When General of the Army Dwight D. Eisenhower went to call on Secretary of State Dean Acheson one day last week, he wore mufti; among Washington's worried civilian functionaries he seemed no more confident, no less harried than the rest. After his talk with the Secretary of State, Eisenhower changed quickly into his working clothes—officers' pinks, Eisenhower jacket, and the five-star shoulder circlets of a General of the Army. For
Old Soldier Eisenhower—or perhaps it was for those who watched him—the change into uniform worked magic. Setting out on the biggest and most important job of his career, he seemed to have grown taller and more erect, and to radiate confidence.
Hero's Task. General Eisenhower went back to Europe to take the supreme command of a NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) whose forces were marshaled largely on paper. He would have to persuade a war-weary, unconfident Western Europe that it must make sacrifices and get ready to fight again. He would have to do it while his own country's councils were divided about his task, while his country's forces were suffering a humiliating defeat in Korea—a fact that Russian propaganda was exploiting to the hilt. He would have to build the defenses of an area that lay open to the Red army, and would remain so until it was armed.
But Ike, as he prepared to take off on his "fact-finding" trip to the other eleven NATO nations, showed neither anxiety nor doubt. He lunched with Senators of both parties, including Republicans Robert Taft and Kenneth Wherry. They all liked Ike, even Taft and Wherry, who did not endorse his mission. At a press conference Eisenhower spoke with great optimism: "The Western world feels that it has the right and the duty to itself to live not only in security, but such security that will give to its peoples confidence, which means that they may live in tranquillity. That is all we are trying to do."
He soberly introduced the point that he would have to make time after time in his tour of the NATO capitals: "Unless every sacrifice made by America is matched by equal sacrifices, equal sincerity of purpose in the Western European nations, this thing cannot win."
At week's end, at the National Airport, he reviewed a guard of honor from all services, made a four-way handclasp with Truman, Acheson and Marshall, kissed wife Mamie, and set off in Marshall's shiny Constellation for Paris. A reporter said to Lieut. General Alfred Gruenther, Eisenhower's chief of staff, who accompanied him: "I hope you have the best of luck." Said Gruenther: "Don't hope. Pray."
Hero's Welcome. Fifteen hours later Eisenhower's plane landed at Orly Field. Five-and-a-half years after he had left as the commander in chief of the victorious Allied armies, Eisenhower returned to Europe facing a danger and a task that were even greater than those of World War II. At his request, Paris had reluctantly canceled a hero's welcome. Eisenhower drove straight to his hotel, pausing only to circle the tomb of the Unknown Soldier, soon settled down to a four-hour conference with his old comrade-in-arms, Field Marshal Montgomery.
In a message to the French and British people, Ike said: