee-whiz stuff will have worn out or been destroyed - probably much of it at the beginning of the conflict - and with the US industrial infrastructure disrupted, they won't be replacing it as they destroy it. So if Britain and Canada were to field large formations of troops, well-equipped *compared to their potential opposition*, they may well be able to make a difference. We aren't INVADING the US after all, just helping things get organized and aiding the US in helping itself - that would be the ONLY way we could make a real difference, 'cause the US is just too big. Anyway, that's as far as Thomas got in this post. I'll try and summon the energy to tackle the other one sometime soon. I have to admit, I'm glad that this thread has sparked some discussion. In the end, that's what it's really all about.