The 1952 presidential debate moderator next asks General Eisenhower what he would do to address the biggest crisis currently facing the nation, the seemingly endless conflict in the Korean peninsula.
"When the enemy struck, on that June day in 1950, what did America do? It did what it always has done in all its times of peril. It appealed to the heroism of its youth.
This appeal was utterly right and utterly inescapable. It was inescapable not only because this was the only way to defend the idea of collective freedom against savage aggression. That appeal was inescapable because there was now in the plight into which we had stumbled into no other way to save honor and self-respect.
The answer to that appeal has been what any American knew it would be. It has been sheer valor--valor on all the Korean mountain-sides that, each day, bear fresh scares of new graves.
Now--in this anxious autumn--from those heroic men there comes back an answering appeal. It is no whine, no whimpering plea. It is a question that addresses itself to simple reason. It asks: Where do we go from here? When comes the end? Is there an end?
Those questions touch all of us. They demand truthful answers. Neither glib promises nor glib excuses will serve. They would be no better than the glib prophesies that brought us to this pass.
My answer--candid and complete--is this: The first task of a new administration will be to review and re-examine every course of action open to us with one goal in view: to bring the Korean War to an early and honorable end.
That job requires a personal trip to Korea. I shall make that trip. Only in that way could I learn how best to serve the American people in the cause of peace. I shall go to Korea."
To Burt, going to Korea sounded like a publicity stunt.
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