<--PREV Doc #549  |  Memorial Commission Home Page  |  Second Term Table of Contents  |  Presidential Papers Home Page  |  Doc#  |  NEXT--> Doc #551 Document #550; January 25, 1958 To hastings Lionel Ismay Series: EM, AWF, Name Series ; Category: Personal The Papers of Dwight David Eisenhower, Volume XVIII - The Presidency: Keeping the Peace Part III: The Space Age Begins; October 1957 to January 1958 Chapter 7: NATO and the Cold War   Dear Pug: I was indeed pleased to receive your note, written from the Barbados. And I was keenly interested in some of the news you were able to give me and in the explanation of the circumstances surrounding the writing of Brookie's book.1 Of course whatever Brookie could possibly have said about his other war associates is not so important as what he says about his own wartime Chief.2 All of us got impatient, at times, with some of the mannerisms, the idiosyncrasies and even the demands of Winston. But I had supposed that all of us felt that these were of no consequence as compared to his great contributions to the war effort and, for myself, I never lost an unbounded admiration and personal liking for him. I could not imagine myself as being guilty of writing anything, ten years after the war was over, that could be construed as disparaging the accomplishments of the wartime Prime Minister. With regard to the book itself: For some years my reading time has been severely limited. So when I pick up a volume that seems to me to be unbalanced or to reflect prejudice and, as you suggest, mental and physical fatigue, I simply ignore the book and go on to something else.3 As you know, I developed, during the course of the war, quite a liking for Brookie. I tried to work with him cooperatively, and was delighted when, on March 24, 1945, as we just succeeded in forcing our "power" crossing of the Rhine, he came to me and said in effect, "Thank God you stuck to your plan. I was wrong and I cannot tell you how happy I am that you had the faith and persistence to see it through."4 At that moment it was no longer merely a question of liking him; I now felt that he had become a really big man. I prefer to think of him as he was on that morning, as he and Winston and I were watching what we clearly saw as the end of the Hitler regime, than to think of him as an embittered individual who has allowed himself to be used for belittling others and himself to appear to be something less than generous. It is really wonderful that you are coming along so well, and I know how much you and Kathleen5 must be enjoying the rest and recreation you are getting. Incidentally, if I knew the identity of "one of your trusted NATO staff" I would thank him for the compliment he paid me in his letter to you, which you relayed to me. It gave me a lift.6 With warm regard, As ever 1 Ismay, who had retired as NATO Secretary General in May 1957 (see Galambos and van Ee, The Middle Way, no. 271, and New York Times, May 17, 1957), had written (n.d., AWF/N) to thank the President belatedly for his Christmas card. He had reported on his own health; on his recent meeting with Churchill ("deaf now, and rather frail; but the indomitable will power and profound wisdom are still there"); and the beginning of work on his memoirs. "Brookie" was Alan Francis Brooke, First Viscount, Baron Alanbrooke of Brookeborough, British field marshal and chief of the Imperial General Staff during World War II (see Chandler, War Years, no. 2397). Ismay had commented on Sir Arthur Bryant's The Turn of the Tide: A History of the War Years Based on the Diaries of Field-Marshal Lord Alanbrooke, Chief of the Imperial General Staff (London, 1957). Calling the book "little short of tragedy," Ismay had wondered "How Brookie could have been so sick as to hand over his diaries--written late at night when he was exhausted, depressed, and self pitying--defeats me! If I had indulged in committing my nocturnal thoughts to paper," he added, "I would have quite often written most scurrilous things about our beloved Chief--and been sorry and ashamed of myself next morning. Brookie himself realizes his error, and is I think very sad about it. So I hope that the Second Volume will be less of a travesty." 2 Alanbrooke had called Churchill "a wonderful character, the most marvellous qualities and superhuman genius mixed with an astonishing lack of vision at times, and an impetuosity which, if not guided, must inevitably bring him into trouble again and again." Churchill's "most remarkable failing" was his inability to "see a whole strategical problem at once. His gaze always settles on some definite part of the canvas and the rest of the picture is lost." Summing up, Alanbrooke said that Churchill was "quite the most difficult man to work with that I have ever struck, but I would not have missed the chance of working with him for anything on earth" (Bryant, Turn of the Tide, p. 723). Alanbrooke was equally hard on Eisenhower. "It must be remembered that Eisenhower had never even commanded a battalion in action when he found himself commanding a group of Armies in North Africa," Alanbrooke said. "No wonder he was at a loss as to what to do, and allowed himself to be absorbed in the political situation at the expense of the tactical. I had little confidence in his having the ability to handle the military situation confronting him, and he caused me great anxiety. . . . He learnt a lot during the war, but tactics, strategy and command were never his strong points" (pp. 527 - 28). See also New York Times, February 17, May 19, 21, 1957. 3 See also no. 933. 4 Eisenhower recalled this episode in Crusade in Europe (p. 372). Alanbrooke would later dispute Eisenhower's version of events in the second volume of his memoirs. "To the best of my memory," Alanbrooke would write, "I congratulated him heartily on his success and said that, as matters had turned out, his policy was now the correct one; that, with the German in his defeated condition, no dangers now existed in a dispersal of effort. I am quite certain that I never said to him, 'You were completely right,' as I am still convinced that he was completely wrong'" (Arthur Bryant, Triumph in the West: A History of the War Years Based on the Diaries of Field-Marshal Lord Alanbrooke, Chief of the Imperial General Staff [Garden City, N.Y., 1959], pp. 332 - 33). 5 Ismay's wife was the former Laura Kathleen Clegg. 6 Ismay had added as a postscript: "I have just this moment received a letter from one of my most trusted NATO Staff of which the following is an extract about the Council Meeting: 'President Ike was very inspiring and did a magnificent job.' I knew you would." On the NATO meeting see no. 493. Bibliographic reference to this document: Eisenhower, Dwight D. Personal To hastings Lionel Ismay, 25 January 1958. In The Papers of Dwight David Eisenhower, ed. L. Galambos and D. van Ee, doc. 550. World Wide Web facsimile by The Dwight D. Eisenhower Memorial Commission of the print edition; Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996, http://www.eisenhowermemorial.org/presidential-papers/second-term/documents/550.cfm <--PREV Doc #549  |  Memorial Commission Home Page  |  Second Term Table of Contents  |  Presidential Papers Home Page  |  Doc#  |  NEXT--> Doc #551

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