I don't understand why you'd work so hard to deny the obvious.
The US multiple invasion attempts, despite failure after failure, demonstrate the strength of our Founders' motivation to conquer Canada.
How can that be anything less than obvious?
Sure, you can say: it wasn't Canada they wanted, only to defeat the British army.
But do you not understand, without a British army there in 1812, there literally was no "Canada" -- it was all just empty territory with no government and very little population.
If the US had defeated the Brits in Canada in 1812 -- especially after our Founders had tried so hard during the Revolutionary War to conquer or negotiate ownership of Canada -- whatever can you imagine they would have done with Canada?
Seriously, what?
Castlebar: "do you honestly think acquisition of bases on North Africa and in Western Europe was a war aim indeceber 1941?"
Of course not, but Canada in 1812 was a vastly different situation.
And the point of mentioning US bases in North Africa and Europe -- since you brought up the subject -- was to demonstrate how victory in battle can produce numerous benefits, that is, if you consider the cost of constant military vigilance a "benefit".
And, by the way, the US did maintain bases in France for about 20 years after the war.
It was interesting to see that the Articles of Confederation explicitly had provisions to admit Canada to our union, but that was not true of the Constitution.
The war of 1812 was supported by a coalition, a substantial part of which hoped to annex Canada. From a naval perspective, operations across the Atlantic without a base would have been very different, and there was some concern that so long as Britain had a forward base, independence was at risk.
Pardon me for not copying, pasting, and italicizing your last post, but I think the majority of posters on this thread are here to debate slavery/Civil war vs our Second War of Independence.
First I do not agree that your point -which I take to be, that the War of 1812 was a war launched by the United States to conquer and annex Canada - is “obvious.” I do, however, agree with your point that Canada was not a real country, but simply the area occupied by 1) the British army 2) the remnant of New France and 3) those citizens of the United States who, in 1783, could not bear to live under a self-governing republic and followed whatever internal compass they had to a land where loyalty to a monarchy suited them.
Secondly, you err in stating that our invasions were all failures. Our invasions won the war for us; particularly the spectacularly successful invasion that at lead the British-Shawnee catastrophe at Moraviantown. That was the decisive land battle of the war.
Finally, your question was “what could possibly be the fate of any part of Canada, invaded and held by the United States, other than annexation?” Fortunately there is unambiguous historical answer to this. In 1748, Americans (NOT BRITISH MILITARY; AMERICANS) invaded the most brilliantly designed fortress in the hemisphere at Louisbourg. We took it; and to settle the War of the Austrian succession – the only on of the “French and Indian Wars" that France arguably “won”, it was returned to France in exchange for concessions on other war aims. That was how war was conducted in those days. We wanted to keep the Northwest Territories (and the last-held British war demand at the negotiating table, before our brilliant successes in the Autumn of 1814 forced theme to capitulate, was that we NOT keep the Northwest territories.)
Pardon me for not copying, pasting, and italicizing your last post, but I think the majority of posters on this thread are here to debate slavery/Civil war vs our Second War of Independence.
First I do not agree that your point -which I take to be, that the War of 1812 was a war launched by the United States to conquer and annex Canada - is “obvious.” I do, however, agree with your point that Canada was not a real country, but simply the area occupied by 1) the British army 2) the remnant of New France and 3) those citizens of the United States who, in 1783, could not bear to live under a self-governing republic and followed whatever internal compass they had to a land where loyalty to a monarchy suited them.
Secondly, you err in stating that our invasions were all failures. Our invasions won the war for us; particularly the spectacularly successful invasion that at lead the British-Shawnee catastrophe at Moraviantown. That was the decisive land battle of the war.
Finally, your question was “what could possibly be the fate of any part of Canada, invaded and held by the United States, other than annexation?” Fortunately there is unambiguous historical answer to this. In 1748, Americans (NOT BRITISH MILITARY; AMERICANS) invaded the most brilliantly designed fortress in the hemisphere at Louisbourg. We took it; and to settle the War of the Austrian succession – the only on of the “French and Indian Wars" that France arguably “won”, it was returned to France in exchange for concessions on other war aims. That was how war was conducted in those days. We wanted to keep the Northwest Territories (and the last-held British war demand at the negotiating table, before our brilliant successes in the Autumn of 1814 forced theme to capitulate, was that we NOT keep the Northwest territories.)