19 November 1953: Message from the Canadian Ambassador to the United States

The Canadian ambassador’s update on the Harry Dexter White situation does not yield fruitful results. The message describes a meeting with Walter Bedell Smith, the US Under Secretary of State, during which he was “exceedingly frank” about the issue of Canadian sources. Smith does not agree with the “nature of recent activities in this whole field” and has been successful in “eliminat[ing] certain features of the evidence given by Brownell which would affect international relationships.” The Canadian ambassador makes it clear that Canada is in a complicated position: “it was difficult, indeed impossible, for the Canadian Government to deal with half a dozen or more different manifestations of the United States and that our only proper channel for complaint and communication was the State Department itself.” Already, the Canadians are growing tired of being out of the loop regarding US investigations and would prefer a more streamlined system.