They Need a Few Beatings and a Bit of Kicking Around and Then You Couldn't Beat Them: Canadian Diplomats Judge Australia and Australians, 1939-1945.

Three Canadian High Commissioners—C.J. Burchell, Victor Odlum and T.C. Davis—served in Australia from 1939 to 1945. Political appointees all, the three men shared generally disparaging and patronising views of Australia and Australians. These views were the product, in part, of a less than close and sometimes acrimonious relationship between these two distant Dominions and Canadian condescension. But American diplomats and even many Australian elites also tended to view the Australians as friendly if uncomplicated people with few organisational or political skills. Unsurprisingly, such views did little to aid the development of close ties between Australia and Canada during the Second World War. They also engendered equally sharp comments about Canada and Canadians from Australian officials. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]