"A Certain Satisfaction"

"One of the things about the presidency," observed the smiling gentleman farmer, "is the way you have to be prepared to jump, just like a mountain sheep from one jag to another." The speaker was in a position to know: he was Dwight Eisenhower in the retirement of his Gettysburg farm, talking for ten filmed hours with TV Newsman Walter Cronkite. Last week, marking Ike's 71st birthday just after he had been given a high bill of health after a physical examination, CBS televised the first of three hour-long shows edited from the conversations. It provided some fascinating and meaningful footnotes to recent presidential history. Items:

ON HIS MOST PRIZED ACHIEVEMENT: "I tried to create an atmosphere of greater serenity and mutual confidence, and I think that this is noticeable."

ON HIS DISAPPOINTMENTS : "The most important is the lack of definite proof that we have made real progress toward achieving peace with justice." And: "One of my greatest disappointments was the defeat of Mr. Nixon. I thought that he was highly qualified to take over the office of the presidency."

ON LIMITED WAR: "People talk about small wars and big wars. Wellington said that no great country can have really a small war. Our needs for peace are such that no matter we see anything happen, we must regard it as a major war because it can easily become that. This business of differentiating so clearly between so-called small wars and a global war is not too clear to me. To my mind, if this spot that you're trying to defend is so important that you are going to send troops and become involved in the thing, you've given hostage to fate, because on what day does this thing become bigger and bigger?"

ON McCARTHYISM: "Only the other day I ran into a memorandum I wrote to myself about April 1953. In this memorandum I said: 'I have looked over this matter ever since it's come to my attention, and I am convinced that the way for me to defeat Senator McCarthy is to ignore him. Never to admit that he has damaged me, upset me.' As far as I can recall, I never mentioned his name, and I happen to know that this had a very great effect."

ON HIS HEART ATTACK: "On Sept. 23, 1955, I was playing golf--and I was playing very well. I started off about the fourth hole, and I had a message to come into the clubhouse. I had a cart, so I dashed up and there was a call from the State Department. It turned out that while I had answered in a matter of a couple of minutes, some little emergency had happened, and they'd like to talk to me in about an hour. They'd let me know. So I went on with my golf date. Now this had caused such commotion that while I was available the conversation hadn't taken place. So in about two or three more holes, some very busy central got me back; they were still talking about the old call that I hadn't completed. So I went back again. Finally, I got back, and I had the conversation, and it wasn't too severe. It was important, but I mean it wasn't too immediate. Finally, we started back on another nine, and I got another call. This one was by someone who didn't realize that I had had the thing. And by this time--I always had an uncertain temper--it had gotten completely out of control. One doctor said he had never seen me in such a state and that's the reason I had a heart attack. So I've never gotten angry again."

ON HIS SECOND TERM: "Up until early in '55 I was quite sure I would never stand again for the presidency. But now the leaders began to come to me and say, Mr. Nixon is not yet ready in age and maturity. I was not too impressed by that. But they were and they said--it was almost the height of the time when he was called a hatchetman, and 'we don't like Nixon'--they said, 'There's just nobody else that we can bring forward, and we think that if the doctors say you can, you should do it.' My doctors said, 'You're just as good as you'll ever be and that's that.' Two or three very bitter opponents were against me, and said that I was going to be dead in a year and therefore a vote for me was a vote for Nixon. There was a certain satisfaction in outliving the course."

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