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evening when the DC-6 carrying President-Elect Dwight
D. Eisenhower from Tokyo landed at Andrews Air Force Base in Washington, D.C.
    Although he was not to take over the
reins of power until January, Eisenhower had flown to Seoul a month after his
election to assess personally the war situation in the Far East, wanting to see
for himself the state of play on the muddy battlefields of Korea.
    His meeting with President Harry Truman
the next day was unofficial, and after the brief welcome Truman suggested they
take a walk in the White House gardens.
    The air was crisp and clear, the ground
covered in a moist carpet of brown and gold leaves, as Truman led Eisenhower
down the path through the lawns where the Secret Service men stood at strategic
intervals.
    The two men seemed a strange pair: the
small bespectacled President with the bow tie and walking cane who, like a
certain predecessor, believed that the way to earn respect was to speak softly
and carry a big stick, and the tall, erect military man and former five-star
general who had been a professional soldier all his life.
    They had reached one of the oak benches
and Truman gestured for them to sit.
    He lit up a Havana cigar, puffed out
smoke and sighed. "You know what I'm going to do the day after I leave
office?
    I'm going to fly down to Florida and bake
under a hot sun. Maybe do me some fishing. Seems like I haven't had time for
that in years." The President hesitated before he looked at Eisenhower's
face and said more seriously, "Tell me, Ike, what's your opinion of
Stalin?"
    The President called his successor by his
nickname, the one that had stuck with him since West Point as a young cadet.
Eisenhower ran a hand over his almost bald head. His shoulders tensed as he sat
forward and looked out at the White House gardens.
    "You mean as a military
adversary?"
    Truman shook his head. "I meant as a
man."
    Eisenhower shrugged and laughed bitterly.
"I don't think you need to ask me that question. I'm on the record in that
regard. The man's a despot and a dictator. Shrewd and cunning as they come. You
could say he's the cause of all our present problems, or certainly most of
them. I wouldn't trust the goddamned son-of-a-bitch an inch."
    Truman leaned forward, his voice firm.
"Hell, Ike, that's my point. He is the whole damned problem. Forget about
the Chinese. We don't have to worry about them for at least another ten years
down the road. But the way the Russians are moving so fast with their nuclear
research they're going to be way ahead of us militarily. And you know as well
as I do they've got some pretty good technical minds working for them. The top
ex-Nazi scientists. We've exploded a hydrogen device, but they're working on
the actual bomb, for God's sakes. And they'll make it, Ike, you mark my words,
and sooner than we think. And when that happens, old Joe Stalin knows he can do
pretty much as he likes."
    "What do our intelligence people
say?"
    "About the Russian hydrogen program?
Six months. Maybe sooner. But six months at the outside. The word is, Stalin's
authorized unlimited funds. And our latest intelligence reports say they've
built a test site at a place near Omsk, in Siberia."
    Eisenhower frowned. The sun was still
warm on his face as he glanced toward the Washington Monument half a mile away
He looked back as Truman put down his cigar and spoke again' "Ike, this is
the first real opportunity we've had to talk in' private, and no doubt the CIA
will be briefing you in the coming weeks, but there's something else you ought
to know. Something pretty disturbing."
    Eisenhower studied the small
dapper-dressed man. "You mean about the Russian bomb program?"
    Truman shook his head and his face
appeared suddenly grim.
    "No. What I'm talking about is a
report. A highly classified report. It was sent to me by the special Soviet
Department we have over near the Potomac. I want you to read it. The source is
a highly placed contact we have who has links to the Kremlin. And to