It’s time to swap Meng for the Two Michaels
Realism should prevail over idealism, polls and politics, Peter G. White says.
I have been surprised at the stark division of opinion concerning the possibility of a swap of Canada’s Two Michaels in a Chinese prison for Meng Wanzhou, who is under luxurious house arrest in Vancouver.
But I found a plausible explanation for the sometimes virulent hostility to this sensible proposal in the May 19 issue of The Spectator magazine.
The former British diplomat Christopher Meyer, reviewing a new biography of Henry Kissinger by Barry Gewen, writes:
“It was not until I went to Harvard in 1988 to take a year out from the Foreign Office that I came to realize how riven by ideology the world of U.S. foreign policy had become . ... My American sabbatical threw open the door to intellectual conflict in the study and practice of international relations unlike anything I had experienced. Two great warring clans — the realists and the idealists, those who took the world as they found it and those who saw the world as they would like it to be — were at each other’s throats.”
This is an apt description of the clash of ideas between Canada’s realists, who simply want to accept China’s realists’ not-so-veiled offer of a straight swap, and our ivory-tower idealists, who proclaim that we must never cave in to bullying or blackmail no matter the real-world circumstances.
The idealists add that you can’t trust the Chinese anyway and that if we give in now it would just encourage them to imprison more innocent Canadians the next time we have a dispute. This, of course, is nonsense.
In the first place, prisoner swaps have happened throughout history, and with the most unsavoury regimes imaginable. They are often conducted like a drug deal: you show me the money, I show you the drugs, and we make the exchange at a safe distance. Even nice Canadians know how this is done.
In the second place, whether or not we do a swap, China may still grab any innocent Canadian it wishes for any spurious reason at any time. The communist dictatorship will not be deterred from this practice just because this time a self-important Canada refused to countenance their offer. They need no encouragement from us to disregard due process.
And in the third place, it is now clear that under the law (the LAW) the decision as to whether or not to release Meng at any time lies solely with the minister of justice — not, pace Justin Trudeau, with the prime minister. Has he already forgotten that Jody Wilson-raybould resigned from his cabinet because of his perceived interference concerning her sole discretion in dealing with the Snc-lavalin case?
It is revealing that the majority of the 19 signatories of the June 23 letter to the prime minister urging Canada to release Meng are people with actual experience in the real world of government and diplomacy, whereas the howls of outrage have come mainly from high-minded members of the commentariat who have never had any management or government responsibility.
So why is the prime minister so pusillanimous? The answer may be found in the Angus Reid poll just out: Across the political spectrum, two-thirds of Canadians agree that the Meng situation should be left to the courts, and disagree with intervention by our elected politicians.
Who wants us to keep holding Meng for possible extradition to the United States? Donald Trump, of course.
However it appears that in the minds of Liberal strategists, the polls are more consequential than any concerns they may have that continuing to hold Meng looks a lot like truckling to the unpopular U.S. president. But in the minds of many of us, the rights of innocent Canadian citizens trump Trump.
It is the misfortune of Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor that their government appears to prefer to be guided by polls and politics rather than by justice, humanity, self-interest and common sense.
Peter G. White is former principal secretary to Prime Minister Brian Mulroney.
In the minds of many of us, the rights of innocent Canadian citizens trump Trump.