On October 25, 2021
© By John Arkelian
The trouble with China is that it is an autocratic one-party state with a world-view that is inimical to our core values. It is hostile to human rights, democracy, and the rule of law. It freely violates treaties, international law, and the shared precepts of the rules-based international order. It is expansionistic, seeking to impose its will on other countries and to usurp international waters. It is aggressive, openly threatening its nearby neighbor Taiwan and relentlessly expanding its military might with the stated objective of neutering the West. It is ruthless (and shameless) in its use of genocide, the hostage-taking of foreign nationals, heavy-handed police state tactics, cyber-crime, malign interference with other countries’ governance, the corrupting of foreign leaders, intellectual property theft, and obstructing a full investigation into the deadly COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic. It is a stranger to truth, with a regime that lies through its teeth without hesitation. It is gaining in economic and military power, with the stated ambition of achieving predominance in the world, wresting that position away from the Western democracies…. The trouble with China is that it is a totalitarian dictatorship which is hostile to all we hold dear and intent on imposing its will upon the rest of the world by any and all means at its malevolent disposal. We should not let that happen.
Even a middle power like Canada has plenty of ways it can stand up to China, though it seems too shamefully timorous to use them. See “The Trouble with China” at: https://artsforum.ca/ideas/the-wide-world