Actually we're in NORAD mainly because of an indisputable geographic fact.
Both president Eisenhower and Prime Minister St Laurent were very aware of the Soviet maned bomber and ballistic missile threat and they recognized the need for a series of radar "chains" all across Canada: the far North Distant Early Warning (DEW) line, the Mid Canada line and the Pinetree line (see below) and they agreed, in the mid 1950s, that
![Flag: Canada :flag_ca: 🇨🇦](https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f1e8-1f1e6.png)
and the
![Flag: U.S. Outlying Islands :flag_um: 🇺🇲](https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f1fa-1f1f2.png)
should cooperate, formally -- diplomatically, militarily and financially - to build and manage/control all three.
The result was NORAD. Neither country really wanted a combined (multi-national) military command but there didn't, still doesn't, seem to be any other way to get the geographic necessity for the protection of the US strategic deterrent unless the US violated Canada's sovereignty in ways that ware, and remain unaccounted unacceptable to both countries - maybe president Trump excepted
![Sneaky :sneaky: :sneaky:](https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f60f.png)
(sorry, couldn't resist).