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Letters: The secret U.S. plan to invade Canada

Readers comment on a top-secret 1930 American plan to attack Canada, the current trade war, the Belleville synagogue attack, and more

‘Some fact behind this fiction’

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Re: Carney prepared for risk that Trump might order U.S. to invade Canada: ‘That’s just risk management’ — Chris Knight, Sept. 24

Letters: The secret U.S. plan to invade Canada Back to video

I know there were a lot of disbelieving eye-rolls when people read about Prime Minister Mark Carney’s comment that he had prepared over the past year for the “extreme tail risk” that our southern neighbour might invade Canada, but there’s actually some fact behind this fiction. Back in the late 1920s, the U.S. military developed War Plan Red (formalized in 1930 and declassified in 1974) as a contingency plan in case of conflict with the British Empire. It was part of a series of colour-coded contingency war plans for around the world. War Plan Orange, for example, was for Japan. War Plan Black was for Germany, and so on.

Most people agree it was nothing more than a planning exercise, but a key part of War Plan Red was the invasion of Canada. It involved U.S. military operations in Halifax, which would be targeted by a poison gas attack to prevent the Royal Navy from using the port, as well as Niagara Falls (power plants), Montreal, Quebec City, Toronto, Winnipeg (minerals and rail), Vancouver, Victoria, and other locations. For its part, the Canadian government drafted Defence Scheme No. 1, conceived by Lt.-Col. James “Buster” Sutherland Brown, which proposed pre-emptive strikes on a number of U.S. border cities to buy time until support from the British Empire arrived.

Columnist Jesse Kline keeps you up to date with what’s happening in Israel and the effects of antisemitism on life here in Canada. Friday mornings.

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Several years ago, no one with an ounce of sanity would have predicted the current trade war we’re in with our American neighbours, but imagine what kind of stable ground we might be on if someone with forward thinking had asked … what if?

Paul Baumberg, Dead Man’s Flats, Alta.

‘Disgusted’ by CBC’s treatment of Jewish reporter

Re: CBC journalist accosted outside Yom Kippur service and Americans are outraged: ‘Try this in Florida and you go to jail’ — National Post staff, Sept. 23; and Jewish CBC journalist faces discipline over comments about anti-Israel protest — Chris Knight, Sept. 25

I am profoundly disgusted with the CBC’s decision to remove veteran reporter Neil Herland from the air after he shared his........

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