With Canada now potentially alone in the face of threats from authoritarian states, we must act fast to deter foreign threats.
In the past few days, the United States under Donald Trump has deliberately sought to undermine the entire world security architecture that has been in place since the end of World War Two.
With his despicable attack against Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, Trump is signalling that the United States intends to align itself with Russia rather than with America’s democratic allies.
Trump may not be able to fully pull off this realignment. Trump’s desire to align with Russia is an unpopular view in the United States, and many in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives will oppose it – including some Republicans.
Still, at the present moment, Canada can no longer count on the United States.
At best, the U.S. will be an unreliable ally for the foreseeable future.
At worst, the U.S. will – in some domains – become a nation Canada must protect itself from.
The U.S. is now musing about joint energy projects with Russia in the Arctic:
“Russia and the United States discussed possible cooperation on energy projects in the Arctic at a meeting in Saudi Arabia Tuesday, a top Russian negotiator told POLITICO.
Kirill Dmitriev, who heads the state-owned Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF), said the economic conversations had been about broad strokes, but that the two sides had discussed some “specific areas of cooperation.”
“It was more a general discussion — maybe joint projects in the Arctic. We specifically discussed the Arctic,” Dmitriev said by phone as he boarded a flight home after the talks in Riyadh.”
Ominously, Russia is starting to repurpose some of its pre-Ukraine invasion rhetoric against Canada:
This kind of language from Russia, combined with Trump’s demonization of Ukraine’s President and discussions of U.S.-Russia cooperation in the Arctic should be setting off alarm bells for Canadians:
While many are understandably hoping this all just ‘goes back to normal,’ that is unlikely.
The reality is that Canadians need to mentally prepare ourselves for a world in which Canada is left alone in the wilderness, and in which the United States may openly side with hostile regimes like Russia, China, and others.
In such a world, Canada would be left without a credible nuclear umbrella – we currently rely on the United States – and would thus have to find a way to get out of the wilderness fast and become a quasi-nuclear power without violating any non-proliferation treaties.
And it turns out, there is a credible way for Canada to make this happen:
Joining the United Kingdom’s nuclear weapons program
Currently, the United Kingdom possesses a Continuous-At-Sea-Deterrant through Trident II SLBMs that can be launched from the UK’s four Vanguard Class submarines. Each submarine carries about 40 warheads in total.
While this arsenal pales in comparison to what America and Russia possess (roughly 3,000 nuclear weapons for America and about 3,500 for Russia), even a few hundred warheads are enough to provide credible deterrence, which is why both the United Kingdom and France maintain their nuclear capability despite significant financial cost.
Matching interests
Right now, Canada and the United Kingdom have matching interests.
The United Kingdom is growing increasingly wary of American unreliability – as is much of Europe. The Trump Administration has sought to directly interfere in British politics, with Elon Musk targeting the British Prime Minister and attempting to push Nigel Farage out of his role as head of the Reform Party.
This is notable, given the fact that the United Kingdom is overwhelmingly pro-Ukraine, and rejects Trump’s ‘blame Ukraine’ narrative:
The UK is also considering sending troops to Ukraine following a ceasefire deal:
So, we see that the UK is willing to reject American narratives on Ukraine, is willing to put real skin in the game to defend Ukraine, and has a populace that – unlike portions of the United States – has not been ravaged and manipulated by Russian propaganda.
In these ways, the UK and Canada are aligned.
On top of all this, the UK has a credible nuclear deterrent, and this makes the country the perfect partner for Canada as we seek new ways to deter foes.
However, the UK has some challenges.
First, their military – while more powerful than Canada’s – has also been underfunded for quite some time. One key problem for the UK is that maintaining a nuclear deterrent is extremely expensive, so even though the country spends over 2% of GDP on their military, much of that goes to maintaining their nuclear weapons and nuclear submarines, meaning they have little left over.
And here’s where Canada comes in.
Canada has no nuclear deterrent.
We could start up our own domestic nuclear weapons program (we have the uranium and expertise to do it), but that would be very controversial and would violate non-proliferation treaties Canada signed.
Now, if the global order completely breaks down into chaos, every alliance crumbles, and its every country for itself, a domestic nuclear program would make sense. But, if we can maintain some semblance of the global order in partnership with our allies, that would be preferable.
And joining the U.K. nuclear program would accomplish that.
Canada could contribute in four main ways.
1 – First, we could provide funding to help the U.K. maintain their nuclear deterrent. The UK spends roughly 11.2 billion CAD per year on their nuclear weapons. Canada could cover half of this cost.
2 – Second, Canada could build nuclear submarine bases in the Canadian Arctic, the West Coast, and the East Coast. These bases would be capable of maintaining and repairing the UK’s nuclear subs.
3 – Third, Canada could provide uranium to the UK to help support the production of new nuclear weapons. The goal should be to produce an extra 500 Trident II missiles (or UK-designed missiles if the U.S. doesn’t wish to cooperate given that Trident missiles are US designs) within the next decade.
4 – Fourth, Canada and the UK should together on building new submarines to carry Trident II missiles. These new subs should be built in Canadian shipyards, and crewed by joint Canadian-British crews.
In return, Canada would receive official protection under the UK nuclear umbrella. The message to hostile powers would be clear: A nuclear attack on Canada would bring a nuclear attack in return.
An important note: While many believe the U.K. could not use nuclear weapons without U.S. approval (due to their close cooperation with the United States), that is not the case:
“The United Kingdom has declared its nuclear weapons to the defense of NATO since 1962 but operates them independently—only the UK Prime Minister can authorize the use of nuclear weapons, even if used as part of a NATO response. The United Kingdom works closely with the United States on many aspects of its nuclear weapons program, including strategy and targeting, but the launch procedure can be done independently. Notably, according to one former UK official involved in the planning and execution of nuclear command, control, and communications, the military has no formal role in offering advice or decision-making with regards to launching UK nuclear weapons (Gower 2019).”
The UK is also one of five countries recognized as nuclear states under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, and makes it’s own nuclear weapons. This is another reason why partnering with the UK makes sense for Canada, as doing so would allay the concerns of other countries who would not want to see another country ‘go nuclear.’
Act now
Canada must act now.
The world is changing fast, and every day we fail to act makes us more vulnerable.
So, Canada should put the four ideas above into an official diplomatic offer and present it to the U.K. as quickly as we possibly can. We should make it clear that we are putting real money behind this offer.
After all, King Charles III is the Commander-in-Chief of the Canadian Armed Forces, with that authority exercised by the Governor General. It is thus logical for Canada to ask for protection under the United Kingdoms nuclear umbrella, and it makes sense for us to offer help to the United Kingdom in affording their current deterrent and strengthening it.
Further, working with the United Kingdom, rather than starting our own program from scratch, would – as mentioned above – keep us in line with non-proliferation treaties, and would help reassure the United States. After all, Canadian-UK nuclear weapons would be used to deter Russia and China, something that every post-WWII U.S. Administration (with the potential exception of the current one perhaps) would have supported.
Even in a dangerous and chaotic world, Canada still has options. We need to make the most of those options now.
Spencer Fernando
Photo – YouTube
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