Canada's foreign policy now rests on the three pillars as Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand outlined at the United Nations in the Fall of 2025: strengthening defence, building economic resilience and advancing core values such as human rights.
Canada has authoritarian threats to the East (Russia), To the West (China) to the North (Russia) and to the South (Trumpist forces)
Canada's bilateral merchandise trade with China totalled $118.7 billion last year. China is Canada's third-largest trading partner after the United States, which recorded $924.4 billion in bilateral merchandise trade with Canada last year.
The EU is Canada's second-largest trading partner, with a total trade value of approximately $161.9 billion in 2024. Canada has a long standing defence relationship with the EU through NATO with troops stationed in various European countries
Canada is having to adjust its posture vis a vis its longstanding parnership with the US given its mercurial President and deep seated changes in that polity.
As Prime Minister Mark Carney has stated:
This decades-long process of an ever-closer economic relationship between the Canadian and U.S. economies is now over. Many of our former strengths, based on close ties to America, have become our vulnerabilities.
Canada's Asia Pacific Strategy in 2022 recognizes China as an increasingly disruptive power.
Nevertheless Canada is pursuing a nuanced strategy that is one part Fabian, one part Strategic Ambiguity and one part Revectoring.
Defence is now a priority in an increasingly dangerous world.
