Eisenhower, Dwight D.

Eisenhower, Dwight D. (1890–1969), U.S. army general, Supreme Commander of Allied Forces in Europe during World War II, and thirty‐fourth president of the United States.Dwight David Eisenhower was born in Denison, Texas, but spent his youth in Abilene, Kansas. After high school he spent two years working before entering West Point, from which he was commissioned in 1915. The following year he married Mamie Doud; they had one son, John.

Eisenhower remained in the United States during World War I. In the 1920s he served in Panama and attended both the General Staff School at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, and the Army War College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. From 1930 to 1935, he was assistant secretary of war and then chief of staff to General Douglas MacArthur in Washington, D.C. In 1936 he accompanied MacArthur to the Philippines, but returned to America when war broke out in Europe in 1939.

Eisenhower rose meteorically during World War II. His performance in the 1941 Louisiana Maneuvers earned him a summons to Washington to assist Army Chief of Staff George Marshall. In 1942 he was given command of American and Allied forces in North Africa; his rout of General Erwin Rommel's forces led President Franklin Delano Roosevelt to select him to lead the Allied invasion of Normandy (Operation Overlord). Eisenhower's key decision—to invade on 6 June 1944 (D‐Day) despite bad weather—proved critical to the operation's success. Although he was criticized by second‐guessers, most notably for allowing Russian troops to liberate Berlin, his strategic decisions have withstood retrospective scrutiny.

After brief service as army chief of staff, Eisenhower returned to civilian life in 1948 as president of Columbia University. In 1951, President Harry S. Truman appointed him as commander of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) forces in Europe. A year later, moderate Republicans successfully pressed Eisenhower to run in the New Hampshire Republican presidential primary; he did well there and in other primaries. At the Republican party convention in July, his forces outmaneuvered those of Senator Robert Taft to secure the nomination, thus launching the “nonpolitical” general's political career. With Senator Richard M. Nixon as his vice presidential running‐mate, he easily defeated Democrat Adlai Stevenson in the general election.

As president, Eisenhower was less conservative than liberals feared, but more so than moderates hoped. A committed internationalist, he supported the United Nations and engaged in a series of historic summit meetings with Soviet leaders. His differences with extreme conservatives included opposition to the communist‐baiting Wisconsin senator Joseph McCarthy. Although criticized at the time for his seemingly passive role, Eisenhower worked subtly to undermine McCarthy even while remaining publicly neutral. In foreign policy, he successfully brokered an armistice ending the Korean War, and presided over a military build‐up (mostly airpower and nuclear weaponry) while holding the federal budget virtually constant. He refused to send American troops to aid the 1956 Hungarian uprising against Soviet military rule, but acted decisively in invading Lebanon in 1958 to stabilize its prowestern government. His appeal across the political spectrum was reflected in his sweeping reelection in 1956, again defeating Stevenson.

Eisenhower sought to moderate American tendencies to over‐militarize the Cold War, defying public pressures to build up U.S. defenses after the Soviets launched the world's first space satellite, Sputnik, in October 1957. In domestic policy, he steered a moderately conservative course, opposing public power and direct support for farmers and labor, while compromising with a Democratic Congress. Although cool to the civil rights movement, he did send federal troops to Arkansas in 1957 when Governor Orval Faubus defined a court order to integrate a Little Rock high school. A dramatic confrontation with the Soviets over the downing of an American surveillance (U–2) plane in 1960 only increased Eisenhower's popularity. His January 1961 farewell address, warning against the “military‐industrial complex,” proved to be one of his more enduring political contributions.

After leaving the White House, Eisenhower avoided partisan activities. In 1964 he disappointed Republican moderates by refusing until the last minute to support their efforts to stave off Barry Goldwater's presidential nomination.

A major figure of the twentieth century, Eisenhower was one of those rare American presidents whose reputation rests more on his prepresidential achievements than on his activities as president or afterward. His strategic decisions and political acumen are widely viewed as crucial to Allied victory in World War II. Still, his accomplishments as president were significant. As the first Republican to occupy the White House after the New Deal, he helped to legitimize the liberal political revolution it represented. He also introduced a staff system to the White House that became the model for succeeding presidents. Finally, the peace (after Korea), prosperity, and balanced federal budgets that characterized his White House years underscore the success of his moderate leadership.
See also Conservatism; Federal Government, Executive Branch: The Presidency; Fifties, The; Foreign Relations; Liberalism; Military Service Academies; Military, The; New Deal Era, The; Nuclear Strategy; Nuclear Weapons; Space Program.

Bibliography

Piers Brendon , Ike: The Life and Times of Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1987.
Stephen E. Ambrose , Eisenhower: Soldier and President, 1990.
Robert Bowie and and Richard Immerman , Waging Peace: How Eisenhower Shaped an Enduring Cold War Strategy, 1998.

Gary W. Reichard