Eisenhower in War and Peace

by Jean Edward Smith

  n In 1984, Stephen Ambrose published the first of several biographies of Eisenhower. In it he stated that “Eisenhower personally wished that the Court had upheld Plessy v. Ferguson.” The allegation is repeated by Ambrose in his subsequent works. Because of Ambrose’s position as an associate editor of the Eisenhower Papers, a generation of historians have accepted his version of Ike’s views. Ambrose provides no documentation, no references, and cites only “private” conversations. The fact is Ambrose cut the allegation from whole cloth. There is no evidence whatsoever to sustain Ambrose’s claim. David A. Nichols, in his definitive study of Eisenhower and civil rights, writes that “there is no credible evidence” for Ambrose’s assertion; Blanche Wiesen Cook, one of the earliest researchers in the archives of the Eisenhower Library, found none, nor have I. In the April 26, 2010, issue of The New Yorker magazine, Richard Rayner reports that Ambrose’s alleged interviews with Eisenhower never took place. The record does not sustain that he ever met privately with Ike. Timothy D. Rives, deputy director of the Eisenhower Presidential Library, provided chapter and verse sustaining Rayner’s conclusions in a subsequent article appearing online on George Mason University’s History News Network, May 17, 2010.

  Ambrose sometimes twisted the facts to fit his portrait of Ike, but never with such pernicious effect as in Eisenhower’s views of civil rights. I did not know Ambrose, and I have no personal animosity toward him. To the contrary, I have always felt indebted to him for his very generous review of my biography of Lucius Clay in The New York Times Book Review in 1990.

  Ambrose, 2 Eisenhower 190; Ambrose, Eisenhower: Soldier and President 367; Nichols, Matter of Justice 279; Rayner, “Channeling Ike,” 20–21; Timothy D. Rives, “Ambrose and Eisenhower: A View from the Stacks,” HNN, May 17, 2010.

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  Military-Industrial Complex

  In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex.

  —DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER,

  January 17, 1961

  On October 4, 1957, with the news that the Soviet Union had successfully launched the world’s first man-made satellite, the nation’s attention shifted abruptly from Little Rock and civil rights to outer space and the arms race. The Russians called the satellite Sputnik, a word artfully translated as “fellow traveler.” It was a small aluminum alloy sphere, 22.8 inches in diameter, weighing 184 pounds, and equipped with two radio transmitters sending continuous signals back to earth. Sputnik orbited the earth, 560 miles up, traveling at a speed of eighteen thousand miles an hour. Shortly afterward came Sputnik II, launched on November 3, six times larger than its predecessor, with an orbit even higher.

  Neither Sputnik nor Sputnik II had any direct military application. They carried no weapons systems or scientific equipment. But the technological breakthrough represented by the launch and the size of the thrust required to propel the satellites into orbit caught the world by surprise. American reaction varied between measured anxiety and total hysteria. The Joint Chiefs clamored for massive increases in the defense budget, civil defense officials mounted an urgent drive to construct bomb shelters nationwide, the academic community pressed for more funds for scientific research, and the Democrats—believing that they had found a chink in Ike’s armor—ballyhooed the missile gap and America’s unpreparedness.

  Eisenhower refused to panic. As at Little Rock, he responded calmly and deliberately, and kept the issue in perspective. Ike was peppered at his news conference on October 9 about the Soviet launch. Charles von Fremd of CBS wanted to know whether the Strategic Air Command was now a museum piece, as Nikita Khrushchev claimed. Absolutely not, Eisenhower replied. Any change in weapons systems would be evolutionary over a long period of time. Robert Clark of the International News Service asked whether we had made a mistake in not recognizing we were in a race with Russians. No, said Ike, the satellite program is a scientific program unrelated to national security. “I don’t know why our scientists should have come in and urged that we do this before anybody else.” May Craig wanted to know whether the Soviets could launch rockets from the satellites. “Not at this time,” Ike replied. They might be able to transmit photographic data back to earth, but that was still under development. Eisenhower carefully distinguished between launching a satellite and firing an intercontinental ballistic missile, where accuracy and guidance were of paramount importance. There was no reason to assume the Russians had any advantage in that respect.

  The key question was put to Eisenhower by Hazel Markel of NBC:

  Q: Mr. President, in light of the great faith which the American people have in your military knowledge and leadership, are you saying at this time with the Russian satellite whirling about the world, you are not more concerned nor overly concerned about our nation’s security?

  EISENHOWER: So far as the satellite itself is concerned, that does not raise my apprehensions, not one iota. I see nothing at this moment, at this stage of development that is significant in that development as far as security is concerned.1

  Eisenhower’s resolute assurance calmed the nation’s jitters. His manner that afternoon exuded confidence. It was not bravado on Ike’s part, nor was he playacting. His assurance rested on iron-clad evidence provided by extensive CIA surveillance flights over the Soviet Union mounted by the agency’s U-2 spy planes. When Eisenhower assumed office in 1953, he was troubled by the lack of accurate information about Soviet military activity. The possibility of surprise attack loomed large. Russian secrecy also contributed to American anxiety, ratcheting up the pressure to spend more and more on potentially useless weapons systems. Aerial surveillance seemed the answer. Eisenhower had pressed for “Open Skies” at Geneva, but the Soviets were uninterested. When MIT president James Killian, who was Ike’s science adviser, and Edwin Land, the inventor of the Polaroid camera, suggested development of a plane that could overfly Soviet airspace at altitudes above Russian antiaircraft defenses and produce highly accurate photographs of the ground below, Eisenhower signed on immediately. His one stipulation was that he did not want uniformed Air Force pilots violating Soviet airspace. That meant it would be a CIA project.2

  The resulting U-2 surveillance aircraft, designed by America’s most talented airplane designer, Kelly Johnson, was built in a supersecret area (the Skunk Works) at Lockheed’s sprawling Burbank, California, facility in 1955–56. Based originally on the Air Force’s F-104 but longer, lower, and lighter, with a wingspan of eighty feet, the U-2 was more of a glider than a jet and could stay aloft for eleven hours with a range of 4,750 miles. It flew at 70,000 feet (soon 80,000), and its cameras could capture the smallest objects on the ground some fourteen miles below. The first reconnaissance flights were made from England in July 1956. They flew over Eastern Europe, and Eisenhower was shown photographs from the missions. Ike was stunned at the clarity of the photos. You could see not only a parking lot fourteen miles below, but you could even see “the lines marking the parking areas for individual cars.”3 In terms of intelligence work, the U-2 was a breakthrough of gigantic proportions. As one high-ranking CIA official put it, “Photography became to the Fifties what code-breaking was to the Forties.”4

  On July 4, 1957, the first flight into Soviet airspace took off from a West German airfield, crossed Eastern Europe, flew over Russian Air Force bases in the Ukraine, then up to Leningrad. The next day a second flight crossed southern Ukraine and went on to Moscow. Eisenhower was shown the photos several days later and was again astounded at the clarity. The photos also depicted Soviet fighters rising to challenge the U-2 but flaming out at 50,000 feet and tumbling back to earth until the pilots could restart their engines.5

  On July 10, the Soviet Union filed a formal diplomatic protest pertaining to the overflights, including an accurate description of what the U-2s had done and where they had gone. The State Department rejected the allegations. John Foster Dulles personally wrote out the reply that no m
ilitary plane had violated Soviet airspace.6 The Russians, for their part, chose not to go public with their protests about the U-2 flights because they did not want to admit to the world that their military was powerless to stop them. Eisenhower recognized that each U-2 flight was a provocation and insisted on approving the flights personally. The risk was small—Allen Dulles had assured the president that if the Soviets ever did shoot down a U-2, the pilot could not survive the crash—but Eisenhower demanded direct control. A former pilot himself, Ike often plotted the routes for the U-2 on flight maps with CIA deputy director Richard Bissell.7

  The U-2 photographs not only provided convincing evidence that there was no missile gap, but that the Soviets had yet to launch an intercontinental ballistic missile. During the Sputnik crisis, John Foster Dulles urged the president to tell the country about the U-2 flights to reassure the public that the United States retained the strategic edge over the Soviets. Eisenhower declined to do so. If he revealed the flights, Ike believed he would come under intense Soviet pressure to halt them. Moscow might even declare that the next flight would be considered an act of war. Rather than take that risk, Eisenhower kept the flights secret, so important was the information they obtained.

  The crises over Little Rock and Sputnik took a toll. In both instances Eisenhower’s steady hand reassured a nation in doubt. But the emotional cost was high. Ike kept his personal feelings bottled up—as he always did—but he suffered for doing so. On Monday, November 25, 1957, Eisenhower welcomed King Mohammed V of Morocco to Washington in a brief ceremony at National Airport, then returned to the White House for a light lunch and a brief nap. Returning to his office in the early afternoon, he suddenly felt dizzy. He had difficulty reading the papers in front of him, could not pick up his pen, and slumped in his chair, unable to get up. He buzzed his secretary Ann Whitman. When Whitman came into the room, Eisenhower tried to tell her what had happened, only to discover that he could not speak intelligibly. His words were slurred and jumbled. “It was impossible for me to express any coherent thought whatsoever. I began to feel truly helpless.”8

  Ann Whitman was alarmed to find the president talking gibberish and immediately summoned General Andrew Goodpaster, Eisenhower’s staff secretary, who occupied the adjacent office. Goodpaster assessed the situation quickly and concluded Ike had suffered a slight seizure. “Mr. President, I think we should get you to bed.”9 Eisenhower had no difficulty walking with Goodpaster’s support, nor did he feel any pain. Goodpaster helped Ike undress and got him into bed. Dr. Snyder arrived shortly afterward. “Having resigned myself to bed, I spent no time worrying about the source of my trouble,” Eisenhower recalled. “I just turned over to take a nap.”

  When the president awoke, two of the nation’s leading neurological surgeons conducted an extensive examination and concluded that Eisenhower had experienced a minor spasm in one of the small capillaries of his brain. The problem was temporary, the doctors agreed, and they predicted a full recovery in a matter of days.10

  Encouraged by the doctors’ prognosis, Eisenhower got up and began to dress for the state dinner that evening honoring King Mohammed. Mamie, John, and Dr. Snyder objected strenuously. Vice President Nixon had already been tapped to substitute for the president, and they insisted that Ike remain in bed. The discussion became heated. Finally, Mamie said that if Eisenhower insisted on going to the dinner, she would not. “It soon appeared to me that a retirement in good order was called for,” said Ike. “I went back to bed.”11

  The following morning Eisenhower was much improved but not yet fully recovered. He was unable to identify a famous William Turner watercolor hanging on his bedroom wall (The Smugglers), one of his favorite pictures, and his words were still slightly garbled. After two additional days of bed rest, the doctors pronounced Eisenhower fully recovered. He and Mamie attended church services in Washington on Thanksgiving, and then drove to Gettysburg for the weekend.

  The doctors were satisfied, but Eisenhower was unsure. This was his third serious illness in three years, and he did not want to cling to office if he was incapable of fulfilling his duties. The memory of Woodrow Wilson’s last year as president troubled Ike, and he was especially sensitive to the possibility that he might not recognize his own disability. Against much high level advice, Eisenhower decided to test himself. The NATO conference of heads of government was due to convene in Paris in mid-December. Dulles suggested that Nixon attend in Ike’s place, but Eisenhower saw it as a test. “If I could carry out this program successfully and without noticeable damage to myself, then I would continue in my duties. If I felt the results to be less than satisfactory, then I would resign.”12

  The trip was a complete success. The president’s motorcade from Orly Airport was greeted by thousands of cheering Parisians, Eisenhower stood in an open car for almost an hour acknowledging their welcome, and his introductory remarks at the Palais de Chaillot went off without a hitch. Ike paid an unscheduled visit to his old NATO headquarters and spoke extemporaneously to the assembled staff and their families. “The talk was short, but to me it represented another milestone. I felt that my recovery was progressing satisfactorily.”13 For three days Eisenhower participated in the NATO meetings with no apparent loss for words. On the flight back to Washington, Dr. Snyder confided to Ike that he was much improved. “As he spoke, I realized that I already had abandoned my doubt concerning my physical capacity to continue my duties; during the remaining three years of my Presidency no question of the kind again occurred to me.”14

  One of the aftereffects of Ike’s stroke was a little known undertaking by him to step down in the event of any future incapacity. In an exchange of letters revealed for the first time with the publication of his memoirs in 1965, Eisenhower carefully laid out for Nixon the circumstances under which the vice president would assume the power and duties of the presidency. If he were disabled, and aware of it, Ike said he would inform Nixon and Nixon would take over. But if he were disabled and unaware of it, Nixon would be exclusively responsible for determining when he should take over. “You will decide.… The decision will be yours only.” Eisenhower said that if medical experts agreed that his disability was permanent, he would immediately resign. By the same token, “I will be the one to determine if and when it is proper for me to resume the powers and duties of the Presidency.”15 Eisenhower’s undertaking was almost a decade before the ratification of the Twenty-fifth Amendment to the Constitution, which provides for presidential disability.

  Eisenhower at his easel. (illustration credit 27.1)

  As Eisenhower’s second term progressed, his principal assistants fell by the wayside. Like a football team with a comfortable lead in the fourth quarter, the starters came off the field. Treasury Secretary George Humphrey, perhaps the most powerful member of the cabinet, resigned on July 28, 1957. Defense Secretary Charles Wilson left on October 8, and Herbert Brownell, in many ways Ike’s most trusted adviser, departed after Little Rock. John Foster Dulles was crippled with cancer, and though he briefly returned to office, he resigned the following year. The loss of the four was a serious setback for Eisenhower. Humphrey, Wilson, Brownell, and Dulles were powerful figures of independent judgment. They were intensely loyal to the president, but could be counted on to speak forcefully when they disagreed. But the most serious loss Ike suffered in his second term was that of Sherman Adams. Adams was by no stretch of the imagination the deputy president. But as White House chief of staff he kept the administration in step and coordinated—just as Bedell Smith had done at SHAEF during the war.

  The parallel between Sherman Adams and Bedell Smith is striking. Both were brusque, austere administrators capable of making on-the-spot decisions that freed Eisenhower of countless details. When generals in Europe were disappointed in decisions made at SHAEF, they usually blamed Bedell rather than Ike. So, too, in Washington. Politicians of both parties focused their ire on Sherman Adams when their requests were denied by the White House. Both Smith and Adams were scrupulous
ly honest. Yet both had curious blind spots. In 1945, as the Allies overran Germany, the German gold hoard fell into American hands. Bedell Smith suggested that part of it be used to strike gold medals for the victorious generals. Eisenhower and Clay dismissed Smith’s suggestion out of hand, yet Smith had meant well. He simply failed to understand why it was inappropriate.16 Sherman Adams’s difficulty was much the same.

  Adams’s problem arose out of his long friendship with New England industrialist Bernard Goldfine. The friendship between the Adams and Goldfine families dated to the early 1940s, when Adams had been Speaker of the New Hampshire General Court (the state legislature) and Goldfine had played an active role in financing textile mills in the state. The families sometimes vacationed together and often exchanged small presents on festive occasions. Goldfine retained an apartment in a downtown Boston hotel that was often used by visiting friends and business associates. When Adams went to Washington in 1953, Goldfine invited him to stay in the apartment whenever he was in Boston, and to sign Goldfine’s name on hotel bills for room service and other incidentals. Goldfine also gave Adams a vicuña coat from one of his mills, and loaned him an oriental rug for his Washington home. Adams, for his part, once gave Goldfine a gold watch, and Rachel, Adams’s wife, had given him a painting—all of which seemed innocent enough among old friends.

  The Adams-Goldfine relationship surfaced in June 1958 during a congressional investigation into Goldfine’s financial dealings. The hotel bills signed by Adams were discovered among Goldfine’s records, and legislators assumed there had been a quid pro quo. On his own initiative Adams asked to testify. There was no subpoena, but he wanted to set the record straight. Adams had made two routine phone calls to the Securities and Exchange Commission to obtain information on Goldfine’s behalf, but there had been no effort to influence the commission. Like Bedell Smith and the German gold, Sherman Adams failed to perceive how a phone call from the White House would be interpreted. Adams said that in retrospect he should have acted more prudently, but insisted he had done nothing wrong. The public perception was otherwise.