A few weeks ago, an editor from China Daily, the English-language mouthpiece of the Chinese Communist Party, reached out to me with a seemingly innocuous request: Would I be willing to write an opinion piece for them? I politely declined. My rationale was simple: Why lend the credibility of my affiliation with the Canadian Global Affairs Institute to a state-run propaganda organ?
My skepticism was swiftly vindicated. Shortly after my refusal, China Daily published that completely misrepresented my views about Japan¡¯s defense spending increases. The piece, published last week, carried a sensational headline accusing Japan of using the guise of ¡°revitalizing its defense industry¡± to achieve ¡°remilitarization.¡±
To bolster this fabricated narrative, the publication blatantly misquoted me along with Hirohito Ogi, a respected scholar at Japan¡¯s Institute of Geoeconomics. Without our permission, our nuanced analyses of Japan¡¯s legitimate defense buildup in the face of a deteriorating regional security environment were twisted into a Chinese Communist Party talking point, complete with a cartoon depicting Japan as a menacing octopus dealing in arms sales.
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