Canada-US on the brink of war?

[vaskidmark]

http://www.macleans.ca/news/canada/the-tiny-islands-where-canada-and-america-are-at-war/

Canada is one wrong move away from a border war with the United States—if you believe a group of boiling-mad Maine lobstermen. Unfathomable as armed conflict between Canada and the United States seems, if it’s going to happen, it will be in the ocean between Maine and New Brunswick, where two tiny, treeless islands—North Rock and Machias Seal—are the last remaining disputed lands between the two countries.

The islands have no obvious value. They aren’t strategically located for military purposes and there are no natural resources to be mined. In fact, the islands’ primary residents are 5,800 pairs of nesting puffins. However, the waters around the islands, known by locals as “the grey zone,” because both Canada and the U.S. claim that part of the ocean, contain a lucrative lobster fishery.

The conflict bubbles to the surface every few years, when a bellicose lobsterman on one side or the other gets quoted in the press and sets the other side off. But things are different this year. Due to the high price of lobster, new lobstermen have entered the fray, and they are ignoring unwritten rules that have kept the conflict on a low simmer since 1783. Most of the American lobstermen are from the Maine coast bordering the grey zone, and most of the Canadians are from Grand Manan Island. Both sides admit they have a few hotheads they keep an eye on, but the new lobstermen aren’t from either community, so there is no one to talk them out of rocking the boat.

“Somebody is going to get killed. We’ve had bad years in the past and got lucky, but this is the worst year I’ve ever seen,” says American John Drouin, chair of the Maine Lobster Zone Council district in charge of the grey zone. Drouin fears things are even more dangerous than they were eight years ago, when Maine lobsterman Patrick Feeney had his thumb ripped off. It got caught as he was trying to free his equipment while jostling with a Canadian for territory. Laurence Cook, chair of the Grand Manan Fishermen’s Association’s committee in charge of the grey zone, echoes Drouin’s sentiment. “You can work with some people, but there are a**holes on both sides of the border who take things too far,” says Cook, who received a death threat in 2002.

Both the Department of Foreign Affairs and the U.S. State Department are quick to assert their claim to the disputed islands. “Canada’s sovereignty over the area has a strong foundation in international law, stemming from 1621,” says Nicolas Doire, a spokesperson for the Department of Foreign Affairs. His sentiments are echoed by Katherine Pfaff, spokesperson for the U.S. State Department: “Our long-standing position is that the Machias Seal Island belongs to the United States by virtue of the 1783 Treaty of Peace.” When asked what their countries were doing to actually resolve the conflict, neither offered an answer.

Now I'm not generally inclined to give  up territory for any reason, but in this case I'd be willing to let John Kerry step into the ring against that Nicolas Doire fellow to settle the matter once and for all.  (Well, no, not once and for all.  Maybe two out of three.  Three out of five?)

stay safe.

[Andiron]

Nice if the lobster fishing community could quietly deep six any ahole that went too far,  and go back to detant.  Policing their own and all that.

[Tallpine]

Do we have an exit strategy  

I'm not sure this "nation building" thing will work in a place like Canada  

[SADShooter]

Lobsterbacks, again? I thought we solved this problem a long time ago.

[cordex]

War. War never changes.

[230RN]

Interesting:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_areas_disputed_by_Canada_and_the_United_States

(This link has coordinates if you want to map the area.)

I guess they've already deep-sixed somebody's thumb?

[lupinus]

So what would this be good for?

[RoadKingLarry]

We need to send Kerry to negotiate a settlement, maybe he can offer to give Detroit and Chicago to Canada in exchange for them not invading us.

[Stand_watie]

http://www.macleans.ca/news/canada/the-tiny-islands-where-canada-and-america-are-at-war/

Now I'm not generally inclined to give  up territory for any reason, but in this case I'd be willing to let John Kerry step into the ring against that Nicolas Doire fellow to settle the matter once and for all.  (Well, no, not once and for all.  Maybe two out of three.  Three out of five?)

stay safe.

Who has more guns Canadian or Maine lobstermen

and "The islands have no obvious value.... contain a lucrative lobster fishery."  Not obvious to who? There are people in the world who don't know the north atlantic seaboard is a valuable resource (not just lobster by far)? I guess they think lobster is grown in a tank out behind the grocery store.

That gives me an idea, I wonder if there is such a thing as salt water fish farming

[Stand_watie]

We need to send Kerry to negotiate a settlement, maybe he can offer to give Detroit and Chicago to Canada in exchange for them not invading us.

You forgot Cleveland.

[Stand_watie]

You forgot Cleveland.

And Gary

[French G.]

Let's make a deal eh? You Canucks can have the islands but you have to keep John Kerry too.

[K Frame]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOR38552MJA

and, of course...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4WcOcgc3WN4

[Strings]

Can we give them the UP, too? Pretty please?

[just Warren]

On the plus side i there's a chance for this to happen:

"Admiral, the enemy has thrown something into the water near our ship! Is it a mine?"

"It's a trap!"

Can we give them the UP, too? Pretty please?

What? No way, dude. For about a year I worked with an UP-per. The guy was one of the funniest, greatest people I've ever met. I assume they're all like that.