Forget Navalny and honour Gouzenko instead

Commemorate the Soviet-era defector near the embassy, Desmond Mills says.

In February, the world was informed of the untimely death of dissident Alexei Navalny in a Russian prison. (Death is not quite the appropriate word, however, as this death was likely closer in nature to a cold-blooded murder.) In response, some in Ottawa have called for a portion of Charlotte Street in front of the Russian Embassy to be renamed in his honour.

It's an intriguing idea, but I cannot help but oppose this proposal. There is a better candidate who should be honoured in this location: Igor Gouzenko, the cipher clerk turned defector whose information ignited the Cold War. Yes, the Cold War started right here in Ottawa.

When Gouzenko left the Russian Embassy with classified documents in 1945, just three days after the end of the Second World War, he exposed two basic facts: that the Soviet Union was stealing nuclear secrets from the West and it was planting sleeper agents in our societies.

In fact, the Soviet nuclear bomb was developed from secrets stolen from the West (to those who have watched the movie Oppenheimer, this will probably sound familiar).

In a very Canadian way, we almost bungled his defection (at first the government did not quite know what to do with him; and an Ottawa newspaper — not this one — turned him away when he tried to tell his story). Bureaucratic quagmires do seem to be our specialty.

While a monument to his defection already exists on Dundonald Park, near his former apartment, it is small in scale. It was from the Russian Embassy that the documents were taken, and that act should be acknowledged. A companion statue of Gouzenko himself could also be installed by the nearby Strathcona Park fountain.

While current international events are of interest, it is equally important to commemorate our local history, especially since it is just as relevant today.

Just as in Gouzenko's time, Russia has used this embassy to destabilize the West. In 2007, Jeffrey Delisle, former sub-lieutenant in the Royal Canadian Navy, walked into the building to sell secret information; and in March 2022, the embassy itself repeatedly made false claims about the wartime situation in Ukraine. Renaming this portion of the street would offer the Russian consular staff a reminder that the West has not forgotten their past or current crimes.

I find myself regularly surprised about how few people in Ottawa, and those visiting the city, know about the Gouzenko incident. I know that part of this collective gap in our memory is due to the gaps in our educational system and how we commemorate public history, something we could help rectify with this proposal.

Despite being long removed from the Cold War, its themes are as important as ever. It is long overdue that we help inform ourselves about Ottawa's (and Canada's) place in that conflict.