Introduction
DWIGHT DAVID EISENHOWER
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Introduction For some time, military historians have been exploring the proposition that service in the Armed Forces of our Nation has been instrumental in preparing a notable number of Americans for positions of senior leadership in the government. Military service played a vital role, for example, in the development of such leaders as Andrew Jackson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Harry Truman. In our own times, perhaps no man better exemplifies this proposition than Dwight David Eisenhower, General of the Army and the thirty-fourth President of the United States. Today, the name Eisenhower is synonymous with dynamic leadership in a complex international environment. But in 1941, this remarkable soldier was nearing the end of an undistinguished military career that had afforded him few opportunities to demonstrate his leadership. Yet, within three years and under the intense pressure of a global war, he rose to become Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces in Europe. The leadership skills that won the great land campaigns of the twentieth century did not come about overnight. They were the product of years of development-development that took place in the small peacetime Army of the 1920s and 30s. As we shape the force for the future, that example should serve as a source of inspiration for professionals throughout our ranks. With this publication, the Army joins in the Nation's remembrance of the 100th anniversary of Dwight Eisenhower's birth. At the same time, this commemoration provides us with a special opportunity to reflect on how military service has prepared so many Americans to contribute so much to the Nation and to the world. This booklet, prepared by the U.S. Army Center of Military History, will add to your understanding of a great American and help you appreciate the profound influence that a career of military service can have on the future of the Nation. Carl E. Vuono
General, United States Army Chief of Staff M. P. W. Stone Secretary of the Army Washington, D.C. 16 March 1990
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General of the Army Dwight David Eisenhower, Chief of Staff, UnitedStates Army.
Portrait by Nicodemus Hufford, 1973
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Dwight D. Eisenhower Dwight D. Eisenhower was a master craftsman in the demanding art of leadership. For twenty years, first as a soldier and then as a statesman, he bore the daily responsibility for difficult decisions that had far-reaching consequences for the nation. An obscure Army officer in 1940, he was internationally known four years later as the Supreme Allied Commander who was leading the Allied armies, navies, and air forces in the crusade in Europe. But Eisenhower was more than just the coalition's chief soldier. He was also a statesman involved as deeply in arranging the political and diplomatic aspects of the alliance as the military. In the politico-military realm, he encountered the sorts of contentious international issues that could divide even friends and learned to mediate the conflicting demands of men and nations. In the process, he came personally to know the men who shaped the postwar world, leaders with whom he continued to deal as he became Army Chief of Staff in 1945, Commander in Chief of NATO forces in 1950, and President of the United States in 1953. As the 1930s drew to a close, however, Eisenhower had no expectations of such lofty duties. In 1940, he finally attained the rank of colonel, the limit of his aspirations through the previous twenty-five years of service. During the 1920s and into the mid1930s, there seemed little chance of another war and thus little chance for distinction. Nonetheless, like many of his generation of officers, Eisenhower diligently studied his profession, preparing himself for jobs he had no realistic expectation of ever holding. It was in those dusty years of peace that much of his schooling as a decision-maker took place. |