Liking Ike.

• Author: Chollet, Derek
• Position: Reviews & Essays

William I. Hitchcock, The Age of Eisenhower: America and the World in the 1950s (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2018), 672 pp., $35.00.

Last October, nearly two decades after Congress ordered work to begin, construction finally got underway on a $150 million memorial located just off the National Mall in Washington, DC to honor Dwight D. Eisenhower.

Developed by the renowned architect Frank Gehry, the monument had been the subject of a protracted battle--one that lasted far longer than the thirty-fourth president's two terms in office. Critics worried about its cost and size, traditionalists scoffed at its unorthodox design and Eisenhower's descendants claimed it was too modest, failing to evoke the glories of Ike's military and political career.

In the end, the site--which will be known as "Eisenhower Park," marked by a steel tapestry with eight-story-high columns spread over a four-acre public space--reflects a compromise among the different ways we remember Eisenhower: the everyman from Kansas and the commanding general who liberated Europe; the reluctant, neophyte politician who was beloved by the public, modernized campaigning and tried to remake the Republican Party; and a presidency that evokes a simpler time, yet charted America's global dominance and presided over the rise of the national-security state.

Such controversy over how Eisenhower should be memorialized is not surprising, because his legacy has never been a simple one. Ike's political opponents on the fight and left initially defined him as an amiable old duffer who could never quite rekindle his World War II heroism. This popular perception prevailed for several decades. Yet since the 1980s, when the Eisenhower archives started opening up, a revisionist interpretation gained momentum. Scholars suddenly heralded Ike's "hidden hand" approach, marked by deceptively sophisticated thinking and disciplined decisionmaking.

Today, Eisenhower is considered one of the all-time greats. In a 1962 poll asking historians to list the finest presidents, Ike placed twenty-second. In 2018, he ranked seventh. Part of this popular rise can be attributed to the rise of an Eisenhower canon from scholars such as John Lewis Gaddis, Richard Immerman and David Nichols, who have scoured the archives to praise Eisenhower's strategic acumen; from journalists Jim Newton, Evan Thomas and Bret Baier, who have written fast-paced histories of Ike's presidency; and from personal reminiscences from writers like Ike's grandson, David.

This spasm of admiration for Eisenhower also reveals something about our contemporary political culture, helping to explain the resurgence of scholarship and why the controversy over the memorial in Washington proved so intense. There is nostalgia for the seeming simplicity and tranquility of the Eisenhower years, although even a cursory study of them offers a reminder of how turbulent they actually were. But more significantly, there is great admiration for Eisenhower's leadership style of careful discipline and hard-headed pragmatism, and a longing for a commander in chief with such a strong vision, dignity and fundamental decency. Simply put, there are not many leaders in Washington right now who are like Ike.

When reflecting on what's roiling America today, the Eisenhower era seems especially relevant. It is impossible to revisit this history and not hear the echoes. Because whether it is the buckling of America's system of global alliances and partnerships, the triumph of "America First," the questioning of science and devaluing of expertise, or the coarsening of America's political discourse and promotion of dark conspiracies about enemies lurking within, we are witnessing a full-frontal assault on the very country that Eisenhower helped create.

William Hitchcock's...