Mission Brazil

When Canada opened its first diplomatic mission in Brazil in 1941, one of its principal aims was to help secure support for the Allied war effort against Nazi Germany. Despite some fascist tendencies of the dictator Getúlio Vargas, Brazil was one of the few South American countries to back the Allies and the only one to eventually commit troops. It deployed 29,500 soldiers who were instrumental in the liberation of Italy, most notably in the Battle of Monte Castello, from November 1944 to February 1945. A Canadian legation and soon a full embassy in Rio de Janeiro, the capital until 1960, was notable given our limited diplomatic relations worldwide; we maintained few political missions outside the Commonwealth. Washington’s Lend-Lease program for matériel and infrastructure was clearly a greater incentive for Brazil’s attachment to Allied war aims. But Canada’s new diplomatic presence played a motivating part.

Canadian business had long been active in Brazil...