President Peripatetic
N Ankara, President Eisenhower had a ride in la 1934 open Lincoln car while the Turks danced their delight in the streets. In Rome he was photo- graphed with the Pope, both of them roaring with laughter (perhaps over the damage done to Roman Catholic Senator John Kennedy's chances of the Democratic nomination by the great birth-control row in the United States); and in Pakistan the distinguished visitor was subjected to ordeal by
cricket—the first President of the United States to witness a Test match, which ought to secure for Mr. Eisenhower a modest place in the 'record' pages of future editions of Wisden.
But it was not until President Eisenhower reached New Delhi on Wednesday that his voyage across the map—it must be rare even for globe- trotting Americans to 'do' eleven nations in nine- teen days—noticeably became more than a public- relations exercise by one of the most competent charmers in the glad-handing business. It has been made very clear indeed that there is to be no diplomatic negotiating in the course of the Presi- dential trip. But it is equally obvious that Mr. Eisenhower and Mr. Nehru will talk about the Chinese " claims and threats that reverberate around the Himalayas, and that Mr. Eisenhower will be all the readier to otter moral, and perhaps even to consider material, support, and all the more able to count on the sympathies of the American public, now that Mr. Nehru has spoken so sternly in Parliament : '1 doubt if there is any country in the world which cares less for peace than China today. . . . If war is thrust upon us, We shall fight with all our strength.'
It has been suggested by Mr. A. J. P. Taylor, in one of his Sunday Express exercises in how to he readable but wrong about world affairs, that Mr. Nehru's brave words are nothing more than an astute move to enlist Mr. Eisenhower's sym- pathies. That he is working on the appreciation that unquestioning support by the President for India against China would make up for the politi cal difficulties at home that arise out of his amiability towards Mr. Khrushchev. All designed to extract economic aid more easily from the Americans.
It may well be that Mr. Nehru enjoys the more devious forms of diplomacy, and likes to keep his hand in, but he hardly needs to be as devious as this. The President knows very well what India's needs are, and the advantages to be gained by helping her to meet them. He has already asked Congress for 4,000 million dollars for foreign aid in 1961—a hundred million dollars more than he asked for last year, and 800 million more than he got—and India is bound to receive a substantial share of what is forthcoming. If Mr. Eisenhower's visit to India helps him to present Indian poverty so much more dramatically to the American public that Congress will think twice before cut- ting down his request, and perhaps even reverse its decision that loans for development must be spent in the United States—an uneconomic piece of big-business selfishness —it will be a trip worth while.
Which is more than can be said for what is to be (except for a luncheon engagement in Morocco) the last visit of all, to Madrid. where the President is to drive through the streets with Generalissimo Franco. escorted by cavalry—no doubt by repre- sentatives of those same Moorish regiments that the Generalissimo brought to Spain to help in putting down its lawful government. To visit Mr. Khrushchev, so as.to talk about a settlement of differences and about world peace, is one thing. To include Spain on a good-will tour is to show a friendliness towards the regime that is not at all implicit in any doing of diplomatic deals with the Soviet Union.
the Spanish monarchists have done well, in the otter they have addressed to the United States Embassy in Madrid, to point out that when the Madrilenos cheer the President as he drives through their city, ten days from now, they will be cheering for the same reason the Poles cheered Vice-President Nixon on his visit to Warsaw—to show their enthusiasm for the liberties enjoyed by the American people and denied to themselves. The difference is that there is nothing at the moment that the West in general, or the United States in particular, can do about the lost liberties of the Poles (except that an accommodation with the Soviet Union will mean a relaxation of Russian pressure in all its strategically important satellites). But the West, and the Americans, could stop bolstering up, and refrain from buttering up. the detestable regime in Spain.
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