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Canada Will Not Be Returning to the U.S. ‘Fold’

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BREAKING NEWS:

Canada has made its choice for the future, and it is clear, that it is not the U.S.A.

By Photomotoman

Political Editorial Opinion

Today, four days before the mid-term election in the United States of America, the U.S. announced today that it has decided to increase its attacks on Canada’s sovereignty and our economy by adding hundreds of more products to those it already illegally imposed on Canada, when it placed 50% tariffs on a huge number of Canadian products, which began on August 22nd, and will be added to on January 1st, 2027. This was, once again, completely an American unilateral action, as Canada has not retaliated, since matching America’s tariff on 28 billion dollars of Canadian products imposed on Canada, illegally on August 22nd, 2026, by the United States.

Seeing as Canadians are not sheep, returning to the fold is of no interest, and works against Canada’s sovereignty.

So, in response to U.S. threats, tariff coercion, extortion, and threats of annexation, Canada has decided to commit to join the EU in the closest conceivable relationship ever experienced by any nation going forward. The nomenclature for this new ‘special’ relationship, as characterized by the European Union, means that Canada is the only nation at the present that has been awarded this status. What is even more surprising is that the actions by the United States to impose ever more tariffs, constraints and restrictions on Canada, has only increased Prime Minister Carney’s popularity, (80%) and for the Canadian populace, cemented the determination of Canadians, Canadian companies, investors and international actors in their supports and their commitments to make the ‘associate membership’ for Canada real and permanent, not for two years, – but for generations.

The rational for doing so should be obvious to anyone, even Americans, whose hubris overrides America’s ability to reason or be rational in response. I am quite sure that as American companies, particularly in the ‘service’ sector realize that Canadian and the European Union’s sovereignty is ‘the’ primary consideration for its citizens, that at some point, Americans will awake to the reality going forward, that is of their own making. The sale, subscriptions and once clients of U.S. products, particularly in AI, data storage, cloud services, software, quantum computing, computer chips, and all associated computer products to its former customers, is about to decrease abruptly, and likely end in the future.

Americans seem to be ignorant of the fact that 50% of U.S. GDP in relation to ‘services’, which accounts for 80% of U.S. GDP, comes from the sale of ‘services’ to foreign buyers, the bulk of those sales from the EU and Canada. And now, Canada and the EU have not only funded sovereign systems, but mandated their use going forward if they do business with either governmental bodies. This relates to everything in the previous paragraph being built either in the EU or Canada, from data centres to AI infrastructure and quantum technologies. That means ‘no sales’ of U.S. AI, cloud, software, chips, and all computer services. That is going to bite, hard. It is now a national project of interest required by the Government of Canada. Sovereignty demands it.

Today, Canada announced a groundbreaking “Alliance for the Future” establishing Canada as the EU’s first “associate member.” This is not traditional EU membership but creates unprecedented integration across six strategic sectors:

• Digital Infrastructure: Sovereign cloud, compute infrastructure, data, AI models and software

• Quantum technologies

• Semiconductors

• Critical raw materials and supply chains

• Clean energy and cleantech

• Pharmaceuticals

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Key elements include a new Canada-EU digital Trade Agreement, (Canada’s first dedicated digital trade pact), Canada joining the European High-Performance Computing Joint Undertaking (access to the JUPITER supercomputer), and participation in Horizon Europe research programs.

Americans still do not seem to understand that this is not an attempt at exercising leverage in relation to future CUSMA talks, (which has already been completely abrogated by the U.S.). Rather, it is a permanent rupture in our relationship that touches every facet of the former relationship. Canadians do indeed support breaking with the United States, as America cannot be trusted.

The Canada-EU Digital Trade Agreement promotes interoperability of emerging AI models, digital regulatory frameworks, and reciprocal market access for cloud and AI services, which means:

• U.S. tech companies operating in both markets could face divergent regulatory requirements

• Canadian data hosting and cloud services increasingly aligned with EU standards (GDPR, AI Act, Data Governance Act)

• Reduced reliance on U.S. hyperscalers (AWS, Azure, Google Cloud) as trusted sovereign infrastructure develops jointly with Europe.

Canadians understand that the U.S. may not like this reality, this future. But the United States created this situation. America decided to economically attack Canada, to denigrate international trade law, even its own laws. America’s actions were meant to coerce Canada into subjugation, where the United States would in effect design Canada’s foreign policy to promote American control and that of America’s plutocrats and kleptocrats who now control the GOP and the Republican Party in the United States.

Let me be blunt. We are not only not interested, but we will also over the next ten years, create our own independent future, without the United States based on the interests and to the benefit of Canadians, in concert with the European Union. Free trade and the enhancement of our already close relationship will supplant most of the ‘relationship’ that once existed between Canada and the U.S.

Trust is an imperative, and in relation to the United States of America, there is none. Our futures will not converge again, they will diverge. And so it is that Canadian supply chains are adjusting to America’s attacks against Canada. For semiconductor and quantum technology specifically, this builds parallel supply chains not dependent on U.S. export controls or technology transfer restrictions.

In the short-term, Canadians expect an irrational response from a United States intent on Hemispheric hegemony. Those actions will only further convince Canadians to double down on Canada’s future actions. I have no doubt that data flows will be routed through sovereign infrastructure rather than U.S. cloud providers. Research and Development will increase substantively with Horizon Europe, and Canadians standards will adhere to EU-Canada frameworks, not U.S. industry standards.

Uncertainties

Canada is now on a path to ‘associate membership’ with the European Union, officially. Canada, in three months, will complete with the EU the exact meaning and any ramifications for every facet of the permanent relationship with the European Union. In six months, another meeting will be held in Canada with EU’s parliamentarians and leaders to initiate actions that will create the formal relationship, going forward.

America may not like the outcomes that evolve from its unilateral actions and choices, suggesting that such actions contravene the USMCA. As farcical as any such response may be, (seeing that the United States broke the agreement by imposing tariffs in the first place), Canada, is moving on. The United States does not decide Canada’s foreign policy.

The Bottom Line and the Future

This is a strategic rebalancing by Canada toward Europe at a moment of strained U.S.-Canada relations. Whether it becomes a bargaining chip to reduce U.S. tariff threats or triggers greater friction depends on Washington. Canada wants a trade-relationship without imposing exorbitant tariffs on Canada, and if such becomes reality, then an accommodation will be found.

However, the United States should be under no illusions, the structural shift by Canada in relation to its future digital and technological orientation is real and will reshape trade dynamics for the near future. Canada is committed to ending all forms of dependency on the United States, be that in relation to military procurement, the delivery of services, computers, AI, data storage, cloud services, software and in all the related aforementioned areas of technology and innovation.

Trust in the United States and the willingness to maintain a ‘relationship’ has never been of less interest to any Canadian government or most Canadians. We have no interest or wish in ever being aligned with the current or any future U.S. administration, as there is no guarantee that the word and any agreements with the United States will ever be adhered to.

The U.S.A., stated that it needed nothing from the world. It had everything it needs. Well, being ostracized and kept out of future free trade markets is going to mean that America will find out what happens when 80% of its GDP is dependent on the sale and adoption of its ‘services’, when it loses 50% of that GDP because it came from foreign sales, which will increasingly diminish over the next five years.

America doubled down on protectionism and tariffs. When you receive nothing from other democracies it will become isolation and being ostracized. The world is organizing into blocs. BRICS, the Middle Power’s Democracies, and the U.S.A., by itself. Without allies, without friends, without trade partners, – that is America’s future, diminished.

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Photomotoman B.A., M.P.A.
Photomotoman B.A., M.P.A.

Written by Photomotoman B.A., M.P.A.

Photomotoman, BA, MPA. Retired Director of Emergency Services, former part-time academIc, avid motorcyclist, photographer, aerial videographer and vlogger.