Canada’s Middle Power Game

In this episode, Minna sits down with Alex Dalziel, Senior Fellow for Arctic Security at the Montreal Institute for Global Security, to discuss Canada’s new “middle power” foreign policy orientation, Arctic security, Canada-Europe relations and how Canada’s military buildup is going.If you want to support our show, go to our Buy Me A Coffee page at http://buymeacoffee.com/mildlyalarmed Email us at [email protected] with any guest feedback, suggestions, and questions. Mentioned in the show:“Prepare for a world of ad hoc coalitions”, from the Economist: https://www.economist.com/by-invitation/2026/07/08/prepare-for-a-world-of-ad-hoc-coalitions “Greenland issues ‘strong warning’ as Trump-linked oil firm prepares to drill”, from the Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/aug/08/greenland-iwarning-trump-linked-oil-firm-prepares-drill “Inside the Ludicrous, Deadly Serious Plan to Take Over Greenland”, from the New Yorker: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2026/06/22/inside-the-ludicrous-deadly-serious-plan-to-take-over-greenland “Trump’s Fixation on Arctic Ships Led to Billions in No-Bid Contracts”, from the New York Times: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/08/01/climate/trump-arctic-ships.html “Davos 2026: Special address by Mark Carney, Prime Minister of Canada”, from World Economic Forum: https://www.weforum.org/stories/forum-institutional/davos-2026-special-address-by-mark-carney-prime-minister-of-canada/ “AI creates 16 new viruses from scratch, showing promise for drug resistance and drawing warnings about potential for misuse”, from CNN: https://edition.cnn.com/2026/08/06/health/ai-viruses-bacteriophages Credits: Anastasiia Lapatina is Ukraine Fellow at Lawfare. She writes a weekly newsletter about Ukraine called Yours Ukrainian. She is based in Kyiv. Karen-Anna Eggen is an Associate Professor and the Head of the Programme for Ukraine and Full-Spectrum Threats at the Norwegian Institute for Defence Studies. She is based in Oslo.Fabian Hoffman is a Senior Research Fellow at the Programme for Ukraine and Full-Spectrum Threats at the Norwegian Institute for Defence Studies. He is the author of the Missile Matters newsletter about defence, missile technology, and nuclear strategy. He is based in Oslo.Minna Ålander is an Analyst at the Stockholm Centre for Eastern European Studies at the Swedish Institute of International Affairs. She’s also an Associate Fellow at Chatham House and a Non-Resident Fellow at CEPA. Minna also writes a newsletter about European security called Northern Flank Notes. She is based in Stockholm.The podcast is engineered by Anthony Bartaway, who is also the co-host of a podcast called Ukraine Without Hype: / @ukrainewithouthype