Under Trump, the US has proved it can't be trusted as an ally or trade partner, argues Stephen Marche, Canadian author of ‘The Next Civil War’. But, his country is feeling strangely confident as it heads into a David and Goliath struggle, united in the conviction it will never be enslaved as the ‘51st state’
America is no longer a member of the free world. That is the almost unbearable truth that has been revealed over the past two months. For Europe, this turn of events has been and will continue to be a painful loss, requiring a more or less complete re-evaluation of their militaries and economic orders. But for Canada, the loss of a sane America is a direct threat to our national survival, and a grotesque betrayal of one of the longest-standing peaceful relationships in world history.
For Canadians, Americans are not just friends and neighbours and allies; they are kin. Americans are our family members, often literally. We have woken up to find our cousins plotting, openly, to enslave us.
Canada has been, more or less, on a war footing since Trump’s declaration that he wanted to make Canada the “51st State”. The national unity that Trump has created in this country is unprecedented. Not since the first American Civil War, when their incipient breakdown threatened to spread across the border, and Canada responded by confederating, has the country been so totally together.
The political leadership and the people are united both in goals and in strategy. When you’re facing a bully, you take your lumps up front, then you hit back with everything you have and you prepare to suffer. Ontario premier Doug Ford has threatened not just retaliatory tariffs, but turning off the power supply to New England, in his words, “with a smile on my face”. Ontario is the single largest purchaser of alcohol in the world, and all American products have been pulled from the shelves.
You cannot buy bourbon in Canada today. Consumers as well as governments are changing their purchasing habits. Canadians are cancelling their vacations to the United States. They are letting American produce rot on the shelves.
I confess that I did not believe that the level of national unity being demonstrated right now was possible. Canada has a huge racially and linguistically diverse population spread over a vast landmass. (Baffin Island alone is bigger than the size of Britain and Ireland combined, with a population of 13,000.) Until Trump’s recent insanities, our prime minister, Justin Trudeau, has been promoting Canada as “a post-national nation”. Over the past decade, we were involved in a perpetual self-criticism and ideological flagelations over our history. All that nonsense is out the window. Liberals and Conservatives are entirely aligned.
Stephen Harper, former Conservative prime minister and arguably the most pro-American leader in Canada’s history, stated that Canada should accept “any level of damage” to protect its sovereignty. Most incredibly, Lucien Bouchard, the Quebec separatist leader who came very close to breaking Quebec out of the union in 1995, has spoken volubly and passionately about fighting for Canada. The one thing we all agree on, and with total conviction, is that we are not going to be Americans. There is more support for separatism in Texas than in Quebec right now – an unimaginable reality even a few months ago.
Trump has started a trade war with Canada – who knows where it will endopen image in gallery
Trump has started a trade war with Canada – who knows where it will end (The Canadian Press/AP)
But all futures are now unimaginable when it comes to America. The country we once knew and loved is gone, and it will never return, not in our lifetimes anyway. Americans cannot be allies. If you fight beside them, as the British did, you can expect them to mock your sons who died at their side. They cannot be partners. If you make a trade deal with them, they will throw it away like an orange peel once they’re done. Any security guarantees they provide are not worth the paper they are written on. We need security guarantees against the United States now.
The sudden absence of the United States from the free world will realign the entire geopolitical structure. Canada will, by necessity, move closer to Europe, and to Britain – places that share our fundamental values. Already, traces of this change are emerging. Nobody in Canada cares much about the royal family normally. Most of the time, it is a source of resigned embarrassment that Charles is on our money. But the King, as head of state, matters now. It did not go unnoticed here that Charles has made public appearances recently dressed as the King of Canada, with his Canadian military honours and decorations. America may be our family, but the free world is our home. We will all have to turn to each other.
Justin Trudeau holding a news conference on imposed US tariffs earlier this weekopen image in gallery
Justin Trudeau holding a news conference on imposed US tariffs earlier this week (The Canadian Press/AP)
Canadians have a strange sense of confidence heading into this David and Goliath struggle. We know we’re going to suffer, but we also know that we have to suffer. The bad news is that America is falling apart, but the good news, now that they are our enemies, is that America is falling apart. They are weakening as a force in the world every day. They are crashing their own economy. They are creating a cost of living crisis within their own borders. They have destroyed their civil service in the name of what may amount to as little as $5bn in savings. They are dismantling their scientific community. They are dismantling their education system. They have fatally wounded the FBI and the CIA. They are gutting their national institutions one by one. In terms of self-mutilating policy decisions, they are up to about a Brexit a week at this point.
The past two months are just the beginning of the chaos that’s coming. Threats to national sovereignty have a way of clarifying the mind. America is a dying star. When stars die, they can either explode or cave in. Either way, you want to be as far away from the cataclysm as possible. Canada, and the rest of the world, need to start running.
Stephen Marche is author of The Next Civil War: Dispatches from the American Future