Eisenhower, Volume II: The President

Description

Stephen E. Ambrose draws upon extensive sources, an unprecedented degree of scholarship, and numerous interviews with Dwight D. Eisenhower himself to offer the fullest, richest, and most objective rendering yet of the soldier who became president. Eisenhower: The President, the second and concluding volume of Stephen Ambrose's brilliant biography, is the first assessment of a postwar President based on access to the entire record. It covers a wide range of subjects, including Eisenhower's rejection of the near-unanimous advice he received as President to use atomic weapons; his thinking on defense policy and the Cold War; his handling of a multitude of foreign-affairs crises; his attitudes and actions on civil rights; his views on Joseph McCarthy and on communism. Also illuminated are Eisenhower's relations with Nixon, Truman, Khrushchev, de Gaulle, and other world leaders. Ambrose provides us with an extraordinary portrait—fairminded and enormously well-informed—of the man, both decent and complex, who is increasingly regarded as one of the twentieth century's greatest Presidents. Introduction 1 President-Elect, November 1952–January 11, 1953 2 Inauguration, January 12–January 20, 1953 3 Getting Started, January 21–March 31, 1953 4 The Chance for Peace, April 1–June 30, 1953 5 Peace in Korea, Coup in Iran, July 1–September 30, 1953 6 Atoms for Peace, October 1–December 31, 1953 7 Bricker, McCarthy, Bravo, Vietnam, January 1–May 7, 1954 8 McCarthy, Guatemala, SEATO, May 8–September 8, 1954 9 Quemoy and Matsu, Off-Year Elections, September 3–December 31, 1954 10 The Formosa Doctrine, January 1–June 20, 1955 11 Open Skies, June—September 1955 12 Heart Attack, September—December 1955 13 Recovery, January—March 1956 14 The Tyranny of the Weak, April—September 1956 15 Election, Suez, Hungary, September 19–December 31, 1956 16 The Eisenhower Doctrine, January—July 1957 17 The High Cost of Defense, Nuclear Testing, Civil Rights, January—July 1957 18 Little Rock, Sputnik, August—November 1957 19 Problems: Stroke, Dulles, Disarmament, Space Race, December 1957–April 1958 20 Lebanon, Sherman Adams, Disarmament, Quemoy and Matsu, Other Woes, May—September 1958 21 Elections, Test-Ban Talks, Berlin, Fidel, October 1958–February 1959 22 A Revival, February—June 1959 23 Traveling for Peace, July–December 1959 24 High Hopes and Unhappy Realities, January—June 1960 25 A Bad Summer and a Terrible Fall, July 1–November 9, 1960 26 Transition, November 9, 1960—January 20, 1961 27 The Eisenhower Presidency: An Assessment, 1953–1961 28 Elder Statesman, January 1961–November 1963 29 Johnson, Goldwater, Vietnam, November 23, 1963–March 1968 30 Taps, March 1968–March 28, 1969 Acknowledgments Photographs About Stephen E. Ambrose Notes Bibliography Index