The Age of Eisenhower

by William I Hitchcock

  Woodruff, known to his company as “the Boss” and everyone else as Mr. Bob, was a true tycoon, though a publicity-shy one. He served on the boards of dozens of the country’s largest banking, steel, railroad, and insurance companies, but he always shunned the press. He was an avid outdoorsman, devoted to quail hunting, and he used his money to acquire 30,000 acres of land in southwestern Georgia to use as a sportman’s paradise. He called it Ichauway, and there he entertained in country grandeur. The grounds were studded with giant oaks and strewn with Spanish moss. The stables included dozens of mules that were hitched to elegant little wagons and used to transport his guests into the scrub in search of quail. He kept great numbers of pointers for the hunt, and when they died he buried them in a dog cemetery; each tombstone displayed an enamel picture of the beloved hound. In the evening, back at the lodge, a fleet of black servants in starched white coats quietly offered visitors Havanas from burnished humidors. Woodruff was rarely seen without a cigar clenched in his teeth.

  He was not an intellectual, to say the least: according to his longtime personal secretary Joseph W. Jones, he never read a book, never made a public speech, never listened to music, rarely attended the theater, and had no passions other than hunting and golf. Naturally he was an original member of Augusta National and a close friend of Bobby Jones. Even after he donated millions of dollars to Atlanta arts organizations, he was never seen enjoying the music, theater, or exhibitions his wealth had made possible. His gift of $100 million to Emory University in 1979 was at that time the largest single donation in the history of American philanthropy; overall he gave away some $350 million of his fortune to civic, arts, and educational institutions. This, from a man who dropped out of college because, he said, he was bored.43

  Eisenhower’s friends, then, were not simply wealthy: they were among the richest and most powerful businessmen in postwar America. And they were all birds of a feather. Like Eisenhower, they started out in life with little and had grown up as outsiders, working in small towns in the Midwest or South. They had little formal education and considered themselves men of action rather than ideas. Like Eisenhower, they were workaholics, intensely competitive, and demanding. Deeply hostile to the New Deal and its expansive federal programs, they shared a profound belief in what Eisenhower liked to call the “American system,” that is, capitalism tempered by personal responsibility and good corporate governance. They felt that government interference in the free market they had mastered was a kind of betrayal of the American ideal. Although they behaved like elitists, retreating behind a high wall of wealth and privilege, they held themselves up as proof that pedigree was no requirement for success in America. They had earned their status by working hard for it, and this developed in them a zealous belief in free enterprise and a guiltless devotion to luxuries that their fabulous wealth allowed.

  Ike enjoyed their company and had no qualms about accepting their largesse. It is easy to see why. He shared their outlook on life, shared their views on politics, and mirrored their personal intensity, drive, and ambition. He also liked their wealth, which he saw as evidence of talent and industry. Eisenhower himself did not own a home of his own until the fall of 1950, when he bought a dilapidated farmhouse in Gettysburg. His wealthy friends could provide him with comforts on a much grander scale. They threw a protective cordon around him, gave him their absolute loyalty, and furnished him with ideas as well as political and social connections of a kind the general did not yet have. Their help would prove invaluable in opening doors for him and, at critical moments, whisking him out of the limelight for periods of rest and recuperation.

  And the friendships worked both ways. Eisenhower had something none of these men possessed: star power. He was a global phenomenon, one of the few men whose face was instantly recognizable around the world and whose name stood for victory and integrity. His friends knew a good product when they saw it and were determined to see Eisenhower become president. Over the course of many weekends of golf, bridge, and hunting, they had ample opportunity to relate their fears of “statism” and a bureaucratic seizure of power. America was in trouble, they believed, and Eisenhower was the only man who could save it.

  CHAPTER 3

  * * *

  Call to Duty

  “It is not easy to just say NO.”

  I

  “WE ARE JUST NOT CAPABLE, in this country, of conceiving of a man who does not want to be president,” Eisenhower wrote at the start of 1950. It was a long diary entry, and it read like the draft of a speech—one he was obviously rehearsing for the many visitors who came to see him at 60 Morningside Heights to talk politics. “I do not want a political career,” he insisted. “I do not want to be publicly associated with any political party.” He would do anything for the public good, as a “military officer instantly responsive to civil government.” Yet he wished to ride above the partisan fray. He wanted to use his Columbia presidency as a platform to laud the virtues of “the American system,” a political order he considered “far superior to any government elsewhere established by men.”1

  Yet the country would not leave Eisenhower alone. The Gallup poll in the spring of 1950 showed him ahead of Truman by 30 points in a head-to-head matchup of presidential contenders. Richard Rovere, the skilled reporter with an acute ear for political whispers, wrote in Harper’s, “The second Eisenhower boom is underway.” In June, Governor Dewey, the twice-defeated GOP presidential aspirant, hinted that he would not run again and that his favored replacement was Ike.2

  The Korean War, which broke out on June 25, 1950, with a surprise invasion of South Korea by communist North Korea, upended world affairs as well as domestic politics in the United States. Truman responded quickly, committing U.S. troops under a United Nations flag to defend South Korea, but the war was a disaster for the allied forces that fought there. South Korean forces were woefully unprepared; they were almost wiped out by the invading North Korean Army, which reached the southern end of the Korean peninsula by mid-September. General MacArthur, based in Tokyo and named commander in chief of UN forces, launched a daring and successful amphibious landing at Inchon on September 15. Sending 75,000 troops onto Korea’s western shoreline in a bold outflanking maneuver, MacArthur caught the North Koreans by surprise. The UN forces appeared to have a rout on their hands, as they snapped up hundreds of thousands of North Korean POWs and rushed northward, taking Pyongyang in mid-October. But this swift advance of American-led UN forces triggered Chinese intervention, and by early November American soldiers were fighting Chinese troops and getting beaten. By Christmas 1950 U.S. forces had been badly mauled by the Chinese and were forced to abandon almost all of North Korea. A few days after New Year’s Day 1951, the Chinese and North Koreans retook Seoul, the South Korean capital. A bloody and tragic stalemate now took hold.

  The outbreak of war punctured the already sagging balloon of Truman’s presidency. Not only did the war go badly, but America’s unpreparedness to confront the global communist threat could be laid at Truman’s door. The record showed that Eisenhower had been speaking out publicly in the months before the war about the erosion of American military power and in particular about Truman’s defense budget, which he thought too low. The fiasco in Korea now proved Eisenhower right, and Truman had to scramble to expand the military to meet the new war effort. The image of an improvisational war president contrasted poorly with the reputation of the steady Ike, whose prophesies had been borne out.3

  There was no time for recrimination. Truman needed help, and he desperately reached out to the men who had led the nation in World War II. On September 12, 1950, he fired his feckless defense secretary Louis Johnson and in his place appointed George C. Marshall. The lion of the armed services, Marshall had left government service in 1949 to take up the presidency of the American Red Cross. His health was somewhat fragile and he dreaded going back to the Pentagon. But Truman had gone in person to Marshall’s home in Leesburg, Virginia, and begged him to take the job. As Marshall put
it in a letter to his goddaughter, “When the president motors down and sits under our oaks and tells me of his difficulties, he has me at a disadvantage.”4

  Truman and his leading advisers feared that the war in Korea might be just the start of a broader communist offensive around the world, perhaps in the Middle East or Western Europe. While trying to halt the North Korean onslaught, therefore, Truman also sought a major expansion of U.S. military forces in Europe in order to deter any possible Soviet threat there. In the summer of 1950 Truman asked Congress for dramatic increases in military spending, army personnel, and aircraft forces, as well as atomic weapons capabilities. Most of the money would be spent enhancing U.S. and allied forces in Europe, where the stakes were highest. The United States could survive the loss of Korea, but if the USSR attacked Western Europe and overran Germany, America’s world position would be imperiled.5

  Only one American soldier had the prestige and reputation to go to Europe to lead this rapid rearmament. On October 27, 1950, Truman asked Ike to take the job of commander in chief of all allied forces in Europe. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) had been formed in April 1949 but still had no integrated military structure and no commander to lead it. Truman needed Ike to go to Europe, galvanize the allied nations, spur their military rearmament, and forge them into a fighting force powerful enough to hold back any Soviet assault. Eisenhower of course could not say no. If Truman believed that sending Ike to Europe would eliminate his most formidable obstacle to reelection in 1952, neither he nor Ike ever mentioned it. If anything, Eisenhower seemed happy to leave Columbia and take the NATO command. “I rather look on this effort,” he wrote to Swede Hazlett, “as about the last remaining chance for the survival of western civilization.”6

  Back in Washington, Eisenhower found the U.S. military establishment in a state of woeful disarray. He considered Truman far too complacent and prone to accept the armed services’ expressions of confidence at face value. In his diary he wrote that Truman was “a fine man who, in the middle of a stormy lake, knows nothing of swimming. Yet a lot of drowning people are forced to look to him as a life guard.” As the news from Korea worsened in late November, Eisenhower confided to one of his close friends, Lt. Gen. Alfred Gruenther, that he was “puzzled” by “a lack of urgency in our preparations.” American actions had been far too slow and cautious, especially on the home front, where mobilization of the economy and armed forces for war had lagged. “Something is terribly wrong,” he wrote in his diary in early December.7

  Such criticism had little merit. In 1950 the United States spent $14 billion on defense, but after the outbreak of war, defense spending skyrocketed. Truman’s 1951 budget called for $23 billion for the military, and almost double that for 1952, when defense spending hit $46 billion—a threefold increase in just three years. More dramatic, on December 16 Truman declared a state of national emergency, freezing prices, forcing striking railroad men back to work, and appointing Charles Edward Wilson, the head of General Electric, as the director of defense mobilization, with sweeping powers over war production.8

  Eisenhower welcomed these bold actions. He took a leave of absence from Columbia and in January 1951, with Truman’s approval, set off for a three-week trip to European capitals to make a preliminary assessment of the political and military picture there. The nation’s attention was fixed on Eisenhower. He was no longer a university president; he was a returning hero, called back to lead a military alliance in a time of crisis. He was in his uniform again, still trim and straining at the bit, recalling to his countrymen past days of martial glory. If Truman was weighed down by six years of a combative, bitter presidency—a man many had come to respect but few to like or revere—Eisenhower’s dignity and confidence reassured the country that one of America’s great military men was back at the helm.

  Eisenhower had to draw on these reserves of prestige to win congressional approval for building up NATO forces. It is important to recall that in 1951 public opinion largely opposed sending significant numbers of American troops to Europe so soon after the Second World War. The United States had already spent some $12 billion through the Marshall Plan to restart the economic engine of the Old World, and many in Congress wondered why the Europeans could not do more to defend themselves. Meanwhile, at home, the U.S. economy was struggling; inflation had soared due to the Korean War, and powerful voices called for a policy of global restraint. In late December 1950 Herbert Hoover, the godfather of the Republican Old Guard, publicly asserted that the Korean War was lost, that more military aid to Europe would be wasteful and provocative, and that America should instead rely on naval and air supremacy to defend itself.

  Many Republicans, joined by some conservative Democrats, voiced similar doubts about Truman’s proposals to rebuild Western Europe’s military capabilities. Senator Kenneth S. Wherry, Republican of Nebraska, argued the constitutional point: the president simply could not send U.S. soldiers overseas without congressional approval, and Congress had not yet been asked to approve the military action in Korea, let alone troops for Europe. In early January 1951 Senator Robert Taft, a perennial Republican presidential candidate and recognized leader of the isolationist faction, spoke against Truman’s policy for over two hours before a packed gallery in the Senate. The “principal purpose of the foreign policy of the United States,” he argued, “is to maintain the liberty of our people. It is not to reform the entire world or spread sweetness and light and economic prosperity” to all those who might want it. Furthermore, sending troops to Europe would surely be seen as provocative by the Soviets and “make war more likely.” A big military buildup in Europe was unnecessary and dangerous.9

  In this atmosphere of gloom and partisan criticism of his foreign policy, Truman deployed his secret weapon: Eisenhower. The general returned from Europe on February 1, 1951, to address a joint session of Congress. Speaking from the heart on a subject that deeply moved him, Eisenhower captivated his audience. He began, as he often did in public addresses, by emphasizing his respect for the legislators and the difficult decision they faced in preparing the country to defend itself. He stressed the connection between a strong Europe and America’s own security. Should Europe, with its talented people and great industrial resources, fall under the sway of the enemy, America would be “gravely imperiled.” The defense of Europe was not America’s responsibility alone, he said to applause. But the United States must take the lead: “What nation is more capable, more ready of providing this leadership?” He appealed to his listeners’ sense of moral purpose: “The cost of peace is going to be a sacrifice, a very great sacrifice, individually and nationally. But total war is a tragedy: it is probably the suicide of our civilization.” He spoke with conviction and quiet urgency.10

  His speech was a huge hit. “Eisenhower’s Magic Wins Over Capitol Hill Suspicion,” headlined the New York Times. James Reston’s accompanying article called it a “personal triumph” for Eisenhower. He was confident, direct, and heartfelt. The performance cemented his reputation as America’s most respected leader on national security issues: “When General Eisenhower addresses a large audience or a committee, even the most cynical Congressman cannot dismiss him with a wisecrack. It is this capacity to command respect and confidence; this combination of knowledge, experience and achievement; this quality of objectivity, of being non-attached to any of the local political warriors; this quality of directness, of toughness, of being the same inside and out that Washington has been seeking.”11

  At just this moment, with his prestige running as high as ever, Eisenhower decided to take the fight directly, though privately, to Taft himself. He invited the senator to meet him at the Pentagon, discreetly, with no press coverage. The general laid his cards on the table. “Would you,” he asked Taft, “agree that collective security is necessary for us in Western Europe and will you support this idea as a bipartisan policy?” If he answered yes, Eisenhower would make a public statement withdrawing his name from the presidential contest
in 1952, leaving the field clear for Taft. But Taft would not offer such assurances. He opposed NATO and opposed spending money on bailing out other nations. Eisenhower failed to budge him. After Taft departed, Eisenhower tore up a piece of paper on which he had earlier written out a pledge to withdraw from political activity. He wagered, “It might be more effective to keep some aura of mystery around my future plans.”12

  Eisenhower’s public performance on behalf of Truman’s troops-for-Europe plan had been so effective that opposition largely melted away. Taft could do little to stop the momentum that Eisenhower had created. A face-saving resolution was passed in the Senate in March calling for the president to get congressional approval before sending American soldiers overseas, but it was toothless. Soon after, in early April, the Senate passed a resolution, 69–21, approving Eisenhower’s appointment to command NATO forces and asserting the vital security importance of building up U.S. forces in Europe. The great debate was over, and once again Eisenhower had been crucial to victory.

  At a time when Truman’s presidency was in trouble, Eisenhower offered a stark contrast. He combined a determined confidence with an unashamed embrace of the rhetoric of freedom. He showed in his speech to Congress, as the Washington Post observed, that “faith and ideas are the things that move nations and civilizations.” His intervention in the NATO debate revealed his immense stature in the country and the world. The presidential buzz around him was humming: he was, in the words of one reporter, “the most attractive and the most intriguing figure in American public life today.” Millions of Americans agreed.13

  II

  When Eisenhower returned to Paris to take up his new post as NATO commander, he faced what he called “one of the most irksome jobs ever designed by man.” Europe still languished in the postwar doldrums. Money was tight; the scars of the war had barely healed. Many Europeans were wary about NATO, seeing it as provocative to the Soviets. Neutralist sentiment ran strong. In this atmosphere, Eisenhower had to develop a common military identity for 12 distinct nations and get them to commit to rearming a continent that had just passed through history’s most destructive war. Even more awkward, he wanted the Germans to play a role in the new alliance. The idea of rearming Germany so soon after the war struck more than a few Europeans as bitterly ironic. In fact the Germans too were against the idea: a poll in the newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung found 67 percent strongly against participation in Western defense. Eisenhower’s diplomatic talents and skills of persuasion would be severely tested.14