Despite US-Canada tensions, it’s business as usual at NORAD

WASHINGTON – Diplomatic relations between the U.S. and Canada have been unusually tense. But in the missile silos and command centers of NORAD it’s still business as usual, according to current and former personnel.

Over the last year, President Donald Trump has tried to impose oppressive tariffs on Canada, mused about annexing and belittled its prime ministers as mere “governors” of the 51st state. The backlash up north propelled Prime Minister Mark Carney’s come-from-behind win last April. 

“We are in the midst of a rupture,” Carney said in Davos, Switzerland, in January, days after a visit to Beijing, where he announced a new strategic partnership with China on trade, clean technology and energy.

“They should be grateful to us,” Trump responded the next day. “Canada lives because of the United States. Remember that, Mark.”

Last summer, 59% of Canadians polled by the Pew Research Center named the U.S. as the country that poses the biggest threat. A Politico survey in February found that just 37% of Canadians still view the U.S. as an ally.

That’s a remarkable state of affairs for partners in the North American Aerospace Defense Command, the world’s only binational military command.

“NORAD serves as a reminder that we’re stronger together,” said retired U.S. Air Force Gen. Glen VanHerck, who led NORAD and U.S. Northern Command from 2020 to 2024. “We’re safer together, despite political tension, which is inevitable.”

Gen. Gregory Guillot, who assumed command in 2024, assured a House committee last April, when tensions were high between the two governments, that unit cohesion remained “as strong as ever.”

NORAD was created in 1958 to protect the continent against Soviet nuclear attack. It still uses Cheyenne Mountain, though headquarters have shifted to nearby Peterson Space Force Base, which it shares with NORTHCOM.

The arrangement was made permanent in 2006. Either country could terminate it with 12 months notice, though until recently that was unthinkable on either side of the 49th parallel.

Approximately 4,800 personnel play a role supporting NORAD’s mission, of which about 1,100 are Canadian, according to NORAD spokesman Capt. Chris Dubé of the Canadian Armed Forces. 

“NORAD continues to demonstrate its ability to effectively defend Canada and the United States through real-world responses and exercises and operations that strengthen our partnership and readiness,” he said by email. 

Secretary of State Marco Rubio has sought repeatedly to take the edge off the president’s rhetoric. In December, for instance, he emphasized that Canada and Mexico are natural U.S. allies because “they face the same threats that we do.” 

But some of the political tension has involved the military alliance, in particular a recent dust-up over Canadian orders for U.S.-made stealth fighters.

But Trump has largely kept NORAD out of the mix as he’s pressured Canada over trade and other issues – and with good reason. His vision for a “Golden Dome” missile defense system would be far harder to deliver without Canada’s cooperation. 

The president’s most recent public comments involving NORAD revolved around the holiday ritual of tracking Santa Claus.

“We track Santa all over the world,” he said from Mar-a-Lago on Christmas Eve. “We want to make sure that he’s not infiltrated, that we’re not infiltrating into our country a bad Santa.”

Continental defense

Recent NORAD missions involved exercises in Alaska and Greenland, working closely with Denmark, despite that kingdom’s “fundamental disagreement” with Trump over his desire to acquire the territory.

On Feb. 19, NORAD detected five Russian aircraft operating in the Alaskan Air Defense Identification Zone. The command intercepted, identified and escorted the aircraft.

Russian and Chinese air and sea activity in the Arctic grew dramatically in 2025, Guillot told Canadian broadcaster CBC in January. Submarines from those countries have been detected along the North American coasts with increasing frequency, he told a House Armed Services Committee hearing last April. 

In the last 14 months, NORAD responded to 19 Russian aircraft in the Alaskan ADIZ and performed 55 intercepts of aircraft violating flight restrictions in the U.S. and Canada,  “demonstrating seamless, real‑time binational coordination,” according to Dubé.

Last May, the Defense Intelligence Agency issued an assessment supporting the need for Golden Dome based on the likely development of hypersonic missiles and other threats by China, Russia, North Korea and Iran over the next decade.

“It is a very sobering picture, and this is the raison d’etre of NORAD,” said Andrea Charron, director of the Centre for Defense and Security Studies at the University of Manitoba. “We’re in more risk now than we ever were in during the Cold War, because we now have not just one adversary, we have multiple adversaries who are gaining peer military skills and capabilities.”

Golden Dome proposal

It’s hard to see how Trump’s vision of a Golden Dome missile defense system comes to fruition without Canadian cooperation and NORAD’s objective to detect threats.

“That’s a NORAD mission,” VanHerck said. “So the question becomes, ‘Where do they put the command and control for that?’”

At a congressional hearing last May, Guillot said NORAD would be integral to Golden Dome’s layered approach, focusing on the detection and tracking aspect of the system.

Trump put the cost of developing and deploying a space-based detection and interception system at $175 billion last May.

A report by Todd Harrison from the American Enterprise Institute puts the cost of the Golden Dome initiative and its goals at $3.6 trillion over 20 years. 

The Pentagon budget signed in December includes $23 billion for development work. 

In a Truth Social post last May, Trump said he wants Canada to contribute $61 billion “if they remain a separate, but unequal, Nation” – though he offered to waive that if Canada agrees to be absorbed into the U.S. as the 51st state.

“They are considering the offer!” he asserted.

That $61 billion is a third larger than Canada’s annual defense budget.

The cost and engineering challenges make Golden Dome’s goals unrealistic, Charron said: “Golden Dome is on a level of ambition that is perhaps problematic.”

Canada rejected a U.S. missile defense program in 2005, citing concerns about sovereignty and strategic stability. 

But defense minister David McGuinty removed restrictions on air and missile defense in July.

“The door really is open to having an integrated air and missile defense system with the U.S.,” Charron said. “There will likely be … a combination of these integrated systems, of which NORAD will be an important part.”

Friction points

Canada’s losses to the U.S. in the finals of both men’s and women’s hockey at the Winter Olympics left some raw emotions for Canadians against its neighbor.

The White House posted an image on X of a bald eagle attacking a Canada goose after the men’s final.

Shortly after taking office, Trump imposed 25% tariffs on most Canadian imports. He quickly doubled the tariff on steel and aluminum to 50%. Canada countered with 25% tariffs that it later rolled back for most imports.

Some $2.6 billion of goods and services crossed the border every day in 2024. Each country is the other’s biggest trading partner in most years. So the trade war has imposed pain on both sides.

After the U.S. Supreme Court struck down Trump’s global tariffs Feb. 20, the administration imposed a new 10% tariff that applies to Canadian imports.

Trump’s attacks on the country’s dignity and economy have alienated Canadians. Cross-border tourism has dropped sharply, and calls to boycott U.S. travel have been widespread.

Military production

Defense spending is a friction point. 

Current U.S. spending for NORAD – or overall investment compared to Canada – is not publicly available. 

But Canada is one of the NATO allies Trump has accused of contributing less than its fair share to that alliance. 

NATO countries set a target in 2006 for each member to spend 2% of GDP on defense. Canada has fallen short every year since then. Stephen Fuhr, Canada’s secretary of state for defense procurement, vowed to hit the 2% target in the current fiscal year by boosting defense spending by CAD$9.3 billion, to nearly CAD$63 billion (about $46 billion in U.S. dollars).

In 2022, Canada committed to spending CAD$38.6 billion over 20 years (about US$30 billion) to modernize NORAD radars, surveillance technology and fighter aircraft weaponry. 

In March 2025, Carney announced a collaboration with Australia to develop radar technology valued at CAD$6 billion for early warning and long surveillance for NORAD. 

Canada has been buying 70% of its weapons from U.S. suppliers. But as part of the pivot away from reliance on the U.S., a defense industry strategy published in February revealed that Canada intends to divert billions to domestic suppliers. The move is expected to create 125,000 jobs in Canada.

Trade tensions prompted the Carney government to rethink a plan to buy 88 F-35 Lightning II jets. The U.S. and 19 other countries fly the stealth fighter made by Lockheed Martin. 

The U.S. ambassador to Ottawa, Pete Hoekstra, warned that scaling back the purchase would impact NORAD.

“NORAD would have to be altered,” Hoekstra told CBC in January during a stop at Luke Air Force Base in Arizona, adding that if Canada doesn’t have enough F-35s to patrol its own airspace, the U.S. would have to send patrols across the border.

“If Canada is no longer going to provide that, then we have to fill those gaps,” he said.

James Fergusson, deputy director of the Centre for Defense and Security Studies at the University of Manitoba, noted that Canadian suppliers sell key components for the F-35. So, if Canada buys fewer planes, the U.S. would turn to suppliers in such places as the United Kingdom or Norway.

“What’s going to happen is that Canadian suppliers involved in the consortium are going to be pushed out,” Fergusson said. 

Canada moved forward with the F-35 contract, purchasing 30 so far. But Canada is reviewing the remainder of the agreement, prompted not only by tensions with the U.S. but an auditor general report showing that cost overruns had driven up the price of 88 jets by 50%, from CAD$19 billion expected in 2023 to more than CAD$28 billion. 

The U.S. will be watching Canada closely for follow-through on the investment in NORAD modernization and the F-35s, Fergusson said. 

“If Canada does not follow through, and we have a history of not following through, that could raise serious questions to the United States about the utility of NORAD,” he said. “Not that NORAD would go away, but it would be marginalized.” 

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