Together & Stronger

Just 15 days out of the hospital after his operation for cancer, Secretary of State John Foster Dulles flew north from his Key West convalescence this week to confer with President Eisenhower in Augusta, Ga. Dulles was doggedly determined to fly to this week's meeting of the NATO Council in Paris to help repair the damaged Atlantic alliance and reshape it for the long days ahead. Together in Augusta* the President and Dulles set the strategy: there would be no international slugging match on the rights and wrongs of Suez; there would be a new U.S. move, mulled over by the State Department all summer, to work toward a stronger political and economic base for NATO.

"Recent events have created some strain between members of the NATO," said Dulles after the conference, "and the coming council meeting affords an opportunity to rebuild a unity and strength. The need for this has been tragically demonstrated by Soviet action in Eastern Europe, particularly in Hungary. There is compelling reason to make the NATO within the area of its particular concern a stronger and more effective body. Thereby it can more surely achieve the treaty's proclaimed goal of safeguarding the freedom, common heritage and civilization of the North Atlantic peoples." As for the specific dangers of the Middle Eastern crisis, Dulles spoke just as hopefully and carefully: "Certainly anyone must indeed be far gone in pessimism if he thinks the dangers of war are as great today as a month ago."

Even as the President and Dulles conferred, the Atlantic alliance was showing a healthier glow. To help the glow the President last week:

P: Activated an emergency U.S. plan to send 675,000 bbls. of Western Hemisphere oil to Europe every day (see below), in response to the British-French decision to withdraw troops from Suez.

P: Proclaimed his faith in NATO as "a basic and indispensable element of American defense alliance against the continuing Soviet Communist threat."

P: Assured U.S. support for Britain's Moslem allies of the Baghdad Pact--Iraq, Iran, Turkey and Pakistan--in the event of any foreign attack.

P: Warned pro-Communist Syria, an opponent of the Baghdad Pact, that the U.S. viewed its imports of Russian arms and equipment with grave concern.

Beyond these specifics, both London and Paris seemed to understand that the U.S. intends to interest and involve itself in the Middle East to help get a long-range settlement; and the U.S. was fully conscious of the continuing British and French economic connections with the area. Thus the road was made clear for new moves towards a stronger NATO--based on a new reality.

* Where a semi-vacationing Ike kept in touch with Washington through a two-place switchboard, a bank of chattering Teletypes, a roomful of closely guarded cryptographic equipment for coding and decoding, and a daily courier plane. He also played 18 holes of golf a day.

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