In the evening edition of El Fuego, the national newspaper, I read a small article reporting that an American missionary named Jim Hetherington had been arrested the day before for providing aid to the enemies of the state. It said the American embassy had intervened and he had been deported to the United States. In the back pages of the same issue, there was a small news report about an attack by paramilitary forces on an Indian settlement on the upper Casanare River. It said the Indians had been shot and their bodies thrown into the river to be eaten by alligators, but provided no further details.
Furious, Heather asked me if I said I had had anything to do with the death of Rojas and I told her I hadn’t — something I thought was true at the time. She looked at me for maybe a minute — it could have been longer — and said,” I don’t believe you. The killing of Rojas coming just after your visit is too much of a coincidence.”
Suddenly afraid she might be right, I hit back, saying the ELN had botched their attack and alienated the people of Sucio, who probably took their revenge by guiding the soldiers to the guerilla camp. “If I hadn’t left when I did,” I said, “I would have met the same end as Rojas.”
“I guess I have no choice but to accept your word,” she said, before going into the bedroom and slamming the door behind her. I went for a long walk to mull over Heather’s accusations, returning late that night convinced that Longshaft must have handed over my report to the CIA, despite my request that is be treated as for Canadian Eyes Only.
Not long afterward, I received an invitation to dinner, specifying it was for one guest only, from the American ambassador in honour of three congressmen visiting from Washington. I had never met the ambassador, the most powerful foreign envoy in Colombia, and asked myself why he would include a junior officer from the Canadian embassy in his list of invitees. The evening of the event, when I presented my invitation and my diplomatic identity card, the marine on duty saluted, opened the front door and said, “Go right in, Mr. Cadotte, you’re expected.” Inside, an embassy protocol officer shook my hand and led me up a flight of stairs to a reception line and introduced me to the ambassador.
“Ah Mr. Cadotte, I’ve heard a lot of good things about you recently,” he said before introducing me to his wife and the congressmen. After I shook the last of the proffered hands, another well-bred junior diplomat led me to a tuxedo-clad waiter for a glass of Californian sparkling wine and a canapé. He then hovered at my side, introducing me to the other guests — members of the Colombian national assembly and officials from the American embassy. I was the only non-American diplomat in the room. We made small talk until the butler announced that dinner was served.
The meal itself was an intimate affair — three tables of eight with one American congressman at each, flanked on each side by Colombian politicians. The other seats were filled with embassy staffers. I was not at the ambassador’s table but was seated beside the next ranking American official, making me wonder why the Americans had invited me. I thought it had to be related in some way to Rojas. I then remembered that Longshaft, in his message back to me after my conversation with Rojas in the church, had said he intended to share that report with the CIA. My hosts just want to know if I picked up any additional information in that encounter that could be useful in their anti-terrorist programs, I told myself, unwilling to confront my responsibility for Rojas’s death.
But my dinner companion didn’t mention Rojas at all. Instead, he asked me polite questions — the sort strangers meeting at an official dinner could be expected to raise — about my home town, my family, my Métis roots, and my professional interests. He then smoothly turned the conversation toward the Vietnam War, the Cuban missile crisis, and national liberation movements in general before homing in on the ELN, asking thought-provoking and erudite questions on its philosophical, religious, and ethical underpinnings. He listened to my views with the utmost seriousness. When the dinner was over and I went home, I realized that while I had told him a lot about my background and provided my views on the major issues of the day, I had obtained nothing in return from him.
About that time, I noticed a car, a powerful, four-door sedan of the type used by police departments in the United States and Canada — its windows tinted to conceal the identity of those inside — trailing behind me in the traffic. When I sped up, it sped up. When I slowed down, it slowed down. When I got up in the morning to go to work, it was waiting outside on the street. When I parked my Beetle on the street outside the embassy, it pulled in behind me and waited for me to come out. When I went shopping, two tough-looking, sun-glass wearing characters followed close behind as I made my purchases. When I asked them to leave me alone, they stared at me, their faces hidden behind their sunglasses, and continued to follow me.
Back at the office, when I described what was happening to Alfonso and asked him if he knew who they were, he turned pale, shrugged his shoulders, and said he didn’t want to get involved. “I have a wife and children, Señor,” was the reason he gave, as he raised his arms in a mute appeal for my understanding.
Two weeks later, Longshaft sent me a laconic message. “Pack everything and leave the country immediately,” it said. “Your posting to Colombia is over.”
Departure was a tense affair. Heather had not broken off our engagement but was still in a bad mood, and the ambassador made it clear he was happy we were leaving. A moving company came to the apartment to pack up and ship to Ottawa our few possessions, and a newly arrived member of the British embassy took the Beetle off my hands for a fair price. Alfonso was the only member of the embassy to see us off — and that was because he had no choice — his duties included driving departing staff to catch their flights back to Canada. As we waited in line to get our boarding passes, I saw one of the men who had been following me over the past several weeks standing near the counter as we checked in. And as the Avianca plane waited on the tarmac for permission to take off, I saw the sedan with the tinted windows parked on the side of the runway.
9: The CIA
Longshaft greeted me warmly when I called on him the day after our arrival in Ottawa. “You did a brave thing down there in Colombia, accompanying Rojas on a raid,” he said over coffee in his office. “It was exactly the sort of thing I wanted when I sent you to Colombia.”
“Did you pass my message to you to the Americans?” I asked, hoping he would say no. “Was that how the Colombians found out where he was? Or did the people of Sucio lead the army to Rojas?”
“The CIA read your report — it provided them with the first detailed way through the maze of trails up the mountain to the ELN camp. They told the Colombians … that’s how they got him. But we didn’t give it to them … at least not right away. We didn’t want Rojas killed any more than you did. He provided some good information on the FLQ when you met him in Bogota and we were hoping he’d be able to tell us more when they got him.”
“Then how did the CIA get my report?”
“The Americans didn’t need my help to get copy of your message. The CIA has been reading Canadian diplomatic mail for years, even though it’s not supposed to. And we’d do the same with theirs if we knew how.”
“Does that mean the killing of killing of Rojas, the massacre of the Indians, the disappearance of Señora Lopez, and the expulsion from Colombia of the American missionary happened because the Americans saw my message?”
“When I passed a copy after the fact to Harvey Lieberman, the local CIA Chief of Station, he didn’t look surprised. That’s because he’d already read it. By that time, the CIA had already briefed the Colombians. And he knew I knew. That’s why I didn’t answer your message. The Americans would have read it as well.”
“I thought Canada and the United States had an agreement they wouldn’t spy on each other.”
“That just applies to the NSA and the CSEC. The NSA doesn’t spy on Canada and the CSEC doesn’t spy on the Americans. But that doesn’t prevent the other American spy agencies from monitoring our mail should th
ey want to.”
Upset at receiving confirmation of what I already suspected, I lashed out. “Don’t you find that humiliating to be treated that way, when we’re supposed to be allies?”
“I suppose it is, but that’s the way the game is played. The good news is the Americans are our closest friends and have our interests at heart. In fact, we’re the lucky ones. They probably read everyone’s mail, friends as well as enemies, only the others don’t know it. And if I have information I really want to keep from the Americans, I never send it over the wires or by satellite transmission. I send it by diplomatic bag, or I discuss the matter directly with the officer concerned when he comes to Ottawa. Like I’m doing with you.”
“I still find it humiliating.”
“You’ve got to get rid of that attitude. They’re our friends. As a matter of fact, the CIA probably saved your life in Bogota.”
Unable to believe him, I answered curtly. “Tell me more.”
“After the death of Rojas, the NSA intercepted a series of messages being exchanged among the members of the ELN hierarchy confirming it had sent a squad to kidnap you. If it couldn’t kidnap you, it was supposed to kill you. They blamed you for betraying Rojas and rolling up his network, including Señora Lopez. By the way, Lopez was Rojas’s wife, but I suppose you knew that already. As we speak, the Colombian secret police are questioning her to find out what she knows about the ELN.”
“How can you be sure?” I said, not wanting to hear what he would say.
“The NSA reads the traffic of the Colombian secret police — and passes the messages to us. So far she hasn’t said much, but they’ll break her sooner or later.”
“And then what?”
“Their normal practice is to fly terrorists after interrogation out over the Caribbean and dump them into the sea. And there’s nothing anybody can do to help her,” he said, anticipating my next question.
“Why do I owe the CIA any favours?” I said, still trying to absorb what he had said.
“Do you remember seeing a sedan with tinted glass, filled with tough-looking guys following you around in Bogota before you left? Those were CIA contractors. But they couldn’t guarantee your safety. That’s one of the reasons the CIA wanted you out. We agreed of course.”
“What’s the other reason?”
“The CIA wanted to keep you alive because it wants you to work for it.”
“You must be joking.”
“No I’m not. The CIA uses Canadians when it can’t deploy its own in places where the United States doesn’t have diplomatic relations. We like to help it out if at all possible since it shares so much with us.”
“Aren’t you afraid of the risks? What if foreign governments find out Canadian diplomats are working for the CIA? Nobody would trust us and our reputation would suffer.”
“There are safeguards in place to keep that from happening and each request is considered on its merits.”
“But why me,” I said, putting off the time when I would have to make a decision. “I was in over my head in Colombia and a lot of people got hurt as a result. I wouldn’t want that to happen again.”
“They’ve done their homework and like what they’ve seen, that’s why. As a matter of fact, you made a big impression on the CIA Station Chief over dinner in Bogota a few weeks ago. Don’t you remember?”
Longshaft’s question didn’t call for an answer, and I asked him instead where the CIA wanted to use me. “In Cuba,” he said. “The Americans closed their embassy in Havana shortly after Castro came to power and withdrew its staff, including the CIA component. Russia then sent troops, nuclear warheads, and missiles targeting the United States, as well as naval units to Cuba. That provoked the missile crisis of 1962. You might have been too young to remember it, but nuclear war between U.S.A. and Soviet Union almost broke out.”
“I wasn’t that young,” I said. “I was in high school.”
“What you couldn’t have known — since it’s one of Canada’s most closely held secrets — is that the president of the United States appealed personally to the prime minister afterwards to send an officer to Cuba to carry out tasking requests for the CIA. He agreed since the reinsertion of the missiles could provoke nuclear war.”
I was intrigued, but said nothing and waited for Longshaft to provide more details.
“If you accept, you’ll be promoted from second to first secretary and go to Cuba on a two-year posting. The Havana embassy is small — smaller even than the one in Bogota — and you’d become deputy to the ambassador. Your day job would be to write political and economic reports, issue passports, and deal with consular cases that may arise. But your weekend and after-hours work would be monitoring Soviet army, naval, and air deployments for the CIA. Alfred Cook, Canada’s ambassador in Havana, has been consulted and he’s agreed to accept your nomination if you agree to go. What do you say?”
“Wouldn’t you rather send me back to another embassy in South America to do the same sort of work I did in Bogota?”
“Helping the CIA in Havana is also a priority.”
“Then I’ll do it,” I said. “But I’m planning to get married. Would I have time fit in a wedding?”
“The name of your fiancé is Heather Sinclair, I believe. O’Connor sent in a negative report, saying she was a hippie, a believer in free love, and soft on the left. He recommended you be denied permission to marry her.”
“I’d leave the Department if we couldn’t get married.”
“Don’t worry. The Department’s given you permission just the same. You won’t be leaving for Havana until September so you’ll have plenty of time to get married and to become familiar with the files and talking to the experts on Cuba. The Department will pick up the tab for hotel accommodation until you leave.”
Heather’s mood improved dramatically when I told her the Department was posting us to Cuba, in her opinion, the most socially and politically advanced country in the Americas if not in the world. When I said we’d have to get married before leaving for Havana, she called her parents in Winnipeg and told them we’d be arriving within two weeks to get married. I could only hear her side of the conversation, but it didn’t seem to go well, at least at the outset. “His name’s Luc Cadotte,” I heard her say. “I know that’s a Métis name … that’s because he’s a Métis from a town on Georgian Bay…. I know what you think about the Métis but I don’t care…. I don’t care if granny and granddad will be upset… I don’t care if your friends talk … you can ask him yourself what he does for a living … you can ask him yourself what his father does for a living ... I don’t care … no I’m not pregnant … no I don’t want a wedding at the United Church…. I want a public ceremony at the registrar’s office … I don’t care who you invite for drinks afterwards…. We’re moving to Cuba where Luc has a job…. If that’s the way you feel about it, we’ll get married in Ottawa…. Okay, we’ll see you at the airport.”
In the end, the wedding was a great success. Heather’s parents, who initially greeted me frostilly, became quite friendly when they discovered I wasn’t a long-haired hippie. The only potentially unpleasant moment occurred when granny, who had had too much to drink at the reception, came up to me and said, “I knew you were a Métis as soon as I saw you. There’s something about your eyes that gives you away — something half Indian, half white, and half Devil.” She then burst out laughing, hit me affectionately on the shoulder, and I forgave her for her ingrained racism.
Back in Ottawa, Mary gave me a temporary office on the ninth floor to use and I kept myself busy preparing for my new posting. But as winter gave way to spring and then to summer, Heather grew bored. Then one day in early July, when I returned to our hotel room after work, she wasn’t there. She had however left me a note to say old CUSO friends from Colombia had dropped in and she was leaving with them to spend a few days at a cottage across the Gatineau River in Wakefield, Quebec. “You don’t need me and I have to get out this apartment for a few days or else I’l
l go crazy. My friends don’t have a phone and so you can’t call me. Don’t worry about me. I’m a big girl and can take care of myself.”
I was suspicious. It was no secret that in the hills around Wakefield in those days there were a number of communes populated by American draft dodgers and deserters and their libertine Canadian friends, many of whom spent their time growing and smoking pot between forays into Ottawa to protest American involvement in the Vietnam War. And, although I didn’t want to think about it, in my imagination I saw her smoking pot and making love to each and every member of the commune, male and female — and each one had the face of Charles Bullock, her former boyfriend in Bogota.
The more I thought about it, the angrier I became. But as the days and then the weeks went by without hearing from her, my anger turned to resignation and a great sense of loss. I missed her so much that when I came home one evening in mid-August and she was there, I rejoiced. She offered no explanation and while friendly enough, she was distant. Something had happened to change her opinion of me during her absence, but we carried on planning for our departure for Cuba in September.
A week before we left, Harvey Lieberman came by to tell me what the CIA expected of me in Cuba, beginning with the context. “The communists are winning the war in Vietnam, the Warsaw Pact has crushed the Prague Spring, the Russians are pulling ahead of us in the arms race, and, for the last couple of years, they’ve been flying bombers carrying nuclear weapons out of Russia and down the east coast of the United States to Cuba. Recently, they’ve positioned submarines in the port of Cienfuegos. No one knows what they’re up to and they’ve got people worried. Some of the folks in Langley even think they’re planning to put missiles and nuclear warheads back into Cuba.”
“What do you want me to do?”
“You’re to snoop around Soviet bases, take pictures of weapons and electronic systems and observe troop movements. But first we want you to do a little job for us in Havana harbour. At this moment, a Soviet freighter, the SS Kama, is tied up at the Soviet Black Sea naval base at Sevastopol with a suspicious cargo of large cylindrical objects tied down under camouflage netting on its deck. It’s scheduled to arrive in Havana this weekend, we need you to get to Cuba before then.”
Exceptional Circumstances Page 12