Dwight David Eisenhower (1890–1969,) nicknamed Ike, was an American military general and political leader. He served as the Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces in Europe during World War II 1943–45 and as the 34th president of the U.S. 1953–61. His standing rests just as much on his achievements as a military leader as on his successes as president.
Born in Denison, Texas, Eisenhower attended the United States Military Academy (West Point) and had a thriving career in the U.S. Army. His strategic decisions and political acumen played a pivotal role in the conclusion in World War II. He directed the Allied invasion of German-occupied France on “D-Day,” June 6, 1944. The successful landings in Normandy were the start of the final campaign of World War II.
After the war, Eisenhower became the first Supreme Allied Commander, Europe, and led the military arm of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO.) His immense popularity as the most successful military general won him a landslide victory as president in 1952, and got him reelected in 1956; he defeated Democratic-party candidate Adlai Stevenson in both those presidential elections.
As president, Eisenhower presided over eight years of peace and prosperity. He adopted a hard line toward communism in both his domestic and foreign policy, brokered the peace agreement to end the Korean War, and established the Interstate Highway System.
More: Wikipedia • READ: Works by Dwight D. Eisenhower
Some people wanted champagne and caviar when they should have had beer and hot dogs.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
Topics: Desire, Desires
If you want total security, go to prison. There you’re fed, clothed, given medical care and so on. The only thing lacking … is freedom.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
Topics: Perspective, Security, Safety
This is what I found out about religion: It gives you courage to make the decisions you must make in a crisis, and then the confidence to leave the result to a higher Power. Only by trust in God can a man carrying responsibility find repose.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
Topics: Religion, Prayer
Biggest damfool mistake I ever made.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
Men of widely divergent views in our own country live in peace together because they share certain common aspirations which are more important than their differences…. The common responsibility of all Americans is to become effective, helpful participants in a way of life that blends and harmonizes the fiercely competitive demands of the individual and society.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
Topics: Quality, America
Oh, that lovely title, ex-president.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
Topics: Presidency
I say when you get into a war, you should win as quick as you can, because your losses become a function of the duration of the war. I believe when you get in a war, get everything you need and win it.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
When shallow critics denounce the profit motive inherent in our system of private enterprise, they ignore the fact that it is an economic support of every human right we possess, and that without it, all rights would soon disappear.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
Topics: Profit, Criticism
With a full century of contrary proof in our possession and despite our demonstrated capacity for cooperative teamwork, some among us seem to accept the shibboleth of an unbridgeable gap between those who hire and those who are employed. We miserably fail to challenge the lie that what is good for management is necessarily bad for labor; that for one side to profit, the other must be depressed. Such distorted doctrine is false and foreign to the American scene where common ideals and purpose permit us a common approach toward the common good.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
How has retirement affected my golf game? A lot more people beat me now
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
Topics: Golf
I don’t think the United States needs superpatriots. We need patriotism, honestly practiced by all of us, and we don’t need these people that are more patriotic than you or anyone else.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
Topics: America
Here in America we are descended in blood and in spirit from revolutionists and rebels—men and women who dare to dissent from accepted doctrine. As their heirs, may we never confuse honest dissent with disloyal subversion.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
Topics: America
A sense of humor is part of the art of leadership, of getting along with people, of getting things done.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
Topics: Humor
Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children… This is not a way of life at all, in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
Topics: Consequences, Peace, War
The world moves, and ideas that were once good are not always good.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
Topics: Ideas, World, Change
An intellectual is a man who takes more words than necessary to tell more than he knows.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
Topics: Intelligence, Words, Intellectuals
Peace and justice are two sides of the same coin.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
Topics: Peace
I would rather have a lucky general than a smart general in any battle. They win battles and they make me lucky.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
Topics: Fortune, Luck
The older I get the more wisdom I find in the ancient rule of taking first things first. A process which often reduces the most complex human problem to a manageable proportion.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
Plans are worthless, but planning is everything.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
There is, in world affairs, a steady course to be followed between an assertion of strength that is truculent and a confession of helplessness that is cowardly.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
Topics: Diplomacy
I believe that for the past twenty years there has been a creeping socialism spreading in the United States.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
I never saw a pessimistic general win a battle.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
Topics: Attitude
The people of the world genuinely want peace. Some day the leaders of the world are going to have to give in and give, it to them.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
Topics: World
Only strength can cooperate. Weakness can only beg.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
Topics: Cooperation, Help, One liners, Weakness
Things are more like they are now than they have ever been before.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
Topics: Truth
There is no such thing as human superiority.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
If all that Americans want is security, they can go to prison. Theyll have enough to eat, a bed and a roof over their heads. But if an American wants to preserve his dignity and his equality as a human being, he must not bow his neck to any dictatorial government.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
Topics: Equality
I’m saving that rocker for the day when I feel as old as I really am.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
Topics: Aging, Age
Only Americans can hurt America.
—Dwight D. Eisenhower
Topics: America
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