Trudeau’s strange China syndrome

The Canadian government’s worthy pursuit of a stronger relationship with China should not come at any cost.

Justin Trudeau’s Liberals should not make a new friend of the Chinese in a way that recklessly alienates our oldest and strongest friends in the United States and Europe.

Nor should Canada seek short-term economic gains by putting at risk the long-term security of our trusted North Atlantic Treaty Organization allies.

Regrettably, the federal government could be making all of these mistakes by saying yes — too quickly, too carelessly and without a strong enough review — to a Chinese takeover of the Canadian high-tech company, Norsat.

Norsat sells satellite communications systems to the U.S. Department of Defense, the U.S. army, the U.S. Marine Corps, NATO, the Taiwanese army as well as NAV Canada, the agency that oversees civil aviation in Canada.

From a security standpoint and the perspective of those customers, that’s highly sensitive technology.

However, Trudeau’s government has OK’d the takeover of Norsat by Hytera Communications of Shenzhen, China.

This decision came after the federal government conducted only a routine security analysis.

What should worry Canadians — and what is worrying an American congressional committee — is that the Liberals failed to conduct a full, national-security review of the takeover to discover how it might affect the transfer of important technology outside Canada. Prime Minister Trudeau says there’s nothing to worry about. A host of security and diplomatic experts disagree. Two former directors of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service — Richard Fadden and Ward Elcock — say they would have recommended that Hytera’s proposed takeover of Norsat be vetted by a comprehensive, national-security review.

That process, they say, would determine whether the deal could hurt Canada and its allies.

A former Canadian ambassador to China, David Mulroney, is also puzzled by the government’s behaviour and calls the takeover “worrying.”

The most pointed American response so far has come from Michael Wessel, head of the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, an American congressional body.

He says the sale “raises significant national-security concerns for the United States” and wants the Pentagon to review its dealings with Norsat.

These are significant alarms Trudeau is doing his best to ignore. He should think again.

Canada has a long, usually positive history of engaging China. There are compelling arguments for strengthening our economic and cultural ties even more. But this should not blind Canada to reality. China is a Communist country ruled by a single party. It is a dictatorship with a terrible record of trampling the human rights of its own citizens.

It is challenging the United States’ status as the world’s preeminent superpower, expanding its armed forces and militarizing reefs in the South China Sea to add muscle to its bid. And it is a part-owner of Hytera, which wants Norsat.

While an American company is making a counter-offer to Norsat, that offer will likely fail.

If it does, the Liberals should order a proper, in-depth national-security review of the Hytera takeover — for the sake of Canada and its allies.