Exceptional Circumstances. James Bartleman
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Would your moral compass allow you to help a Canadian company obtain a contract through bribery?”
“I would never do such a thing.”
“Even if Canadian jobs were at stake?”
“No, I still wouldn’t.”
“Are you aware that the Canadian government, at this moment, is helping Canadian asbestos companies market their product overseas when they and the companies know asbestos causes hundreds of thousands of lung cancer deaths each year? What would you do if you received instructions to promote asbestos in the country of your accreditation?”
“I wouldn’t do it.”
“What if you were told you would be fired for insubordination if you didn’t do as you were told?”
“I still wouldn’t do it.”
“Are you saying the exceptional circumstance argument doesn’t apply to asbestos sales but does when it comes to accepting information derived from torture?”
“That’s right, torture is acceptable in exceptional circumstances but selling asbestos is an absolute abomination, and always inexcusable; lung cancer is a horrible disease.”
“I think we’ve gone as far as we can in dealing with these issues,” Longshaft said. “Unless there’s a member of the board who has something else to ask Mr. Cadotte on this topic.”
Without looking up from the table, Hunter mumbled something nobody understood. “Please speak up, Jonathan,” Longshaft said. “We would all benefit from your views.”
“With the indulgence of the board, I’d like to repeat a little joke attributed to Winston Churchill, which has some relevance to this discussion. Churchill said to a socialite: ‘Madame, would you sleep with me for five million pounds?’ To which the socialite responded, ‘My goodness, Mr. Churchill … Well, I suppose … we would have to discuss terms of course….’ Churchill asked, ‘Would you sleep with me for five pounds?’ and the socialite responded, ‘Mr. Churchill, what sort of woman do you think I am?’ To which Churchill said, ‘Madam, we’ve already established that. Now we are haggling about the price.’ ”
Nobody laughed, and I could tell from the angry looks the others directed at Longshaft that he had violated some sort of understanding. Maybe they didn’t think the topic was fit to be discussed with someone who wasn’t yet a member of the Department? Maybe they didn’t want to be reminded about the disagreeable things Foreign Service officers were sometimes required to do?
Whatever it was, Burump, his jowls quivering, reacted badly, telling Longshaft, “I don’t have anything else to raise with the candidate, but there is something I must say to you, Theodore. In more than three decades of service at Ottawa and abroad, I never once came across a case where a Foreign Service officer was asked to pass to headquarters information derived from torture by an institution of a foreign government. I have never heard of a case where one of our officers helped a Canadian company bribe a local official to obtain a contract. I admit that we are all instructed to promote the sales of products like asbestos and tobacco, which are not good for anyone’s health, and we sell automatic weapons and light armoured vehicles to governments that will use them against their own peoples, against oppressed minorities, or in wars against neighbouring states. We obey because we realize we live in an imperfect world and if we didn’t win those contracts, then someone else would. But the Department I know and love is staffed by decent, law-abiding and loyal officers, not by a gang of goons.”
“Maybe if you had to deal with the sorts of things that come across my desk every day, you wouldn’t feel that way.” Longshaft responded. “I deal with the underside of life and you work on the sunny side. Now back to business. Mr. Cadotte, as my last question, please discuss the issue most likely to trouble domestic peace in Canada in the years ahead — take all the time you want. Then you’ll be free to go and we’ll break for the day.”
I knew the board expected me to talk about the Quiet Revolution in Quebec — the struggle of Quebeckers to carve out a new place for themselves in Canada after centuries of corrupt priest-ridden governments and two hundred years of domination by English-speaking business elites. It had been the issue that occupied the headlines, the editorial pages, and the debates in Parliament for years. Royal commissions had been struck, and a new national flag thought to be more in tune with the times adopted. English-speaking Quebeckers, unwilling to make an effort to learn French, and afraid they would have no place in the political order, were abandoning their Montreal enclaves of privilege to make new lives for themselves in Toronto. At the same time, a terrorist group, the Front de libération du Québec, the FLQ, emerged from the shadows to try to turn the quiet revolution into a violent one. They were bombing the symbols of the old order such as armouries and post offices, and robbing banks and liquor stores to finance their operations. Nobody, however, took them seriously. After all, Canada, Quebec included, was a liberal parliamentary democracy. The FLQ was an anomaly which would eventually just fade away.
I was confident I knew the issues thoroughly and would have had no problem laying them out to the board and fielding any questions they might have. But I didn’t want to do it. I wanted to talk about the condition of Aboriginal people in Canada, especially the Métis, but I didn’t think the board would be interested. I was also still under the shock of Longshaft’s relentless Jesuitical examination of my moral compass. He had opened up my soul in the company of strangers and found it wanting. With his little joke, Hunter had insinuated that I was no better than an intellectual whore, ready to trade lives if the price was right. I didn’t know why I had allowed myself to be drawn into a repulsive debate on the costs and benefits of torture in the first place.
Glancing around, I saw the board members looking at me as if I was some country hick, too naïve to understand the complex nature of the world and the moral compromises officers of the Department had to make to save Canadian lives and sell Canadian goods. Suddenly, I felt out of place in this room of sophisticated, cynical senior officers and didn’t want to subject myself to another cross examination on an issue closer to my heart than to theirs. Perhaps I would go to teacher’s college after all and go home to Penetang to teach at my old high school.
“I think I’ll withdraw my application to join the Department,” I said, and got up and left the room.
3: Unreasonable Expectations
The next evening, to my surprise, Burump called me at my rooming house. “I wasn’t at all happy with the way the interview went yesterday, Dear Boy,” he said. “I’d like you to come see me before you make up your mind about a career in the Department.”
By that time, I was having second thoughts about leaving the conference room in a huff. By giving way to a fit of childish pique, I had turned my back on the career of my dreams and I hated the idea of becoming a teacher like Angus Fairbanks in small-town Ontario. I was thus delighted that such a senior officer had taken the trouble to call me and hoped he wanted to give me another chance.
“I didn’t know I was getting an offer.”
“Don’t be impertinent with me. I’m on your side. Come see me in my office in the Daley Building on Rideau Street first thing Monday morning. There are a few things you should know.”
I was standing outside his door when Burump arrived for work and he told me to accompany him to get a cup of coffee. A few minutes later we emerged from the elevator into a windowless basement snack bar.
“This is our gourmet restaurant,” he said. “The specialties are always the same — fried-egg sandwiches smeared with ketchup, baked beans, and buttered toast; french fries with salt and vinegar; hamburgers with the works; hotdogs with mustard; apple and raisin pie; muffins; and awful, tepid coffee. The odour of boiling grease and burnt toast adds to the charm.”
As we waited in line to buy our coffee, a steady flow of people passed by carrying food back to their offices. Without exception, they took the time to greet Burump — some nodding their heads in recognition, others stopping a minute to comment on the weather, and others to share a joke. Burump laughed at all