Article

Arnold Cantwell Smith

Published Online December 2, 2007

Last Edited December 16, 2013

Arnold Cantwell Smith, diplomat (b at Toronto, Ont 18 Jan 1915; d there 7 Feb 1994). A Rhodes scholar who joined the Dept of External Affairs in 1943, he was posted to Russia, 1943-45, and he acted as secretary to the Kellock-Taschereau Royal Commission (see Igor Gouzenko).

Smith, Arnold Cantwell

Arnold Cantwell Smith, diplomat (b at Toronto, Ont 18 Jan 1915; d there 7 Feb 1994). A Rhodes scholar who joined the Dept of External Affairs in 1943, he was posted to Russia, 1943-45, and he acted as secretary to the Kellock-Taschereau Royal Commission (see Igor Gouzenko). His subsequent service included stints in Brussels, New York, Cambodia and London, and culminated in terms as ambassador to Cairo, 1958-61, and to Moscow, 1961-63.

From 1965 to 1975 he was an enthusiastic, creative, deeply committed first secretary-general of the Commonwealth, a period he recalls in Stitches in Time (1981). He is also the author of The We-They Frontier: From International Relations to World Politics (1983) and, with Arthur Lall, Multilateral Negotiation and Mediation: Instruments and Methods (1985). In 1975, the Queen awarded him membership in the order of the Companions of Honour, limited to only 65 honourees at a time. He was appointed the Lester B. Pearson professor of international affairs at Carleton University in Ottawa from 1976-81.He became an Officer of the Order of Canada in 1984.