A member of 41 Canadian Brigade Group patrols on skis during a yearly series of drills highlighting the military’s ability to defend the Canadian Arctic, in Yellowknife, Northwest Territories on Feb. 16.Carlos Osorio/Reuters
Irvin Studin is president of The Institute for 21st Century Questions. He was nominated for the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize for his worldwide work on the education and youth crises coming out of the pandemic period.
Now that the applause has faded, let me speak to a capital incoherence in the “middle power” thesis recently articulated by Prime Minister Mark Carney at Davos, Switzerland.
In 2019, I was our country’s most vocal opponent of the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA), arguing that it created a vassal state of the world’s second largest country. Article 32.10, now quite topical, was little discussed or understood back then, but it was a clear attempt by Washington to exercise a veto on Canada’s future attempts to develop advanced economic relations with other major powers (and not just China!).
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As we signed and ratified the USMCA under massive American pressure and with precious little parliamentary or national debate on the details, we today face Trump 2.0 not as a “middle power,” but as a country vassalized at law and in strategic reputation.
For all his pathologies, U.S. President Donald Trump’s debasement of our country and our leaders is a direct function of his firm belief that he succeeded in vassalizing us, and that we signed on as a happy, even unwitting vassal. He now comes into the USMCA review period as predator. The shark and remora may live side by side in amity – as it were – unless and until the shark suddenly decides to eat the remora.
Mr. Carney’s project now comes into sharper relief: It must not be to sing the praises of a Canadian “middle powerdom” that does not exist, but instead to de-vassalize our country – to restore the independence of our decision-making (externally and domestically) and institutions, and to refashion our economy, reputation and strategic capabilities such that Canada, coming out of the terrible crises of the pandemic period, may be at least as successful this century as it was in the last.
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If Canada is not presently a middle power, what will it be tomorrow? Answer: Either a deeper vassal still or, far more preferably, a great power in its own right. The fork in the road is that sharp for our country.
If Mr. Carney fails in resisting Mr. Trump – if he signs another bad deal, conceding to hyper-extortionary asks or terms (on resources, territory, military bases, external relations or domestic policy reforms that undermine national unity or social cohesion) – then Canada’s vassalization will not only be deep, but likely irreparable and irreversible. Any moves to annex Canada would have similar vassalizing consequences for us. So too would perfidious initiatives by the Trump team and its proxies to advance secessionist causes in Alberta, Quebec and other parts of the Canadian federation.
On the other hand, the very process of resisting (and surviving!) Mr. Trump – if successful – could lay the groundwork for a Canadian great power. After all, we are surrounded on all sides today by the greatest powers in the world – America to the south, China to the west, Russia across the Arctic, and Europe to the east. I call this environment “ACRE” – America-China-Russia-Europe; or Canada’s four-point strategic or geopolitical game. If one does the math, this makes for 15 combinations of pressures and pulls from all sides across our gigantic territory by these gigantic neighbours (all of them nuclear powers!).
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A country surrounded by three or four great powers cannot, structurally, be a middle power. Full stop. Nay, it can only be a vassal state (and not just to America!) or, by virtue of surviving this wicked four-point, 15-combination game, a great power in its own right.
Mr. Trump’s annexation threats to Greenland – and to Canada – now come into sharper relief. America is not a full-on Arctic power. Canada is. American annexation of any parts of the Canadian (or Greenlandic) Arctic would seal our fate as vassals for the coming decades. We have good reasons to resist and fight for our lives – for our own future will be great and powerful.