Change of plans - I'm still using the Chinese AI, but I'm going to be mashing it up with Ronto/Canadian nationalism. An uneasy alliance between the two, if you will.

Edit: Some ideas for this sitch: Toronto has a huge network of pedestrian tunnels and underground shopping centers that were built IRL in the 1970s-80s (some in the early 1900s) initially and have been expanded since; also including subway lines/stations and the like. Now, this isn't anywhere near enough to comfortably hold the entire population, but my thinking is that it might be enough to shelter a decent enough portion of the population from the bombs to make a [i]difference[/i] and allow Toronto to become the major regional power of 'Ronto' that's mentioned in The Pitt. I'm still thinking about how exactly that's going to happen - my immediate thought is that the very high density of power-generating facilities in the region might allow-it to re-electrify comparatively quickly, though a lot of those will be targets of any nuclear attack, so it's partly a question of how many survived and in what state. There's also the question of nuclear research facilities like Chalk River.

I also considered how access to the great Lakes region might affect the survival of an urban area like Ronto - perhaps it's an especially valuable fishing resource in the post-nuclear wasteland; maybe the lion's share of the didn't land in the lakes or the connected watersheds, avoiding making it a toxic pile of ass? Additionally, Canada was (fairly) recently occupied, and US Forces would probably still be fairly active suppressing dissent. Could that have led to a relatively large availability of military equipment?