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US, Canada make security pact
Agreement allows Washington to send troops over border
By Colin Nickerson, Globe Staff
MONTREAL - A pact signed by Ottawa and Washington yesterday may allow for the deployment of United States armed forces on Canadian soil in the event of a terrorist attack or other large-scale emergency. Although billed by Canadian authorities as a sort of mutual assistance program between good neighbors, the agreement comes as this country's armed forces are teetering toward insolvency and so reduced in size and firepower that Canada, which played a heroic role in crushing Nazi Germany, is considered incapable today of fighting even a small conflict on its own behalf. Neither do most military analysts consider Canada any longer capable of contributing in an important way as a military ally of the United States or Britain in overseas operations. The agreement created a joint planning group that will spell out standards for ''cross-border'' military operations in the event of a terrorist attack or other calamity. The pact means that for the first time Ottawa has agreed, in principle, that US troops could enter Canadian territory to assist police and firefighters in an emergency - a notion that would have been nearly unthinkable prior to the Sept. 11 attacks against the World Trade Center and Pentagon. The plan is highly controversial in a country sensitive to any sacrifice of sovereignty to its superpower neighbor. But Defense Minister John McCallum said at a news conference in Ottawa that Canada has little choice but to work closely with the United States. The pact, he said, ''puts us in a position to work with the United States on plans to defend North America - plans the United States would otherwise be developing without us.''

*****WTF??? I gave Ottawa more credit than they obviously deserved...At this rate, the new nation of the United States of North America will exist within 5 years. Mexico is next...Dubya even speaks the language like an immigrant...*****

posted by A Curmudgeon 1:08 PM