In Quarters Six, Dieffenbach silently pulled a $10 bill from his wallet and handed it to Scott. The former chairman squinted and looked out the window toward the Mall and the Capitol, bright in the midday sun. "I could never budge Palmer," he mused.
At Mount Thunder, General Garlock stared at his TV set. The whole thing baffled him. That visit to his home by Gentleman Jim Scott and Billy Riley Tuesday night had been bothering him for four days. Did the President really know something more than he was saying? Should he ask for an appointment at the White House and tell him about the visit? What was his duty? He leaned forward to hear the rest of Lyman's speech.
A new chief of staff for the Air Force has already been appointed. He is General Bernard Rutkowski, until now the commander of our North American Air Defense Command. His life and career exemplify the promise of America; his fine combat record and unique abilities as military tactician and strategist speak for themselves. He was sworn into office last night in this house. I am confident he will serve with distinction alongside Admiral Palmer.
The Army and Marines, and the Navy, have fully qualified deputy commanders who have assumed, for the time being, the command of their services.
Jiggs Casey sat in his living room in Arlington, between his wife and his old friend Mutt Henderson. Marge put her mouth to Casey's ear and whispered, "I'm sorry I made such a fuss about New York, honey. I had no idea that something important really was going on." Casey merely grinned down at her.
Henderson got up from the sofa, absently exploring the purple lump under his left eye with his fingertips. "Jeez, this is an awful lot for a simple country boy to take in one week. How about a guy mixing himself a drink?"
Casey said, "Sure. And fix one for Marge and me too."
When Henderson had gone into the kitchen, Marge asked, "Jiggs, was there some kind of plot, or something, going on this week?" Casey looked at her in surprise.
"I don't know, Marge, I really don't," he said. "I have no certain knowledge-and I have no doubts."
In another suburban subdivision, across the river in Bethesda, Bill Fullerton stood in the shade of the big beech tree behind his home as he listened to the radio resting on the cookout table. Just what the devil was the connection between this and that call from Paul Girard Monday night? And that list of classified bases President Lyman wanted Tuesday morning? After thirty years of sitting in the Budget Bureau and dealing with the Pentagon, he thought, I can smell fish when they're hidden somewhere around, and this thing sure smells fishy. Do you suppose some kind of military operation was involved? And what about Site Y-just where the hell is the place, anyway?
There may be some who believe that these changes in our military high command will weaken the nation in a critical time. To them I say with complete confidence: Put aside your fears. Admiral Palmer, General Rutkowski and the other officers now in charge of our defenses have served in high councils for many years and they are fully prepared and able to assume their new responsibilities.
As I set out for Vienna next week I shall need your support and your prayers, but I shall go in confidence, with the assurance that all is well at home and that the nation, having made its decisions in our traditional way, remains devoted to the basic principles handed to us by the founding fathers.
Henry Whitney listened in rapt attention to the President's voice. He was in the home of a fellow foreign service officer in Georgetown. When he had checked in with the Spanish desk at the department that morning, they read him an angry cable from Father Archibald at the embassy in Madrid. Whitney hadn't figured out how to handle that one yet, but now he was thinking of other things. Yes, he thought, I'll pray for you, Mr. President, wherever you go and whatever you do. Then he thought of Jordan Lyman's parting pledge to him. Maybe Miss Townsend could arrange something to cool Ambassador Lytle's anger. Better call right after the broadcast is over.
And now, if I may, let me make a few general observations. No matter what convictions and deeply felt motives moved General Scott and his colleagues to act as they did, I had no choice, as President and commander in chief of the armed forces, but to act as I did. To have done otherwise would have been to betray the great trust handed down to us across two centuries by the men who wrote the Constitution.
This is a republic, managed by a President freely elected by all the people. Sometimes the President has been a military man. Sometimes he has been a civilian. It matters not from what profession he may come; once he is elected, he must assume full responsibility, under the Constitution, for the foreign relations and the defense of the United States. He may make mistakes; his decisions may be popular or unpopular; but so long as he remains in office, he may not avoid the responsibility for decision. And it must follow that once he has made a decision-whether for better or for worse-members of the government which he directs must give his policies full support.
It was not the opposition of General Scott and his colleagues which required their resignations. It was the timing of that opposition. Until the Senate ratified the treaty, they had every right-indeed a duty- to speak their views frankly and fully. But once the Senate voted, making the treaty an established national policy of the United States, they were then duty-bound to render it every support within their power as long as they remained on active duty. That they refused to do; and that refusal no President could countenance.
Somewhere, this afternoon, there are listening men who will one day occupy this office. I would betray my obligation to them and to their generation of Americans, as well as my duty to the past and to all of you today, if I failed to act as I have.
I would close with one final observation. There has been abroad in this land, in recent months, a whisper that we have somehow lost our greatness; that we do not have the strength to win-without war-the struggle for liberty throughout the world; that we do not have the fortitude to face, without either surrender or blind violence, the present challenge of men who would use tools as old as tyranny itself to make the future theirs.
I say to you today that this whisper is a vile slander -a slander on America, on its people, on the institutions which we hold dear and which in turn sustain us. Our country is strong-strong enough to be a peacemaker. It is proud-proud enough to be patient. We love our good life-love it enough to die for it if need be, or to forgo some of its benefits to help others less fortunate come closer to achieving it.
So, my fellow citizens, go back to this lovely day in May. Do not weep for your country. Do not listen to the whispers, for they are wrong. We remain strong and proud, peaceful and patient, ready to sacrifice, always willing to help others who seek their way out of the long tunnels of tyranny into the bright sunshine of liberty. Good-by, and God bless you all.
President Lyman's closing sentence crackled incongruously from the radio in the smashed automobile as a Virginia highway patrolman swung his squad car off Route 120. The trooper hurried across the road to the car, which lay on its side against a stone wall. The dust and smoke of violent collision still drifted upward from the wreck.