In Fallout season two, episode seven, we got a sneak peek into something I wasn’t sure the TV series would touch on: the relationship between the United States and Canada before the bombs dropped in the Great War. Sit down with me, friends, and let’s talk about the US’ annexation of Canada in Fallout‘s lore. This is a horror story, so grab your blankies.
The United States Occupies Canada in Fallout‘s World
In the opening of Fallout 1, we’re shown a US propaganda film. In said film, there’s footage of a US soldier in full Power Armor. Before him is a Canadian civilian, on his knees and bound at the wrists. The soldier executes him in the middle of the street. He then laughs and waves at the camera. This chilling imagery exemplifies the dynamic between the United States and Canada in Fallout—it wasn’t just one innocent with a gun to his head. The whole of Canada had a gun to its head. Its military could not and did not stand up to the will of the United States in this version of history. What started as a consensual deal to manage the front in Alaska in Fallout quickly morphed into a full-scale military occupation by the US.
Let’s talk about how it happened.
The Resource Wars Began an International Conflict
The wars to end the world started as resource wars, first between Europe and the Middle East, then between America and China, sparking the Sino-American war. In the Fallout universe, things like wind power, hydroelectric, and solar weren’t relied upon the way they are in our world. Renewable energy found a home in the apocalypse—Hoover Dam powers the NCR-occupied portions of the Mojave, as well as the Vegas Strip, per their standing deal with House circa 2276. Acadia, an all-synth settlement in Maine, operates a wind farm to provide its residents with power. As the player character in Fallout 4, you can even build windmill generators yourself. But in the 21st century? It was drill, drill, drill and mine, mine, mine.
It’s often speculated that in the Fallout timeline, transistors were not invented until the 2060s. In our world, they came about in 1947. Development teams across Interplay, Bethesda, and Obsidian have not confirmed nor denied this. But the theory explains why so much of the tech in Fallout is hulking and bulky. It’s why cell phones don’t exist. It’s also why the internet doesn’t exist in the traditional sense, just client terminals hooked up to independent mainframes and networks.
Canada Retained Resources, so It Was in Trouble on Fallout
When humanity hunted for greater power in our world, as East and West disarmed from the edge of nuclear war, we (at least in part) reached for renewable resources. In Fallout, the United States needed oil and uranium because the infrastructure of its country, and more importantly, its military, was utterly dependent upon it. Instead of changing, they waged war on the world. The Chinese were the enemy, sure—but so was anyone else in the United States’ way. Like Canada. Canada, a country that was still rich in uranium deposits and untapped oil in Fallout‘s world, soon got caught in the United States’ crosshairs and greed.
The Anchorage Front Line Forced Canada to Let the United States Military Enter Its Borders in Fallout
Speaking of oil, Alaska’s rich oil fields became a key target in the Sino-American War. To reinforce and defend these vital reserves, the United States established the Anchorage Front Line. In Fallout‘s history, the United States increased its military presence significantly, fortifying a defense system that could keep Canada safe from the encroaching threat of the People’s Republic of China. The United States began to pressure Canada to allow the US military to guard the Alaskan pipeline. Tensions rose between Canada and the United States in Fallout, as you can imagine.
Just as the Chinese spread up through Russia like an infection in Fallout‘s timeline, across the sea, the United States was doing the exact same thing to Canada. In the end, only Alaska would separate them. That, and a whole lot of ocean. Damn, Disco Elysium was right, geopolitical conflict IS always about mineral rights.
Operation: Anchorage lasted eleven long, long years. While the initial surge of troops left the Chinese with plenty of forward operating bases and land, they weren’t able to resist the might of the US military indefinitely, especially once T45 Power Armor was introduced to the troops. I know Cooper thinks it’s the shits, but it was the edge they needed to turn the tide permanently. A mainland invasion of China swiftly followed after they were pushed out of Alaska. The bombs fell not long after.
In Fallout, The United States Quietly Began Its Annexation of Canada Without Permission
But forget China! We were talking about Canada. Once Canadian leaders gave in to rising pressures from the United States and allowed the military to set up outposts along the Alaskan Pipeline in Fallout, it was already over. The subtle annexation of Canada by the United States had begun in earnest. Once the war was truly underway in Fallout, the United States escalated its military presence in Canada tenfold, with the goal of mutual defense. Supposedly.
The United States seized control of Canadian resources in order to fund the war effort in Fallout. Vast stretches of timberland were destroyed, other resources in Canada were stretched to the breaking point. Many Americans refer to Canada as Little America (LITTLE? Have you SEEN Canada?). Widespread Canadian protests went unheard. Even in the US, protests broke out, with people standing up for the rights and well-being of their neighbors to the North.
The United States didn’t care.
The Annexation of Canada in Fallout
Canadian rebel forces grew with time in Fallout‘s history, but they didn’t have one-hundredth of the manpower needed to take on an occupying force the size of the one the United States had in Canada. Any attempt at resistance was a desperate effort that almost always ended in tragedy. Just ask Overseer Steph’s Mom. Oh, wait, you can’t, she’s dead.
Tensions boiled over into violence after an attempted sabotage of the Alaskan Pipeline by unknown forces. The discovery of this ‘mysterious plot’ gave the US the last excuse it needed to fully annex Canada in Fallout. Context clues would perhaps imply that this was an inside job. American troops began seizing control of Canadian infrastructure and resources. Canadian cities quickly fell under martial law, with American troops patrolling the streets. Canada was no longer a sovereign nation. The United States had annexed Canada.
The official annexation of Canada by the US began in 2072 in Fallout. When the Canadian resistance cells joined forces into a cohesive movement and started their campaign of sabotage and guerrilla warfare, the United States responded with an abundance of force. People were put down in the streets like dogs for perceived disobedience.
The text in the propaganda film preceding the scene I mentioned is as follows:
“Our dedicated boys keep the peace in newly annexed Canada.”
And we’re back to the start.
Canada’s Annexation Was Horrifying
Pictures of these atrocities made their way to the United States, even without the help of the internet or the 24-hour news cycle. Civil unrest reaches an all-time high in the United States, ending in riots and mass killings of protestors. By 2077, the annexation of Canada was complete in Fallout‘s world. Canada ceased to exist as an independent nation. Canadian provinces became US territories. It was stated that any protestors or resistance members would be shot on sight. The United States gained valuable land, resources, and infrastructure.
During the intro sequence for Fallout, you can see a sign at the border that declares “The Big 51” — presumably a new nickname for Canada. I guess it’s better than Little America? The bodies of murdered mounties can be seen dangling from it.
Uranium Fever Has Done and Got Me Down
Fallout does love to create twisted reflections of the real world. In Fallout season two, we see Steph and others escaping from the “Uranium City” Internment Camp in Canada. Uranium City is actually a real place, actually, in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan. North of Lake Athabasca and Beaverlodge Lake, Uranium City sits on Martin Lake, at the mouth of the Fredette River. The site of the town was discovered in 1949 by S. Kaiman, while he was doing research on nuclear materials for El Dorado Mining and Refining, a crown company handling the uranium mining operations in the region. Uranium City itself was founded in 1952 to serve the mines in the Beaverlodge Uranium Area.
A concerted effort was made to move miners’ living quarters from the El Dorado camp to Uranium City in 1960. It was a thriving town up until 1982, with a population approaching 2,500 and infrastructure planned to support 5,000. However, the closure of the mines that year led to total economic collapse that resulted in the departure of most of its residents.
In other words, Uranium City is a uranium boomtown, phased out when all of that juicy ore had been sucked from the earth with an industrial straw. And, in the Fallout universe, it’s a work camp for political dissidents in Canada. Or maybe random Canadians (who were physically able) were taken from their homes and forced to work the mines. I suspect we may find out more as Stephanie begins to truly unravel, and we learn about her dark and difficult past.
Canada in Fallout Season 2
Speaking of, for now, we get merely a glimpse of the horrors that Stephanie and other Canadians went through after America annexed Canada in Fallout season two. And that leads us to the best of all Fallout lines, when Steph’s mother tells her, “Don’t think of them as human beings, think of them as Americans.” It’s clear the horrors in Steph’s past are still with her, and she’s still running and running through that snow, trying to escape the Americans who have invaded Canada and ruined her life. But horrors have a way of begetting horrors. America’s annexation of Canada in Fallout may seem like a global atrocity, but we bet it’ll end with pain for everyone on a very personal level. And that’s what Fallout is so good at showing us.
Fallout season two is streaming now on Prime Video.