"A War for Peace"

In a few impromptu phrases at his news conference last week, the President of the U.S. gave a fresh meaning to the nation's foreign policy. Dwight Eisenhower was talking about his plan for an atom-powered merchant ship to dramatize his "atoms for peace" program. With intense feeling, he exclaimed: "If we are going to win this war for peace, let's stop talking about 'cold war.' We are trying to wage a war for peace."

Toward the Summit. The theme of peace was very much on his mind all week. After his six-day New England trip, the President got up on a platform at Maine's Dow Air Force Base to say farewell to 5,000 waiting, waving down-Easters. He was working, he said, toward one end: "Peace on this earth, for which we all aspire." On the flight to Washington aboard the Columbine, he discussed with Secretary of State John Foster Dulles plans for the Big Four conference at Geneva on July 18: the long-heralded Parley at the Summit with the British, French and Soviet chiefs of state.

Preparations for Geneva occupied a good part of the presidential week. At a special White House luncheon, Eisenhower discussed the conference with the 20 top Latin American envoys (who were delighted by the unusual gesture of hemispheric solidarity). He invited 26 congressional leaders from both parties to another White House conference on Geneva this week. He approved the official list of nine U.S. delegates* accompanying him on the trip--the first peacetime journey to Europe by any American President since Woodrow Wilson's fateful sojourn for the 1919 Paris conference.

Prospects: Better. At his news conference, despite the muggy heat, Ike was crisp and cheerful. He wore a brown suit and purple-hued tie, looked tanned and fit. Adroitly, he fielded questions about a second term. When a newsman suggested that the cheering roadside crowds in New England meant that many people "would like to see you stand for re-election," Ike quipped: "You possibly saw my friends along the roads, and we don't know who was behind in the alleys." The newsmen roared.

Gravely, the President dealt with grave issues. He restated basic U.S. policy on the Soviet satellite states: until they are freed, "there could be no real peace." But he shrugged over a resolution, passed 367 to 0 by the House, urging their liberation. "How?" he asked. "You are certainly not going to declare war, are you?" On world disarmament, he said flatly: "It is going to be a very long and tortuous road." Disarmament always is, he added. "I have personally been studying it for 40 years." He termed last month's Bering Strait incident, the Soviet jet attack on a U.S. patrol bomber, as probably a "misunderstanding" (at week's end the U.S. decided to accept the Soviet apologies and their offer to pay 50% of the damage).

Eisenhower outlined his plans and expectations for Geneva. He intends to leave on July 15 or 16. He noted that his time for the conference was limited (probably about six days). Weighing his words carefully, he stated the U.S. approach to Geneva: "Obviously, some change has come about in the Soviet attitude," he said, "that [may make] it easier to live with them, easier to negotiate with them, easier to solve problems."

He warned: "No one believes that the great Marxian doctrine of world revolution has been abandoned by its advocates. We have got, therefore, to be careful." But he did not rule out positive results: "There could be decisions on how we would approach them." His estimate of the prospects: "Better than I thought they were two months ago."

39th Anniversary. At his desk the President added a third telephone for interoffice calls (his other phones: a line to the White House switchboard, a direct line to Secretary Dulles and other top officials). He signed a bill giving 1,000,000 federal workers a pay raise--their first since 1951--averaging $325 a year. He sent Congress, which turned down his $21 million request for the atom-powered merchant ship, a second request for the money. "Any way you can do it is cheap," he insisted.

He greeted enthusiastically the Army's new Chief of Staff, one of his World War II division commanders (the famed 101st Airborne), General Maxwell Taylor ("Max, I hope to see you often up here"). At week's end he flew in his new small plane to his Gettysburg farm for a White House staff picnic celebrating a special occasion: the 39th anniversary of the day in Denver when, newly promoted to 1st lieutenant, Ike Eisenhower married Mamie Doud.

* Secretary Dulles; White House Special Assistant Dillon Anderson and Press Secretary James C. Hagerty; State's Counselor Douglas MacArthur II; Policy Planning Director Robert R. Bowie; Assistant Secretary for European Affairs Livingston T. Merchant and Legal Adviser Herman Phleger; Ambassadors Charles E. Bohlen (to the U.S.S.R.) and Llewellyn E. Thompson (to Austria).

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