Dwight D. Eisenhower
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Last Modified: 01/29/07
Summary: Websites and texts on Dwight D. Eisenhower. For use in Web Mastery 1A.Link: Presidency Wiki
Summary: Wikipedia page on Dwight D. Eisenhower's presidency. For use in Web Mastery 1A.
Link: Operation Wetback
Summary: Webpage on Eisenhower's Operation Wetback. For use in Web Mastery 1A.
Link: Eisenhower Wiki
Summary: Wikipedia page on Dwight D. Eisenhower. For use in Web Mastery 1A.
Military
Kansas Senator Joseph L. Bristow
recommended Dwight for an appointment to the United States Military Academy
in 1911
, which he received .
Eisenhower graduated in the upper half
of the class
of 1915
.
He served with the infantry until 1918 at various camps in Texas and Georgia . During World War I , Eisenhower became the #3 leader of the new tank corps and rose to brevet Lieutenant Colonel in the National Army.
After the war , Eisenhower reverted to his regular rank of captain
( and was promoted to major
a few days later ) before assuming duties at Camp Meade , Maryland , where he remained until 1922
.
After the Japanese
attack on Pearl Harbor ,
Eisenhower was assigned to the General Staff
in Washington , where he
served until June 1942
with responsibility for creating the major war
plans
to defeat Japan and Germany .
He was appointed Assistant Chief of Staff
in charge of Operations Division under Chief of Staff General George C. Marshall . It was his close association with Marshall which finally brought Eisenhower to senior command positions .
In December 1943
, it was announced that Eisenhower would be Supreme Allied Commander
in Europe . In January 1944
, he resumed command of ETOUSA and the following month was officially designated as the Supreme Allied Commander of the Allied Expeditionary Force
( SHAEF ) , serving in a dual role until the end of hostilities in Europe in May 1945
.
He was charged with planning and carrying out the Allied assault on the coast of Normandy
in June 1944
.
Until the end of the War in Europe
on May 8 ,
1945
, Eisenhower , through SHAEF , had supreme command of all operational Allied forces
, and through his command of ETOUSA , administrative command of all U.S. forces on the Western Front
.
As recognition of his senior position in the Allied command , on December 20
, 1944
, he was promoted to General of the Army
.
Eisenhower showed his great talents for leadership and diplomacy .
Although he had never seen action himself , he won the respect of
front-line commanders
. He dealt skillfully with difficult subordinates
such as Omar Bradley
and Patton , and allies
such as Winston Churchill , Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery
and General Charles de Gaulle .
He had fundamental disagreements with Churchill and Montgomery over
questions of strategy , but these rarely upset his relationships with
them . He negotiated with Soviet
Marshal Zhukov
, and such was the confidence that President Franklin D. Roosevelt
had in him , he sometimes worked directly with Stalin.
From: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dwight_eisenhower
Family
Eisenhower married Mamie Geneva Doud
( 1896 – 1979
) , of Denver , Colorado , on July 1
, 1916
.
They had two children: Doud Dwight Eisenhower
( 1917 – 1921
) , whose tragic death in childhood from scarlet fever
haunted the couple , and John Sheldon David Doud Eisenhower
( born in 1922
) . John Eisenhower served in the United States Army , then became an author and served as U.S. Ambassador to Belgium . John's son , David Eisenhower , after whom Camp David
is named , married Richard Nixon's daughter Julie
in 1968
.
From: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dwight_eisenhower
Birth
Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower
( born David Dwight Eisenhower
on October 14, 1890
– March 28, 1969
) was an American
soldier
and politician .
Eisenhower was born to a German American
family in Denison
, Texas
.
From: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dwight_eisenhower
President
As a Republican
, he was elected the 34th President
of the United States
( 1953–1961
) , serving for two terms
.
As president , he ended the Korean War , kept up the pressure on the Soviet Union during the Cold War , made nuclear weapons a higher defense priority , launched the space race , enlarged the Social Security program , and began building the Interstate Highway System .
Eisenhower
had strong conservative beliefs
which led him to reject
Democratic efforts to nominate him
in 1948
. Instead he announced for
the Republican Party
nomination in 1952
. His goal was to prevent Robert A. Taft's
version of isolationism
-- such as opposition to NATO -- from becoming public policy .
In the 1952
U.S. presidential election
, Eisenhower
easily defeated Illinois Governor Adlai Stevenson
and became the first career soldier since Ulysses S. Grant
to be elected President
.
During his campaign , Eisenhower
had promised to end the stalemated Korean
War
. He threatened to use nuclear weapons and a cease-fire was signed
in July 1953
. He signed defense treaties with South Korea
and the Republic of China
, and formed an anti-Communist alliance with Asian and Pacific countries
, SEATO
, to halt the spread of Communism
in Asia .
Eisenhower
, while accepting the doctrine of containment
originally developed by George Kennan
, sought to fight the USSR
through more active means .
He , along with Secretary of State John Foster Dulles
, developed the tactic of covert action
, used the CIA
-- directed by Allen Dulles
to interfere with suspected Communist governments abroad
.
An early use of covert action was against the elected Iranian
prime minister Mossadeq
in 1953
. The Shah of Iran
and pro-monarchy forces ejected him from
power in a complex coup supported by US intelligence agencies .
Eisenhower
increased U.S. involvement in Southeast Asia
.
In 1954
, he sent Dulles
to Geneva
as a delegate to the Geneva Conference
, which ended the First Indochina War
and temporarily partitioned Vietnam
into a Communist northern half ( under Ho Chi Minh
) and a non-Communist southern half ( under Ngo Dinh Diem
) .
In February 1955
, Eisenhower
dispatched the first American soldiers to Vietnam
as military advisors to Diem's
army .
In 1956
, Eisenhower
strongly disapproved of the actions of Britain ,
France and Israel in sending troops to Egypt
in the dispute over
control of the Suez Canal .
He used the economic power of the U.S. to force his European allies to
back down and withdraw from Egypt
. However , he later described this
decision as the greatest foreign policy mistake he made
during his time
in office .
During his second term, he became increasingly involved in Middle Eastern
affairs
, sent troops to Lebanon
in 1958
, and promoted the creation of the Baghdad Pact
between Iraq
, Turkey
, Pakistan
, and Iran
, as well as the United Kingdom
.
Under Eisenhower's
presidency the U.S. developed as a global nuclear
power .
On October , 30 , 1953
, Eisenhower
approved the security policy document
NSC 162/2
, which emphasized nuclear weapons above all other defense
means .
Eisenhower
believed that a free enterprise
economy should run itself
, and he took little interest in domestic
policy
. Although his 1952
landslide gave the Republicans control of
both houses of the Congress , Eisenhower
believed that taxes could not
be cut until the budget was balanced
.
On June 17
, 1954
, Eisenhower
launched Operation Wetback
in response to increasing illegal immigration to the United States .
Eisenhower
appointed a Cabinet of nine "businessmen and a plumber"
, and
gave them wide latitude in handling domestic affairs
. He allowed them
to take credit for domestic policy
and allow him to concentrate on
foreign affairs .
In 1957
, Eisenhower
sent federal troops to Little Rock , Arkansas
after Governor Orval Faubus
attempted to defy a Supreme Court
ruling that ordered the desegregation
of all public schools .
Democrats attacked Eisenhower
for not taking a public stand against Senator Joseph McCarthy's
anti-communist campaigns . Privately , he held McCarthy
in contempt ,
saying , " I just won't get down in the gutter with that man " . Eisenhower
worked behind the scenes to weaken McCarthy
, and helped cause his
downfall
in 1954
.
Eisenhower
promoted the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956
, which created the United States' Interstate Highways
. It was the largest public works program in U.S.
history , providing a 41,000-mile highway system .
Eisenhower
retained his popularity throughout his presidency
. In 1956
he was re-elected by an even wider margin
than in 1952
, again defeating
Stevenson
, and carrying such traditional Democratic states as Texas and
Tennessee .
From: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dwight_eisenhower
