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In all its dealings with China, Canada’s posture is uniquely supine.

“I’m calling on all like-minded countries to display the same spirit that led to the founding of a union across Europe in 1951: the clear-eyed sense that only by coming together can we protect our values and our future.”

But to get out from underneath the absurd restraints that have dictated our relationship with Taiwan ever since Canada opened diplomatic relations with the Chinese Communist Party regime in 1970, we’re all going to have to confront some of the prettiest lies we have been telling ourselves about Canada’s place on “the world stage,” and about how we got there. This is where Eric Lerhe, the former director of NATO policy at National Defence Headquarters in Ottawa, enters the conversation.

In an extensive paper to be released this week by the Macdonald-Laurier Institute, Lerhe proposes a series of modest contributions Canada might make to Taiwan’s security, particularly in collaboration with Japan, France, Germany, the United States, New Zealand and Australia, and also to more securely guarantee Taiwan’s place as a key trading partner in the Pacific region. “But first, Ottawa needs to be prepared to challenge some of the sacred shibboleths in how it has approached China and Taiwan,” Lerhe writes.