On the
complicated relationship between wartime and national leadership.
The 44 U.S.
presidents to date have shared one obvious trait (their
gender); now that race can no longer be identified as a second (if it even
could have been prior to 2008), one of the other most common
characteristics of our chief executives has been a military background, and
more exactly a prominent history of military leadership. From George
Washington to Andrew
Jackson and Zachary
Taylor, Ulysses S. Grant
to Teddy
Roosevelt, virtually every significant American military conflict has
produced at least one future president from its ranks of leaders. The link
makes sense, both broadly (because of the leg up that any form of prior
prominence can provide a candidate) and specifically (because of the veneration
with which we generally treat our military heroes). But it also raises the complex
question of whether military leadership can or should be correlated with
national leadership.
If we examine
the case of the most recent military leader to be elected president, Dwight
D. Eisenhower, there are good arguments on either side of that debate (George H.W. Bush was also
a prominent World War II veteran, but as a naval aviator, not a general or
other leader). On the one hand, Eisenhower’s experience as the Supreme Commander
of the Allied Expeditionary Forces, and specifically his leadership role in
planning
and executing the D-Day Invasion, undoubtedly prepared him for many of the
most significant elements to the presidency: not only strategic thinking and decision
making, but also overseeing a huge and multi-layered organization, delegating
to and trusting his team, and many other shared features of the two jobs. But
on the other hand, political affiliations and oppositions are far different from
and murkier than those in wartime, and military leadership in no necessary way
prepares a person for engaging with (much less leading in response to) those
issues; a fact concisely illustrated by Eisenhower’s
unwillingness to publicly critique Senator Joseph McCarthy (despite private
opposition to his efforts) either during or after the 1952 presidential
campaign.
Yet there’s one
more layer to what Eisenhower helps us see about these different roles and
identities: his famous farewell
address, during which he critiqued the evolving military-industrial
complex in strikingly
overt terms. It’s fair to say that any president brings his or her past
experiences to the job, and that in the best case those experiences inform the
administration’s leadership in significant and potent ways. Moreover, the
public perception of those experiences, particularly if they are as valorized
as military heroism, can greatly influence how controversial presidential
actions or perspectives are viewed and responded to. Which is to say, whether or
not Eisenhower’s views on the dangers posed by the military-industrial complex
were a product of his own wartime experiences (and it seems likely that they
were, at least in part), his prior military stature afforded him the
opportunity to make those statements, and more exactly to be perceived by a
broad audience as someone worth listening to on those complicated and crucial
issues. I believe the speech was one of Eisenhower’s most heroic moments, but
it was also deeply tied to his other ones.
Next D-Day story
tomorrow,
Ben
PS. What do you
think? Other D-Day stories you’d highlight or share?
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