Canada and the Beginning of the Cold War: Modern Interpretations

Abstract

The most widespread plots interpreted as the beginning of the Cold War are the events that took place in 1946: February 9 – J. Stalin’s speech to the electorate in Moscow; February 22 – the American charge d’Affaires in the Soviet Union G. Kennan’s “long telegram”; March 5 – W. Churchill’s speech in Fulton (the USA); September 27 – the Soviet Ambassador in the United States N. Novikov’s “long telegram”. But there was an earlier event, so called “Gouzenko affair”, which is almost unknown for the Ukrainian historiography. On September 5, 1945, Igor Gouzenko, a cipher clerk of the Soviet embassy to Canada, defected to the Canadian side with more than a hundred secret documents that proved the USSR’s espionage activities in the countries of North America. Information about the network of Soviet agents caused a real panic in the West and was perceived as a real start of the Cold War. In the article, there is made an attempt to review the main events related to the Gouzenko affair and to identify the dominant interpretations of this case in contemporary historical writings. One can find different interpretations of the reasons and the consequences of Gouzenko’s defection which dramatically affected the history of the world. One of the main vivid results was an anti-communist hysteria in the West which was caused by the investigation that Canadian, American and British public officials and eminent scientists were recruited by the Soviet Union as agents for the atomic espionage. For Canada, the Gouzenko affair had an unprecedented affect because on the one hand it led to the closer relations with the United States in the sphere of security and defense, and on the other hand Canada was involved into the international scandal and used this case as a moment to start more activities on the international arena. It has been also found that the Canadian and American studies about Gouzenko affair are focused on the fact that the Allies on the anti-Hitler coalition need to take a fresh look at security and further cooperation with the USSR, while the overwhelming majority of Russian publications is focused on the very fact of betrayal of Igor Gouzenko.

Keywords

• canada
• cold war
• gouzenko affair
• espionage.