China has been pulling Canada's strings for nearly four decades
National Post, 05 March 2023
A statue of a Canadian PM shaking the blood-soaked hand of a Chinese tyrant would be a fitting expression of Canadian policy
Regarding the Chinese election interference scandal, there was this little nugget that came to public attention. The Chinese donors — who were to be reimbursed by the Chinese communist state — who ponied up a cool million for the Trudeau Foundation wanted to build a joint statue for Pierre Elliott Trudeau and Chairman Mao at the University of Montreal law school.
The law school demurred on the Mao bit, saying that, “Obviously, since Mao had no connection to the university, that suggestion was not an option for us.”
It’s not obvious actually, as universities tend to set a very low bar in terms of whose cash they take. It is notable though that being one of the greatest mass killers in history did not disqualify Mao, but that he hadn’t done even a semester abroad on campus. If he was an alumnus, or perhaps had agreed to accept an honorary degree, then things may have been different.
It seems that the entire Trudeau-Mao statue project was dropped. It may have had a better chance if it had been proposed for the Desmarais family’s Power Corp. headquarters in Montreal. That is the corporate seat of Canada’s multi-generational bipartisan soft-on-China policy. The Desmarais family had business interests in China and powerful friends in Ottawa — Trudeau Sr., Brian Mulroney, Jean Chrétien and Paul Martin. The latter were eager to be put in service of the former.
Thus a statue of a Canadian prime minister shaking the blood-soaked hand of a Chinese tyrant would have been a fitting expression of Canadian policy.
Recall that the greatest crisis in foreign relations for Beijing was the Tiananmen Square massacre of 1989. Would that prevent China’s integration into the world economy and its capacity to project its power abroad?
Canada came to the rescue of the Chinese communists, working hard to minimize the impact of Tiananmen. First up was Pierre Trudeau in 1990, retired but mightily active in federal politics, leading the charge against Meech Lake. He went to China, escorted at all times by agents of the communist regime, along with sons Justin and Sacha. The sign was clear. The G7’s longest-serving head of government was saying that Tiananmen should be put in the rearview mirror.
Sacha would later write of the trip, recalling the fond memories his father had of touring Maoist China decades previous. The Trudeau affection for Mao was long-standing.
Next up was Mulroney. One of his last acts before leaving office in June 1993 was to host a dinner at 24 Sussex Drive for Chinese Vice-Premier Zhu Rongji, along with Paul and André Desmarais. Despite post-Tiananmen sanctions, Canada was eager to get back to business as usual. A few months later, Mulroney himself was in China getting on with business.
The campaign reached its height when Chrétien — who was employed by the Desmarais family in the 1980s and whose daughter married André Desmarais — began his premiership with a mammoth Team Canada visit to Beijing. In due course, Chrétien would be succeeded by Paul Martin, who came into his own fortune courtesy of the Desmarais family.
Thus by 2018, Beijing had every reason to be confident that with another prime minister from Montreal installed in Ottawa, Canada would continue to be agreeable. Then China seized the Two Michaels. While they knew that Justin Trudeau would accept the kidnapping with equanimity, what if he lost power? The plight of the Michaels had made an impression on Canadians, personalizing the gangster state China had become. What if another party came into office?
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