It’s how the powerful get away with occluding the truth

Alexander Penfold: Toronto, March 28, 2020

In Terry Glavin's brilliant editorial in the National Post today, he rightly articulates that we are indeed in the midst of a war that is being fought on two fronts. One against Covid 19 but a more critical battle is underway as to who controls the narrative and who might be to blame for the outbreak. The President's handling of the epidemic is being criticized from all sides. With Trump vulnerable to very negative public opinion in Canada, the actual messages on China and the CCP's cover-up are being lost on all but a few. Dangerous for our democracy, and it flies in the face of our understanding that our policy has failed Canada while benefiting the Communist Party of China. In 1970, our Prime Minister, Pierre Elliot Trudeau and the government of Canada was the first western nation to recognize the Peoples Republic of China (PRC).  

Diplomats embraced China as an equal partner while setting no benchmarks or standards to remain in partnership. Their ideology and belief system is not in line with the West, but apparantley the allure of economic gain was enough for most. The CCP are shrewd operators, and right under our nose, they infiltrated our government, the public service and rose to prominence in our society to direct and control public policy initiatives that benefited their goals.

The CCP’s braintrust began to circulate lurid fictions to the effect that the virus didn’t originate in China at all

Currently, many Canadian politicians, media and business elite are seemingly lining up behind the wrong warring faction and parroting back China's propaganda lies. Why, you ask? Politicians seduced by the CCP operatives (diplomats) turned a blind eye to what they were doing in our country. Let's go no further than the case of the Michael's who are being held on suspicion of espionage in China. A tit for tat diplomatic response over the detention of Meng Wanzhou for extradition to the United States on using illegal shell companies to circumvent international sanctions on Iran.

Only recently have journalists, academics, authors and some brave politicians been sounding the alarm bells. Glavin, Nuttall, Fife, Chase, Burton Cooper and former Ambassador to China, David Mulroney, to name a few. But most importantly Ottawa think tank MacDonald Laurier Institute has been writing articles, lobbying politicians taking China head-on. Much to the dismay of the Chinese embassy in our nation's capital. The ML Institutes 10th anniversary dinner focused on the Indo-Pacific and the challenges Canada and the world face in addressing China's sharp and soft power diplomacy. The event held last month in Ottawa had a distinguished group of military and diplomatic representation from around the world. Last November, I had the opportunity to attend ML's event on Blunting China's Sharp Power.    It featured many renowned experts including ;

• Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian, Senior Reporter, International Consortium of Investigative Journalists

• Charles Burton, MLI Senior Fellow

• Margaret McCuaig-Johnston, University of Ottawa

• J Michael Cole, chief editor of the Taiwan Sentinel and MLI Senior Fellow

• Robert Fife, Globe and Mail (moderator)

I think for some in the room the narrative came as a shock as Puma Shen, Assistant Professor at the criminology graduate department, National Taipei University laid out the propaganda and media manipulation campaigns run by the Chinese state in Canada. In fact, he suggests that one of the servers tied to the attacks was based here in Canada. Make no mistake China uses twitter, We-chat, Facebook and other social media platforms as part of their global disinformation and propaganda campaigns.

Internationally, Australian academic and author Clive Hamilton* has been at the forefront of this battle to bring the actions of the CCP to the attention of governments around the world. In Australia, they have already taken concrete action against the CCP and Clive has been tapped by policy think tanks and intelligence agencies the world over. As Clive spoke around the world on China’s vast influence in Australia he started to collaborate with other academics and governments, as a clear and dangerous pattern was emerging. He had worked with co-author Mareike Ohlberg* over a few years and after a meeting in Europe, they decided the world needed a book that would provide insights on just how pervasive the influence and covert operations of the CCP are within western nations.

By doing so, they have put together the most explosive and comprehensive narrative of the CCP's corporate and military espionage, propaganda interests around the world. Of course, they do all of this while being embedded into communities, running for local, provincial and federal public office as part of their need to direct public policy narratives that benefit the Chinese regime. In all honesty Canadians, we have all been asleep at the switch.  In Terry Glavin’s brilliant editorial in the National Post today he rightly articulates that we are indeed in the midst of a war that is being fought on two fronts. One against Covid 19 but a more important battle is underway as to who controls the narrative and who might be to blame for the outbreak. The President’s handling of the epidemic is being criticized from all sides and with Trump vulnerable to very negative public opinion in Canada the true messages on China and the CCP’s cover-up are being lost on all but a few. That is dangerous for our democracy and would once again be a callous disregard of the past fifty years of China’s stealth war against democratic institutions and western nations.

In their new book Hidden Hand published by Optimum, the authors clearly articulate the strategies of a criminal organization that runs China. Please make no mistake about it; the CCP is that enterprise and all Canadians need to be aware of the threat to our institutions and the freedoms.

Hidden Hand shows how the Chinese Communist Party represents a profound threat to Western democracy. It's vital reading for Canadians who want to understand what is happening, and points to a way of carving out a new diplomatic course with China. But the question remains:

Does the government have the will to stand up to Beijing and its proxies in Canada, or is it too late?

The Canadian edition of the book will be launched in Ottawa and Toronto in late May with the author in attendance if travel permits.  

Clive Hamilton is an Australian academic and author. His book on China's influence in Australia, Silent Invasion, was a national bestseller that propelled him to the centre of the China debate at home and abroad. His articles have appeared in the Guardian, New York Times, Foreign Affairs and THES.

Mareike Ohlberg is a senior fellow in the Asia Program of the German Marshall Fund. She previously worked at the Mercator Institute for China Studies. Her many articles on China have been featured in the New York Times, Foreign Affairs and Neue Zürcher Zeitung.