IN THE SECOND HALF of 1959, with Adams, Foster Dulles, and so many others from the original team gone, and with Eisenhower adopting a more strenuous speaking and traveling schedule, talk of the “new” Eisenhower filled columns and editorials. Whitman noted angrily that in 1958 the reporters had been calling Eisenhower an “old and sick and feeble” man, but she was pleased by all the good publicity the Administration was getting by mid-1959. Then she wondered, since she was part of the “old” team, whether she ought not to leave too. Fortunately for the President, Whitman recorded that “I don’t want to leave while I still feel that the President has any shred of affection for me or feels that I can in any way serve him better than someone new.” Besides, she did not see any “new” Eisenhower, except for one thing: “I believe that he came to office with a healthy fear of Congress, a carry-over from days when he appeared before committees, kowtowing to Congress.” Whitman thought he had learned to stand up to Congress, as evidenced by his recent veto of a Democratic housing bill and his success in getting some labor-reform legislation through Congress. Then Whitman put her finger on what was causing all the “new” talk—“While the decisions were always the President’s, I think that Herter and Jerry Persons are more inclined to remain in the background than were Adams and certainly Dulles.”1
• •
In fact, the theme Eisenhower was stressing in 1959 was an old one that stretched back to Atoms for Peace (1953), Open Skies (1955), and other attempts to find some accommodation with the Soviets. At a mid-June meeting with Under Secretary of State Douglas Dillon and Goodpaster, Eisenhower said “we must look for added or new subjects or possibilities on which to negotiate. He said he had racked his head to think of such things—that would not appear to be concessions—and was at his ‘wits end.’ ” But he was not, really, for he immediately added that Khrushchev had raised the question of IRBMs, and Eisenhower felt that if ICBM development continued, “it might be possible to give up these IRBM plans.”2
Two days later, on June 17, Eisenhower met with Dillon, Gray, McElroy, and Goodpaster. Eisenhower said he could see good reason for the DOD policy of placing IRBMs in Germany, France, and Britain, but going so close to the Soviet borders as Greece “seems very questionable.” Eisenhower drew an analogy: “If Cuba or Mexico were to become Communist inclined, and the Soviets were to send arms and equipment, . . . we would feel that we would have to intervene, militarily if necessary.” In a more general sense, Eisenhower protested against the mushroom-type growth of American military bases around the world; in places like Morocco or Libya, he pointed out, they “impose a political drain on us—a constant burden and handicap.”
McElroy insisted that the President “consider the question against the Soviet threats to obliterate Western Europe. It was a situation resulting from threats such as these that led us to offer these IRBMs to our allies, who were showing signs of being shaken by the threat.” Then he made the classic argument for more missiles: The weapons could be used as bargaining chips. McElroy “felt we can push the Soviets toward willingness to consider disarmament seriously if these weapons are in fact deployed near them.” That position put McElroy (and all those who used his arguments in the sixties and seventies and eighties) in the strange position of advocating building more bombs and missiles in the present in order to not have to build more bombs and missiles in the future. And Eisenhower gave McElroy what has become the classic rejoinder: “The President commented that this [missile] deployment does not seem to serve to reduce tensions between ourselves and the Soviets.” In other words, the Russians did not scare easily. Eisenhower then insisted that no pressure be put on the Greeks to accept IRBMs, nor on the Italians or the Turks or anyone else. “Only if the Greeks asked for them should they be provided.”3
With Europe about to be covered with IRBMs, and with the ICBMs coming into production, and with a crisis over Berlin, everyone was getting a little more frightened. Pressure from the Europeans for a summit, especially from Macmillan, was intense and growing. Khrushchev said he wanted to meet with Eisenhower. For his part, Eisenhower was willing enough to talk, but only after the Foreign Ministers’ meeting (currently in recess in Geneva) had produced some progress. Khrushchev said that by defining the differences, they already had made progress, a proposition Eisenhower refused to accept. There were some informal exchanges taking place—in July, an American Exhibition opened in Moscow, as a counterpart to a Russian Exhibition opening in New York. Eisenhower sent Nixon and his brother Milton to Moscow (where Nixon got into his famous “kitchen debate” with Khrushchev), but as Eisenhower told his aides, making a point “he has made many times, that the Vice-President is not a part of the negotiating mechanism of government.”4
The President was, of course, the supreme negotiator. But Dulles had always warned him against summit meetings unless and until the Foreign Ministers had made some progress, a position that obviously put great stress on the role of the Secretary of State. Eisenhower agreed with Dulles, but Khrushchev did not. Eisenhower liked to pretend that American diplomatic teams, and especially the Secretary of State, were free to conclude deals with the Soviets on the basis of mutual discussions, but complained that none of Khrushchev’s agents, including his Foreign Minister, were allowed to make any decisions on their own. But Eisenhower was caught in a contradiction on this point, because he always insisted that every final decision was his, as in fact it was. With the Foreign Ministers’ meeting stalled and in recess, and with the test-ban talks, also based in Geneva, and also stalled and in recess, if Eisenhower wanted to use the last year and a half of his term to advance the cause of peace, he was going to have to talk directly to Khrushchev. That was exactly what Khrushchev wanted; indeed he had dropped any number of hints that he would like to visit the United States and then invite Eisenhower to Moscow.
Eisenhower was intrigued by the idea. American domestic politics were at a virtual standstill, as all the politicians were gearing up for the 1960 election and the only significant issue between Eisenhower and Congress was the budget. Further, technology was making travel so much easier, faster, and more comfortable. In 1959, Air Force One replaced the Columbine as the President’s airplane. The new craft dwarfed the old one, had a much greater range and more room inside, and could fly around the world if the President desired. Travel, just for its own sake, had always been one of Eisenhower’s chief delights. There were many places he wanted to see—most especially India—and he had been compiling a mental list of the sites he intended to visit after retirement. But how much nicer to visit them while he was still President, and could use Air Force One, and—best of all—could use his prestige and position to further the cause of peace, to which he had committed himself and his Administration.
On July 10, Eisenhower told Herter, Dillon, and Goodpaster that if there was some progress at the Geneva Foreign Ministers’ meeting (due to resume in three days), he would ask Khrushchev to visit the United States after he had opened the Russian Exhibition and made an appearance before the U.N. Then in October, he said, he would visit Moscow, afterward flying on to India. He wanted Robert Murphy to deliver the invitation orally to First Deputy Premier Frol Kozlov, who was in New York but scheduled to fly back to Moscow on July 12. Eisenhower explained that he thought talking to Khrushchev might do some good at the Geneva sessions. But, he added, his real reason was that a talk with Khrushchev “would be useful for one thing. If Khrushchev were to threaten war or use of force, he would immediately call his bluff and ask him to agree on a day to start.”5
By July 22, Khrushchev had responded; he would be delighted to come, for a ten-day visit, and there was much he wanted to see. He made no mention of the Geneva meeting. Eisenhower was terribly agitated by this, and grew even angrier when Murphy confessed that he had issued an unqualified invitation, because he had not understood that the proposed visit was dependent upon progress at Geneva. Eisenhower called in Dillon and Murphy and told them that “someone had failed.” He could see the point to a two-day visit to Camp David for private talks, but a ten-day visit was another thing altogether. Goodpaster noted, “The President said he is staggered by the situation now presented to him . . . It was a surprise to him that his concept on safeguarding the invitation had not been observed.” But he guessed he “would have to pay the penalty.” His mind went back to Dulles; the President found he was missing Foster even more than he had feared he would. Goodpaster noted that the President “recalled that he and Mr. Dulles had always talked from ideas or topics and not from papers. Mr. Dulles would then put on paper the idea upon which they had agreed and send it to the President to correct and confirm.”6
In accepting the invitation, Khrushchev said he had been warned about hot summer weather in the United States and wanted to make the trip a bit later in September. On August 5, the day the Foreign Ministers’ meeting broke up after a stalemate had been reached on the German problem, Eisenhower announced the impending Khrushchev visit. The announcement brought howls of protest from various Cold Warriors. William Buckley, for example, wanted to fill the Hudson River with red dye so that when Khrushchev entered New York harbor, it would be on a figurative “river of blood.” Reporters too were hostile. At an August 12 news conference, held in Gettysburg, Eisenhower was asked what it was in the United States that he wanted Khrushchev to see. Whitman called Eisenhower’s reply a “love song to America.”
“I would like for him, among other things, to see this,” Eisenhower responded. “The evidence that the fine, small or modest homes that Americans live in are not the exception as he seemed to think the sample we sent over to Moscow was.” He wanted Khrushchev to see Levittown, a town “universally and exclusively inhabited by its workmen . . . I would like to see him have to fly along in my chopper and just make a circuit of the District, to see the uncountable homes that have been built all around, modest but decent, fine, comfortable homes.” Further, “I would like to see him go in the little town where I was born and pick up the evidence . . . and let them tell him the story of how hard I worked until I was twenty-one, when I went to West Point.” Referring to Nixon’s debate with Khrushchev, Eisenhower reminded the press that the Russian dictator had said to Nixon, “What do you know about work? You never worked.” Well, said the President, “I can show him the evidence that I did, and I would like him to see it.” Most of all, Eisenhower emphasized, “I want him to see a happy people. I want him to see a free people, doing exactly as they choose, within the limits that they must not transgress the rights of others.”
There was a steel strike going on, one that had Eisenhower worried, because of its adverse effect on the GNP. He had insisted, however, on the principle of collective bargaining and refused to intervene. Reporters and politicians alike thought something should be done to bring the strike to an end before Khrushchev came over. Eisenhower would not agree. “Don’t we want Mr. Khrushchev to see this country as a freedom-loving place?” he asked. “Why should we worry too much about the fact that people can strike in this country?”7
Eisenhower did not tell the reporters, but he did say privately, that he had something else he wanted Khrushchev to see—his opportunity. As Goodpaster recorded it, “The President thought he personally might make an appeal to Khrushchev in terms of his place in history, point out that if he wants to gain such a place through making a change to improve the international climate, the President is confident that something can be worked out.” Eisenhower intended to stress that while he had about eighteen months to go, Khrushchev would be in command for many years to come. He felt he had to make such an appeal, he said, if only “to satisfy his own conscience.”8
• •
De Gaulle and Adenauer were predictably and understandably worried, Macmillan only slightly less so. The thought of Eisenhower and Khrushchev making deals together alarmed them. In order to reassure them, and to try out Air Force One and to indulge in some nostalgia, Eisenhower decided to visit the three Western capitals before Khrushchev’s Steptember 15 arrival in America. C. D. Jackson, always on the lookout for a psychological-warfare angle, suggested that Eisenhower go to Paris on August 27, which would be two days after the fifteenth anniversary of the liberation of the city, and thus a not-too-gentle reminder to de Gaulle and the French that they owed their freedom to Eisenhower and American arms. Eisenhower liked the idea and made the proposal; de Gaulle deftly turned it down, saying he preferred a September date. Eisenhower therefore decided to go to Bonn first, then London, then Paris, then a vacation in Scotland.
On August 25, on the eve of his departure, Eisenhower held a news conference. Peter Lisagor said there was criticism of all this traveling around the President was going to be doing. The critics feared that it “will erode the presidential prestige . . . Would you care to comment on that?” Eisenhower got into one of his lecturing moods. “We are putting now, . . . something on the order of $41 billion every year [on defense]. No one seems to stop to think about what that is doing to this country.” If Eisenhower did not explore every avenue for peace, and the arms race continued “indefinitely into the future, where is the explosion point?” Prestige? He was not worried about his prestige. “We are talking about the human race and what’s going to happen to it.”9
At 3:20 A.M., August 26, Eisenhower climbed aboard Air Force One for the first time. Mamie had gotten up to come see him off (she had been tempted to go along, but there was too much flying involved for her taste), and he showed her the accommodations, which dazzled him but bored her. The flight itself, his first ever in a jet, Eisenhower found an “exhilarating experience.” As the big jet went into its “silent, effortless acceleration and its rapid rate of climb,” whatever doubts Eisenhower may have had about the wisdom of spending most of the remainder of his term on world travels vanished. He was hooked.10
In Bonn, the talks with Adenauer were primarily about the French problems in Algeria, on which subject Adenauer “seemed almost obsessed . . .” The German Chancellor told Eisenhower that the Communists were behind the Algerian rebellion, and that if Algeria fell, the North African dominoes would fall with it—Morocco, Tunisia, then the Middle East. Eisenhower said he could not “foresee such a chain of disaster.”11 He turned the subject to German rearmament and possible American withdrawals from Europe. (A subject that was much on his mind of late, partly because of a serious balance-of-payments problem and a consequent drain on America’s gold resources; in July, he had told Radford that “we are getting into insoluble problems in connection with our bases abroad. They are terribly expensive . . .” and recalled that when he was SACEUR, he hoped to have all American troops out of Europe by 1955.12) Adenauer promised that Germany would do more rearming. Eisenhower said he hoped so, and added that he looked forward to the day that the German contingent in NATO was sufficiently large that the Americans could reduce their ground forces in Europe. Adenauer, much alarmed, asked Eisenhower to not even mention the possibility.13
In London, Eisenhower talked with Macmillan. Their only disagreement was over the test-ban negotiations. Macmillan was willing to accept something short of a verifiable inspection system in order to get a comprehensive test ban, while Eisenhower favored a ban on atmospheric testing only.
In Paris, de Gaulle was as difficult as Eisenhower had anticipated he would be. De Gaulle had earlier suggested a tripartite pact, between France, Britain, and the United States, that would act together on a worldwide basis, with a common strategy and foreign policy. As a part of it, France would have a veto on the use of American nuclear weapons stationed in France. The State Department, and Eisenhower, thought the first idea absurd (there was a strong suspicion that what de Gaulle really wanted was American support in Algeria), and the second unacceptable. De Gaulle had therefore ordered American nuclear weapons out of France, a process that was going on during Eisenhower’s visit. He had also withdrawn the French fleet from NATO. Nor did de Gaulle hesitate to voice his suspicion that the Americans, along with their British friends, wanted to run NATO and indeed the world.
(De Gaulle’s suspicion about collusion between the English-speaking nations was not entirely misplaced. It was an idea that had tempted Churchill, and in March 1959, Eisenhower had told the Republican leaders that “it might be a good idea to begin to try to get Britain and Canada, Australia and New Zealand, all together with us in one great government.” Referring to the statehood status achieved by Alaska and Hawaii, he said, “In view of the fact that the United States has now gone beyond its own shores, an idea like this—given time—might not be too difficult to sell.”14)
Eisenhower personally had mixed feelings about de Gaulle. At a briefing with General Lauris Norstad, the new SACEUR, “The President said that de Gaulle merely wants to make France the first nation of the world with himself the first Frenchman.” He reviewed all the difficulties he had had with de Gaulle during the war. But Norstad, in a sharp insight, said that de Gaulle “is fond of the President personally. This fondness, far from being a comforting matter, can be extremely troublesome,” because de Gaulle counted on Eisenhower’s reciprocal feeling to help him achieve his goals. And Eisenhower did have an ability, both in the war and in the late fifties, unusual among Americans, to see things from France’s point of view. Thus he told Norstad, “In fairness to de Gaulle, on many of these NATO issues, we would react very much as de Gaulle does if the shoe were on the other foot.”15
But seeing the French point of view and agreeing with it were two different things. On Algeria, for example, where de Gaulle was attempting to quash the rebellion before holding elections, it looked to Eisenhower as if the French were making the same mistake they had made in Indochina. In any case, he told Herter during the State Department briefing on France, “We cannot abandon our old principles of supporting national freedom and self-determination, and we cannot join the colonialists.” Eisenhower thought “we are deep enough in Europe’s troubles now, and must be tough in saying that we do not propose to go deeper.”16
In his talks with de Gaulle, Eisenhower was equally firm. He just could not support the French in Algeria. De Gaulle tried to revive the idea of a tripartite worldwide arrangement, to no avail. Eisenhower tried to revive the idea of the European Defense Community, or all-European army. The President reminded de Gaulle that in early 1952, he “swore, prayed, almost wept for the EDC. It was initialed, but after the French Parliament was through with it, there was nothing left.” Would de Gaulle like to examine it again? Non, replied de Gaulle, as he loftily declared that “an Army can have no morale unless it is defending its own country.” Eisenhower blanched, then reminded de Gaulle that “in the Second World War, when a lot of us were fighting on foreign soil, it seemed we had good morale.”17
• •
The war was much on his mind. Nothing new had come out of the discussions, but nevertheless the trip gave Eisenhower a great boost, because it brought back so many good memories and because of the evidence it provided of Eisenhower’s extraordinary popularity in Western Europe. On the twenty-mile drive from the airport to the American Embassy in Bonn, the roads were jammed with cheering crowds; it was a moving experience for Eisenhower, to be cheered by the people he had only so recently conquered. Eisenhower told Adenauer it was “astonishing”; the Chancellor agreed.
In Paris, the people quite outdid themselves. De Gaulle may not have wanted them to remember Eisenhower’s role in their liberation, but they remembered anyway. From the airport to the city, the crowds were huge. De Gaulle and Eisenhower rode in a convertible, waving to the wildly enthusiastic throngs. “How many?” Eisenhower asked de Gaulle. “At least a million,” de Gaulle told him. “I did not expect half as many,” said Eisenhower, deeply moved.
London was the best, although Eisenhower had feared the worst. He had been warned to expect a cool reception, as the British had by no means forgiven him for Suez, and the Montgomery memoirs controversy was still warm. In addition, Macmillan had given the trip minimum publicity, as the talks were informal and because Eisenhower had given tentative agreement to making another, formal visit at Christmastime. But as the motorcade drove from the airport to the city, through a gathering dusk, the people of Britain turned out to honor the man who had such a special place in their hearts. They turned out by the thousands, by the tens of thousands, by the hundreds of thousands. As the crowds grew denser, Macmillan kept repeating, “I never would have believed it, I never would have believed it.” As they got to Grosvenor Square, Eisenhower’s wartime headquarters, Macmillan told him, “The state visit in December is off. Anything after this would be anticlimax.”18
Eisenhower hosted a dinner for his wartime comrades. He paid a visit to the royal family. He spent a weekend at Chequers (ah, the memories). He took a few days’ vacation at Culzean Castle, given to him for his lifetime by the people of Scotland. The gang flew over to play bridge.
Not everything was perfect. At his dinner, Eisenhower returned to his idea of getting the top people together at Camp David to write an authoritative history of World War II, as a rebuttal to Monty.19 (When Eisenhower returned to the States, he gave a television talk about his trip. Working on the script, he noticed the date—September 10, 1959. Slamming down his blue pencil, he told Whitman that it was the fifteenth anniversary of the day he met Monty at the Brussels airfield, and Monty “made his preposterous proposal to go to Berlin.”20)
London provided the appropriate setting for the climax of the trip. Eisenhower appeared with Macmillan on television, talking extemporaneously. Eisenhower, discussing the need for greater cultural exchange, showed again that the British always brought out the best in him. Turning to Macmillan, he said with great earnestness, “I like to believe that people, in the long run, are going to do more to promote peace than our governments. Indeed, I think that people want peace so much that one of these days governments had better get out of the way and let them have it.”21
That was the spirit of his trip, the spirit in which he had, however grudgingly, agreed to a Khrushchev visit, the spirit in which he intended to work in the time remaining to him.
• •
On September 7, Eisenhower returned to the States. Khrushchev was due to arrive in a week. Eisenhower made last-minute preparations (there was a major flap over dress at the formal White House dinner, and over Khrushchev’s schedule for his tour of the country). Even before leaving for Europe, Eisenhower had tried to give the talks some chance of success by making concessions on testing. McCone and McElroy and the JCS all wanted to resume testing, but after a July NSC meeting “the President grew heated about atmospheric tests,” indicating that “he would not approve them.”22 In that case, the AEC and DOD wanted underground testing. But Eisenhower would not approve that either. Instead, he met with George Kistiakowsky, who in July had replaced Killian as the President’s science adviser. Kistiakowsky gave him the bad news that the latest scientific information was that underground tests, at least below twenty kilotons, could not be accurately detected. Eisenhower therefore decided, as he had been inclined to do anyway, to accept a State Department proposal that the United States drop its attempts to achieve a comprehensive test-ban treaty and instead try to secure Khrushchev’s agreement to an atmospheric test ban. In addition, Eisenhower decided to extend his unilateral test moratorium from its October 31 expiration date to January 1, 1960. There was a “wild reaction” from McCone and McElroy, but on August 26, the President announced it anyway.23
Khrushchev arrived for two days of talks, formal dinners, and a helicopter ride over Washington. Khrushchev gave Eisenhower a gift, a model of a projectile called Lunik II, which had just made a trip to the moon. Eisenhower thought it a bit on the blatant side, but then thought to himself “quite possibly the man [is] completely sincere.” In his opening statement at the talks, Khrushchev made the most basic point, one that everyone said they recognized but that no one was willing to act on as a basis of policy. We do not want war, said Khrushchev, and we believe that you know that. Eisenhower said he did, that there was no future in mutual suicide. After that, they really had nothing more to discuss, as on all the outstanding issues—the status of Berlin, of Formosa, Soviet (and American) meddling in the Middle East, disarmament—each man had taken a position from which he would not back down.24
Primarily, Eisenhower wanted to appeal to Khrushchev’s sense of history, in order to get some progress somewhere, most likely on testing. As he told the Republican leaders, he wanted to make “one great personal effort, before leaving office, to soften up the Soviet leader even a little bit. Except for the Austrian peace treaty, we haven’t made a chip in the granite in seven years.”25 He did get a chance to make the point to Khrushchev privately; Khrushchev took it graciously, but said that there would have to be movement toward compromise by both sides.
On the helicopter ride, to Eisenhower’s disappointment, Khrushchev remained silent. Eisenhower had wanted Khrushchev to see all those middle-class homes, and all those automobiles rushing out of Washington in the late afternoon to get to them. Khrushchev did, but he would not say anything, or even change expression. The following morning, he took off for a tour of the country. Eisenhower assigned Cabot Lodge to accompany him, slighting Nixon in the process. Khrushchev’s tour was a media event of the first magnitude. He made great copy and the world press was there to take down his rages, his delights, his off-the-cuff comments, his threats, his blandishments, and to satisfy his desire for headlines.
A highlight came on September 18, when Khrushchev spoke to the U.N. He was proud of his speech—back in Washington, he had tapped his pocket and told Eisenhower, “Here is my speech and no one is going to see it.”26 Thus Eisenhower was completely unprepared for Khrushchev’s bombshell, which was nothing less than a call for a total abolition of all weapons, nuclear and conventional, over the next four years, without any provision for inspection or supervision. If the West was not ready for so radical a cure, he was willing to pursue the stalled test-ban issue, which he said was “acute and eminently ripe for solution.”27
On September 25, Khrushchev returned to Washington. He and Eisenhower took a helicopter to Camp David for two days of talks. Now it was Khrushchev’s turn to try to impress Eisenhower. He grew quite expansive in discussing the military and security posture of the Soviet Union (all through the trip, he had been kidding Lodge about how easily the KGB broke the most secret American communications, and hinted that the KGB had a mole highly placed in the CIA). He said the Russians were building more powerful nuclear submarines than the Americans. Khrushchev claimed that the U.S.S.R. had all the bombs it wanted and would soon have all the missiles it needed, and bragged that the number was a “lot.” He said he had decided that small tactical atomic weapons were too expensive. So was atomic power for civilian purposes; Khrushchev said the Russians had stopped work on their nuclear power plants and were relying instead on gas, oil, and coal. But, as Eisenhower later told Twining, “Khrushchev gave great emphasis to the tremendous costs of defense, returning to this subject time after time. He repeatedly emphasized the importance of disarmament.”28
They had a long talk about World War II. Khrushchev assured Eisenhower, “Your old friend Zhukov is all right. Don’t worry about him. He’s down in the Ukraine fishing—and like all generals he is probably writing his memoirs.” They drove over to Gettysburg, where Khrushchev met Eisenhower’s grandchildren. Khrushchev bantered with them, and on the spot asked them to accompany Eisenhower to Moscow. The children were delighted, their parents somewhat less so. Eisenhower showed Khrushchev his Black Angus herd. Khrushchev admired the animals and said he was trying to improve the cattle-breeding industry in Russia. Eisenhower arranged for Lewis Strauss to send Khrushchev a prize-winning bull and two heifers. Then Khrushchev began talking about the subject Eisenhower had hoped he would, American homes and automobiles, and Eisenhower was more disappointed than ever, because Khrushchev said he was not impressed. In fact, he was shocked at all the waste. Those vast numbers of cars, he said, represented only a waste of time, money, and effort. Well, said Eisenhower, he must find the road system impressive. No, replied Khrushchev, because in his country there was little need for such roads because the Soviet people lived close together, did not care for automobiles, and seldom moved. The American people, he observed, “do not seem to like the place where they live and always want to be on the move going someplace else.” And all those houses, Khrushchev continued, cost more to build, more to heat, more for upkeep and surrounding grounds than the multiple-family housing in the Soviet Union.
The only positive note to emerge was Khrushchev’s willingness to remove any hint of a deadline or an ultimatum from the Berlin question.29 On that basis, the two leaders made a tentative agreement to meet at the summit, in Paris, in May. After the summit, Eisenhower——and his wife, son, daughter-in-law, and grandchildren—would pay a visit to Russia. Before that, Eisenhower would make another trip, in December, to Europe, the Middle East, and the Italian subcontinent.
• •
In preparation for that trip, which would include a meeting of the heads of government of the United States, Britain, France, and West Germany, and to review his discussions with Khrushchev, Eisenhower called ambassador to the Soviet Union Llewellyn Thompson to Washington for talks. Thompson told Eisenhower that he thought Khrushchev’s motive in the Berlin situation was to get a peace treaty with East Germany (the NATO powers had already made peace with West Germany), not so much to make trouble in Berlin as to “nail down the eastern frontiers of Germany and of Poland, and thus remove these sources of future trouble” (and not incidentally to nail down the Russian-Polish frontier, moved far to the west by Stalin in 1945). Thompson also said that Adenauer “does not really want to try to get the eastern provinces back for Germany,” and that the last thing de Gaulle wanted was a reunified Germany. Eisenhower said that Khrushchev had made the point to him, and that he thought “there was much in what Khrushchev had said . . . The President said that more and more he is coming to the view that complete reunification of the two parts of Germany is not going to be achieved early.”
On testing, Thompson said he thought Khrushchev would continue to hold out for a comprehensive ban, because “his main objective is to keep China and Germany from getting these weapons . . . Resumption of underground tests would permit the Chinese and Germans to develop these weapons ultimately.” But, Thompson added, Khrushchev “is far out in advance of many of his people on this issue,” even though he frequently put on a show for the benefit of his associates. Eisenhower commented “that Khrushchev cannot be as confident of his position as Stalin was.”
Then Eisenhower began to muse on Khrushchev’s U.N. call for total disarmament. The President was hardly likely to go that far, but he told Thompson, “Suppose that we disarmed in everything but missiles and bombs. It is hard to see how any serious war could be initiated under those circumstances.” It was also difficult to see how Eisenhower could have expected Khrushchev to take such a proposal seriously, as it would have meant disarming Russian strength, the Red Army, while retaining those weapons, atomic and nuclear, in which America was superior.
Back in Russia, meanwhile, Khrushchev was talking about the “spirit of Camp David,” and generally being noticeably more friendly to Thompson. Eisenhower urged the ambassador to see more of Khrushchev informally in the future, because he thought that “someone as voluble as Khrushchev would be bound to disclose useful information in such talks.”30
• •
Another voluble leader, Fidel Castro, was causing confusion and alarm in Washington, where the great question was, Is Fidel a Communist or not? No one seemed to be certain. What Eisenhower was certain about was Batista’s politics, and he found them unacceptable. In July, Batista applied for admission to the United States; Mrs. Batista wrote directly to Mamie asking her to intervene. But Eisenhower would not be moved. “There is one thing we cannot afford,” he told his staff, “that is, to be known as a haven for displaced dictators who have robbed their countries.” Eisenhower said he had met Batista and thought him a “nice guy,” but he still insisted that Batista should not be allowed into the country. It had nothing to do with Castro, he said: “You just can’t make a policy of bringing dictators into this country.”31
By the fall of 1959, Cuban refugees were streaming into Miami. In southern Florida, they were organizing themselves into counterrevolutionary groups, with the avowed purpose of driving Castro from power. On October 27, Herter reported to Eisenhower that the State, Justice, and Defense departments were working together to stop the refugees’ activities. But, he said, they were handicapped by the fact that private planes flew out of some two hundred airfields in Florida; in addition, American laws on the subject were weak and it was difficult to obtain a conviction. Eisenhower admitted that it was “impossible to police them all,” but he did think that Herter could station inspectors at the major airfields. Then he asked, “Why doesn’t Castro just shoot the airplanes down?” Herter did not know, but he did say that “the Cubans have been behaving very badly.”32
• •
“Every place I go,” Whitman told Eisenhower on July 20, “people seem to be choosing up sides on the Nixon-Rockefeller matter.” Eisenhower replied that what he wanted for 1960 was a combination ticket of the two, although even better would be a Nixon-Al Gruenther team.33 Even at that, his first choice for the presidential candidate was not Nixon, but Robert Anderson. But he could not persuade Anderson to consider the idea, and he was fully aware of Nixon’s great strength with the party regulars. It was just that he had doubts about Nixon’s maturity, doubts that were strengthened by Khrushchev’s visit, because Nixon got into a couple of shouting arguments with Khrushchev. But he did not like Rockefeller at all. As governor of New York, Rockefeller had turned out to be a spender and a budget buster. Eisenhower exchanged anxious letters with Bill Robinson and other New York friends about Rockefeller’s activities, although of course he could not make his criticism of a Republican governor public.34
Above all, Eisenhower wanted party unity going into the presidential election, but it was difficult to maintain. As in 1952, the Republicans were splitting between the moderate, internationalist wing, which was more or less supporting Rockefeller, and the Old Guard, which was enthusiastically supporting Nixon. The two candidates, meanwhile, were sniping at each other. In August, Rockefeller was quoted as expressing disapproval of the invitation to Khrushchev for a visit, and putting the blame for it on Nixon. Eisenhower talked to Rockefeller about it; Rockefeller vehemently denied having made such a statement, which he called a “complete lie.”
Eisenhower then wrote Nixon, explaining Rockefeller’s position. Eisenhower said that “my concern about the matter is that two people—even should both become candidates for the same nomination—who have supported me so long and faithfully through the years I have been in this office should find themselves publicly at odds about an issue that in fact does not exist.” In conclusion, Eisenhower expressed a forlorn hope: “My opinion is that people can be politically ambitious if they so desire without necessarily becoming personal antagonists.”35
Another man with a monumental ego who wanted badly to be President was Lyndon Johnson. His sensitivity to supposed slights was striking. In August, Eisenhower gave a stag dinner for some correspondents. He was asked, informally, about the Democratic candidates. He decided not to mention anyone who was a serious candidate, and instead commented on Senators Holland and Stennis, who had no chance. A reporter asked him if there was anyone from Texas who could handle the job. Eisenhower mentioned Sam Rayburn.
First thing the following morning, Johnson was on the telephone to Eisenhower. The senator said he was “hurt” by the President’s refusal to mention his name, adding “that the thing that distressed him so much was that one whom he has admired so much would be represented to feel bitter toward him.” Johnson cited an off-the-record remark by one senator to the effect that the President was “burning mad” at him. But what really hurt was Eisenhower’s comment that Mr. Sam would make a fine candidate, while leaving out Johnson’s name (although Johnson hastened to add that he had the greatest admiration for Mr. Sam). Then Johnson concluded by stating, with great sincerity and emphasis, that it did not matter to him, because “I have no ambitions politically.” The things politicians say to each other!36
• •
Of all his domestic programs, Eisenhower’s favorite by far was the Interstate System. By 1959, it was in bad trouble. Construction costs were far higher than had been anticipated, primarily because of the expense of building urban freeways directly through the inner cities, where land acquisition prices and the problems of building the roads were so much greater than in the countryside. In Eisenhower’s vision, the superhighways were not supposed to have gone into the cities, but only around them, as in Europe. His objections were not sociological—few if any of those associated with the building of the Interstates anticipated the tremendous effect the urban freeways would have on housing patterns, schools, inner-city conditions, the spread of the suburbs, or the other nearly limitless ways in which the four- and six- and eight-lane highways changed the face of urban America. Eisenhower’s objections were to the cost, not the result. He evidently was unaware that in rounding up the votes in 1956 for the Interstate bill, Jerry Persons and the staff had made a deal with urban representatives, who as a group tended to oppose the whole program. The deal was that in exchange for big-city votes, the cities would get their share and more of the construction expenditures.
The evidence that Eisenhower was unaware of this deal comes from his reaction to seeing, in July of 1959, while driving from the White House toward Camp David, a deep freeway construction gash in the outskirts of metropolitan Washington. Surprised and appalled by what he saw, when he got to Camp David he called the director of the Bureau of the Budget, Maurice Stans, to ask for an explanation. Unsatisfied with the result, he ordered a formal White House study of the urban Interstates.37 On July 9, he called in the members of the Mass Transportation Survey of the Washington Metropolitan Area and asked them what they were doing about a rapid-transit subway system. The reply was that some $1 billion would be spent over the next twenty years. The President then “stated his concern that too much of the interstate highway money might be going into connections in the cities.” Next, the President asked whether the committee had considered placing a special tax on automobiles coming into the central cities, “it being his observation that it was very wasteful to have an average of just over one man per $3,000 car driving into the central area and taking all the space required to park the car.”38
Clearly, Eisenhower by that time was thinking his way through the thing and anticipating the future better than his planners could do, but neither that fact nor his position made it possible for him to stop the onrushing program. At a special meeting with the highway people in early 1960, Eisenhower indicated that “the matter of running Interstate routes through the congested parts of the cities was entirely against his original concept and wishes, that he never anticipated that the program would turn out this way,” but he noted that he had been told, finally, that what “sold the program to the Congress” was the urban feature. Therefore, it was too late to turn it around; Eisenhower said that he “had reached the point where his hands were virtually tied.”39 Nor did he again bring up the idea of taxing suburban cars coming into the cities.
• •
The President was frustrated in other areas too. As the end of his term approached, he increasingly thought in long-range terms—witness such suggestions as a political union of all the English-speaking nations—and by September of 1959 he had some constitutional amendments he wanted to propose. The first would give the President an item veto on appropriation bills, a hardy old perennial that every President wants and no Congress will give. The second would make the term of House members four years instead of two, an idea Eisenhower liked because it would make it possible for congressmen to campaign less and work at their jobs more. The third would require a two-thirds vote of the Senate to turn down a presidential appointee to the Executive Branch, a proposal that only showed how angry he was over the rejection by the Senate of the Strauss nomination.40 To the end of his life, he tried to talk up these proposed amendments, but without encouragement and without success.
The constitutional amendment that he was stuck with was the one that forbade his running again. At a Republican leaders’ meeting early in 1959, Halleck and Dirksen cursed themselves and the Republican Party for passing the Twenty-Second Amendment, just to spite Roosevelt; then they began thinking that what had been done could be undone. Stating the obvious, Halleck said it “would be a major operation for us to switch around.” Eisenhower said that he could take either side of the argument. “Had I been voting, I never would have voted for Mr. R except the fourth time, in the middle of the war.” He insisted that repealing the amendment would have no effect on him, because no one over seventy years of age should ever be President. But, he told Halleck and Dirksen, “You won’t hurt my feelings if you speak to repeal—and maybe if I read some of your eloquent speeches I’d be convinced!” From the congressmen’s point of view, however, there was no point to repeal if Ike would not run again, and nothing was done.
Perhaps they should not have given up so easily—Eisenhower left them with a broad hint they might have followed up. In explaining why he would have voted for Roosevelt in 1944, Eisenhower said that “in a real emergency, it would be tough to turn over the government. Suppose McClellan had beaten Lincoln in 1864?”41 Eisenhower did not say that he thought the situation in 1960 was in any way to be compared to the crisis of 1944, but the thought persists that he had twice before allowed himself to be persuaded that he was the “only man” who could save the country. Given his doubts about Nixon and his certainty that the Democrats would be a disaster, given his good health, given his intense desire to achieve peace, and given his conviction that he was indeed the best man in the country for the job, he might have allowed himself to be persuaded one more time. But the effort was not made. It is virtually certain that had he been able to and agreed to run in 1960, he could have been overwhelmingly re-elected.
• •
Eisenhower devoted most of the Republican leaders’ meetings to giving pep talks on holding down spending. In the recession year of 1958 the government had run a $12 billion deficit, but in 1959, revenues were up by nearly $10 billion, and as the economy recovered, spending for antirecession measures was curtailed. In fiscal 1959, Eisenhower cut federal spending by almost $4 billion. The result was a $1 billion surplus, and a projected $4 billion surplus in 1960.42
As always, defense was the most difficult place to hold down spending. The generals and the admirals were determined to stick to the cutting edge of the technological revolution, while they simultaneously wanted the largest nuclear arsenal, the best delivery system, the world’s most powerful Navy and conventional Air Force, and a large, mobile standing Army. They, and their many supporters, could be most eloquent in stating their position. At a June 23 meeting with the top officials in DOD and the PSAC, for example, Eisenhower was told that there was unanimous agreement on the pressing need to go forward with the project for a nuclear-powered aircraft. But Eisenhower could not be bamboozled. He asked some probing questions, which revealed that the major reason his military advisers wanted to do it was because they thought it was possible to do it. “The President commented that the next thing he knows someone would be proposing to take the liner Queen Elizabeth and put wings a mile wide on it and install enough power plant to make it fly. Dr. York begged him not to let the idea get around, or someone would want to try.”43
It was not that the President was opposed to new ideas, or that he was incapable of changing his mind. Two years earlier, at the time of Sputnik, he had insisted that the bomber was still much the best delivery system; since then, advances in rocketry had been such as to convince him otherwise. What bothered him most, however, was that the Air Force insisted on having both, indeed wanted to fund a new bomber, the B-70, while increasing ICBM construction. Eisenhower said he was “very skeptical” about the need for any new bombers. “If the missiles are effective, there will be no need for these bombers.” He said he wished the Air Force officers would make up their minds, and added (he must have had a grin on his face), “I am beginning to think that the Air Force is not concerned over true economy in defense.”
McElroy said that DOD wanted to put money into the B-70 because it represented the state of the art, and would provide spin-off benefits in civilian air transport. Eisenhower said “sharply that he cannot see us putting military money into a project to develop a civilian transport. He is ‘allergic’ to such an idea.” But all the PSAC members jumped in to urge funding for the B-70. And Twining said the Air Force planned to send the B-70 over Russia “to search out and knock out mobile ICBMs on railroads.” Eisenhower snorted. “If they think that,” he said, “they are crazy!” He explained, “We are not going to be searching out mobile bases for ICBMs, we are going to be hitting the big industrial and control complexes.”44
When Eisenhower met with the JCS, they too pressed him for the B-70. The Air Force Chief of Staff, General Thomas D. White, argued that all the Air Force wanted was research and development money, and reminded Eisenhower of the “premium we gain from having different systems for attack.” Eisenhower replied that in “ten years the missile capacity of both countries will be such as to be able to destroy each other many times over.” He thought that “we are going overboard in different ways to do the same thing.” White replied that “this is the last aircraft under development in the world” and almost begged Eisenhower to leave it in the program. But Eisenhower “reviewed past examples of weapons that had outlived their era and said he thought we were talking about bows and arrows at the time of gunpowder when we spoke of bombers in the missile age.”45 He refused to support the B-70.
Another military expense Eisenhower wanted to reduce was in the American contribution to NATO. In mid-November, he told the people in DOD that he wanted to pull back some air and ground units from Europe. Eisenhower said that the United States had six divisions in Europe, “which we never intended to keep there permanently.” The only reason he could see to maintaining them was that “the NATO allies are almost psychopathic whenever anyone suggests removing them.” He also wondered why the United States should maintain the Sixth Fleet in the Mediterranean, which was a British and French responsibility and where the U.S. Navy would only be bottled up in time of war. Eisenhower said this was an area in which he had always been in sharp disagreement with Dulles, who “had practically a phobia against raising the question of reduction of these forces.” Eisenhower’s response, he related, was that by pulling out Americans, the United States could force the Europeans to do more in their own defense.46
• •
Eisenhower’s consultations with the JCS, DOD, and PSAC took place in Augusta, where he and Mamie spent most of November, surrounded by the gang. John and his family were there much of the time too. On the plane ride down, on October 21, Eisenhower told Slater, “fifteen months from that date” and he would “be a free man.” The children put on a show for their grandparents; eleven-year-old David topped it off by reciting the Gettysburg Address. Eisenhower did much of the cooking. For one lunch, he sent out for a long list of groceries. First he stewed some chickens, then used the broth to boil the quail. He removed the quail meat from the bones, browned it, put it over hominy grits, and smothered the whole with a sauce from the chicken broth. Mainly, however, he rested himself mentally and physically, in preparation for his journey.47
Planning for the trip was in itself a major undertaking. Eisenhower proposed to visit Rome, Ankara, Karachi, Kabul, New Delhi, Teheran, Athens, Tunis, Paris, Madrid, and Casablanca. His purpose in going, he told a December 2 news conference, was that “I have relatively few months left and . . . I do feel a compulsion to visit a number of countries . . . I want to prove that we are not aggressive, that we seek nobody else’s territories or possessions; we do not seek to violate anybody else’s rights.” Further, “such prestige and standing as I have on the earth, I want to use it.”48
He also wanted to get something straight with de Gaulle. In November, de Gaulle had written him about NATO and nuclear matters. Eisenhower said he was “astonished” by some of de Gaulle’s points. For example, de Gaulle raised the question as to what would happen in the future to France if the two powers sharing the nuclear monopoly decided to divide the world. Or what would happen to France if the two superpowers decided to limit their battle to Europe. “It is possible to imagine,” de Gaulle said, “that on some awful day Western Europe will be wiped out from Moscow and Central Europe from Washington.” Finally, de Gaulle had written, “and who can even say that the two rivals, after I know not what political and social upheaval, will not unite?”
Eisenhower’s reply was restrained but firm. He said he was “disturbed” that de Gaulle should believe the United States could fall to “such a low moral plane” as to run out on its commitments to its allies. He was “astonished” that de Gaulle could even suggest that the United States might divide the world with the Soviets. He objected strenuously to having his country put into “the same category of nations with the Soviet Union,” calling it “unjustified.”49
When he saw de Gaulle later in Paris, de Gaulle apologized and then some, as he again asked Eisenhower to consider a British, French, American triumvirate that would act together around the world. Eisenhower still had no interest in such a project. At the heads-of-government meeting, the only act of any consequence was an agreement to have a summit meeting in Paris in the spring of 1960.
The trip as a whole was triumph after triumph. In India, Greece, Spain, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Turkey, Italy, Iran, and at other stops the crowds turned out by the millions to see Eisenhower. He in turn did a great deal of sightseeing of his own, and was especially delighted to fulfill a boyhood dream and visit the Taj Mahal (he was appropriately impressed). Mamie had wanted to come along, but there was too much flying involved. John accompanied his father as a staff aide, and Barbara came with him. It was, taken all together, the perfect trip—exhausting but fascinating and satisfying. No real business had been done—none had been intended—but the enthusiastic reception Eisenhower received wherever he went showed that he was the world’s most respected and beloved leader. Even in India, people lined up by the millions and stood for hours just to catch a glimpse of Ike. Nehru said they were the largest crowds he had seen since Independence Day, bigger even than the ones Mahatma Gandhi used to draw.50 Eisenhower had caught the world’s imagination, reminiscent of the way Woodrow Wilson had done in 1919, as the peacemaker.
For his part, Eisenhower had seen such poverty as he had never before experienced. Upon his return, on December 22, he and Mamie went down to Augusta for the holidays. On New Year’s Eve, he met with State, Defense, and PSAC leaders. He told them that as a result of his trip, he had decided that “the most critical question before us is what the rich countries are going to do with their wealth. The underdeveloped countries need the help we can give, and I am convinced we will go down within a short span of time if we do not give them this help. I’m frightened over the likelihood that we will be unable to get our people to support this kind of operation in time . . . If we cannot get a great number of the new countries committed to our side, the U.N. may soon be stacked against us.”
Eisenhower also wanted progress on disarmament. He said the United States should agree to any kind of an inspection system the Russians would accept, because “our real aim is to open that country to some degree.” He was tempted to take Khrushchev up on his offer of total disarmament, but he thought “it will be necessary to leave atomic weapons to the last.” In Eisenhower’s view, “If we cut back our armaments to where only a retaliatory force is left, war becomes completely futile.” He therefore thought that the United States should strive for an agreement of reducing conventional arms and nuclear delivery systems. Herter reminded him that some years ago Strauss had thought it would be to America’s advantage to agree to a total stop on the production of all nuclear material, but that it now appeared that DOD requirements were such that more bombs had to be built. “The President said he is completely unconvinced as to the validity of these so-called requirements.”51
Nevertheless, production continued. But with a summit coming up, and with Khrushchev in an apparently conciliatory mood, and with all the recent evidence of how beloved he was around the world, with a budget surplus, and with the Berlin crisis surmounted, Eisenhower on New Year’s Eve could look back on 1959 with satisfaction. It had been a much better year than 1958, and gave him confidence as he looked forward to 1960.