It's a diplomatic reset that would have seemed unimaginable months ago. After years of mutual hostility, Canada and China are beginning to thaw their once-frosty relationship. But **former national security analyst and policy advisor Dennis Molinaro **says Canada's failure to act on decades of Chinese intelligence warnings has hurt our country's ability to meet current geopolitical challenges. He speaks with Piya Chattopadhyay about the long and complicated history of Canada-China relations – and the lessons that should be applied to today.
This is a podacst (19 min).
Dr. Molinaro is a researcher at the University of Ontario focusing on counter-intelligence, foreign interference, the history of intelligence and the use of emergency powers in peacetime.
Dennis Molinaro also wrote an opinion piece: China’s secret war in Canada
... the West’s interactions with nation-states such as the People’s Republic of China (PRC), they have been governed by a specific delusion for half a century. Canada ... believed that if it did business with China, extended a hand of friendship, China would transform itself into a liberal-democratic country. Trade would lead to freedom. But Canada was wrong. Beijing never considered joining a liberal order and instead used Canada as a backdoor to the U.S. and as a means of exploiting resources and technology.
... The stories of secret PRC police stations in the news a little more than a year ago weren’t a new phenomenon. The PRC had been interfering and seeking to influence the political and civic life in Canada for decades. And Canadian leaders have done little to deter adversaries from operating here.
But how did such a situation arise? To date, Canadians have had diplomatic histories of the Canada-China relationship but an intelligence history wasn’t incorporated into them. That’s necessary if Canada hopes to have a realistic appraisal and understanding of the relationship.
... The China that Canada’s leaders saw and engaged with was one they invented in their own minds. They saw a potential market for wheat and potash. They saw a counterweight to the U.S. They convinced themselves that economic liberalization would inevitably lead to political freedom. They weren’t alone in this thinking, even the U.S. adopted it, though its defences against Beijing were more developed than Canada’s.
... But the truth was that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) used western openness to build its economy and modernize its military. They used western universities to train their scientists. The West dreamed of partnership while China planned for dominance.
... The regime in Beijing operates on a concept of transnational sovereignty. It believes anyone of Chinese descent, regardless of their citizenship, owes their loyalty to China. By this logic, it doesn’t respect Canada’s borders as it hunts its critics in Canada. It harasses the Uyghur community, Tibetans, the Falun Gong, and Hong Kong pro-democracy activists and Taiwan independence supporters. It uses threats against family members back home to silence dissidents in places such as Vancouver and Toronto.
... This is transnational repression. It’s a foreign state enforcing its political will on Canadian soil ... The United Front Work Department is an arm of the Chinese Communist Party tasked with influencing foreign elites and controlling the PRC diaspora abroad. Its goal is to make foreign decision-makers sympathetic to Beijing’s interests, and it cultivates relationships with influential figures at all levels from school boards to Parliament. In return, it expects support for China’s interests and silence on its indiscretions. During the April 2024 Hogue inquiry into foreign interference, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service reported that it believed China interfered in the 2019 and 2021 federal elections.
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