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DE RUEHOT #0136/01 0252315
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R 252315Z JAN 08
FM AMEMBASSY OTTAWA
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 7209
INFO RUCNCAN/ALL CANADIAN POSTS COLLECTIVE
RUEHZL/EUROPEAN POLITICAL COLLECTIVE
RUEHWH/WESTERN HEMISPHERIC AFFAIRS DIPL POSTS
RHMCSUU/FBI WASHINGTON DC
RHMFIUU/DEPT OF HOMELAND SECURITY WASHINGTON DC
RUEAIIA/CIA WASHDC
RHEHNSC/WHITE HOUSE NSC WASHINGTON DC
RUEABND/DEA HQS WASHDC
RUEAORC/US CUSTOMS AND BORDER PROTECTION WASHINGTON DC

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 OTTAWA 000136 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV KPAO CA
SUBJECT: PRIMETIME IMAGES OF US-CANADA BORDER PAINT U.S. IN 
INCREASINGLY NEGATIVE LIGHT 
 
OTTAWA 00000136  001.2 OF 003 
 
 
¶1. (SBU) Summary: The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) 
has long gone to great pains to highlight the distinction 
between Americans and Canadians in its programming, generally 
at our expense. However, the level of anti-American melodrama 
has been given a huge boost in the current television season 
as a number of programs offer Canadian viewers their fill of 
nefarious American officials carrying out equally nefarious 
deeds in Canada while Canadian officials either oppose them 
or fall trying.  CIA rendition flights, schemes to steal 
Canada's water, "the Guantanamo-Syria express," F-16's flying 
in for bombing runs in Quebec to eliminate escaped 
terrorists:  in response to the onslaught, one media 
commentator concluded, somewhat tongue-in-cheek, that 
"apparently, our immigration department's real enemies aren't 
terrorists or smugglers -- they're Americans."  While this 
situation hardly constitutes a public diplomacy crisis per 
se, the degree of comfort with which Canadian broadcast 
entities, including those financed by Canadian tax dollars, 
twist current events to feed long-standing negative images of 
the U.S. -- and the extent to which the Canadian public seems 
willing to indulge in the feast - is noteworthy as an 
indication of the kind of insidious negative popular 
stereotyping we are increasingly up against in Canada.  End 
Summary. 
 
"THE BORDER" -CANADA'S ANSWER TO 24, W/O THAT SUTHERLAND GUY 
--------------------------------------------- --------------- 
 
¶2. (SBU) When American TV and movie producers want action, 
the formula involves Middle Eastern terrorists, a ticking 
nuclear device, and a (somewhat ironically, Canadian) guy 
named Sutherland.  Canadian producers don't need to look so 
far -- they can find all the action they need right on the 
U.S.-Canadian border.  This piece of real estate, which most 
Americans associate with snow blowing back and forth across 
an imaginary line, has for the past three weeks been for 
Canadian viewers the site of downed rendition flights, F-16 
bombing runs, and terrorist suspects being whisked away to 
Middle Eastern torture facilities. "The Border," which 
state-owned CBC premiered on January 7, attracted an 
impressive 710,000 viewers on its first showing -- not 
exactly Hockey Night in Canada, but equivalent to an American 
program drawing about eight million U.S. viewers.  The show 
depicts Canadian immigration and customs officers' efforts to 
secure the U.S.-Canadian border and the litany of moral 
dilemmas they face in doing so.  The CBC bills the 
high-budget program as depicting the "new war" on the border 
and "the few who fight it."  While the "war" is supposed to 
be against criminals and terrorists trying to cross the 
border, many of the immigration team's battles end up being 
with U.S. government officials, often in tandem with the 
CIA-colluding Canadian Security and Intelligence Service 
(CSIS). 
 
¶3. (SBU) The clash between the Americans and Canadians got 
started early in the season and has continued unabated.  In 
episode one a Syrian terrorist with a belt full of gel-based 
explosives is removed from a plane in Canada while the 
Canadian-Syrian man sitting next to him is rendered by the 
CIA/CSIS team to Syria -- a fairly transparent reference to 
QCIA/CSIS team to Syria -- a fairly transparent reference to 
the Maher Arar case.  Fortunately for the incarcerated 
individual, the sympathetic Canadian Immigration and Customs 
Security official recognizes the mistake and shrewdly causes 
the government to rescue him from a Syrian jail through 
organized media pressure.  The episode ends with a preview of 
things to come when one of the Canadian immigration officers 
notes with disgust, "Homeland Security is sending in some hot 
shot agent." 
 
¶4. (SBU) Episode two expands on this theme, featuring the 
arrival of an arrogant, albeit stunningly attractive female 
DHS officer, sort of a cross between Salma Hayek and Cruella 
De Vil.  The show portrays the DHS official bossing around 
her stereotypically more compassionate Canadian colleagues 
while uttering such classic lines as, "Who do you think 
provides the muscle to protect your fine ideals?" and "You 
would have killed him.  Let the American justice system do it 
for you."  Her fallback line in most situations is "it's a 
matter of national security." 
 
¶5. (SBU) But the one-liners and cross-border stereotypes 
really take off in episode three, in which an American 
 
OTTAWA 00000136  002.2 OF 003 
 
 
rendition aircraft with three terrorist suspects on the 
"Guantanamo to Syria express" crashes in Quebec and the 
terrorists escape -- however, not before killing a Quebec 
police officer, whose sympathetic widow appears throughout 
the show.  The DHS officer's answer to everything is American 
firepower, but in this episode even CSIS gets a chance at 
redemption as the CSIS officer in charge challenges her. Ms. 
DHS barks back, "You really want to talk territorial 
sovereignty, or should we talk about getting the terrorists 
back?"  After being chased through the woods of Quebec by a 
cross-culturally balanced CSIS-JTF2 team which kills a 
15-year-old terrorist in a shootout, the bad guys are finally 
cornered on the side of a pristine Canadian lake.  Then, 
after a conversation with Washington in which she asks "can 
you bypass NSA and State?", our DHS official calls in an 
air-strike on the terrorists without Canadian concurrence. 
Canadian planes, another official has explained, are "already 
deployed to Afghanistan, helping our neighbors fight their 
war on terror."  With only seconds to spare before the bombs 
are dropped on the Quebec site, the planes are called off 
when the CSIS-JTF team affirms positive control over the 
terrorists.  Finally, in a last-minute allowance for 
redemption, the CSIS officer informs his DHS colleague that 
the captured terrorists will not be turned over to the U.S. 
but will stand trial for the death of the Quebec police 
officer.  She does get the final word, though, hissing the 
classic phrase "you people are so nave," before the screen 
goes blank. 
 
DEA ALSO TAKES SOME HITS 
------------------------ 
 
¶6. (SBU) If that isn't enough, "the Border" is only one of 
the CBC programs featuring cross-border relations. 
"Intelligence," which depicts a Canadian intelligence unit 
collaborating with a local drug lord-turned government 
informant, is just as stinging in its portrayal of 
U.S.-Canada law enforcement cooperation.  Through its two 
seasons, the program has followed plot lines including a DEA 
attempt to frame the Canadian informant for murder, a CIA 
plot to secretly divert Canadian water to the American 
southwest, and a rogue DEA team that actually starts selling 
drugs for a profit.  A columnist in conservative Canadian 
daily newspaper "The National Post" commented, "There's no 
question that the CSIS heroes on 'Intelligence' consider the 
Americans our most dangerous enemies." 
 
EVEN THE LITTLE MOSQUE GETS IN TO THE ACT 
----------------------------------------- 
 
¶7. (U) Even "Little Mosque on the Prairie," a popular 
Canadian sitcom that depicts a Muslim community in a small 
Saskatchewan town, has joined the trend of featuring 
U.S.-Canada border relations.  This time, however, the State 
Department is the fall guy.  A December 2007 episode 
portrayed a Muslim economics professor trying to remove his 
name from the No-Fly-List at a U.S. consulate.  The show 
depicts a rude and eccentric U.S. consular officer 
stereotypically attempting to find any excuse to avoid being 
helpful.  Another episode depicted how an innocent trip 
across the border became a jumble of frayed nerves as Grandpa 
was scurried into secondary by U.S. border officials because 
his name matched something on the watch list. 
Qhis name matched something on the watch list. 
 
GIVE US YOUR WATER; OH WHAT THE HECK WE'LL TAKE YOUR COUNTRY 
TOO 
--------------------------------------------- ---- 
 
¶8. (U) And it appears that the season is just warming up. 
After CIA renditions, DEA murder plots, DHS missteps, and 
unhelpful consular officers, a U.S. takeover of Canada may 
have been the only theme left for the CBC "H20" mini-series. 
The series was first broadcast in 2005, when it featured an 
investigation into an American assassination of the Canadian 
prime minister and a very broad-based (and wildly 
implausible) U.S. scheme to steal Canadian water.  A two-part 
sequel, set to be broadcast in March and April 2008, will 
portray the United States as manipulating innocent, trusting 
Canadians into voting in favor of Canada's becoming part of 
the United States.  Then, after the United States completely 
takes over Canada, one brave Canadian unites Canadians and 
Europeans in an attempt to end America's hegemony.  Another 
 
OTTAWA 00000136  003.2 OF 003 
 
 
program could prove more benign but will certainly include 
its share of digs against all things American:  Global TV 
reportedly is gearing up for a March 2008 debut of its own 
border security drama, set to feature Canadian 
search-and-rescue officers patrolling the U.S.-Canada border. 
 
 
COMMENT 
------- 
 
¶9. (SBU) EKOS pollster Frank Graves told Poloff he thought 
that at this point such shows are reflective and not causal 
in determining attitudes in Canada.  They play on the 
deep-seated caution most Canadians feel toward their large 
neighbor to the south, a sort of zeitgeist that has been in 
the background for decades.  As one example, a December 2007 
Strategic Counsel poll showed that nine percent of Canadians 
thought U.S. foreign policy was the greatest threat to the 
world -- twice as high as those who were concerned about 
weapons of mass destruction.  What Graves does find 
disturbing -- and here he believes that the causal or 
reflective question is not important -- is that support for a 
less porous border is increasing in both Canada and the U.S.: 
in the U.S. because of generalized fear of terrorism and in 
Canada because of concern over guns, sovereignty, and the 
impact that a terrorist attack on the U.S. would have on 
trade.  Graves has detected an increasingly wary attitude 
over the border that he believes could lead to greater 
distance between the two countries. 
 
¶10. (SBU) While there is no single answer to this trend, it 
does serve to demonstrate the importance of constant 
creative, and adequately-funded public-diplomacy engagement 
with Canadians, at all levels and in virtually all parts of 
the country.  We need to do everything we can to make it more 
difficult for Canadians to fall into the trap of seeing all 
U.S. policies as the result of nefarious faceless U.S. 
bureaucrats anxious to squeeze their northern neighbor. 
While there are those who may rate the need for USG 
public-diplomacy programs as less vital in Canada than in 
other nations because our societies are so much alike, we 
clearly have real challenges here that simply must be 
adequately addressed. 
 
Visit Canada,s Economy and Environment Forum at 
http://www.intelink.gov/communities/state/can ada 
 
WILKINS