Status
Available
Call number
Publication
Little, Brown and Company (2012), Hardcover, 496 pages
Description
Upon assuming the presidency in 1953, Dwight Eisenhower came to be seen by many as a doddering lightweight. Yet behind the bland smile and apparent simplemindedness was a brilliant, intellectual tactician. As Evan Thomas reveals in his provocative examination of Ike's White House years, Eisenhower was a master of calculated duplicity. As with his bridge and poker games he was eventually forced to stop playing after leaving too many fellow army officers insolvent, Ike could be patient and ruthless in the con, and generous and expedient in his partnerships. Facing the Soviet Union, China, and his own generals, some of whom believed a first strike was the only means of survival, Eisenhower would make his boldest and riskiest bet yet, one of such enormity that there could be but two outcomes: the survival of the world, or its end.--From publisher description.… (more)
User reviews
LibraryThing member teddyballgame
In Ike's Bluff, Evan Thomas provides a thorough analysis of President Dwight Eisenhower's strategy in dealing with the Soviet Union during the Cold War. Eisenhower was a very cunning man who did his fair share of military posturing with the Soviet Union in order to avoid World War III. By
Thomas makes a strong case that Eisenhower was uniquely positioned to engage in this strategy due to his personality, reputation and skills. His military career gave him instant legitimacy in the eyes of opponents. His tremendous skill at card games translated to foreign policy causing even his closest aides to wonder what he was truly thinking at all times. Hence, the Soviets never really knew whether the threat of nuclear war was real or not. Eisenhower told no one his thoughts and it was almost impossible to read his mannerisms or tone, so no leaks or rumors ever occurred.
This book also provides a great insight into his personality, his relationships with Mamie and his doctor, and his relationships with his family. Thomas makes Ike come alive as a human being who has flaws but also has the unique characteristics needed for the era and the office.
I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in the Cold War, U.S. Presidents, foreign policy, or Eisenhower himself. It's very well written and insightful.
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implicitly threatening the Soviet's with all out nuclear war, Eisenhower protected the American people during his Presidency.Thomas makes a strong case that Eisenhower was uniquely positioned to engage in this strategy due to his personality, reputation and skills. His military career gave him instant legitimacy in the eyes of opponents. His tremendous skill at card games translated to foreign policy causing even his closest aides to wonder what he was truly thinking at all times. Hence, the Soviets never really knew whether the threat of nuclear war was real or not. Eisenhower told no one his thoughts and it was almost impossible to read his mannerisms or tone, so no leaks or rumors ever occurred.
This book also provides a great insight into his personality, his relationships with Mamie and his doctor, and his relationships with his family. Thomas makes Ike come alive as a human being who has flaws but also has the unique characteristics needed for the era and the office.
I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in the Cold War, U.S. Presidents, foreign policy, or Eisenhower himself. It's very well written and insightful.
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LibraryThing member nbmars
A number of new studies of Dwight Eisenhower have reassessed him in a much more positive light than he was previously considered. (Historical revisionism of the Eisenhower Administration is not a new phenomenon, but it has picked up speed of late.) Evan Thomas joins the latest list of scholars who
"The peace and prosperity that marked his two terms in office ‘didn’t just happen, by God’ (quoting Eisenhower)… The 1950’s were boringly peaceful (or are remembered that way) only because Eisenhower made them so.”
The principal thesis of Evan Thomas's study of Eisenhower’s presidency is that the U.S. was able to keep the peace while simultaneously containing communist expansion during the 1950’s by credibly threatening to use nuclear weapons. That doctrine or policy became know as “massive retaliation,” meaning that the U.S. made it clear that it would use nearly its entire stock of nuclear weapons in any conflict. To Dwight Eisenhower, there were to be no small wars — it was all or nothing. Thomas argues (as does Jim Newton in Eisenhower: The White House Years, to be reviewed in the next post), Eisenhower was so credible that no one, not even the audacious and provocative Mao Zedong, was willing to risk war with the U.S.
Eisenhower (Ike) benefited from his experience as a card shark. He took up poker at West Point, and won so often and so much that he had to quit to save his reputation. Then he took up bridge, and “was a fierce, take-no-prisoners player.” Both games require intelligence, skill at strategy and forecasting, confidence, and the ability to read one’s opponents. Ike, his staff secretary said, was adept at all of these traits.
These were skills he would take with him to the presidency.
Ike’s first major challenge was to extricate the US from the Korean War. He was elected partially on his promise, “I shall go to Korea.” President Truman famously queried, “What will he do when he gets there?” What he did shortly after returning was to raise the stakes of fighting for the other side. Some historians have claimed that Ike warned the Chinese, using the intermediary of India, that if the war continued the U.S. might feel compelled to use nuclear weapons. Indeed, some of Ike's advisors later claimed these secret signals turned the tide. But Thomas questions this, in part because Nehru claims he never passed on the message. In any event, Ike greatly increased the bombing of dams and power plants, causing widespread flooding and ruining a year’s rice crop. The ensuing threat of famine was “deeply destructive and demoralizing” in and of itself to North Korea. In addition, the death of Stalin (who supported a dragged-out war to bleed the West), contributed to bringing the North Koreans and Chinese to the negotiating table.
Eisenhower was terribly concerned about the dangers of nuclear war. Accordingly, he developed a coherent strategy to avoid it. Unlike his Army Chief of Staff, the four star general Maxwell Taylor, and other advocates of developing the military ability to fight small wars, Ike thought small wars led to big wars, and in the nuclear age that might mean total war. The way to avoid small wars was to threaten big wars from the beginning, and mean it. Ike wrote that Taylor’s doctrine of flexible response:
"...was dependent on an assumption that we are opposed by a people who think as we do with regard to the value of human life. But they do not, as shown in many incidents from the last war.... In the event they should decide to go to war, the pressure on them to use atomic weapons in a sudden blow would be extremely great.”
[Ultimately, General Taylor, critical of Eisenhower’s military policies, retired from active service in July 1959.]
Ike expended serious efforts to induce the Soviets to engage in mutual reduction in arms. At the 1955 Geneva conference (see picture, above), he proposed “Open Skies,” a policy that would allow the Soviet and American reconnaissance planes to freely fly over each other's territory. He wanted to reduce the threat of surprise attack, "the great fear of the new nuclear age."
The Russians would not accept because (as we learned later) they were so weak they did not want the US to have a realistic appraisal of their strength.
But the U.S. was even better at craftiness with Ike at the helm. Thomas writes: "His ability to save the world from nuclear Armageddon entirely depended on his ability to convince America’s enemies—and his own followers—that he was willing to use nuclear weapons. This was a bluff of epic proportions.”
Thomas credits Eisenhower with many other wise choices during his presidency, such as his management of the Suez crises of 1956, his handling of volatile and dangerous characters like Chiang Kai-Shek and Curtis LeMay, his decision to emphasize ICBMs rather than bombers, and his avoidance of involvement in Vietnam despite the pleas of the French.
[It should be noted that Eisenhower was critical of the way the US under Lyndon Johnson fought the Vietnam war. Ike’s philosophy was to avoid a war unless you were willing to fight to win. One can only wonder how Ike’s Korean policy of relentless attacks on civilian targets, coupled with the threat of nuclear war, might have fared in Vietnam.]
Ike recognized and regretted that part of the price of avoiding nuclear war was convincing the US populace that the threat was both terrible and real. Yet he avoided letting the country devolve into a modern Sparta or a garrison state. Two bon mots from Thomas in the final chapter summarize the thrust of the book:
"Ike was more comfortable as a soldier, yet his greatest victories were the wars he did not fight.”
"Lincoln went to war to save the Union. Eisenhower avoided war to save the world.”
Evaluation: This is an excellent book not only for those not yet born during this period, but also for those who were around, but unaware of just how dangerous a time it was.
(JAB)
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aim to elevate Eisenhower’s reputation, and he does so by focusing on his handling of the nuclear threat during his time in office. As Thomas demonstrates in this entertaining history: "The peace and prosperity that marked his two terms in office ‘didn’t just happen, by God’ (quoting Eisenhower)… The 1950’s were boringly peaceful (or are remembered that way) only because Eisenhower made them so.”
The principal thesis of Evan Thomas's study of Eisenhower’s presidency is that the U.S. was able to keep the peace while simultaneously containing communist expansion during the 1950’s by credibly threatening to use nuclear weapons. That doctrine or policy became know as “massive retaliation,” meaning that the U.S. made it clear that it would use nearly its entire stock of nuclear weapons in any conflict. To Dwight Eisenhower, there were to be no small wars — it was all or nothing. Thomas argues (as does Jim Newton in Eisenhower: The White House Years, to be reviewed in the next post), Eisenhower was so credible that no one, not even the audacious and provocative Mao Zedong, was willing to risk war with the U.S.
Eisenhower (Ike) benefited from his experience as a card shark. He took up poker at West Point, and won so often and so much that he had to quit to save his reputation. Then he took up bridge, and “was a fierce, take-no-prisoners player.” Both games require intelligence, skill at strategy and forecasting, confidence, and the ability to read one’s opponents. Ike, his staff secretary said, was adept at all of these traits.
These were skills he would take with him to the presidency.
Ike’s first major challenge was to extricate the US from the Korean War. He was elected partially on his promise, “I shall go to Korea.” President Truman famously queried, “What will he do when he gets there?” What he did shortly after returning was to raise the stakes of fighting for the other side. Some historians have claimed that Ike warned the Chinese, using the intermediary of India, that if the war continued the U.S. might feel compelled to use nuclear weapons. Indeed, some of Ike's advisors later claimed these secret signals turned the tide. But Thomas questions this, in part because Nehru claims he never passed on the message. In any event, Ike greatly increased the bombing of dams and power plants, causing widespread flooding and ruining a year’s rice crop. The ensuing threat of famine was “deeply destructive and demoralizing” in and of itself to North Korea. In addition, the death of Stalin (who supported a dragged-out war to bleed the West), contributed to bringing the North Koreans and Chinese to the negotiating table.
Eisenhower was terribly concerned about the dangers of nuclear war. Accordingly, he developed a coherent strategy to avoid it. Unlike his Army Chief of Staff, the four star general Maxwell Taylor, and other advocates of developing the military ability to fight small wars, Ike thought small wars led to big wars, and in the nuclear age that might mean total war. The way to avoid small wars was to threaten big wars from the beginning, and mean it. Ike wrote that Taylor’s doctrine of flexible response:
"...was dependent on an assumption that we are opposed by a people who think as we do with regard to the value of human life. But they do not, as shown in many incidents from the last war.... In the event they should decide to go to war, the pressure on them to use atomic weapons in a sudden blow would be extremely great.”
[Ultimately, General Taylor, critical of Eisenhower’s military policies, retired from active service in July 1959.]
Ike expended serious efforts to induce the Soviets to engage in mutual reduction in arms. At the 1955 Geneva conference (see picture, above), he proposed “Open Skies,” a policy that would allow the Soviet and American reconnaissance planes to freely fly over each other's territory. He wanted to reduce the threat of surprise attack, "the great fear of the new nuclear age."
The Russians would not accept because (as we learned later) they were so weak they did not want the US to have a realistic appraisal of their strength.
But the U.S. was even better at craftiness with Ike at the helm. Thomas writes: "His ability to save the world from nuclear Armageddon entirely depended on his ability to convince America’s enemies—and his own followers—that he was willing to use nuclear weapons. This was a bluff of epic proportions.”
Thomas credits Eisenhower with many other wise choices during his presidency, such as his management of the Suez crises of 1956, his handling of volatile and dangerous characters like Chiang Kai-Shek and Curtis LeMay, his decision to emphasize ICBMs rather than bombers, and his avoidance of involvement in Vietnam despite the pleas of the French.
[It should be noted that Eisenhower was critical of the way the US under Lyndon Johnson fought the Vietnam war. Ike’s philosophy was to avoid a war unless you were willing to fight to win. One can only wonder how Ike’s Korean policy of relentless attacks on civilian targets, coupled with the threat of nuclear war, might have fared in Vietnam.]
Ike recognized and regretted that part of the price of avoiding nuclear war was convincing the US populace that the threat was both terrible and real. Yet he avoided letting the country devolve into a modern Sparta or a garrison state. Two bon mots from Thomas in the final chapter summarize the thrust of the book:
"Ike was more comfortable as a soldier, yet his greatest victories were the wars he did not fight.”
"Lincoln went to war to save the Union. Eisenhower avoided war to save the world.”
Evaluation: This is an excellent book not only for those not yet born during this period, but also for those who were around, but unaware of just how dangerous a time it was.
(JAB)
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LibraryThing member Philip100
If you like Eisenhower then this is a good book to read. If you are one of those who believe's Eisenhower was a weak president you really should read this book, it has some very good insight into how Ike lead the country , and did a very good job of keeping the Cold war in check. The man was a lot
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better president than he is given credit for. I think this is a very good book and would recommend it to all followers of American History. Show Less
LibraryThing member VGAHarris
Okay, but spent too much time talking about Ike's golf game and not enough about his diplomacy. Also repetitive in spots, discussing Ike's temperament. The point was clinched early and didn't need repeated anecdotes.
LibraryThing member buffalogr
This book is about Eisenhower's foreign policy/military decisions during his presidency--nothing else. I've viewed Ike's terms in office as sort of holding; this book says different--Ike saved the world from nuclear holocaust and we didn't even know it. I enjoyed this book because the author got
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inside the president's mind...not just regurgitated history...what Ike actually felt during the various episodes during 1953-1960. I found it curious that Ike mistrusted the military, gained from many years of association. Then, when Kennedy failed at the Bay of Pigs, he tried not to say: "I told you so." Also, this book also provides some background and insight on Ike's 1960 prescient comment about the military industrial complex. Show Less
LibraryThing member buffalogr
This book is about Eisenhower's foreign policy/military decisions during his presidency--nothing else. I've viewed Ike's terms in office as sort of holding; this book says different--Ike saved the world from nuclear holocaust and we didn't even know it. I enjoyed this book because the author got
Show More
inside the president's mind...not just regurgitated history...what Ike actually felt during the various episodes during 1953-1960. I found it curious that Ike mistrusted the military, gained from many years of association. Then, when Kennedy failed at the Bay of Pigs, he tried not to say: "I told you so." Also, this book also provides some background and insight on Ike's 1960 prescient comment about the military industrial complex. Show Less
LibraryThing member DeaconBernie
Overall, this book is more a reminder than a cutting edge history. The author makes a good effort to show Granddad Ike was not all a big smile and "aw shucks." Nevertheless, the author goes to great length to describe Ike's bluff. He avoids suggesting Ike was with out principle or that his entire
What does come through loud and clear is that the fifties, contrary to a certain fondness and wistfulness, was not a benign period. Taking it year by year, as the author does, sets one to questioning how could we ever look back at those years as a peaceful time. Perhaps that is really what Ike's bluff was all about, that the fifties contrary to the assumed peacefulness was really a very hot time. Surely it couldn't be said that Ike was acting for another age?
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administration was a big lie. Ike always had enough weaponry to defend the USA and to project power. The bluff, if indeed it was a bluff, was that he wouldn't fight but he wanted others to know it would not be to their advantage to test us too far. The main thought one should glean is that Ike was prepared to let his reputation speak for him. What does come through loud and clear is that the fifties, contrary to a certain fondness and wistfulness, was not a benign period. Taking it year by year, as the author does, sets one to questioning how could we ever look back at those years as a peaceful time. Perhaps that is really what Ike's bluff was all about, that the fifties contrary to the assumed peacefulness was really a very hot time. Surely it couldn't be said that Ike was acting for another age?
Show Less
LibraryThing member hardlyhardy
Dwight Eisenhower liked playing cards as much as he liked playing golf, but he was better at cards and one reason for that was his skill at bluffing. Evan Thomas explores how this particular skill carried over into his presidency in his 2012 biography “Ike’s Bluff: President Eisenhower’s
Having spent a career in the U.S. Army, culminating in his appointment as Supreme Commander in World War II and a military success that led to his election to the presidency in 1952, Eisenhower came to believe you shouldn’t fight wars unless you were fully committed to victory. Put another way, all or nothing.
Throughout the 1950s, the Cold War threatened to turn into a hot one. Both the United States and the Soviet Union had nuclear weapons pointed at each other. Smaller wars threatened to break out everywhere, such as over the Suez Canal, and any small war could ignite a larger one.
What Ike knew, thanks to the U-2 flights and other espionage, was that the Soviets were bluffers, too. They didn’t have nearly the nuclear weaponry or the delivery capacity they pretended to have. But they could still be formidable in a conventional war. Ike’s bluff, in a nutshell, was all or nothing. There would be no small wars. If the Soviets wanted a fight, they would have to face American nukes. Would Eisenhower really have done it? Nobody really knows, but most important, Nikita Khrushchev didn’t know, and as a result, Thomas argues, the 1950s, for all their tension, were a relatively peaceful time. “The United States was blessed to be led by a man who understood the nature of war better than anyone else, and who had the patience and wisdom, as well as the cunning and guile, to keep the peace” he writes.
Presidents after Eisenhower, beginning with John F. Kennedy, have committed American troops to smaller wars, such as in Vietnam and Afghanistan, without being fully committed to victory. The consequences have not been pretty.
Thomas suggests that Ike bluffed not just the Soviets but the American people, as well. He pretended in public to be a low-key, slightly confused old man who would rather play golf than focus on the nation’s business. In truth the golf was a means of relieving the tension from his intense attention to affairs of state. Even today some historians still fall for the bluff and underestimate Eisenhower’s presidency, says Thomas.
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Secret Battle to Save the World.”Having spent a career in the U.S. Army, culminating in his appointment as Supreme Commander in World War II and a military success that led to his election to the presidency in 1952, Eisenhower came to believe you shouldn’t fight wars unless you were fully committed to victory. Put another way, all or nothing.
Throughout the 1950s, the Cold War threatened to turn into a hot one. Both the United States and the Soviet Union had nuclear weapons pointed at each other. Smaller wars threatened to break out everywhere, such as over the Suez Canal, and any small war could ignite a larger one.
What Ike knew, thanks to the U-2 flights and other espionage, was that the Soviets were bluffers, too. They didn’t have nearly the nuclear weaponry or the delivery capacity they pretended to have. But they could still be formidable in a conventional war. Ike’s bluff, in a nutshell, was all or nothing. There would be no small wars. If the Soviets wanted a fight, they would have to face American nukes. Would Eisenhower really have done it? Nobody really knows, but most important, Nikita Khrushchev didn’t know, and as a result, Thomas argues, the 1950s, for all their tension, were a relatively peaceful time. “The United States was blessed to be led by a man who understood the nature of war better than anyone else, and who had the patience and wisdom, as well as the cunning and guile, to keep the peace” he writes.
Presidents after Eisenhower, beginning with John F. Kennedy, have committed American troops to smaller wars, such as in Vietnam and Afghanistan, without being fully committed to victory. The consequences have not been pretty.
Thomas suggests that Ike bluffed not just the Soviets but the American people, as well. He pretended in public to be a low-key, slightly confused old man who would rather play golf than focus on the nation’s business. In truth the golf was a means of relieving the tension from his intense attention to affairs of state. Even today some historians still fall for the bluff and underestimate Eisenhower’s presidency, says Thomas.
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LibraryThing member DanJlaf
A more indepth book about the Time during Korean war where IKE contemplated and via background moves bluffed (or not) that If NK and USSR/Red China didn't end the korean war He would expand it into Red China with Nuclear bombs on China A interesting look back at how before Cuban Missile crisis we
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could have Gone Nuclea Show Less
Language
Original publication date
2012
Physical description
496 p.
ISBN
0316091049 / 9780316091046