EDITORIAL: China is the real threat, not the U.S.

Despite the current hysteria of many in Canada’s chattering classes, the greatest security threat we face is not the United States but China. 

Prime Minister Mark Carney agrees.  

He described China as the number one security threat to Canada during the election. 

A year ago, the final report of Canada’s foreign interference inquiry, presided over by Justice Marie-Josee Hogue, identified China as, “the most active perpetrator of foreign interference targeting Canada’s democratic institutions.” 

In addition, it said: 

“The People’s Republic of China targets members of Chinese Canadian diaspora communities for the purposes of repression, influence and forced return of targeted individuals to the PRC. It deploys a wide range of tradecraft to carry out its activities, one of which is to use a person’s family and friends living in the PRC as leverage against them. The PRC uses its diplomatic missions, PRC international students, community organizations and private individuals, among others, to carry out its transnational repression activities.” 

Relations between Canada and China reached a low point in 2018 when China kidnapped and falsely imprisoned Canadians Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor in retaliation for Canada honouring a U.S. arrest warrant for Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou in Vancouver. 

Carney is heading to China next week to meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping in a bid to repair diplomatic and business relations. 

It’s part of his effort to double non-U.S. exports over the next decade, generating $300 billion more in trade and lessening Canada’s reliance on the U.S. 

That said, the U.S. will always be Canada’s major trading partner, historically accounting for 75% of all Canadian exports (currently down to 67% because of U.S. tariffs.) 

Keeping Canadians safe while increasing trade with China, our greatest security threat. is crucial. 

Carney says he will achieve this by putting “guardrails” around co-operating with China to exclude such key areas as artificial intelligence, critical minerals and defence. 

But that begs the question of why Canada’s Liberal government still hasn’t set up a working foreign lobbyists’ registry, one of many steps needed to protect Canadian interests, which the Liberals claim they’ve been “actively considering” for five years. 

While trade is important, keeping Canadians safe from security threats is the most important function of the federal government.