What threat was Canada so afraid of that the government felt the need to constantly produce human death machines?
"Holy Crap, Quebec is getting uppity again, let's coat another mutant in adamantium!"
One explanation is that Canada needed its own meta-human defenders. This was, of course, the reason why Canada's own Alpha Flight was formed. But Weapon X had a different purpose. It was supposed to create unstoppable assassins. Work by writers like Larry Hama, Grant Morrisson, and Frank Tieri has muddied the waters in terms of the purpose of Weapon X and why it was built. Based on divergent histories, Weapon X may have been a subdivision of the CIA, a covert operations training program, or an offshoot of a counter-mutant program developed by sentient bacteria. That's right, I actually typed that sentence.
Regardless, someone in the Canadian government was still there to provide funding for Weapon X, whatever its intended purpose may have been. And I'm sure they had to receive progress reports such as: "We created a supersoldier with a healing ability and an indestructible skeleton. And he was really cool. But then he killed all of the scientists and the guards... and he's living in the woods now. So... we need more money."
And Canada, true and loyal country that it is, kept footing the bill. And Weapon X kept on chugging, giving bionic enhancements and healing factors to the clinically insane. Now that's good government.
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How to balance the Canadian budget: break the super covert government monopoly and open adamantium mining to private enterprise and tax the windfall profits of the harvesting consortiums!
Wait, Weapon X has killed all the miners?
Damn.
I actually did a double take on sentient bacteria.
It's funded from the Canadian Health Care budget as a black-ops item. No wonder the economics of the Canadian system seem unsustainable.
I think the CIA link makes most sense. It's probably some sort of NATO-type joint venture, funded by America's massive military budget.
If you think about it, in the Marvel universe, there's a massive amount of government-funded R&D, especially in the area of genetic and other engineering of humans as soldiers. Which makes sense when you consider how powerful superheroes would be in a national security context - they're essentially a whole extra kind of nuclear weapon, and everyone needs to go and build their own arsenal to deter everyone else.
Supreme Power from Marvel's MAX imprint actually does a good job of handling this, where Hyperion essentially becomes property of the U.S government and is used as a covert asset, and Doctor Spectrum goes through a similar process. Other countries develop their own superhuman programs to maintain the balance of power, spheres of influence are worked out, etc.
It's probably some sort of NATO-type joint venture, funded by America's massive military budget.
Perhaps there's some sort of Guantanamo Bay-type legal deal going on? Canadian law may be friendlier to the covert manufacture of superpowered assassins than US law. (I am not a lawyer, so I'm not sure.)
Ajay -
Probably. Given that the kind of invasive and not-particularly-consensual biological engineering/cloning/etc. that goes on in Weapon X, it wouldn't surprise me if the U.S does a joint venture with Canada so that they can say "we don't genetically engineer people in America," and avoid public scrutiny and prosecution for kidnapping and assault charges.
“So we had this idea… what if we coat a wolverine in VIBRANIUM next? Funding plz.”
(I pray no Marvel writer is reading this…)
Super soldiers and assassins.. you think there would be a better screening process really...
I think the first two Ultimates series covered this ground quite well, treating Supers as military assets with effectively a world wide race to create Superhuman WMD's.
Eventually led to an invasion os the US by foreign powers hacked off at the US's dominance of the Supers game.
Ultimately, it makes sense for the Canadian government to keep building super-assassins. We can't compete with American military, whether in the field of traditional force or superhuman; and it's only a matter of time before they start sending sentinels north, or Doom takes over, or some such thing. Unless they think that Alpha Flight can stop every America-loyal super, then their only chance is to assassinate the leaders.
I think Hugh has an excellent point.
"Hi, Obama? This is Kim Jong-Il. The good news is we've abandoned our nuclear program. ...Yes, I knew you'd be thrilled. ...Yes, you're welcome, you're welcome. But there is a catch.
...Yes, you see, we've developed the ultimate power of the Glorious People's Human Traffic Light Man. Send us one trillion dollars in small, unmarked bills or else New York becomes a completely unmanageable gridlock! Bwah hah hah! ...What do you mean, already?"
I think the idea that it's a joint NATO thing of some sort is correct, given that in X2 Stryker is answering to the POTUS, not the Prime Minister of Canada. Ditto on the put it outside US borders for deniability thing.
leoboiko, This is Krypto...
I am a Marvel AND a DC reader...
And I have this to say:
LOLZ! God, your comment was so funny!
Krypto
k
nice post.
it's very useful for me.
thanks. :)
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