A conference on the subject of Chinese independence at the University of Toronto on August 5 turned out to be very informative, very scary and featured a very interesting panel.
Brian McAdam started the Project Sidewinder investigation. Photo: Adu Raudkivi
One main panellist was supposed to be Jason Kenney, M.P., Conservative parliamentarian. However, illness prevented his attendance. Kenney was replaced by Conservative Senator Consiglio Di Nino, polite and certainly knowledgeable about things Chinese.
Another main panellist was the Honourable Sheila Copps, the former Deputy Prime Minister in the Chrétien Liberal government that became cozy with the communist Chinese. Her presence was not predictable because she's now speaking with those against the communist Chinese.
When asked how the association with communist China happened under her watch, Copps said, "economics always supersedes ethics. My ministry wasn't Foreign Affairs or Foreign Trade."
The most interesting panellist however was Brian MacAdam, the former external affairs officer in Hong Kong whose information started the Sidewinder investigation eight years ago. He interviewed many refugee claimants who would tell the same story, of the thousands of Chinese spies in Canada. The RCMP and CSIS started the secret investigation to look into the matter.
Shortly the two agencies were in opposition with each other and the CSIS side did the investigation of the investigation. The CSIS side won and MacAdam was "allowed to retire" while the RCMP's investigator, Corporal Reed was fired.
"They are still trying to harass me, " said MacAdam, adding, "the main reason behind this is Paul Desmarais, who is associated to Prime Minister Paul Martin and former Prime Minister Jean Chrétien, and has connections to Bombardier, who wanted to sell to China. "
MacAdam went to Hong Kong in 1968, a few years after the Cultural Revolution during which 1-2 million Chinese were murdered. MacAdam quoted from The Black book of Communism: "The communist Chinese regime has killed more people than Hitler and Stalin combined, between 47 and 75 million."
He continued "in 1978 Deng Xiaoping threw China's doors open to the west and it ceased to be a communist nation and instead became a fascist state." Once the market opened up, "the west went rushing to trade with China. The logic was that if a person were to sell a widget to every Chinese person, they could earn 1 billion dollars and be able to play golf for the rest of one's life."
MacAdam noted that "China has become the factory of the world. It pays its workers $2 a day, and is heavy with pollution. In exchange it demands western technology transfers and exhorts, steals or counterfeits the rest (unearthed as part of the Sidewinder findings)."
This "factory" takes advantage of the imbalances of such a system. "Most western countries have massive trade deficits with China. Canada buys 14 billion from China but only sells 3 billion, which amounts to approximately 50,000 jobs. What Canada sells is raw goods while it buys manufactured products and technology."
Further, "the higher elements of the party are rife with corruption, a government minister will be able to stack away millions which he will then transfer to the west. This amounts to between $28 - 40 billion." MacAdam added a cautionary note. "An experienced China hand predicts that the communist Chinese regime could collapse by 2010."
During the conference, no mention was made of the joint military manoeuvres on August 19, to be held between China and Russia involving 10,000 troops, to discover ways to combat "internal threat". Exactly what is meant by "internal threat" is its own question.
