By Philip Yeung
An unsurvivable two-front trade war
Canada is baffling. Amid a catastrophic tariff war with America, it chooses to pick a needless, monumental trade fight with China, slapping a 100% tariff on Chinese-made electric vehicles, provoking a retaliatory 75.8% anti-dumping tariff on Canadian canola seed. This is devastating news to Canadian farmers as they stare at the loss of 200,000 jobs. Carney is dragging Canada into an unsurvivable two-front trade war simultaneously with its largest and second-largest trading partners.
The souring of China-Canada relationship
The China-Canada relationship, once sweet and romantic under Pierre Trudeau, turned sour under his hollow-headed heir, Justin. Trudeau junior should have stayed in his side-hustle as a barroom bouncer, or played wide-eyed tourist in an Indian guru garb. Unfit for the job, his two terms spelled utter disaster for Canada, blindly following Trump's crazy anti-China policies. Worse, he fell into the deadly Trump trap by executing a US arrest warrant against the CFO of Huawei, China's tech giant. His adolescent stupidity knocked bilateral relations off kilter. By the time Trudeau staggered off the stage, Sino-Canadian relations were in tatters. They have never recovered.
China is a science-first nation, indifferent to world domination
He left behind bone-deep mutual distrust. Objectively, Canada has no quarrel with Canada. China's ideological coating is an irrelevance. Though socialist, it is not North Korea, Cuba, or Venezuela. In less than 40 years, China is transformed into a different country---a science-first country, big on technology, poverty alleviation, infrastructure construction, innovation and education, and rationally governed like no other nation on earth, laser-focused on purpose and progress. But blinded and brainwashed by US propaganda, under Trudeau, Canada was duped into viewing China as a strategic threat.
China is no threat to Canada
I am left scratching my head exactly how China constitutes a threat to Canada. It fights no wars, invades no neighbors, and the two countries are separated by the vast Pacific. China's religion is trade and prosperity.
China will defend its sovereignty and security. Taiwan is no Ukraine
The truth is stark and simple: No US encirclement of China, no Chinese militarization of South China Sea islands. Keeping the sea lanes unchoked for trade is a matter of life and death. Imagine America facing a blockade off its Florida coast. It would have summoned all its military might to break the chokehold. America is bi-coastal. China is not. Landlocked to the north, south, and west, it must keep its eastern coast clear at all costs. Hence the red line: Taiwan must not fall into the wrong hands. The saber-rattling over the Taiwan Strait is entirely US-instigated. Recognized as part of Greater China, Taiwan is no Ukraine. China's sovereignty and survival are on the line.
I know Canada. I also know its so-called Climate of Opinion. During the J-Trudeau years, the climate of opinion was mindlessly anti-Chinese, poisoned by the nonsensical theory of the China threat. The gullible press was equally unkind. They forget that China was a victim, not a bad actor, in the Huawei CFO's unjustifiable arrest and its aftermath.
China may have a socialist veneer, but it is Confucian to the core. The only country preaching the doctrine of global common prosperity covets no global domination. But America has demonized China into a dirty word.
China's core creed: weakness invites aggression and victimization
China muscles up for one reason: it never forgets its dismemberment by foreign predatory powers. That bitter lesson has congealed into its core creed: "weakness invites aggression and victimization". The aggressive gene, rampant in Russians, Americans, and British colonialists, is absent in the Chinese DNA. For centuries, China never fought a single war of aggression. Unthinking Canadian leaders should stop parroting the US nonsense about the China Threat. Look at the facts: for the last 75 years, global conflict has come either from US or Russian aggression. China is squeaky-clean. Ideological labels are outdated, misleading, and dangerous.
Canada's 100% tariff on Chinese electric vehicles is wrong on three counts: First, most Canadians oppose it. Second, electric vehicles dance to the tune of Canada's clean air gospel. Third, a one-sided tariff goes against Canada's long-standing reputation as a dutiful WTO member.
Bone-headed Canadian leadership: Wake up to new geopolitical reality
When pretty boy Trudeau stepped down, all heaved a sigh of relief, harboring high hopes that the new leader is a smart man with no flies on him. They count on his restoring China-Canada relations to their former rationality. But stubbornly, Carney has not shaken off Trudeau's pig-headed China bias. This strategic failure is down to two things: First, the glaring lack of China expertise in his cabinet, crowded with ministers of Indian descent, but boasting no wise China hands on board. This is indefensible when China looms so large in world affairs. Carney is dangerously China-ignorant.
Carney is dangerously China-ignorant
Second, he is caught half-asleep in America's "red pill" moment, when the US has redefined the geopolitical reality. Under Trump's America-first sledgehammer approach, alliances mean nothing. Canada must realign to survive. Even terrifying Trump is handling China gingerly. But Carney is behaving like a proverbial bull in a china shop. Geopolitics, unlike banking, requires nimble thinking. Being a knee-jerk China hawk is repeating Justin's folly and sleepwalking into another disaster. China is, after all, Canada's second-largest trading partner. Trump has scrambled the rules of the game. Carney must learn to unscramble them.
A little respect goes a long way—how to repair the China-Canada relationship
I will let Carney in on a little secret: The key to dealing with the Chinese is respect, for they will reciprocate. They will behave like perfect Confucian scholars when respected. Locked in a vicious dog fight with both Trump and China, Carney might not have the teeth to survive intact. I feel sorry for Canada.
The views do not necessarily reflect those of DotDotNews.
Read more articles by Philip Yeung:
Opinion | Trump dumps India---from lovey-dovey to huffing-puffing
Opinion | Who is the paper tiger now: US or China?
Opinion | Outfoxed and out-muscled, EU kowtows to Trump
Opinion | Can Trump wriggle out, Houdini-like, from a fatal scandal?
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