George Chuvalo died yesterday. He was Canada's heavyweight boxing champ many times over. He fought Muhammad Ali twice and was never knocked down in 93 fights. He exemplified the Canuck fighting spirit. Fools like Trump grossly misunderstand this Canuck fighting spirit. Here's Charlie Angus's column today about our preparedness for a major conflict with Trump or any country foolish enough to misread our fighting history.
Canada is on a war footing. How else to interpret the Prime Minister’s recent meeting with President Zelensky in Banff? The Prime Minister announced a plan to ramp up drone production from two thousand units to two million drones in just two years
Nothing of this scope could have been imagined a few short years ago. It brings us back to the early days of the Second World War when Canada went from having a small militia to creating the fourth largest air force and the third largest navy in the world.
The fact that Zelensky had been an honoured guest at the meetings in Banff spoke volumes. Nobody knows more about drone technology than Ukraine, and no other leader knows what it means to stand up to a threat from a superpower.
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The Prime Minister announced the establishment of the Defence Drone Initiative Marketplace (DDIM) that he said will give Canadian government agencies and their allies “privileged access” to roughly 400 Canadian drone suppliers.
Carney stated,
“This is a key part of our plan to build industrial capacity here in Canada to produce millions of drones within the next two years, and today’s contracts will increase the number of drones available to the cap tenfold.”
One third of those drones will go to help Ukraine.
What about the other 70%?
In an interview with the Toronto Star, Major General Wade Rutland says that Canada is preparing itself for the possibility of large-scale combat and that;
“We are seeing Canada as a theatre of operations now.”
The Canadian Joint Operations Command has been tasked with gaming out all manner of scenarios to envision what a defence of Canada would look like.
Clearly, such planning is purely hypothetical and may never be needed.
But here we are.
Meanwhile in the United States, Trump is promising bribes and calling on his base to “cheat, cheat, cheat” to hold onto power. Canadians would be fools to trust that the midterms will somehow make this go away. Hence the need to bring the best and the brightest to the table.
We are in a dangerous moment that goes way beyond the taunts and threats coming from MAGA Republicans.
Carney made the drone announcement in the wake of the bizarre tariff retaliation launched against us earlier this week. After vowing to destroy our economy, Trump unveiled tariff retribution targeting bamboo furniture, pony fur and mezcal.
Never mind the fact that Canada doesn’t produce mezcal; there was the obvious question – what the heck is pony fur? Turns out it is a leather byproduct made from goat or cow.
Talk about niche? This is super niche.
Canadian trade experts had been gaming out the scenarios for the rage response from Washington. They expected Trump to hammer us hard. But now they are just scratching their heads.
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At the same time as the White House were throwing tariffs on bamboo furniture, they were backing down on previous 50% tariff threats on toilet paper, cement and road salt – all products the US needs.
It has shit show written all over it.
Such are the dramatic differences between the two sides.
Canada went into the trade negotiations knowing we were in the fight of our lives. The government established a large team of advisors, industry experts and top-level researchers. In every affected government department, there was a highly trained civil service ready to quickly respond to the calls from their deputy minister to analyze every possible line item.
The White House went into the negotiations with bluster and threats but clearly no plan B. They assumed that we would roll over. This is an administration populated by sycophants who are not focused on trade policy but on winning Trump’s approval for memes that stoke those rage algorithms. The White House is a vivid example of what Mussolini calls an “onagrocacy” – government by braying asses.
It all seems so haphazard and almost comical. But don’t laugh.
Just because they look ridiculous doesn’t mean that they aren’t extremely dangerous. Their rhetoric against us continues to escalate.
This is why Canada is preparing for all eventualities.
While Donald Trump is waging war on pony fur, Canada is undertaking an unprecedented increase in drone capability.
We are in the fight for our lives. As the smaller player, we know the other side much better than they seem to know us.
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A terrifying time? Perhaps. But I sleep better knowing that the PM is putting all scenarios on the table.
If every one of us does our part, we will get through this.
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