Eisenhower in War and Peace by Jean Edward SmithMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
This is where my presidential biography journey will end. It is a fitting one, since this is a president I knew little to nothing about.
It is refreshing to have a biographer who is straightforward about when the subject was in the wrong. All too often I feel like they make excuses for the person they are writing about.
Interesting how, having experienced war as a general, Eisenhower was dead against starting new wars, entering Indochina, using the atomic bomb with china and Vietnam (as he was advised to do), because he was against these. But then let himself get manipulated into subverting democracy and have the CIA carry out coups in Iran and Guatemala.
I feel like the second presidential term and later years were rushed through, with little to no detail.
But all in all a great biography of a very interesting man, going through a pivotal time in United States history. Between the Korean war, desegregation, the cold war, in addition to Eisenhower's accomplishments during WWII, a lot of ground is covered here.
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