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It’s a real pleasure to be here today and to begin the panel to discuss the background on “Atoms for Peace.” It’s a particular pleasure for me because I’m sort of a twofer, you could say. I can represent the Eisenhower family in this process, but it’s a treat to address this group as I’ve been involved in nuclear issues myself for a very long time. Only people in this room would understand the thrill of getting inside the third perimeter fence of Chelyabinsk-70 which I did a number of years ago as part of the Baker-Cutler Commission. I was a member of that commission and it gave me, certainly, an opportunity not only to see one of the important places in the Cold War confrontation we had between ourselves and the Soviet Union, but it gave me a real sense and feel to what it is that we try to do at gatherings like this.

Thank you very much for that wonderful introduction about the history of this [speech]. Being involved in contemporary affairs with respect to nuclear weapons, it’s always interesting to go back and look at many of the historical underpinnings for where we find ourselves today, and of course Atoms for Peace was a very big part of the legacy we are dealing with today.

When I came here this morning, I was thinking of how appropriate it was that we were starting at the crack of dawn because C. D. Jackson, who had been tasked with doing the early drafts of this speech, convened his group to discuss what the shape of this speech would look like at the Metropolitan Club, and since they met early in the morning they decided they were going to call it “Operation Wheaties.” It seemed to me that we were having an Operation Wheaties here as well.

In any case, Bob [Pfaltzgraff] outlined a wonderful introduction with respect to how this speech came about.