American Leaders Could Learn Much from Its Past Presidents

US President, Dwight David Eisenhower

Fifty five years ago this month, one of Americas greatest Generals and the previous leader of the Allied Armies in Europe of World War II, Dwight David Eisenhower, gave one of his most famous and preeminent speeches. This was a speech to the American Society of Newspaper Editors as he was also running for the office of the President of the United States. What is so ironic and amazing is that the basis of that speech, coming from a man that had been ultimately responsible for sending thousands of young men and women to their deaths, is the level of common sense and compassion expressed in his understanding of the needs of all Americans, regardless of their past fears of the world around them.

After managing the largest combined armed force in the history of the world, this man was now running for the office of the worlds most powerful leader. In this speech, he was essentially promoting what his previous civilian leader, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt had said at the beginning of the world war.

After the bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1941, FDR made his famous speech to the American people saying that; "All we have to fear, is fear its self." Now at this point, in 1953, all of America was again in fear of an eminent atomic war with the Soviet Union. Eisenhower was trying to tell the people that yes, a good defense for the country was indeed prudent. However, more important was that America should set the standard for all nations and should focus on going forward, away from perpetual fear and concern. All Americans should concentrate on their families, their communities and improving the world around them. Here he was, one of the most successful war-time military Generals in the history of war, that had also become one of the most trusted men on earth.

This man could easily have taken his past position of authority over the military (as has been done in the US over the past eight years) to promote the attitude that all of America should continue to be in fear. He could have easily told the people to focus that fear on their enemies, to the exclusion of everything else around them. Instead, Eisenhower's speech told the people to turn in the other direction, away from conflict and war and to focus their efforts on pursuing peace and on rebuilding their country and their attitudes toward the infrastructure of their lives and their families.

This great military leader was telling the American people to stop focusing on the building of the machines of war, but to set a balance of building a strong military and national defense while taking care to support the pursuit of world peace. Along with this endeavor, he encouraged all of America to continue rebuilding and expanding the nation's infrastructure while warning the citizens to always keep a watchful eye on the rise of the American military industrial complex.

Unfortunately, as we have experienced before and as what usually happens, human nature seldom learns much from its past or listens to those that have learned from the past.

To demonstrate what Dwight Eisenhower was trying to communicate to America, here is an excerpt from this 1953 speech titled;

A Chance for Peace.

"The way chosen by the United States was plainly marked by a few clear precepts, which govern its conduct in world affairs.

First: No people on earth can be held, as a people, to be enemy, for all humanity shares the common hunger for peace and fellowship and justice.

Second: No nation's security and well-being can be lastingly achieved in isolation but only in effective cooperation with fellow-nations.

Third: Any nation's right to form of government and an economic system of its own choosing is inalienable.

Fourth: Any nation's attempt to dictate to other nations their form of government is indefensible.

And fifth: A nation's hope of lasting peace cannot be firmly based upon any race in armaments but rather upon just relations and honest understanding with all other nations.

In the light of these principles the citizens of the United States defined the way they proposed to follow, through the aftermath of war, toward true peace. "

In order to demonstrate his attitude toward focusing Americans away from war and conflict, Eisenhower offered the following:

"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.

The cost of one modern heavy bomber is this:

>>>A modern brick school in more than 30 cities.

>>>It is two electric power plants, each serving a town of 60,000 population.

>>>It is two fine, fully equipped hospitals.

>>>It is some 50 miles of concrete highway.

>>>We pay for a single fighter with a half million bushels of wheat.

>>>We pay for a single destroyer with new homes that could have housed more than 8,000 people.

This, I repeat, is the best way of life to be found on the road the world has been taking.

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. These plain and cruel truths define the peril and point to the hope that comes with this spring of 1953.

This is one of those times in the affairs of nations when the gravest choices must be made, if there is to be a turning toward a just and lasting peace. It is a moment that calls upon the governments of the world to speak their intentions with simplicity and with honesty. It calls upon them to answer the questions that stirs the hearts of all sane men: is there no other way the world may live?"

It is so ironic that a similar speech could be written today about what is needed to bring this country back to the greatness it once was. It is also ironic that the man speaking these words was once the most feared military genius by his enemies and that he later became a very successful peace-time / cold war US President.

During Dwight Eisenhower's two terms in office, the middle class citizens of the United States made significant contributions to what he envisioned in 1953. No Republican President since has come close to the contributions made by this man of a World War, a Cold War and a subsequent significant time of peace.

If only we would learn from men like Dwight David Eisenhower.