[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 
>immediately vote to secede from Quebec and rejoin either Canada or
>Nunavut or to form separate enclaves (depending on the group). Canada
>deems their basic right to do so inalienable, whereas Quebec views
>itself as indivisible and rejects the validity of these claims. At
>first, protests break out, then an ongoing geurilla war backed (it is
>thought) by US Native Peoples and by Canadian sympathizers. 

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,
>> enacts a national defense agreement with Canada,
>
>** No, due to the conflicts brewing up with the Natives. AND Canada's 
>defence establishment being stretched too thin and Quebec's desire to 
>(like any nation) have its own army. 

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.
>> Both nations move quickly to prevent economic meltdown, and issue a
joint
>> declaration emphasizing the political stability of the new situation.

>
>I believe both would like to do this, but I suspect the Markets would 
>be skeptical and growing problems with Native populations would 
>exacerbate it. I further suspect, from US comments, they wouldn't be 
>happy about this fragmentation or the potential for collapse. 
>

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 
>think he'll leave under the taint of a Censure from a last minute 
>deal, and I think we'll have Republicans in office again. I think if 
>you think people will vote for Al Gore, you are smoking more cheap 
>narcotics than Al seems to be....

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
after
>> a mutually satisfactory division of the national debt is realized,
and the
>> Canadian dollar begins a climb...
>
>This might be the end result, but I believe you'll have Civil War 
>between Quebec and the Indians and a few nasty incidents or 
>attrocities could well drag Canada into it.

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 
>of the PSBs I've heard this month.

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
NAFTA, and
>> the US welcomes the newly created Quebec Air Force into NORAD (the
North
>> American Aerospace Defence organization).
>
>If we can reach a peaceful solution, or a stable one at any rate, 
>without getting the UN involved due to seccession wars with the 
>Indians and Innuit, and a few die hard Ontarians who are ready to go 
>down and lay burning tires on the bridges at the drop of a hat (I 
>know some...), this makes sense. Something tells me it would take a 
>long way to reach this state. 

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
>> seeing more of the country lost, and in a rare moment of
provincial-federal
>> cooperation, a compromise plan was worked out.  The four Maritime
provinces
>> would be joined into one large region, with a single government
structure
>> based in Halifax.  This would eliminate much of the inefficient
duplication
>> of services in the small provinces, and subsequent cost savings.
>
>Doesn't solve the shortage of resources due to poor luck and 
>depletion and therefore the employment shortage which is their real 
>problem though. 

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
>> US and Canada awarded the contract to build the new central East
Coast
>> shipping complex in Halifax - since Halifax has the only good major
deep
>> water protected harbour North of Florida.  This becomes the central
>> shipping hub for all of the North East, 
>
>Hmmm. There must be somebody on the US Eastern seaboard who'd 
>challenge this assertion. 

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
being
>> >extended to France and the French-aligned members of the EU. 
Meanwhile,
>> >regional differences in the U.S. are exacerbated by the ongoing
>> >linguistic and cultural Balkanization of the south and southwest
regions
>> >of the U.S.  The influx of former Canadians, with first-hand
experience
>> >of what too much multi-culturism can lead to, support a backlash
which
>> >reverses decades of bilingual policies.
>
>I doubt it. We've clung to this albatross for a long time. 
>

I agree with you completely.  (Jonathan's comment...  sorry Jonathan)

>And perhaps secessionist movement from some States. 
>
> Canada and the other North American states watch as the US devolves
>> into civil war.  Mediation efforts by Canadian diplomats, experienced
with
>> the successful integration of multi-cultural policies
>
>When? Are you living in the same debt-ridden troubled country I am? 
>Or does living so far from Quebec and Ottawa give you a special 
>distance to view this from? Or has the glow from Toronto obscured the 
>darker truths? (I'm only poking fun, but the questions are real). 

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 
>automatically.

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
>> government calls up the entire military reserve, begins a program of
>> recruitment to expand the forces on a wide scale, and requests aid
from the
>> British and German governments, both of whom have large military
training
>> establishments in the Prairie provinces and in Labrador.
>
>Large.... ummm.... well, I guess to a Canadian... I think our 
>southern neighbours wouldn't think they were too huge. 

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
>> government allows its forces to help with resettling the massive
numbers of
>> refugees flowing north across the border including policing
resettlement
>> camps, but only the British government allows its troops to join the
>> Canadians in patrolling the border areas.  
>
>This presumes Europe is stable enough for Germany to spare the force. 
>or had you only in mind the German Kampfgruppe in Manitoba?
> 

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
>> assembled a large military force in staging areas along the border,
>
>Large relative to the battered survivors in the USA. not really large 
>compared to Pre war force formations. 

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.

Adrian