Jay

Carney’s proposed “strategic partnership” with China represents a fundamental misreading of the current security environment. This isn’t about trade protectionism; it’s about recognising asymmetric competition that’s been underway for decades. At Davos, Carney framed this as a trade diversification issue without acknowledging that China has been the primary revisionist actor actively eroding the liberal international order (LIO) That omission is telling. China’s soft power strategy (economic coercion, elite capture, infrastructure dependencies) has systematically undermined this order while Western states pursued engagement policies based on false assumptions of convergence. The Biden admin and allies finally began countermeasures: reshoring critical supply chains, technology controls, alliance reinforcement. But they’re playing catch-up against decades of Chinese strategic positioning. Time asymmetry matters in great power competition. Trump’s more confrontational approach, whatever its flaws, reflects the urgency of this moment. The window for preserving Western strategic advantage is narrowing. US hegemonic stability, for all its imperfections, underwrites Canadian security and prosperity. Carney’s positioning reads like reactive spite rather than strategic calculation. Alienating your primary security guarantor over a trade dispute isn’t statecraft. It’s dangerous and short-sighted, conflating economic opportunity with strategic alignment. To be clear: selective economic engagement with China, with robust safeguards (tech transfer controls, critical infrastructure exclusions, supply chain resilience) is rational policy. A “strategic partnership”? That’s something entirely different. The question isn’t whether Canada trades with China. It’s whether we understand the difference between transactional commerce and strategic partnership with a revisionist power. #Canada #China #Davos26