The Great Escape
This is a story about courage, imagination, determination, and audacity, but above all about how the magic of love can overcome the most formidable obstacles.
From One “Fantaisiste” to Another
John Benjamin Clark Watkins was born in Norval Station, Ontario, in 1902. He had specialized in Scandinavian studies at the University of Toronto and at Cornell University, from which he received his doctorate in 1944 (after working for more than a decade…
Nixon in China: The Week that Changed the World
Some 15 years ago historian Francis Fukuyama published The End of History and the Last Man. His book, an expansion of a 1989 article, argued that the end of the Cold War and the breakup of the Soviet empire represented the end…
Reds in Rockcliffe?
Sixty years ago, the defection of a cypher clerk from the embassy of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics in Ottawa focussed world attention on Canada in an early and dramatic episode of what became the Cold War. Documents and testimony from…
Party Lines from Moscow
“I was sent there as an insult — not just to deliver an insult, a mission for a more senior diplomat, but to be one,” John Holmes later recalled of his posting to Moscow as Chargé d’Affaires in 1947. In the wake…
How the Cold War Began: The Gouzenko Affair and the Hunt for Soviet Spies
Through diligent research, assisted by greater access to archival material than was possible until recently, Amy Knight has brought to bear her great expertise on Soviet history to produce one of the finest books on the Gouzenko Affair, which she rightly terms…
Memories of Bucharest
Posthumous publications nearly always arouse a mixture of feelings, including gratitude for an unexpected gift as well as regret that we cannot discuss what we have read with the author. That reaction is especially appropriate with the book from which we publish…
Uncle Joe Who? Understanding Khrushchev and Forgetting Stalin
One of the more remarkable careers in Canadian diplomatic history was the one which took John Watkins (1902-1964) from the family farm near Norval Station, Ontario, to the senior ranks of the Department of External Affairs, with two postings in Moscow (including…
Whither Forecast: A Canadian Predicts the Balance of Power in the Cold War
_n earlier issues of bout de papier, we reprinted two papers from the early 1950s which were parts of a comprehensive “Re-Examination of Canadian Foreign Policy” that was guided by the Deputy Under-secretary of State for External Affairs, Escott Reid, at the…
Intelligence in the Cold War: Organisation, Role and International Cooperation
The paradigm shift which occurred on September I has led to a new reality which will likely have an enduring impact on the way foreign policy is conducted. During the last half century there have been a number of watersheds when foreign…
