On November 6th a Chinese warplane fired flares extremally close to a Canadian military helicopter patrolling the local area. Many Canadian officers and the pilots in the helicopter said this action was extremally dangerous and could have ended in the downing of the helicopter, which in most eyes is an act of war.
This aggressive and dangerous interaction is not the first China and other nations have had in the past 10 years. Many times already China has claimed international water as theirs and forced many countries to take a defensive stance on their boundaries drawn up in the South China Sea. This close act of war has also sparked an increase in military activity in China and Canada and a increase in the need for diplomacy in the area to shore up any problems that may continue to pop up between China and neighboring countries. This interaction also increases pressure on U.S officials as they are busy with Israeli and Ukrainian wars as well as the increase of Chinese aggression in Asia and Africa in the past few months.
This is connected to IR because of how China and Canada react to an issue such as this and how diplomacy draws us closer or farther away from peace within East Asia. This is also important to us because we may need to remember acts like these in the future when we become voters or diplomats who interact with officials who can make decisions like going to war or taking a diplomatic stance on maritime law and trading treaties in China.