Evening star., 1948-10-11
Like Old Joe

One looks in vain for any rational ex-
planation of the Presidents near-miss
plan to send Chief Justice Vinson on a
mission to Moscow. The suggestion has
been made that the idea may have origin
ated from those advising the President
on his campaign tactics. They may have
thought that a dramatic announcement,
on free radio time, that the President was
appealing direct to Stain through Mr..
Vinson would be Knockout.
But it is hard to believe THAT the Presi-
dent would agree to any such proposal
as Grass political gesture. The more
likely explanation is that the scheme fitted
his own conception of Stain. In Cali
fornia last June the President tossed a
revealing observation to the crowd from
of his cuff. II went to Potsdam in 1945, "
he said, g" with the kindliest feelings
in the world toward Russia. and We made
certain agreements, specific agreements.
l got very well acquainted with Joe Stain,
and like Old joe He is decent fellow.
But Joe is prisoner of the Politburo. He
can't do what he wants to. He makes
agreements and if he could he would keep
them. But the people who run the gov
ernment are very specific in saying that
he can't keep them. ."
AS contradictory as it seems, in view
of the above, the President may have felt
that "Old Joe," if he heard the story OF
how we feel about the atom bomb from the
lips of the Chief Justice, would try to make
an agreement. After all, according to
the President, he is decent fellow" and
though a prisoner of his government
merely a bird in a gilded cage, he would
beat his little wings out against the bars
of the Politburo in trying to reach an
agreement If the Chief Justice told him
confidentially just how Mr.. Truman feels
about the atom bomb.
Something of the sort must have oc-
CURED to Mr.. Truman. For he could not
have read his own Governments white
paper" issued just week before, and have
given the plan about Mr.. Vinson any
semblance of serious consideration He
could not have made himself familiar with
this long, dismal narrative of negotiations
in Moscow and Berlin-for he was giving
'em hell on the hustings at the time
old appeal Stain business should be re-
vived. 1t is difficult to believe that he had
any clear conception of the significance
of the decision for joint presentation of
the Berlin issue, by Britain, France and
the United States, to the United Nations
Assembly. For the two-year debate on
the atom bomb control in the United Ma
tionS is all of a piece with the Berlin issue
merely another example of the cold,
hard core of fact that Russa's aims and
our own for securing world peace are not
the same and that the best hope for max
ing them the same Is that Russia may in
time become convinced that peace, rather
than war, will best serve her national
interests.
Senator Vandenberg referred last night
to the narrow escape" In Washington. 1t
Is the narrowness of that escape from q
repetition of the personal appeal to Stain
that is alarming. The worlds future and
our own are not going to be settled by
repeating the indignities already suffered
and the mistakes already made in trying
to settle tough questions in cozy chats
with "Old joe" There is a long history
of such chats and some of them have
worked out in a manner that at times
seems disastrous. One more of them and
our apprehensive allies may decide that
Stain must surely have invented better
mousetrap and the thing to do is to by
pass the United Nations in beating path,
one at time, to his door.