P.E.Trudeau, Traitor

P.E. Trudeau, Traitor

Pierre Trudeau served 4 terms as Canada's Prime Minister between 1969 and 1984.
He placed a greater priority on Canada's relations with China
which led to establishment of diplomatic relations with the People's Republic of China in 1970.
In 1973, Trudeau became the first Canadian Prime Minister to visit China.

CANADA'S RED TRUDEAU

Mr. Trudeau told the wife of U.S. charge d'affaires
that he was a Communist and then went on to
criticize the U.S. and praise the Soviet Union.

Trudeau a 'showoff,' diplomat told U.S
Claiming to be a Communist showed his 'desire to shock'
Elizabeth Thompson, CanWest News Service, May 21, 2003

A top Canadian diplomat told the United States that Pierre Trudeau was "a showoff" and "an individual not possessing much common sense," in a bid to allay concerns that Communists had infiltrated the Canadian government, according to secret U.S. State Department documents.

In a two-page Memorandum of Conversation dated May 7, 1952, a U.S. State Department official recounts a conversation with George Ignatieff, then second-in-command at the Canadian Embassy in Washington, who approached him to discuss Mr.Trudeau's "indiscreet" behaviour at a conference in Moscow.

"The Canadians describe him as young and adventurous with a desire to travel and as an individual not possessing much common sense," wrote H. Raynor, director of the State Department's British North America section. The Memorandum of Conversation was classified "secret security information" for more than 50 years until it was declassified following a request from the Montreal Gazette.

The document sheds new light on Canada's relations with the U.S. during the Cold War and the McCarthy era -- a period when the U.S. was obsessed with fighting communism. It could also help explain why the Federal Bureau of Investigation accumulated a voluminous file on the former prime minister.

It all began when Mr. Trudeau, then 32, decided to attend an economic conference in the Soviet Union. In what Canadian chargé d'affaires Robert Ford later described as "an infantile desire to shock," Mr. Trudeau told the wife of U.S. chargé d'affaires Hugh Cumming that he was a Communist and a Catholic, then went on to criticize the U.S. and praise the Soviet Union.

Concerned that the incident involving a former Privy Council employee would undermine U.S. estimates of Canada's security, Mr. Ignatieff was dispatched in what appears to be a pre-emptive strike.

"In view of certain indiscreet remarks and perhaps behaviour while at Moscow, the Canadians imagine we may receive a report from our Embassy about his activity," wrote Mr. Raynor. "The Canadians desire us to know that he is not considered a security risk in Ottawa. While he was formerly employed in the Privy Council's Office, it was in a minor capacity and the Canadians state that he had no access to classified information."

Mr. Ignatieff described Mr. Trudeau as "an individual of neutralist sentiments" and did not say whether Mr. Trudeau was a Communist.

"Mr. Ignatieff said that he did not know whether or not in fact he was a Communist."

Ottawa historical researcher Christopher Cook, who uncovered Mr. Ford's memo to the Canadian government about the incident, said the U.S. might have kept the State Department document secret to protect the Canadian government.

"They might have felt that they were protecting the Canadian government from embarrassment about the fact that they approached the U.S. government on Canadian citizens and this issue of whether they can be trusted or not."