CANADA: The Easiest Trip

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John Foster Dulles, who has traveled some 200,000 miles since becoming U.S. Secretary of State, had never made the easiest possible diplomatic trip: the hop across the border for an official visit to Canada. Last week, while the controversy over the Yalta papers boiled up at home (see NATIONAL AFFAIRS), Dulles acted on a long-standing invitation and flew to Ottawa for a two-day stay as the guest of Governor-General Vincent Massey.

Bursts of Applause. Few of Ottawa's many recent diplomatic visitors excited so much advance interest. Ever since he joined the Eisenhower Cabinet, Dulles and his policies have been the object of constant—and often critical—discussion among Canadian leaders. A full turnout of Ottawa officials met him at Uplands Airport. That afternoon a special meeting of the House and Senate Committees on External Affairs was called and Dulles, the first non-Canadian diplomat ever invited since the House committee was formed ten years ago, was asked to speak.

Dulles seemed to sense that he was facing an unconvinced audience, and he rose to the occasion with a superb performance. For half an hour, in his most scholarly manner, he addressed the M.P.s and Senators, then answered questions for another 20 minutes. He gave the politicians no startling new facts, but he spelled out the current U.S. policy—of taking a firm stand against Communism in the Far East—with such force and clarity that committee members interrupted him time after time with bursts of applause.

Good Impression. In private talks with the Cabinet, Dulles was even more forceful. He directly attacked the proposal often made by Canadian and British leaders that the islands of Quemoy and Matsu off China should be meekly surrendered to the Reds, with no truce concession in return, in order to have, as they put it, "a hundred miles of clear water between you and the Communists." If that is the thing to do, Dulles asked, why not withdraw all the way to the U.S. mainland, behind 6,000 miles of water? The proposal might seem sensible to someone who looked only at a map, but it took no account of the all-important morale of the non-Communist millions in the Far East. His recent trip to Asia, Dulles told the Canadians, had convinced him that the only way to stop further aggression, and strengthen the will of Asians to resist Communism, is the positive U.S. policy to draw a line and warn the Reds that any advance in force beyond it could mean all-out war.

Whether he won them over to his viewpoint is a question that will be answered only in future Canadian foreign-policy decisions and debates. But there was no doubt that John Foster Dulles personally had made a good impression on Canadian leaders. The reaction of Toronto Conservative M.P. Margaret Aitken was typical: "I don't necessarily agree with his point of view, but it was immensely reassuring to know that the U.S. has men of that intellectual caliber at the top."