Eisenhower, Dwight David

Eisenhower, Dwight David ( ‘Ike’ Eisenhower) (b. 14 Oct. 1890, d. 28 Mar. 1969). 34th US President 1953–61 Born in Denison, Texas, he grew up in Kansas and graduated from the Military Academy in West Point in 1915. During World War I he commanded a tank-training unit and had numerous assignments between the wars, including service with Douglas MacArthur in the Philippines. In 1942 General George Marshall selected him over 366 more senior officers to be commander of US troops in Europe. As a lieutenant-general he went on to command Operation Torch in November 1942, the Allied landing in North Africa (North African campaigns). In December 1943 he was appointed Supreme Commander of the Allied Expeditionary Forces. As such he was responsible for the planning and execution of the D-Day landings and subsequent campaigns in Europe. His tact, optimism, and command of bureaucratic politics enabled him to secure inter-Allied collaboration and to avoid confrontation. After the war he retired to the USA, where he was courted by Republicans at the same time as Democrats. The latter feared Truman's defeat, and offered him the 1948 Democrat nomination for President, which he refused. In 1951 he was persuaded to return to active service as supreme commander of NATO, a command he held for fifteen months, finally retiring from the army in June 1952.

He was elected President as a Republican in November 1952, with Richard Nixon as Vice-President. In July 1953 he fulfilled his promise to seek an end to the Korean War by signing an armistice. The first Republican President since 1933, Eisenhower considered himself a ‘dynamic conservative’, attempting to encourage business through tax cuts and the decrease of federal control in the economy, while expressing a concern for social welfare. His administration became a bystander in the right-wing ‘witch hunt’ of Senator McCarthy, and he has been criticized by posterity for his public neutrality in the episode. Eisenhower's record on civil rights was moderate, culminating in the important decision to appoint Earl Warren to the Supreme Court, as well as the relatively moderate 1957 Civil Rights Act. In 1957 he used federal troops to quell segregationist violence at Little Rock, Arkansas. In foreign policy, Eisenhower increased US political commitment in Indochina following the defeat of France at Dien Bien Phu, though he resolutely opposed the sending of US troops into the area. With Dulles as Secretary of State, the NATO and ANZUS pacts were extended by the SEATO Pact of 1954. Keenly interested in foreign affairs throughout his Presidency, he was embarrassed in May 1960, when he publicly denied that a US high-altitude reconnaissance U-2 plane was shot down over Soviet territory. The Soviets proved him wrong by producing evidence, and publicly exposed his lie. In the 1960 presidential contest between Nixon and John F. Kennedy, he refused to throw his full support behind his Vice President (Kennedy was elected by a narrow margin).