Most Popular Books by John S. D. Eisenhower

The Mexican-American War of the 1840s, precipitated by border disputes and the U.S. annexation of Texas, ended with the military occupation of Mexico City by General Winfield Scott. In the subsequent treaty, the United States gained territory that would become California, Nevada, New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, and parts of Wyoming and Colorado. In this highly readable account, John S. D. Eisenhower provides a comprehensive survey of this frequently overlooked war. NOTE: This edition does not include photographs.

A profile of the twelfth president traces his rise in the military and successes in the Mexican War to his election as the first president without a prior political office, in an account that also offers insight into Taylor''s views on slavery and his sudden death.

Which generals were most influential in World War II? Did Winston Churchill really see himself as culturally "half American"? What really caused the break between Harry S. Truman and Dwight Eisenhower? In Soldiers and Statesmen, John S. D. Eisenhower answers these questions and more, offering his personal reflections on great leaders of our time. The son of President Dwight D. Eisenhower, John S. D. Eisenhower possesses an expert perspective on prominent political and military leaders, giving readers a matchless view on relationships between powerful figures and the president. Eisenhower also had a long military career, coincidentally beginning with his graduation from West Point on D-Day. His unique position as a young Army staff officer and close relationship with his father gave him insider''s access to leaders such as Winston Churchill, Harry Truman, George Patton, Douglas MacArthur, Omar Bradley, John Foster Dulles, Mark Clark, Terry Allen, and Matthew Ridgway. He combines personal insight with the specialized knowledge of a veteran soldier and accomplished historian to communicate exclusive perspectives on U. S. foreign relations and leadership. Eisenhower''s observations of various wartime leaders began in June 1944, just after the Allied landings in Normandy. On orders from General George C. Marshall, Army chief of staff, Eisenhower sailed from New York aboard the British-liner-turned-American-troopship Queen Maryto join his father, Supreme Commander of the Allied Expeditionary Force, in London, where he stayed for over two weeks. A year later, at the end of the war, Eisenhower accompanied his father as a temporary aide on trips where Ike''s former associates were present. In the mid-1950s, Eisenhower''s perspective was broadened by his service in a room next to the White House Oval Office during his father''s tenure as president. On the light side, Eisenhower has added a special appendix called "Home Movies," in which he reveals amusing and often irreverent vignettes from his life in military service. Eisenhower gives readers both a taste of history from the inside and a rich and relatable memoir filled with compelling remembrances.

The hero of the War of 1812, the conqueror of Mexico City in the Mexican-American War, and Abraham Lincoln’s top soldier during the first six months of the Civil War, General Winfield Scott was a seminal force in the early expansion and consolidation of the American republic. John S. D. Eisenhower explores how Scott, who served under fourteen presidents, played a leading role in the development of the United States Army from a tiny, loosely organized, politics-dominated establishment to a disciplined professional force capable of effective and sustained campaigning.

It was the greatest single battle the U.S. Army ever fought. More than a million GIs were involved and nearly 80,000 became casualties. The Allied generals had to rally beaten, dispirited troops in the face of an attack they had never dreamed possible.A study in command, from generals to squad leaders, The Bitter Woods follows von Runstedt, Dietrich, and of course Hitler, as closely as the Americans. As son of the supreme commander Dwight D. Eisenhower, a West Point graduate, a retired Army brigadier general, and a military historian, John Eisenhower is uniquely qualified to tell how the Allied generals (nearly all of whom he knew personally) met Hitler''s challenge; how the two armies fought fiercely in the Ardennes from December 1944 to January 1945; and how the Allied victory broke the back of Nazi aggression.

Eisenhower''s reflections on his youth as an Army brat and military and political careers are combined with his impressions of his father and the international figures he has encountered.

Recounts President Woodrow Wilson''s abortive efforts to preserve democracy in Mexico amid political chaos.

Italy, from the toe to the Alps, was the scene of the longest, bloodiest, most frustrating, and least understood series of battles fought by the Western Allies during World War II. Now, John S. D. Eisenhower offers a new look at the Italian campaign, emphasizing the Anzio offensive—an operation pushed by Winston Churchill that fell largely to American troops to carry out. It was visualized as an amphibious landing of two Allied divisions behind German lines that would force the Wehrmacht to evacuate all of Italy. But the Germans held on and, with the arrival of reinforcements, nearly wiped out the Allied troops pinned down at Anzio Beach. By portraying that struggle from the perspectives of both commanders and foot soldiers, this prominent military historian focuses on the experiences of the individuals who fought in the Italian campaign to reveal what the battle at Anzio was all about. But more than the account of one operation, They Fought at Anzio covers the entire Italian campaign, from the landings at Salerno to the capture of Rome. Eisenhower brings a trained eye to reconstructing the difficult terrain of battle, approaching the Anzio campaign as a contest between opposing commands striving to anticipate and counter the opponent’s moves—not as a field exercise but as a deadly struggle for survival. He analyzes the command decisions that brought about the Anzio stalemate, interspersing his account with personal experiences of the men in the trenches, the nurses of the 56th Evacuation Hospital, and the young officers witnessing the horrors of war for the first time. As a study in command, Eisenhower’s narrative gives new credit to generals Lucian Truscott and Fred Walker and assesses both the strengths and weaknesses of General Mark Clark, allowing us to grasp the situation as it appeared to those in command. He also offers compelling portraits of German commanders Field Marshal Albert Kesselring and General Frido von Senger und Etterlin. It has been said that Anzio was a soldier’s battle, remembered more for blood shed than for military objectives achieved. By focusing on the experiences of the soldiers who fought there and the decisions of commanders in perilous circumstances, They Fought at Anzio offers a new appreciation of the contributions of both and a new understanding of this unheralded theater of the war.

Theodore Roosevelt was a man of wide interests, strong opinions, and intense ambition for both himself and his country. When he met Leonard Wood in 1897, he recognized a kindred spirit. Moreover, the two men shared a zeal for making the United States an imperial power that would challenge Great Britain as world leader. For the remainder of their lives, their careers would intertwine in ways that shaped the American nation. When the Spanish American War came, both men seized the opportunity to promote the goals of American empire. Roosevelt resigned as assistant secretary of the navy in William McKinley’s administration to serve as a lieutenant colonel of the Rough Riders, a newly organized volunteer cavalry. Wood, then a captain in the medical corps and physician to McKinley, was promoted to colonel and given charge of the unit. Roosevelt later took over command of the Rough Riders. In the Battle of San Juan Hill, he led it in a charge up Kettle Hill that would end in victory for the American troops and make their daring commander a household name, a war hero, and, eventually, president of the United States. At the Treaty of Paris in 1898, Spain ceded Cuba, Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippines to the United States. The next year, Wood became military governor of Cuba. He remained in the post until 1902. By that time Roosevelt was president. One of the major accomplishments of his administration was reorganization of the War Department, which the war with Spain had proved disastrously outdated. In 1909, when William Howard Taft needed a strong army chief of staff to enforce the new rules, he appointed Leonard Wood. Both Wood and Roosevelt were strong proponents of preparedness, and when war broke out in Europe in August 1914, Wood, retired as chief of staff and backed by Roosevelt, established the “Plattsburg camps,” a system of basic training camps. When America entered the Great War, the two men’s foresight was justified, but their earlier push for mobilization had angered Woodrow Wilson, and both were denied the command positions they sought in Europe. Roosevelt died in 1919 while preparing for another presidential campaign. Wood made a run in his place but was never taken seriously as a candidate. He retired from the army and spent the last seven years of his life as civilian governor of the Philippines. It was a quiet end for two men who had been giants of their time. While their modernization of the army is widely admired, they were not without their critics. Roosevelt and Wood saw themselves as bold leaders but were regarded by some as ruthless strivers. And while their shared ambitions for the United States were tempered by a strong sense of duty, they could, in their certainty and determination, trample those who stood in their path. Teddy Roosevelt and Leonard Wood: Partners in Command is a revealing and long overdue look at the dynamic partnership of this fascinating pair and will be welcomed by scholars and military history enthusiasts alike.

Table of contents

La originalidad de esta obra radica en resaltar con buen estilo literario la estrategia militar y, sin dejar de mencionar la situaci n mexicana, las desavenencias que se dieron entre los dirigentes norteamericanos que organizaron la invasi n. la actitud de Eisenhower al narrar los hechos es de imparcialidad.

From the Publisher: Fought far from home, World War I was nonetheless a stirring American adventure. The achievements of the United States during that war, often underrated by military historians, were in fact remarkable, and they turned the tide of the conflict. So says John S.D. Eisenhower, one of today''s most acclaimed military historians, in his sweeping history of the Great War and the men who won it: the Yanks of the American Expeditionary Force. Their men dying in droves on the stalemated Western Front, British and French generals complained that America was giving too little, too late. John Eisenhower shows why they were wrong. The European Allies wished to plug the much-needed U.S. troops into their armies in order to fill the gaps in the line. But General John J. "Black Jack" Pershing, the indomitable commander of the AEF, determined that its troops would fight together, as a whole, in a truly American army. Only this force, he argued-not bolstered French or British units-could convince Germany that it was hopeless to fight on. Pershing''s often-criticized decision led to the beginning of the end of World War I-and the beginning of the U.S. Army as it is known today. The United States started the war with 200,000 troops, including the National Guard as well as regulars. They were men principally trained to fight Indians and Mexicans. Just nineteen months later the Army had mobilized, trained, and equipped four million men and shipped two million of them to France. It was the greatest mobilization of military forces the New World had yet seen. For the men it was a baptism of fire. Throughout Yanks Eisenhower focuses on the small but expert cadre of officers who directed our effort: not only Pershing, but also the men who would win their lasting fame in a later war-MacArthur, Patton, and Marshall. But the author has mined diaries, memoirs, and after-action reports to resurrect as well the doughboys in the trenches, the unknown soldiers who made every advance possible and suffered most for every defeat. He brings vividly to life those men who achieved prominence as the AEF and its allies drove the Germans back into their homeland-the irreverent diarist Maury Maverick, Charles W. Whittlesey and his famous "lost battalion," the colorful Colonel Ulysses Grant McAlexander, and Sergeant Alvin C. York, who became an instant celebrity by singlehandedly taking 132 Germans as prisoners. From outposts in dusty, inglorious American backwaters to the final bloody drive across Europe, Yanks illuminates America''s Great War as though for the first time. In the AEF, General John J. Pershing created the Army that would make ours the American age; in Yanks that Army has at last found a storyteller worthy of its deeds.

Anecdotes and personal recollections of Dwight Eisenhower''s military career and Presidency; Korea; inauguration, 1953; development of military weapons; Geneva Conference.

father''s decision-making process; relationships with, performances of Bedell Smith, George Catlett Marshall, John Foster Dulles, Arthur Radford, Matthew Ridgway, Omar Bradley, Charlie Wilson, John O''Daniel, Al Gruenther, Allen Dulles; Eisenhower''s problems with appointments; views on nuclear weaponry; Potsdam Conference, 1945; tactical problems with Dien Bien Phu; formation of South East Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO); U2 incident.

A.L.S. (1952 Oct. 4, Korea) to Frank Beebe, and 3 signed photographs of Dwight D. Eisenhower, Mamie Eisenhower, and John Eisenhower.

This is a multivolume encyclopedic resource, both for the general reader and specialist, on the central conflict of the 20th century, covering the entire scope of the Second World War from its earliest roots to its continuing impact on global politics and human society.

Writes about being a son of a president and his own interest in writing.